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Dowdy Jill Biden Graces Cover Of Vogue, Supermodel Melania Trump Shunned

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ANALYSIS – Totally tone deaf. Just a little reminder of how ridiculously biased, partisan and idiotic our mainstream media has become, including the fluffy fashion forums.

First Lady Jill Biden, the incredibly unstylish, power-hungry, social climbing, faux intellectual with an unserious Doctor of Education (EdD), has again graced the cover of Vogue magazine.

This, her third time, right before the upcoming election. (RELATED: Poor Sign Placement Haunts Jill Biden At Hunter High School)

The New York Post noted how remarkably out of touch the Biden White House is:

After Biden’s horrific debate performance on Thursday, much of the media world reluctantly conceded that our 46th president looks like a lost toddler.

And then there’s Vogue — which literally couldn’t stop the presses. The fashion-bible-turned-Dem-PR-machine was already rolling out its July issue, with cover model Jill Biden in a silk cream Ralph Lauren dress that retails for $4,990.

Office of the President of the United States, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The magazine landed on the internet Monday morning with a resounding, wincing thud.

It was tone deaf. It was tacky — but this shoot and interview, conducted months ago, would have been messy even if the debate disaster had never happened.

Fox News host Jimmy Failla on X had this to say about the horrible caregiver of the elderly and frail Joe Biden:

Melania Trump is an actual super model who speaks 5 languages but she’s NEVER been on the cover of Vogue. Jill Biden commits vicious elder abuse on the world stage and now has two Vogue covers to show for it. Congrats Jill, you’ll be great in “The Devil Wears Depends.”

Newsweek noted the backlash:

Former NBC senior executive Mike Sington said, “First Lady Jill Biden appears on the cover of Vogue magazine, which seems like a good time to remind you that Melania Trump never appeared on the cover of Vogue when she was First Lady.”

C.J. Pearson, a co-chair of the GOP Youth Advisory Council, said: “Outside of how tone deaf this following Joe Biden‘s disastrous debate performance, it is even more absurd that Jill Biden somehow graced the cover of Vogue and @MELANIATRUMP was never given the opportunity. Asinine even.”

Another user on X noted: “She will NEVER be Melania.”

Dr. Jill, as she insists on being called, first appeared on a Vogue cover in 2021 right after Joe Biden was inaugurated. She later appeared on the cover of the digital Winter 2023 issue. 

Meanwhile, Melania Trump, an actual former supermodel who speaks several languages, and was exemplary, and always stylish and immaculately attired, as first lady is still shunned by the fashion world.

Back in 2005, when she was getting married to The Donald, and well before Trump became president, Melania did get her own Vogue cover as Trump’s new bride. But oddly, she never again got a cover for Vogue or any other fashion, or mainstream magazine. (RELATED: Melania Trump Addresses Jan. 6 for First Time)

Newsweek noted the backlash:

Former NBC senior executive Mike Sington said, “First Lady Jill Biden appears on the cover of Vogue magazine, which seems like a good time to remind you that Melania Trump never appeared on the cover of Vogue when she was First Lady.”

C.J. Pearson, a co-chair of the GOP Youth Advisory Council, said: “Outside of how tone deaf this following Joe Biden‘s disastrous debate performance, it is even more absurd that Jill Biden somehow graced the cover of Vogue and @MELANIATRUMP was never given the opportunity. Asinine even.”

Another user on X noted: “She will NEVER be Melania.”

The fact that she never landed a Vogue cover in her White House years was such a point of consternation that the former First Lady Trump criticized Wintour, who also serves as Condé Nast’s chief content officer, for it during a 2022 Fox News interview.

WWD reported:

As Jill Biden‘s role in encouraging President Joe Biden to stay in the presidential race — despite his lackluster performance in Thursday night’s debate with Donald Trump — continues to be hashed over in the media and around the globe, Vogue debuted its August issue with the first lady on its cover.

In this already deeply divided country, the Condé Nast fashion magazine — intentionally or not — has ratcheted up the public dispute about Biden’s full-steam-ahead plans. As of Monday afternoon, Vogue‘s post of the first lady’s cover had 51,960 likes and 5,286 comments. The first lady donned an ivory Ralph Lauren Collection dress for the Norman Jean Roy-shot cover that accompanied Maya Singer’s interview.

