Remembering
James Robison

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The Brew: Remembering the Liberation of Auschwitz

By Al Perrotta Published on January 28, 2025

Originally, today’s Brew was not going to be made with Colombian coffee … but now that the South American nation has agreed to take back their criminals who came to our country illegally, we can enjoy our cup of Jose.   

But first, a remembrance.

Holocaust Remembrance Day: 80th Anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp

Yesterday marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. Between 1940 and 1945, an estimated 1.1 million people were murdered there — predominantly Jews, but also Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, and others. At the time of rescue, soldiers found only 7,000 emaciated prisoners alive. It’s a sickening scene now seared into the minds of all people of conscience.

Recently, 94-year-old Holocaust survivor Jona Saks made the journey to Auschwitz, where she spent one brutal year as a young girl.

“It doesn’t do any good for your heart, for your mind, for anything,” she told CNN about returning. “But it’s necessary. It’s necessary for the world to know.”

People tend to have short-term memories concerning persistent hostilities toward the Jewish people. “As time passes over, things are being forgotten,” Laks said. “The world hasn’t learned its lessons from what happened, from what was done.”

Indeed, the world has said, “Never again.” But what we have seen in the reaction to the terrorist attacks of October 7, from many points on the globe and a large chunk of the American liberal elite, says in reality, “We didn’t mean it when we said that.”

And yet, the Jewish people survive.

“Had it not been the Lord who was on our side,”
Let Israel now say,
“Had it not been the Lord who was on our side
When men rose up against us,
 Then they would have swallowed us alive,
When their anger was kindled against us;
Then the waters would have engulfed us,
The stream would have swept over our soul;
Then the raging waters would have swept over our soul.”

Blessed be the Lord,
Who has not given us to be torn by their teeth.
Our soul has escaped as a bird out of the snare of the trapper;
The snare is broken and we have escaped.
Our help is in the name of the Lord,
Who made heaven and earth. (Psalm 124 NASB)

Commander-in-Chief Reinstates 8,000 Service Members Booted for Refusing to Take the Jab

President Donald Trump has reinstated 8,000 service members who were kicked out of the military for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccinations. The hassled heroes will be restored to rank and receive back pay.

In another signal of a Biden-era military change, new Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth showed up at the Pentagon for his first day on the job Monday and referred to Fort Bragg and Fort Benning by their historic names — not the new ones slapped on them after the cancel culture went after the nine military bases named for Confederate generals a century ago as a gesture of unification. (Biden renamed them all.)

https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/1883882709086253496

Commander-in-Chief Trump also put his forces to work on a task that inexplicably wasn’t assigned months ago: helping Western North Carolina. During his visit to the region Friday, Trump said he was ordering the Army Corp of Engineers in to clean up and rebuild roads, bridges, and riverbanks.

Monday morning, the good guys rolled in.

Oh, Colombia

Quite the drama played out Sunday as the world rediscovered what it means to have an American president who means business. Colombia refused to allow two planeloads of criminals who entered the U.S. illegally to land after the Trump administration rounded them up and sent them home. Trump interrupted his golf game to issue a statement announcing severe punishments on Colombia, including massive tariffs, revoking the visas of Colombian officials, and issuing a travel ban for Colombian citizens. He did everything but put the fictional coffee grower Juan Valdez on a terror watch list.

To emphasize his seriousness, Trump went gangster on social media, posting an AI-generated image of a fedora-clad president in pinstripes looking like he was plotting the St. Valentine’s Day massacre.

 

Alexandria Ocasio Cortez began weeping about how Trump’s moves would make coffee prices soar. The View’s Ana Navarro snarked that it would ruin Valentine’s Day since such a great percentage of flowers are imported from Colombia.

Let Americans get murdered and raped, but don’t mess with my java or the floral arrangements at my beach house!

Unfortunately for husbands and boyfriends who are too lazy to buy Valentine’s flowers for their ladies, Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, quickly capitulated. In fact, at one point Petro offered his own presidential plane to bring the bad guys back in. By evening, the two nations had announced a deal had been reached: Colombia will repatriate whatever illegal immigrants ICE captures.

Meanwhile, as tough as Trump looks in that shot, it doesn’t compare to the official portrait of Melania Trump released Monday.

That’s the look of someone who’s thinking, “You rifled through my drawers and shot at my husband. He’s the least of your problems.”

Meanwhile, Vice President J.D. Vance showed he isn’t playing around, either. In fact, we may have our first memorable line of the new administration: “I don’t really care, Margaret.”

Chiefs Going to Super Bowl Again … with a Little Help from Their Friends

Taylor Swift is returning to the Super Bowl; the refs at Sunday’s AFC championship game helped make sure of that. While no one can doubt the greatness of the Kansas City Chiefs, the way they always seem to get favorable calls is getting to be annoying. Why the Chiefs? This Associated Press post signals one reason NFL fans are suspicious.

Fox News also pitched in.

The Chiefs defeated the Bills Sunday night to earn a shot at their third straight Super Bowl victory. The scoreboard said 32-29, but the indelible image for Bills fans will be the still shots of quarterback Josh Allen clearly earning a first down on a crucial 4th and 1.

Yet somehow, even after further review (by who, Taylor Swift’s agent? the advertising firm for State Farm?), the refs declared that Allen had come up short.

And again, the hearty, loyal Bills fans ended the season broken-hearted. Oh, it’s one thing for Scott Norwood’s Super Bowl-winning kick to sail wide 34 years ago Monday. That you can blame on cruel winds of the gods. It’s another thing if Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes beats you in overtime before you even get a chance to touch the ball. That you can blame on rules since changed and Mahomes being Mahomes. But to have clear calls go against you? That’s enough to leave the generally genial Bill fans spitting fire … and fans of fair play league-wide thumbing their nose.

Maybe it’s all those incantations Swift has become notorious for doing on stage and in her spare time. My advice to the Bills? “Have Josh Allen date Ariana Grande.”

The Apostle James’s advice to the Bills? “Count it all joy, my Buffalo brethren when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

The Bills, by this point, are the kings of steadfastness. But a Super Bowl ring would be nice for them at some point.

As thrilling as the game was, the highlight was retired Navy Petty Officer First Class Generald Wilson’s performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

What a way to go into the morning!

Along The Stream …

It appears The Stream is having some influence (whether directly or indirectly, we can’t be sure) as “Elon Musk Tweets to Trump: No More Federal ‘Bribes’ to Churches That Traffic Immigrants.” John Zmirak has been saying this for years.

Dr. Gary Habermas appears on Apologetics Roadshow to discuss“Is the Shroud of Turin a Photograph of Jesus’s Resurrected Body?”

 

Al Perrotta is The Stream’s Washington Bureau chief. He is also the creator of the soon-to-bloom Substack channel Bananas Republic.