Some students at Cornell University think political correctness is more important than common sense. An open forum was held to discuss problems with Cornell’s student governing organization called the Student Assembly. The meeting was called to address the representation of minority students. Minorities are already represented by special liaison positions for international students, LGBT students, female students and others. However, that was not enough for some liberal young people. They demanded more minority representatives.

Clearly these students are not learning much from their history and government classes. They should know that race-restrictive elections are unconstitutional in the United States. Unfortunately, liberals do not seem to care about the facts. This is what happens when there is a culture of political correctness on college campuses. Students care more about feelings than facts. One liberal student even said “I don’t need to see statistics to know that people feel under-represented.”

This problem at Cornell proves that political correctness still reigns supreme on many university campuses. Feminists and LGBT activists like to complain about how they are deprived of equality. However, the race-based elections they propose are not equal at all. These liberal college students need to understand that America’s democratic elections are designed to give every citizen an equal voice in how their government is run. That equality is what makes America’s government so unique and effective. When someone is not allowed to vote in an election because they are white, male or heterosexual, that takes away that person’s voice. Cornell’s Student Assembly should not take away the rights of students to vote just because they are not in any minority group. That is un-American and unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause.

Phyllis Schlafly has been a national leader of the conservative movement since the publication of her best-selling 1964 book, A Choice Not An Echo. She has been a leader of the pro-family movement since 1972, when she started her national volunteer organization called Eagle Forum. In a ten-year battle, Mrs. Schlafly led the pro-family movement to victory over the principal legislative goal of the radical feminists, called the Equal Rights Amendment. An articulate and successful opponent of the radical feminist movement, she appears in debated on college campuses more frequently than any other conservative.

The females in my family line have a weird disorder. I can’t seem to find it in the medical books, and I don’t think it has an official name, but here it is: We can’t do cartwheels.

There, I said it. It’s shocking, I know. I was surprised by it when I was little and every neighborhood girl I knew would cartwheel across the lawn like a runaway wagon wheel. My sister and I were in good shape, but our best attempts ended in heaps. Our cartwheel disorder sounds like a small thing, and it was, but when everyone is taking turns doing them in gym class, it feels like a pretty big deal. We don’t usually like our weaknesses. They are to be stuffed under the rug or carefully disguised. “Oh no,” we assure, as we wander coolly away, “I just don’t feel like doing a cartwheel right now.”

The truth is that we all have weaknesses, and so do our children, and so will their children after them. We all stink at something. Some of us are slow readers, some clam up in social contexts, some struggle with addictions, some forget things easily.

We hate these weaknesses! Would it surprise you to learn that God likes them?

The apostle Paul lets us in on a personal struggle he had with weakness. He called it a “thorn” in the flesh (2 Corinthians 12:7). It must have driven him crazy. It might have been a sickness or a vision problem, but nobody knows for sure. Whatever it was, he pleaded with the Lord three times to take this weakness away. He wanted it gone.

God didn’t give Paul what he wanted. He gave him something better.

We read in 2 Corinthians 12:9–10 that God basically replied, “Sorry, Paul, I’m going to let this weakness remain so that you can see my power at work in your life, and so others will know how strong I am.” God had a purpose in allowing the thorn to remain. He lovingly allowed it to remain.

That must have been hard for Paul to hear. The thorn was still causing him pain. But instead of whining and stomping out of the room, Paul moved toward God. He began not just accepting his weakness, or ignoring his weakness, but boasting in it. Boasting is a loud thing, an obvious thing, a look-at-me thing.

“Hey everybody, check me out! I really am weak. I can’t hide it. I don’t have it all together. But look at all God’s doing! It’s Him, not me! His strength is working through me.” Paul decided to stop viewing his weakness as a thorn and start viewing it as a spotlight that could show off God’s power in his life. What a change.

Have you ever tried boasting in your weaknesses? It’s not easy. Pride is much more comfortable when we’re known for our strengths and successes, not our frailties. It wants us to be needed, not needy. It wants us to be the expert, not the learner. It wants us to be seen as self-sufficient. It wants the spotlight to be shining right back on our faces.