Of course, Vogue’s editorial direction is strongly liberal. WWD added:

Requests for comment from Vogue’s global editorial director Anna Wintour and Singer through a Vogue spokesperson were declined. The company spokesperson said, “It’s no secret that Anna has been a supporter of Democratic campaigns for decades. Our August cover story is a look at the tremendous work Dr. Biden has done, and the most urgent issues in 2024 and beyond.”

Meanwhile, a parting comment: Newsmax’s Rob Schmitt wrote, “Nice puff piece on the most valueless person in America and her bid to keep her corpse-like husband into the White House to stay relevant.”

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Amanda Head: Tell Us What You Think – Coronation Edition

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There’s a new King of England.

Did you miss the coronation? Let Amanda spill all the juicy details!

Watch this special coronation edition of The Hollywood Conservative below:

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Amanda Head: Protect Our Kids!

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In the wake of the tragic Covenant Christian Elementary School shooting there has been a renewed push to employ school safety officers throughout the country…

What do you think?

Watch Amanda explain the controversy below:

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

FBI Has Been Weaponized Against Americans by Politicized DOJ: Former Asst. Director

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I, Aude, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

ANALYSIS – As I have repeatedly written about, here, here, and here, the politicization at the higher levels of the FBI, and to degree at DHS (Department of Homeland Security), and other federal law enforcement agencies, is one of the gravest threats facing our Republic and our Constitutional liberties today.

The danger is widespread and involves the Bureau straying well into illegal domestic spying and censorship.

The possible crimes go from FBI collusion with Big Tech (Twitter, Facebook, et al,) to censor Americans who may criticize certain government-approved narratives, to creating an entire army of analysts, and agents exclusively devoted to pursuing a vaguely defined, virtually nonexistent, ‘domestic terror’ threat.

The latter being an aggressive pursuit many see as a thinly veiled attempt to target, coerce and silence conservatives simply.

It also extends to ignoring widespread violence against pro-life churches and nonprofits to using heavy-handed storm trooper tactics against unarmed peaceful pro-life protesters.

Much has been recently uncovered about the FBI collusion with Twitter, thanks to Elon Musk and his Twitter files. 

And the Bureau’s heavy-handed and tone-deaf response blaming any criticism of the FBI as coming from ‘conspiracy theorists’ spreading ‘misinformation,’ made them appear even more obtuse, and dangerous.

Some, including me, have called for thorough house cleaning at the Bureau, especially at the top where much of the rot appears to be concentrated.

As I have always said, the vast majority of the employees, analysts and field agents at the FBI are honorable, decent, American patriots.

But the same can no longer be said for much of the current leadership.

At the root of the problem is the FBI steadily giving up its traditional independence within the Department of Justice (DOJ), which has basically taken over the Bureau.

One way to start cleaning house is to create an independent commission modeled after the, yes – sometimes overzealous, 1970s Senate ‘Church Committee’ that uncovered abuses at the CIA, NSA, and FBI, to investigate the FBI again, and impose significant reforms.

And now we have another senior FBI official, ex-FBI Assistant Director Chris Swecker, publicly saying the same thing.

The well-regarded Swecker retired as the assistant director for criminal investigations after 24 years at the FBI. 

Just the News reports that Swecker argues that the bureau’s problems start with the politicization of its ranks by the DOJ.

The news outlet adds:

“What I see is that it’s basically a wholesale takeover by the Department of Justice, which is filled with political appointees in every top position, and then by extension, right into the administration,” Swecker said in a wide-ranging interview on the John Solomon Reports podcast.

“You see DOJ people  and many of the top executive positions inside the FBI now — you see people that have made a career out of bouncing in and out of silk-stocking law firms between the Department of Justice and then these law firms. And I have to say they are incredibly liberal in their politics. And that has now sort of taken over the FBI, and they are inserting that ideology into their high-profile investigations.”

Just the News continues:

Swecker said the FBI’s involvement in labeling school parents “domestic terrorists,” and its “bare-knuckles” pursuit of Donald Trump contrasted with its “kid gloves cases” against Hillary Clinton, Andrew McCabe and Hunter Biden have not only shaken public trust but also the internal confidence of the FBI.

As the outlet noted, the FBI “has yielded the independence Congress gave it under the law and is now subservient to a group of liberal ideologues inside the Justice Department who have pressured agents to stray into unwarranted domestic spying and censorship.”

