Last week, the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem issued a joint statement asserting their exclusive authority over the Christian flock in the Holy Land. The letter condemned “Christian Zionism” as a damaging ideology that harms Christian unity and serves political agendas. This prompted a sharp rebuttal from U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee and an extensive deconstruction from evangelical circles. The original statement claimed that the historic Apostolic Churches are the sole representatives of the Christian faith in the region. It accused “local individuals” of advancing ideologies that mislead the public and interfere with the internal life of the church. The Patriarchs expressed concern that these individuals—likely referring to a massive delegation of 1,000 U.S. pastors that visited in December 2025—were being welcomed at official levels by the Israeli government, which they viewed as a threat to the indigenous Christian presence. U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee responded by rejecting the notion of “exclusivity” in representing the Christian faith. His response focused on several key points. Huckabee argued that no single sect should claim a monopoly on the Christian viewpoint, noting that the evangelical tradition is a “global and growing” force. He asserted that the foundation of Christianity is Judaism. He argued that if God could break His covenant with the Jewish people, Christians would have no assurance that He would keep His covenant with them. “The thought that God is even capable of breaking a covenant is anathema to those of us who embrace Holy Scripture as the authority of the church. If God can or would break His covenant with the Jews, then what hope would Christians have that He would keep His covenant with us?” he stated. Huckabee redefined the term, stating that a Zionist is simply someone who believes the Jewish people have a right to live in their ancestral homeland. He expressed confusion as to why anyone claiming the “moniker ‘Christian'” would not also be a Zionist. He urged the Patriarchs to focus on shared truths—such as the sanctity of life and marriage—rather than jurisdictional disputes. In response to the statement of non-evangelical churches in Israel, I issued the following. I hope you will read prayerfully. I love my brothers and sisters in Christ from traditional, liturgical churches and respect their views, but I do not feel any sect of the Christian… pic.twitter.com/jqohEWk0xJ — Ambassador Mike Huckabee (@GovMikeHuckabee) January 20, 2026 A viral social media post by an Evangelical Christian further deconstructed the Patriarchs’ letter, arguing it was an “institutional-political statement” rather than a theological one. The critique followed several lines of reasoning. The post noted a “critical omission”: the Patriarchs’ letter cited only one verse (Romans 12:5) regarding unity, but failed to address the numerous scriptures regarding God’s covenant with Israel. The critique highlighted that the letter ignored Romans 11:29, which states God’s calling is “irrevocable,” and Jeremiah 31:35-37, which ties Israel’s existence to the permanence of the sun and stars. The deconstruction argued that the decline of the Christian population in the Holy Land is not caused by Christian Zionism. It provided statistics to shift the focus: In Bethlehem, the Christian population was 86% in 1950, but dropped to approximately 12% by 2026. The post cited economic collapse, Islamist intimidation, and property disputes under Palestinian Authority control—factors unrelated to Evangelical theology—as the primary causes of emigration. The post argued the letter was a response to “anxiety over loss of control.” By bypassing traditional hierarchies to meet with Israeli officials, external Christian groups threatened the Patriarchs’ “monopoly on the Christian voice.” The critique labeled the Patriarchs’ claim of “exclusive representation” as a “category error,” asserting that theological beliefs do not require ecclesiastical permission. The critique slammed the letter for being strategically vague. By not naming the “local individuals” or specific “activities,” the Patriarchs created an “ambient guilt” that allowed them to signal disapproval without having to engage in a documented theological debate. https://t.co/k9dJ8q9HYB — Insurrection Barbie (@DefiyantlyFree) January 19, 2026 While the Patriarchs appealed to historic institutional authority, Huckabee and the Evangelical response appealed to the literal interpretation of Biblical covenants, suggesting that the “unity” requested by the Jerusalem leaders was actually a demand for institutional submission.

Monday was Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a day celebrating the legacy of a man who is famous in the United States for saying that we ought to judge people based on the content of their character, rather than the color of their skin. The story of the Civil Rights Act is one of Southern Democrats largely opposing the Civil Rights Movement. Ever since then, Democrats have been searching for the next Civil Rights Movement. We’ve seen many iterations of this over the course of the subsequent decades. We saw a quasi-civil rights movement pushed by the Left with regard to gender and sexuality, the idea that women had to be freed from the predations of the patriarchy, similar to the way that black people required freeing from the predations of Jim Crow. That, of course, was a bad analogy. Then we heard the same thing with regard to LGBTQ+-, that this was the new civil rights movement. But now, Democrats seem to have hit upon the idea that the new civil rights movement is illegal immigration. They believe illegal immigrants must be allowed to stay in the United States, and enforcement of the laws against illegal immigration is itself a form of white supremacy. The Democrats are stretching on this one because they’re running out of examples of true policy-driven widespread American racism. The demand is higher than the supply. Here’s one example: Eric Holder, the former attorney general of the United States, suggested on Monday that the Voting Rights Act is under a serious and abiding threat. Not only that, he suggested that there was the threat that America was about to be resegregated by the Trump administration, saying, “We are experiencing unprecedented mid-decade gerrymandering attempts designed to disproportionately disenfranchise black and brown voters. As the president desperately clings to power like an insecure dictator, there is a concerted effort to resegregate America.” There is not a “concerted effort to segregate America.” No one who is sentient in America believes that there is. No one is worried that black Americans are now going to be forced to drink out of different water fountains, or be forced to go to different schools, or that we are going to resegregate restaurants or anything like that. This is a wild overstatement. The reality is that the story of the post-Jim Crow racial situation in America was one of increasing good relations between the races. That was true all the way up to 2013, according to the polling data. A vast majority of both black Americans and white Americans, up until roughly 2013, thought that American race relations were improving steadily, and that they had improved markedly since the 1960s. Then we slipped into the BLM era and the late stages of the Obama presidency. That sank Americans’ perceptions of race relations. But that does not mean that black Americans are being held underfoot by white Americans, that white supremacy rules the roost these days. Thus, Democrats are looking for their new civil rights movement. They need another excuse for why they ought to be in charge, why they have the moral high ground. That’s a hard case to make. The Democratic Party has lost the moral high ground on a wide variety of issues: It has become not only the abortion-on-demand party, but the Celebrate Your Abortion party. The Democratic Party has become a party that cannot explain to you why a woman isn’t a man and a man isn’t a woman. It has become the party of full-scale open borders, and so now they are going to attempt to cram the illegal immigration issue into the civil rights discussion. And it won’t work.