Boasting in weakness requires humility, and according to Philippians 2:3-4, that means counting “others more significant than yourselves.” It means backing slowly out of the center of the circle and pushing someone else in. It’s celebrating their accomplishments, not minding too much if we’re overlooked, and laughing at our own mistakes. When we’re humble, our weaknesses don’t surprise us because we’re not that impressed with ourselves anyway; we’re impressed with God, and we want His strength to be seen.

The Philippians 2 passage above continues by giving us an incredible example—a pinch-yourself-to-see-if-you’re-dreaming kind of example. Jesus, the prince of heaven with all the universe at His disposal, threw it all in. He emptied himself. He walked away from His scepter and His dazzling robes and became an ordinary human being. He laid down strength and picked up weakness. The angels must have covered their eyes in horror.

The prince humbled himself further, even to the point of death. He hung in disgrace and shame on a cross with bystanders gawking and taunting. He was weak and frail, all because He was looking to our interests, not his own. He knew we needed a Savior, so He ignored His own reputation and did the unthinkable for us. He gave us His life. His “weakness” showed us the strength of God’s love. In fact, He gave us His strength. He gave us all of Himself. We can admit weaknesses because we don’t need our own strength. We have His.

Let’s stop pretending. No one is fooled by the cheap facade of perfection anyway, and its coarse fabric darkens the light of Christ in our lives. Let’s get real with Paul and admit that we’re weak. We need help, and help has come. We have all that we need in the infinite strength of Christ. If I could speak to my 8-year-old self, I’d tell her to try the cartwheel, land in a heap, and fall back on the grass laughing because she doesn’t have to be good at everything. Her imperfect life can point to the strength of God, which is so much better than a perfect cartwheel anyway.

Adapted from Between Us Girls by Trish Donohue. ©2016 New Growth Press. Used with permission.

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Trish Donohue is a wife and mom who writes from her kitchen table in West Chester, PA. Donohue currently leads the women’s ministry at Covenant Fellowship Church in Glen Mills, PA, where her husband, Jim, serves as pastor. A desire to disciple her two daughters paired with a love for writing motivated the writing of her first book, Between Us Girls. Visit Trish’s blog at .

As a Jewish boy growing up in the 1950s, it was always exciting to me to think about wearing the tallit. This is because in order to wear the tallit, you had to have had your bar mitzvah.

For years, you would study Hebrew and Jewish history, and Jewish customs and traditions. Then on the day of your bar mitzvah, you would wear a special new tallit and read from the Torah (the five books of Moses, which are the first five books in the Old Testament) and the haftarah (a series of selections from the books of the prophets, called the Nevi’im). You would also give a d’rash (exposition or exegesis) on the Torah reading, and then end with reading a letter of thanks to the rabbi, cantor, and board of the synagogue. The tallit you received at your bar mitzvah would be worn throughout your life for all the major life events. It would then be passed on to your son in your memory when your life here on this Earth ended.

To a Jewish person, the tallit is symbolic of one’s Jewish identity because it is used in every major life cycle event. But to those not born Jewish, it is symbolic of the Jewish Messiah. More and more, as I travel to speak in churches, I meet people who are seeking to understand the Jewish roots of the Christian faith. They will blow the shofar, pray the Shema, and don a tallit during prayer. At the synagogue I lead, we keep tallitot (the plural form of tallit) for guests to use during the service, and many are eager to do so. Coming under the tallit often helps a person seek Yeshua without distraction and commune with the Ruach HaKodesh (Spirit of God) in a whole new way.

I do not believe that as followers of Yeshua we are obligated to pray under a tallit, but I have heard many people say that coming under a tallit in prayer helped them deepen their intimacy with Hashem. The tallit does not have special power in itself, but it reminds us of God and His Word, in which we find all power.

So if the tallit can be this significant in a person’s relationship with God, you may be wondering: “What exactly is it and how is it used?”

The tallit is the Jewish prayer shawl. It is rectangular and generally white with blue or black stripes, and it has tassels on each of its four corners called tzitzit. The tallit can be large (tallit gadol) and cover a person’s entire body, or it can be small (tallit katan), reaching only to the shoulders. But it must be long enough to be worn over the shoulders as a shawl and not just around the neck as a scarf. For a Jewish person, it is typically used in every major life cycle event—from circumcision to bar/bat mitzvah to marriage and even death. But it is most frequently used in prayer.