This is dangerously un-American and is one of the biggest threats to our Republic and our liberties. It’s time to really investigate and shake things up at the FBI.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Christianity is Dying in the West, and Islam May Be Taking Over the Rest

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Photo via Pixabay free images

ANALYSIS – While many of us recently celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ, also known as the ‘Prince of Peace,’ 2023 brings a year of danger and turmoil, with multiple regional flash points that could lead to a major war.

But longer term, another global danger is brewing, more slowly, but inexorably.

This danger is mostly political, ideological, and religious.

And while it may take a couple of more decades to come to pass, this steady shift will have profound historic repercussions and will change the world mostly for the worse.

I am talking about the steady death of Christianity in the U.S. and Europe, and the global growth and potential dominance of Islam in large parts of the world. 

And this future looks bleak.

Symbolically, as we just celebrated Christmas, let’s begin with the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. It is built above the site where Jesus was reportedly born on the West Bank of the Palestinian territories.

It still broadcasts beautiful Christmas Eve services worldwide on TV.

However, most who watched the service on TV aren’t aware that the Christian population of Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christianity, has been decimated under Muslim rule.

It has plummeted from 85% in 1947 to 15% today.

Christians worldwide aren’t faring too much better.

There are now 2.2 billion Christians in the world, at least nominally. But Islam has 1.97 billion followers, and rising. 

And Islam is growing in two ways – it is advancing by the sword and the cradle. 

Islamist extremist violence, terrorism, insurgency, and war, which in a major victory just recaptured Afghanistan, is spreading extremist Islam from the Middle East to Africa at a rapid pace.

Meanwhile, combined with the militant spread, a higher global Muslim fertility rate (2.9 children per woman, versus 2.6 for the rest of the world), means that by 2075, Islam will be the world’s dominant religion.

And where Islam is dominant as a religion it is also dominant politically and legally, as the Prophet Mohammed prescribed.

Of course, Islamist apologists, and Christian-hating leftists, will immediately denounce any criticism of Islam as racist or ‘Islamophobic.’ 

So let me quickly note that hundreds of thousands of Christian American soldiers have fought, and died, on multiple battlefields to defend Muslims, everywhere from Bosnia to Iraq and Syria to Afghanistan, and even Africa.

I personally served as a Marine Corps officer and military attache’ in Arab Muslim countries as well as in Bosnia where we were protecting Muslims.

I also spent many long days and nights during several months last year, remotely from Washington, DC trying to save hundreds, if not thousands of our Muslim brothers and sisters abandoned in Afghanistan by Joe Biden.

I also did what I could to help these worthy allies come and relocate to the U.S. when possible.

I did this due to my Christian values, my family’s experience being abandoned by another Democratic administration in another previously allied country (JFK and Cuba), as much as my sense of patriotic duty.

Sadly, we likely will never see the actions on a similar scale in reverse.

But the issue is far beyond whether individual Muslims are good, Christians are bad, or vice versa. The issue is what a world dominated by Muslim values, politics, and law – versus one which has been dominated by Christianity – will look like.

And based on what we see in too many Islamic-led countries today, that future will be far worse than what we have now.

Most, if not all, of our western liberal values the left hold so dear, and so do many conservatives, originate directly from Christianity, and indirectly from Judaism. 

Yes, Christianity, when wrongly wedded to the state during the Middle Ages, was often used by ruthless monarchs to justify war and intolerance.

But that history is long gone, along with the politically powerful royal families of Europe.

Since at least the reformation, Christianity, including my own Catholic Church, has been free of the state and has been (even if imperfectly) a bulwark of tolerance, peace, and positive social change.

Sadly, the same cannot be said of Islam.

Though many call Islam a religion of peace, Islam literally means submission, and bloody jihad has been integral to its core since Mohammed. 

And except when it has been effectively contained by the West, Islam has been an aggressive militant force.

And while Christianity during the past few centuries has firmly returned to its peaceful, almost pacifist, roots of Christ, its founder, Islam struggles with the fact that at its core and founding, Islam is violent and intolerant.

As was Mohammed – Islam’s founder – the warrior prophet.

And whereas in the West we have the separation of church and state, based in part on Jesus’ teaching of ‘give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and unto God what is God’s,’ in Islam it’s the opposite.

There is no similar separation in Islamic tradition. Islam is as much a political ideology and legal structure as it is a religion. 

And though the vast majority of individual Muslims are good, peaceful, tolerant, and loving people, Islam itself allows for officially sanctioned violence and intolerance. 

It all too often even rewards it.