A new poll indicates that the majority of Americans back President Donald Trump’s proposal to allow people to buy their own health insurance with direct funding from the government as an alternative to continuing Affordable Care Act subsidies. OnMessage Public Strategies and the Insurance Watchdog Coalition asked 1,000 likely voters nationally their thoughts on a variety of health care issues from Jan. 15-18, including 59% who said they would back Trump’s health care pitch. A memo from the polling firm described it as a “center-right coalition” with that 59% being made up of 82% of Republicans and 51% of Independents. Twenty-eight percent opposed, 13% did not know or did not have an opinion. Last week, Trump announced the “Great Healthcare Plan” pitch for Congress, as the president said in a video announcement last week that it “will truly make health care affordable again.” The webpage for the policy states that it “stops sending big insurance companies billions in extra taxpayer-funded subsidy payments and instead sends that money directly to eligible Americans to allow them to buy the health insurance of their choice.” Sixty-three percent of those polled said that health insurance companies should be the focus of policymakers “to solve the problems in health care” effecting them, with 13% saying pharmaceutical companies. There was also 97% consensus on having “more transparency for health insurance companies so they can’t use secret rules or computer programs to decide who gets care and when” and that “health insurance pricing needs to be made more transparent so that patients know the cost for every appointment, procedure or prescription drug, allowing patients to make informed choices, driving down costs overall.” In addition, 70% of those polled agreed with the premise that “health insurance companies should be forced to cover all drugs offered on the new government website without marking up the price,” in a specific reference to TrumpRx, a government website launched to help people find the lowest drug prices available for specific medications. Only 11% disagreed. “While many Democrats believe that the issue of health care offers them political inroads, Republicans and the Trump Administration have the chance to go on offense with meaningful policy wins for voters as it relates to health insurance and have begun to do so,” the OnMessage memo stated. Congress has been at odds over the Affordable Care Act subsidies that expired at the end of 2025, with the House voting to extend the subsidies for three years with the support of a handful of Republicans through a discharge petition. Talks have been murkier in the Senate on the continuation of the subsidies, as ACA plan premiums rose significantly for many, as many conservatives have argued it serves as evidence that Obamacare was not a fiscal sound policy to begin with. Politico reported Tuesday that a bipartisan health care deal was achieved on some aspects of the debate, but not the subsidies.

Vice President JD Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance made a big announcement on January 20. The couple is expecting their fourth child, a baby boy. “We’re very excited to share the news that Usha is pregnant with our fourth child, a boy,” the couple shared in an Instagram post. “Usha and the baby are doing well, and we are all looking forward to welcoming him in late July.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Second Lady Usha Vance (@slotus) The New Baby Will Be JD Vance and Usha Vance’s Third Son JD and Usha Vance are proud parents of sons Ewan, 8, and Vivek, 5. They also have a daughter 3-year-old Mirabel. This new baby will certainly keep JD Vance and his family busy. “During this exciting and hectic time, we are particularly grateful for the military doctors who take excellent care of our family and for the staff members who do so much to ensure that we can serve the country while enjoying a wonderful life with our children,” the couple added on Instagram. As soon as the news hit social media, many congratulated JD Vance and Usha Vance on their new baby. “A dad with 4 kids in a position of power is a wonderful thing,” someone wrote, “A focus on family!” “Congrats!!! But bro, chill. You’re gonna be super busy as 48,” another person joked. “Raising children in a solid family is the greatest adventure. Congratulations,” a message reads. Others commented about JD Vance and his wife welcoming a baby while in office. “Oooo – a baby born during a vice presidency! Congratulations!!” A follower cheered. “Congratulations,” another person pointed out. “This has the be a first in a long time of babies born to a sitting VP!” According to CNN, this is the first time in history that a sitting vice president has welcomed a baby while in office. This story’s featured image is by Antoine Gyori – Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images

'The cardinals wringing their hands over violations of borders and the use of force is rich'

'How are we supposed to host the Olympics when we can't even keep the lights on?'

'Usha and the baby are doing well'

‘Rules-based order is fiction’

'The world now places far less trust in us'

It’s unfair to boil Marc Ford’s career down to just The Black Crowes. Sure, The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion (1992), Amorica (1994), and Three Snakes and One Charm (1996) are, as for puts it, “Good records. Period.” But there’s far more to Ford’s catalog. One could look toward 1990s Burning Tree, his work with Ben Harper in the 2000s, his three records with The Magpie Salute—where he teamed up with former Black Crowes bandmate, Rich Robinson—or his production work, a crown jewel of which is Ryan Bingham’s Mescalito (2007). But Ford’s fans will know that it’s his solo work The post Marc Ford: The ClassicRockHistory.com Interview appeared first on ClassicRockHistory.com.