Tallitot are generally worn at morning Shabbat services and during morning prayers. An exception is the Kol Nidre, the evening service on the eve of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), during which the tallit is also worn. A person wearing a tallit will generally keep it draped over his shoulders, but during times of prayer he will use it to cover his head.

Traditionally men have worn the prayer shawl because Jewish law did not obligate women to wear them and the Torah discourages women from wearing men’s garments. But now there are many styles and colors available that are very feminine, so both men and women wear tallitot. The stripes on the tallit are usually blue, black or purple, but they can be any color of the rainbow. The tallit is classically made of wool, cotton or silk, but it can be made out of any material so long as the prohibition against combining linen and wool is observed.

The wearing of the tallit commences in the Torah. We read in the 15th chapter of the Book of Bamidbar (Numbers):

“Adonai spoke to Moses saying, “Speak to Bnei-Yisrael. Say to them that they are to make for themselves tzitzit [fringes, ציצית] on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and they are to put a blue cord on each tzitzit. It will be your own tzitzit—so whenever you look at them, you will remember all the mitzvot [commandments] of Adonai and do them and not go spying out after your own hearts and your own eyes, prostituting yourselves. This way you will remember and obey all My mitzvot and you will be holy to your God. I am Adonai your God. I brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God. I am Adonai your God.” (Num. 15:37–41, TLV).

In ancient times, people in most cultures wore some type of blanket-like garment to protect them from the sun during the day and the cool air at night. So the command in Numbers 15 was not for the Jewish people to start wearing this type of garment but rather for them to add the tzitzit on the four corners, which would set them apart from other nations. Even today, Bedouins wear abayas, which can resemble the tallit but lack the tzitzit.

The purpose of the tallit was, in fact, to hold the tzitzitot, or fringes. The tzitzitot were to be tied on each of the garment’s four corners so that when we look at the tallit, specifically the tzitzit, we would remember the commandments of God. Today there are T-shirts onto which the tzitzit may be tied at each of the four corners, illustrating again that the tzitzit are most important.

Traditionally on each tzitzit is a blue cord called the tekhelet. According to some, the blue tekhelet is to remind us of God’s creation, the ocean, the sky, the tablets upon which the Ten Commandments were written and His throne of glory. This particular color blue was once very hard to acquire and was thus used on special garments.

During antiquity, it was derived from a type of snail found near the Aegean Sea. It has been thought that after the destruction of the second temple, knowledge of the actual source of the dye was lost. For this reason, it is now common for the tzitzit to have only white fringes. It is believed that some of the species that carry the dye have been found, but that is not universally accepted as fact.

There are places in Israel today where you can purchase the tzitzit with the tekhelet. They can be tied on to the four corners of a garment to make a tallit. During one of the tours of Israel that my wife, Racquel, and I co-led with two other rabbis over twenty years ago, we met an Israeli storeowner who sold the tzitzit with the tekhelet.

I purchased a tallit gadol (large tallit) and a tallit katan from him, and I still wear them today. There are also many websites that sell tallitot, some of which include the tekhelet. To learn more about how to purchase a tallit, you can visit our website at . {eoa}

Excerpted from The Tallit: Experience the Mysteries of the Prayer Shawl and Other Hidden Treasures, by Charlie Kluge (Charisma House, 2016).

Television personality Oprah Winfrey is 1 Corinthians 13 in the flesh, life coach and frequent Oprah guest Iyanla Vanzant says.  

“The personification of love,” Vanzant says. “To me, that is who and what Oprah Winfrey is: a human personification of love.” 

The problem is Vanzant is a priestess in the Yoruba tradition. Given her beliefs, this is not the type of endorsement you want, even if it points to 1 Corinthians 13. Consider this religion, according to Wikipedia:

According to Kola Abimbola, the Yoruba have evolved a robust cosmology. In brief, it holds that all human beings possess what is known as “Ayanmo” (destiny, fate) and are expected to eventually become one in spirit with Olodumare (Olorun, the divine creator and source of all energy). Furthermore, the thoughts and actions of each person in Ayé (the physical realm/Life) interact with all other living things, including the Earth itself.

Each person attempts to achieve transcendence and find their destiny in Orun-Rere (the spiritual realm of those who do good and beneficial things). One’s ori-inu (spiritual consciousness in the physical realm) must grow in order to consummate union with one’s “Iponri” (Ori Orun, spiritual self).