And this is why to this day, a small but significant minority of Muslims openly support violence.

As Boston Herald columnist Don Feder writes in the Washington Times:

…worldwide, 8% of Muslims say suicide bombings are “sometimes” or “often” justified in the name of Islam. That 8% may not seem like much, but it means more than 100 million condone coldblooded murder to defend perceived attacks on Islam.

Feder adds: “Even in the West, many Muslims want to live under Islamic law (Sharia), where adulterers are stoned to death and converts to other faiths are murdered.”

To be more precise he notes: “In Russia, where Islam is expected to be the largest religion by 2050, 42% of Muslims support Sharia, as do 71% in Nigeria, 46% in France and 40% in the United Kingdom.”

Feder continues:

While Muslims in the West demand tolerance, Christians rarely get it under Islam. In Egypt, Coptic churches are bombed, congregants shot, and girls kidnapped and forced to convert. All over the Middle East, ancient communities have been uprooted.

Meanwhile, half the population growth worldwide between now and 2050 will be concentrated in Africa, including Congo, Nigeria, and Tanzania. 

The growth there is much more by the sword than the cradle, as all these countries have active violent Islamist insurgencies.

In Europe it is the opposite. Europeans are simply dying off by choice, and being replaced, often by Muslims.

Feder explains:

…the European fertility rate is 1.49, well below the replacement level of 2.1. Europe lost 1.1 million people last year. That’s the first rumbling of a coming earthquake. The fertility rate for European Muslims is 2.54. You don’t need to be a statistician to see which way the demographic winds are blowing.

It’s estimated that by 2085, 13 European countries will have Muslim majorities — this in a continent once known as Christendom. Christians are writing their own obituary by failing to heed the commandment to be fruitful and multiply.

And while in the United States, Islam has not yet become big enough to endanger our liberal western culture and legal system, there have been rumblings and testing of our resolve. 

This usually occurs at the local level where Muslims may dominate, and opportunistic ‘civic’ leaders may use that as leverage to try to force change in their favor.

However, the bigger threat in America is simply the loss of Christianity. And the moral and spiritual vacuum that this is creating. 

Christianity, the former bedrock of American society and the system it was built on, has rapidly declined in the U.S. from 91% as recently as 1976 to 73.7% in 2016, to 64% in 2022.

A third of the clueless Generation Z (or ‘Zoomers’) say they are unaffiliated with any religion or denomination.

According to a recent Pew Research study, Christians will be a minority of 47% in this country by 2050.

So, a belated Merry Christmas to all. We won’t be celebrating it as much in the not-too-distant future.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Amanda Head: Trump Does More for Ohio Town Victims Than Biden

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They say actions speak louder than words…

Former President Trump is stepping up as Joe Biden continues to let Americans down. Less than three weeks ago, a train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio in an event that could have a devastating impact on the environment and community.

Despite the ongoing chaos, the Biden administration has been slow to act…no surprise there.

Watch Amanda break down the situation below:

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

NYT, Scientists and Journalists’ Failed Miserably on C*VID Lab Leak Story: National Security Experts

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Haxorjoe, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

ANALYSIS – Thankfully the pressure continues to build on the establishment media and scientific community for its massive failure and cover-up of the C*VID-19 lab leak origin theory. 

From day one of the C*VID outbreak in Wuhan, China, I argued that it would be dereliction of duty for any intelligence analyst worth his/her salt, or any journalist or expert, to ignore the elephant in the room – that there was a rare Chinese government Level 4 Biosafety Lab (BSL-4) within a few miles of the alleged ground zero for the virus.

Compounding this fact with the understanding that China has a robust bioweapons research effort, and shoddy safety protocols at the relatively new lab in Wuhan, it should have been a no-brainer, everyone should have been all over this scenario.

But sure enough, for partisan, ideological, and just plain stupid, reasons the establishment mob quickly dismissed that possibility outright, calling it a conspiracy theory and even worse, racist. 

Many of these players wanted to stay on the good side of China, some had vested interests in keeping a lid on it, others instinctively rebuked anything President Trump proposed, and others simply wanted to obsessively focus on how Trump was allegedly failing on COVID rather than on where this deadly virus originated.

Meanwhile, Big Tech social media platforms openly censored any views, including mine on LinkedIn, that simply reported on and explored the facts and available intelligence on the Wuhan lab and its potential relation to C*VID.

Over time however, this subpar reporting, and the massive effort bordering on a conspiracy to suppress the truth on C*VID’s origins, began to crumble.

The June 9 World Health Organization Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens report, and various other serious investigations, concluded that deliberate human involvement, or at least human error, may ultimately have been at the root of the pandemic that has killed over 15 million people worldwide.

In December, reports The Blaze, Republicans on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence also concluded in their interim report that it was “plausible” that Ch*nese military researchers possessed the C*VID-19 virus “as part of bioweapons research” prior to its release into the world as a consequence of a safety incident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Many of the obtuse big media outlets, colluding with Big Tech, and the misguided science experts have begun to retract and recant. Some even quietly admitting they may have been wrong on the lab leak origin theory.

But that isn’t enough. Far from it.

As reported by The Blaze:

A group of national security experts published a letter this week denouncing those in the mainstream media who downplayed, ignored, or outright denied the possibility that the C*VID-19 virus originated in a Chinese c*mmunist l*b in Wuhan.

The January 11 letter addressed to the editors of the Lancet, Nature Medicine, the New York Times, and Time magazine, was signed by forty-three national security experts, including House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-Texas), former Defense Intelligence Agency acting Director David Shedd, former national security adviser Robert O’Brien, and numerous former State Department and National Security Council officials. 

The Blaze continues:

The letter implicates news outlets like the New York Times and scientific journals such as the Lancet in an apparent campaign to censor or displace dissenting voices around the pandemic’s origins.

Not only was journalists’ and editors’ failure to entertain the possibility that the W*han Institute of Vir*logy — controlled by the genocidal Chinese regime and notorious for performing gain-of-function experiments on coronaviruses — a dereliction of duty, it “served to hamper national and international policy discussions about how to mitigate against future pandemics of any origin — natural, accidental, or deliberate.”

Their letter calls for those who intentionally or not helped absolve the Chinese c*mmunist regime of any guilt in originating and spreading the deadly C*VID virus to be held accountable. 

The authors also called on major news organizations “to carry out deeper investigations into the pandemic’s origins, particularly by examining all credible origins hypotheses.”

This is the minimum they should do.

As the letter states, American security and prosperity depend upon “rigorous scientific debate, research, and scholarship, as well as an intrepid and independent news media.”

And all these media outlets, scientific journals, and individual journalists and experts “failed in their duty.”

They should all be called out and shamed publicly, and they should provide the nation, and the world a very public apology.

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Inside DOGE: Elon Musk’s Bold Move To Rewiring Federal Thinking

Screenshot via X [Credit: @amuse]

In the history of American bureaucracy, few ideas have carried the sting of satire and the force of reform as powerfully as Steve Davis’s $1 credit card limit. It is a solution so blunt, so absurd on its face, that only a government so accustomed to inertia could have missed it for decades. And yet, here it is, at the center of a sprawling audit by the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, that has, in just seven weeks, eliminated or disabled 470,000 federal charge cards across thirty agencies. The origin of this initiative reveals more than cleverness or thrift. It reflects a new attitude, one that insists the machinery of government need not be calcified. The federal workforce, long derided as passive and obstructionist, is now being challenged to solve problems, not explain why they cannot be solved. This, more than any tally of dollars saved, may be DOGE’s greatest achievement.

When Elon Musk assumed control of DOGE under President Trump’s second administration, he brought with him an instinct for disruption. But disruption, as many reformers have learned, is often easier said than done. Take federal credit cards. There were, as of early 2025, roughly 4.6 million active accounts across the federal government, while the civilian workforce comprised fewer than 3 million employees. Even the most charitable reading suggests gross redundancy. More cynical observers see potential for abuse. DOGE asked the obvious question: why so many cards? The initial impulse was to cancel them outright. But as is often the case in government, legality is not aligned with simplicity.

Enter Steve Davis. Known for his austere management style and history with Musk-led enterprises, Davis encountered legal counsel who informed him that mass cancellation would breach existing contracts, violate administrative rules, and risk judicial entanglement. Most would stop there. But Davis, adhering to Musk’s ethos of first-principles thinking, chose another route. If the cards could not be canceled, could they be rendered functionally useless? Yes. Set their limits to $1.

This workaround achieved in days what years of audits and Inspector General warnings had not. The cards remained technically active, sidestepping the legal landmines of cancellation, but were practically neutered. The act was swift, surgical, and reversible. It allowed agencies to petition for exemptions in cases of genuine operational need, but forced every cardholder and department head to justify the existence of each card. Waste thrives in opacity. The $1 cap turned on the lights.