Those who stop growing spiritually, in any of their given lives, are destined for “Orun-Apadi” (the invisible realm of potsherds). Life and death are said to be cycles of existence in a series of physical bodies while one’s spirit evolves toward transcendence. This evolution is said to be most evident amongst the Orishas, the divine viziers of Olorun.

The White House has declared that it may be revising United States nuclear policy during President Barack Obama’s final months in office. A “no first use” policy would be a disaster for the U.S. and its allies.

The Obama administration’s consideration of the no first use policy is based on a lack of humility before U.S. historical experience and a failure of imagination with respect to the future international environment.

At its core, a no first use policy means that the United States would not be the first to use nuclear weapons under any circumstance other than to retaliate after a nuclear weapons attack.

Currently, the United States maintains a level of ambiguity when it comes to specifying the circumstance under which nuclear weapons would be used. Such ambiguity is beneficial to U.S. national security and to that of allies because it leaves the adversaries guessing about U.S. strategy.

The first striking problem is that non-nuclear weapons, for example, biological and chemical, can cause as many fatalities as nuclear weapons. The United States needs to deter such attacks just as it needs to deter nuclear attacks. Both Russia and China have active biological and chemical weapons programs and chemical weapons were most recently used in the Syrian conflict.

The administration underwent a comprehensive reassessment of U.S. nuclear weapons posture in its 2010 Nuclear Posture Review. The review recommended against adopting the no first use policy.

The Nuclear Posture Review’s conclusion is even more significant considering it was based on very optimistic assumptions about the international environment—for example, that Russia is no longer an adversary and that the potential for conflict with Moscow is low. Since then, Russia has invaded another country, made nuclear threats against the U.S and its allies, and acted against U.S. interests in the Middle East. In short, the international security environment is a lot worse than the Obama administration assessed in 2010.

As defense expert Keith Payne points out, if the U.S. adopts a no first use policy, adversaries might feel safer to conduct devastating biological, chemical, and conventional attacks against the United States and its allies without a fear of the U.S. retaliating with the most threatening response available. As such, a no first use policy would weaken deterrence that has served the U.S. well since the end of World War II.

The second problem with the no first use policy is that about 30 nations around the world, close U.S. allies like Japan or NATO allies, rely on U.S. nuclear weapons for their own security. They rely on the United States to deter their nuclear-armed neighbors.

North Korea habitually threatens South Korea with annihilation. North Korea’s ballistic missiles can reach Japan, another close U.S. ally. Russia is pursuing increasingly aggressive revisionist policies on the European theater. U.S. nuclear weapons have kept nuclear programs of allies at bay—and that is a very good thing as the complexity of the nuclear environment and thus the potential for miscalculation increases the more nuclear-armed countries exist.

Facing dangerous neighbors and lacking U.S. assurances vis-à-vis devastating non-nuclear attacks, these countries would be undoubtedly more inclined to pursue their own nuclear weapons capabilities, complicating or thwarting U.S. nonproliferation efforts.

The third problem is a lack of imagination on the part of the Obama administration. In the past, the U.S. found itself in the circumstance in which a nuclear weapon use was deemed necessary so that a conflict with Japan might end on terms favorable to the U.S. faster than if the United States continued to wage a conventional war. There is no way of telling if future presidents will not find themselves in the middle of a situation in which a nuclear weapons use might save American blood and treasure, however terrible such a situation would be.

The threshold for detonating nuclear weapons is incredibly high—and justly so. After all, they are some of the most devastating weapons mankind has ever invented. But this should not blind us to the fact that we use our nuclear weapons every day—we use them to deter large-scale attacks, conventional and weapons of mass destruction, every day; and have been since the dawn of the nuclear age.

Nuclear ambiguity has served us well, as decades of Democratic and Republican administrations affirmed over and over. Now is not the time to adopt a no first use policy.

Michaela Dodge specializes in missile defense, nuclear weapons modernization and arms control as policy analyst for defense and strategic policy in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies.

One of the greatest revelations of my life is: I can choose my thoughts and think things on purpose. In other words, I don’t have to just think about whatever falls into my mind. This was a life-changing revelation for me because as Proverbs 23:7 (AMP) says, “As [a man] thinks in his heart, so is he.” I like to say it like this: Where the mind goes, the man follows.