Naturally, the immediate reaction inside many agencies was panic. At the National Park Service, staff could not process trash removal contracts. At the FDA, scientific research paused as laboratories found themselves unable to order reagents. At the Department of Defense, travel for civilian personnel ground to a halt. Critics likened it to a shutdown, albeit without furloughs. Others, more charitable, described it as a stress test. And indeed, that is precisely what it was: a large-scale audit conducted not by paper trails and desk reviews, but by rendering all purchases impossible and observing who protested, why, and with what justification.

This approach reflects a deeper philosophical question. What is government for? Is it a perpetuator of routine, or a servant of necessity? The DOGE initiative, in its credit card audit, insisted that nothing in government spending ought to be assumed sacred or automatic. Every purchase, every expense, must be rooted in mission-critical need. And for that to happen, a culture shift must occur, not merely in policy, but in mindset. The federal worker must no longer be an apologist for the status quo, but an agent of reform.

Remarkably, this message has found traction. Inside the agencies affected by the freeze, DOGE has reported a surge in what one official described as “constructive dissent.” Civil servants who once reflexively recited reasons for inaction are now offering alternative mechanisms, revised workflows, and digital solutions. One employee at the Department of Agriculture proposed consolidating regional office supply chains after realizing that over a dozen separate cardholders were purchasing duplicative items within the same week. A NOAA field team discovered it could pool resources for bulk procurement, saving money and reducing redundancy. These are not acts of whistleblowing or radical restructuring. They are small, localized acts of efficiency, and they matter.

Critics argue that these are marginal gains and that the real drivers of federal bloat lie elsewhere: entitlement spending, defense procurement, or healthcare subsidies. And they are not wrong. But they miss the point. DOGE’s $1 limit was not about accounting minutiae, it was about psychology. In a system where inertia reigns, a symbolic shock is often the necessary prelude to substantive reform. The act of asking why, why this card, why this purchase, why this employee, forces a reappraisal that scales. Culture, not just cost, was the target.

There is a danger here, of course. Symbolism can become performance, and austerity can become vanity. If agencies are deprived of necessary tools for the sake of headlines, then reform becomes sabotage. This is why the $1 policy included an appeals process, a mechanism for restoring functionality where needed. In a philosophical sense, this is the principle of proportionality applied to public finance: restrictions should be commensurate with the likelihood of abuse, and reversible upon demonstration of legitimate need.

DOGE’s broader audit, still underway, has now expanded to cover nearly thirty agencies. It is not simply cutting cards. It is classifying them, comparing issuance practices, flagging statistical anomalies, and building a federal dashboard of real-time usage. This is not glamorous work. There are no ribbon-cuttings, no legacy-defining achievements. But it is the marrow of good governance. As Aristotle noted, excellence is not an act, but a habit. The DOGE team has adopted a habit of scrutiny. And that habit, when instilled in the civil service, is a kind of virtue.

Here we arrive at the most profound implication. What if the federal workforce is not inherently wasteful or cynical, but simply trapped in a system that rewards compliance over creativity? What if, when given both the mandate and the moral permission to think, civil servants become problem solvers? The $1 limit policy is, in this light, less a budgetary tool than a pedagogical one. It teaches. It asks employees to imagine how their department might function if every dollar mattered, and to act accordingly.

In a bureaucratic culture where the phrase “we can’t do that” serves as both shield and apology, DOGE has introduced a new mantra: try. Try to find the workaround. Try to reimagine procurement. Try to do more with less. This shift may not register on a spreadsheet. It may not win an election. But it rehumanizes the federal workforce. It treats them not as drones executing policy, but as intelligent actors capable of judgment, reform, and even invention.

The future of DOGE will no doubt face resistance. Unions, entrenched bureaucrats, and political opponents will argue it oversteps or misunderstands the delicate machinery of governance. Some of that criticism will be valid. But what cannot be denied is that DOGE has already achieved something rare: it has made federal workers think differently. It has shown that even the most byzantine of systems contains levers for change—if one is willing to pull them.

The $1 card limit is not a policy; it is a parable. It tells us that in the face of complexity, simplicity is a virtue. That in the face of inertia, audacity has a place. And that in the face of sprawling bureaucracies, sometimes the best way to fix the machine is to unplug it and see who calls to complain. That is when the real work begins.