God has a wonderful life planned for every single person, and He is concerned about the hidden man of the heart, which is our inner life. Our inner life is what we think about. And like the Scripture above says, the way we think determines how we live and who we are. That’s why we need to think about what we’re thinking about.

In 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 (AMPC), the Bible teaches that we have weapons of warfare that are “mighty before God for the overthrow and destruction of strongholds” and that we are to “lead every thought and purpose away captive into the obedience of Christ.” A stronghold in our mind is an area of thinking that the enemy—Satan—has somehow managed to dominate, causing us to believe lies. And although they are lies, they become our reality.

The only way we can know if the devil is lying to us is by studying the Word of God so we can tell the difference between the truth and the lies. It’s so important for each of us to be a student of the Bible, because this is the key to getting victory over strongholds and having the life Jesus died to give us—a life of peace with God, peace with ourselves, great relationships, real joy and the ability to become all God has created us to be.

It all comes down to choosing to believe what God says (the truth) more than we believe our feelings, what other people say or our circumstances.

Now it’s good to go to church and hear someone teach the Word; you can learn a lot about God and His will for your life this way. But you need to have your own personal experience with God to really understand how He thinks and to renew your mind in the truth.

Romans 12:2 (AMPC) says, “Do not be conformed to this world … but be transformed (changed) by the [entire] renewal of your mind … so that you may prove [for yourselves] what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

As your mind is being renewed, you’ll be able to recognize thoughts that don’t agree with God’s Word. When they come, take them “captive into the obedience of Christ.” In other words, throw aside any thought that doesn’t line up with the Word and replace it with truth.

Ephesians 4:23 (AMPC) says, “Be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind [having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude].” Every day we need to take time to study the Word so we can purposely think according to what it says. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we can have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16), know who we are in Christ, and be free of strongholds that will keep us from God’s “good and acceptable and perfect will” for us.

One practical way you can accomplish this is to have a think session every day. Just sit down and say, “I’m going to think about some things on purpose.” Then spend some time thinking about Scriptures that renew your mind with the truth about what God says—about His love for you, His plan for you, how He wants you to live and behave. Use a concordance to find verses that cover areas you are struggling with or need to know more about. I want to encourage you to write some of them down and put them places where you will see them every day, like the bathroom mirror or refrigerator.

It’s so wonderful to understand that you can have what God says you can have if you learn to think the way He thinks. It’s also important to realize that this transformation is an ongoing process. It won’t happen overnight, and you will need to be patient with yourself as you focus on making a little progress each day so you can keep your mind renewed and grow in your relationship with God.

If you will make a commitment to set your mind on God’s Word, renewing your mind with truth, then you will experience the fullness of new life that you can have in Christ. All it takes is a little more progress one day at a time. {eoa}

You have probably noticed that spiritual warfare has increased—and is increasing in the last days. It doesn’t take a prophet to discern the raging culture wars, the bold rise of principalities like Jezebel, or the spirit of the world that has settled into a front row seat in far too many churches.

Whether we like it or not, we are in a war.

Indeed, passive Christianity is no longer an option for those who want to live victorious lives, especially in this world where antichrist agendas are pushing all things of Jesus out of the public square and sexual immorality is celebrated rather than mourned. We have moved from peacetime Christianity to wartime Christianity. Of course, we are not wrestling against flesh and blood but against principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, and spiritual forces of evil (Eph. 6:12).

Although the enemy is unseen, it is very real. Whether you are new to spiritual warfare or you’re an expert warrior, the days in which we live demand full engagement in the battle. We do not have the luxury of retreating and hoping the darkness will not overtake us. There is no cease-fire in the spirit. The devil will not back off and call a truce if we lay our weapons down and take off our armor. Quite the opposite; if we give up the fight, we essentially surrender to the evil forces that are warring against our minds, our bodies, our families, our finances, and the fullness of our destinies. But we are not going to do that!

Here is the problem: many believers are finding that the spiritual warfare tactics they have relied on in the past are less effective—or not effective at all—in forcing the devil to flee.

Yet I know that James 4:7 is true: “Therefore submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” Sometimes it feels like I am submitting and resisting with everything in me, yet stubborn devils refuse to obey the Word of God. At times I have wondered if there is a line of demons in formation waiting to step up and take their best shot when one is forced to flee in the name of Jesus. If so, that means we have to live a submitted-resisting lifestyle to hold back the darkness.

I want to rally the troops—the prophetic warriors. I want to reveal to you the power of the end-times spiritual warfare arsenal. God is calling prophetic warriors—those empowered by His Spirit, flowing in the gifts of the Spirit, walking in the fruits of the Spirit, and enforcing the will of the Spirit—to the front lines. Are you ready for the challenge? I’ll guarantee you this: if you will press into paradigm, you will see even old enemies finally flee.

End Times Prophetic Insight

The signs of the times are all around us. Some are questioning if we are in the beginning of the Tribulation. Others are sure we’re at least at the beginning of sorrows. Still others suggest that some of the trumpets named in the Book of Revelation have already sounded. I don’t know about all that, but I do know this: Jesus expects us to discern the signs of the times, and the signs I’m seeing convince me that we’re in the end times. Consider Paul the Apostle’s prophecy:

“Know this: In the last days perilous times will come. Men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, slanderers, unrestrained, fierce, despisers of those who are good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying its power. Turn away from such people” (2 Tim. 3:1-5).

Beyond the dying birds, earthquakes, floods, droughts, famines, beached sea lions, blood moons, wars, rumors of wars, the rise of false prophets, abounding iniquity, health epidemics such as Ebola and the bird flu, microchip implants, and the like, it is obvious that the love of many has grown cold (Matt. 24:12). Police officers are shooting civilians. Massacres are becoming commonplace. Racists are burning down church buildings. And radical Islam has declared war on most of the human race.

The spiritual war is manifesting in the natural like never before seen in our day. Although we can’t pray the end times away, we can rise up in the name of Jesus and wage spiritual war against everything that opposes God’s will. Of course, that means we need to discern what the will of the Lord is.

And that means we need to tap into the prophetic realm to get supernatural intelligence directly from the Spirit of God. God is calling prophetic spiritual warriors to the front lines.

Now is the time to shed some new light on Joel’s prophecy about the last days. For decades we have shared it and declared it, but until now I hadn’t seen beyond the surface level of the prophecy:

“And it will be that, afterwards, I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; then your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, and your young men will see visions. Even on the menservants and maidservants in those days I will pour out My Spirit. Then I will work wonders in the heavens and the earth—blood and fire and columns of smoke” (Joel 2:28-30).

I believe those prophetic manifestations are part of the end-times prophetic warfare arsenal. Many have pulled back from the battle lines—and even broken rank—because of wounds sustained in battle. But God is raising up a new breed of prophetic warriors—Special Forces—who will march in tandem with the Holy Spirit and see victories. The key to triumph is to follow the Holy Spirit’s battle plan and timing.

Excerpted from Waging Prophetic Warfare: Effective Prayer Strategies to Defeat the Enemy, by Jennifer LeClaire (Charisma House, 2016).

Jennifer LeClaire is senior editor of Charisma. She is also director of Awakening House of Prayer in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, co-founder of , on the leadership team of the New Breed Revival Network and author of several books, including The Next Great Move of God: An Appeal to Heaven for Spiritual Awakening;Mornings With the Holy Spirit, Listening Daily to the Still, Small Voice of God; The Making of a Prophet and Satan’s Deadly Trio: Defeating the Deceptions of Jezebel, Religion and Witchcraft. You can visit her website here. You can also join Jennifer onFacebook or follow her on Twitter. Jennifer’s Periscope handle is @propheticbooks.

Economic sanctions levied against North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un by the United States were a criminal act and a “declaration of war,” according to the Hermit Kingdom’s director-general of U.S. affairs in its Foreign Ministry.

“The Obama administration went so far to have the impudence to challenge the supreme dignity of the DPRK in order to get rid of its unfavorable position during the political and military showdown with the DPRK,” Han Song-ryol told reporters Thursday. “The United States has crossed the red line in our showdown,” he said. “We regard this thrice-cursed crime as a declaration of war.”

The rhetoric could be part of the North’s usual saber rattling ahead of annual joint military exercises for the U.S. and South Korean militaries. However, it also signals the hair-trigger relationship between North Korea and the U.S., which are still technically at war.