Sponsored by the John Milton Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to helping independent journalists overcome formidable challenges in today’s media landscape and bring crucial stories to you.

READ NEXT: Federal Judge Blocks Hugely Popular Trump-Backed Reform

Amanda Head: Liberals and Their Lies on the 4th of July!

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Liberals just can’t help themselves…

Watch Amanda explain the controversy below:

Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.

Biden Admin. Spied On Bank Accounts Of Trump Supporters

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Image via Pixabay free images.

Americans who purchased Bibles, sporting goods or products associated with former President Donald Trump were flagged for surveillance by a federal government spy program, U.S. House investigators reveal.

After the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol, FBI officials told banks that Americans who support President Trump or express religious views may be suspected terrorists, and demanded banks report customers whose transactions indicated they may be political conservatives.

Such blanket surveillance is prohibited by the United States Constitution, which requires the federal government to secure a warrant, based on probable cause, specifically naming the person targeted.

“New documents obtained by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government reveal that the federal government flagged terms like “MAGA” and “TRUMP” for financial institutions if Americans used those phrases when completing transactions,” the U.S. House Judiciary Committee revealed in a statement.

“Individuals who shopped at stores like Cabela’s or Dick’s Sporting Goods, or purchased religious texts like a bible, may also have had their transactions flagged. This kind of pervasive financial surveillance, carried out in coordination with and at the request of federal law enforcement, into Americans’ private transactions is alarming and raises serious concerns about the FBI’s respect for fundamental civil liberties,” the Committee stated.

In response, the Committee is demanding senior government officials appear for questioning.

“In light of these revelations, Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) has requested transcribed interviews from Peter Sullivan, Senior Private Sector Partner for Outreach in the Strategic Partner Engagement Section of the FBI, and Noah Bishoff, former Director of the Office of Stakeholder Integration and Engagement in the Strategic Operations Division of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN),” the Committee reveals.

Jordan’s letter to Noah Bishoff reads, in part: 

“The Committee and Select Subcommittee have obtained documents indicating that following January 6, 2021, FinCEN distributed materials to financial institutions that, among other things, outline the ‘typologies’ of various persons of interest and provide financial institutions with suggested search terms and Merchant Category Codes (MCCs) for identifying transactions on behalf of federal law enforcement. These materials included a document recommending the use of generic terms like ‘TRUMP’ and ‘MAGA’ to ‘search Zelle payment messages’ as well as a ‘prior FinCEN analysis’ of ‘Lone Actor/Homegrown Violent Extremism Indicators.’ According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of ‘extremism’ indicators that include ‘transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,’ or ‘the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.’ In other words, FinCEN urged large financial institutions to comb through the private transactions of their customers for suspicious charges on the basis of protected political and religious expression.

“In addition, the Committee and Select Subcommittee have obtained documents showing that FinCEN distributed slides, prepared by a financial institution, explaining how other financial institutions can use MCC codes to detect customers whose transactions may reflect ‘potential active shooters, [and] who may include dangerous International Terrorists / Domestic Terrorists / Homegrown Violent Extremists (“Lone Wolves”).’ For example, the slides instruct financial institutions to query for transactions using certain MCC codes such as ‘3484: Small Arms,’ ‘5091: Sporting and Recreational Goods and Supplies,’ and the keywords ‘Cabela’s,’ and ‘Dick’s Sporting Goods,’ among several others. Despite these transactions having no apparent criminal nexus—and, in fact, relate to Americans exercising their Second Amendment rights—FinCEN seems to have adopted a characterization of these Americans as potential threat actors. This kind of pervasive financial surveillance, carried out in coordination with and at the request of federal law enforcement, into Americans’ private transactions is alarming and raises serious doubts about FinCEN’s respect for fundamental civil liberties.

“As the former Director of the Office of Stakeholder Integration and Engagement in the Strategic Operations Division, you engaged regularly with financial institutions following the events of January 6, 2021, including the distribution of material about how financial institutions could use private customer information to assist federal law enforcement. As such, your testimony will aid our oversight. In particular, your testimony will help to inform the Committee and Select Subcommittee about federal law enforcement’s mass accumulation and use of Americans’ private information without legal process; FinCEN’s protocols, if any, to safeguard Americans’ privacy and constitutional rights in the receipt and use of such information; and FinCEN’s general engagement with the private sector on law-enforcement matters.”

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