A hair trigger isn’t a good situation, given the growing tensions in the South Pacific over China’s expansionist agenda. China and Russia have also just announced they will be conducting their own joint exercises in the region, as well.

“Nobody can predict what kind of influence this kind of vicious confrontation between the DPRK and the United States will have upon the situation on the Korean Peninsula,” Han said. “By doing these kinds of vicious and hostile acts toward the DPRK, the U.S. has already declared war against the DPRK. So it is our self-defensive right and justifiable action to respond in a very hard way.

“We are all prepared for war, and we are all prepared for peace. If the United States forces those kinds of large-scale exercises in August, then the situation caused by that will be the responsibility of the United States.”

Last year’s August exercises involved 50,000 South Korean troops and another 30,000 Americans. And while it produced similar saber rattling from North Korea, and a brief period of heightened tensions, the North showed restraint.

The exercises have a dual role of giving U.S. and South Korean forces the chance to train together, as well as putting pressure on North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program. Han said that’s not going to happen, though.

“In the view of cause and effect, it is the U.S. that provided the cause of our possession of nuclear forces,” he said. “We never hide the fact, and we are very proud of the fact, that we have very strong nuclear deterrent forces not only to cope with the United States’ nuclear blackmail but also to neutralize the nuclear blackmail of the United States.”

Hundreds of Bernie Sanders supporters are expected to stage a Fart-In Thursday at the Democratic National Convention meeting in Philadelphia.

An assortment of Socialists, beatniks, and leftwing rabble-rousers plan to consume massive quantities of pork and beans in preparation for the pungent protest.

We have yet to ascertain why the liberals are passing gas—but the mass flatulence is expected to happen just moments before Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech.

U.S. News reports heavy containers laden with beans—both dry and canned—have already been shipped to the City of Brotherly Love. They plan to feast on a variety of selections, including navy, pinto, baked and lima (which emits a rather noxious fume).

“It shows the level of absolute disgust that we’re at. We think we’re going to remember 2016 as the year we begin to bury the two corporate political parties,” Cheri Honkala told U.S. News.

Ms. Honkala is the national coordinator for the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign, one of the groups behind the “Fart-In.”

“It’s really a shame—this whole thing does stink,” she said. “Democrats and Republicans are like Pepsi and Coke. They listen to corporations and they don’t listen to anti-poverty activists.”

The plan is for activists to scarf down as many beans as possible and then wait for nature to run its course. As the songwriter once wrote, “Beans, beans, the magical fruit … “

At the appointed hour, the protesters will corporately pass gas—both inside and outside the Wells Fargo Arena. And that has drawn a word of warning from meteorologists.

Thunderstorms are in the forecast and some weather guessers fear the static discharge from a lightning strike could cause the protestors to spontaneously combust.

Also, scientists have grave concerns that the sheer number of gassy liberals could blow a hole in the ozone from Philadelphia to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

Therefore, residents who live in the projected path of this foul wind should begin immediate preparations to protect themselves and their property.

FEMA has not issued an official advisory, but sources within the government tell me people living along the eastern seaboard should acquire gas masks and at least two cases of industrial strength Febreze.

To those of you down wind of the blast zone—God speed.

A recurring theme for Democrats—and even more than a few conservatives—is that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump mocked the disability of a New York Times reporter.

But the blogger Catholics4Trump says it has the true story that the mainstream media has been hiding from Americans. You can read the entire post here, but here’s the gist of their argument:

What the media did not choose to show you was video of Serge Kovaleski. Notice how the media only showed and still shows photos of him. This was done for a reason. As it turns out, Kovaleski’s disability is a congenital condition called arthrogryposis. Arthrogryposis causes restricted movement in the joints but does not cause spasms or uncontrolled moving of the limbs like cerebral palsy does.

To show the depths of the deceit, one CNN reporter explained, while displaying a still photo of him, that Kovaleski, “suffers from a chronic condition that impairs movement of his arms.” Again, the implication is that Kovaleski can’t control his arms from moving. To the contrary, Kovaleski appears perfectly calm when giving interviews. Thus, if Trump truly wanted to mock Kovaleski’s disability, he would have had to stand perfectly still with a flexed right hand and not flail his arms.

The blog wants you to check out the video below to verify their claims.