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The Senate Banking Committee convened a hearing June 11 around a question that cuts to the core of American competitiveness and the American Dream: Can the United States ensure that rapid advances in artificial intelligence support "innovation, affordability, and American dominance?"

Those three goals are inseparable, and they all hinge on a single variable: ensuring that the world’s most advanced chips stay in American hands and out of China’s. President Ronald Reagan understood this logic during the Cold War, when his administration moved aggressively to deny the Soviet Union access to cutting-edge Western technology — not because the Soviets lacked talent, but because denying them the tools was itself a strategic weapon.

The same principle applies today. Indiana Republican Sen. Jim Banks and Florida Republican Rep. Brian Mast understand the stakes. The "AI Overwatch Act" they are advancing in the House and Senate is the right answer.

China already has world-class AI talent fielding competitive models. However, it lacks reliable access to the highest-end chips, a gap that keeps Beijing behind. The AI Overwatch Act codifies the prohibition on exporting our most advanced chips to China — making permanent a policy the Trump administration has enforced and that must outlast any single administration.

TRUMP’S CHINA THAW LEAVES TAIWAN DECISION LOOMING AS EX-NBA STAR WARNS ISLAND HOLDS KEY TO US AI RACE

It would create a simple test, ensuring sales will not strengthen an adversary’s military, intelligence, surveillance or cyber capabilities and would not erode our technological lead. Importantly, it would also fast-track trusted exports to allies and partners, so that we could export the full American AI stack to friends who gain access to top-tier capability, while ownership and oversight would stay with the United States.

The measures are not just common sense — they are the precondition for every goal the Senate Banking Committee named.

Export controls on chips are vital but not sufficient given the scale of China’s effort to overtake the United States. China’s parallel path to closing the gap is building advanced chips domestically, which is why Sens. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., and Andy Kim, D-N.J., introduced the bipartisan and bicameral "Match Act."

HOW US CEOS QUIETLY TEAMED UP WITH TRUMP TO GAIN LEVERAGE OVER CHINA

The bill bars the sale and servicing of the most essential chipmaking tools to facilities in China, locks restrictions on Huawei, SMIC and other Chinese Communist Party-linked chipmakers into law and presses our allies to align their own export controls so that American toolmakers aren’t simply undercut by foreign competitors selling Beijing the same equipment. Together, the Overwatch and Match Acts close both doors: China can neither buy our best chips nor buy the tools to make them. 

Start with innovation. In April, the White House accused China of running industrial-scale campaigns to copy American frontier models, using tens of thousands of fraudulent accounts and jailbreaking techniques to siphon proprietary capabilities and release cheaper knockoffs stripped of the safeguards our companies build in.

Beijing is already pilfering our AI advantage because it cannot yet train frontier models at scale without our hardware. To hand Beijing our hardware advantage on top of that would be unilateral disarmament, allowing state-subsidized Chinese firms to match American products at a lower price and box our companies out of global markets just like they have done in solar, steel and electric vehicles. You do not protect an innovation lead by selling your rival the engine — or the factory that builds it.

CHINESE MONEY REPORTEDLY TIED TO AI DATA CENTER OPPOSITION

Then there is affordability. The dividend of AI leadership is supposed to land here at home, in new industries, good jobs and the broad prosperity that makes the American Dream attainable. That dividend disappears the moment we hand Beijing the tools to undercut us.

I have spoken with executives across multiple sectors who understand that the AI supply chain and compute infrastructure — chips, fabs, data centers and the energy to run them — have become the new industrial base. America’s technology advantage is the engine of that prosperity. Losing it is not an abstraction — it is lost jobs, lost leverage and a dimmer American Dream.

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And there is dominance. The country that leads in the most capable models, the chips that train them, and the energy to run them will set global standards and decide whose values are embedded in the defining technology of this century. That is the line between AI that serves a free people and AI that powers a surveillance state.

President Donald Trump’s AI Action Plan names the stakes plainly, calling it imperative that America and its allies win this race, and the current administration has held the line by keeping our most capable chips out of China and tightening enforcement against those who try to route them there anyway.

There is no doubt China recognizes that compute power is the bottleneck in this race. In March, federal prosecutors in New York charged three people tied to the server maker Super Micro, including a co-founder, with diverting roughly $2.5 billion in Nvidia-powered servers to China through a front company in Southeast Asia, using falsified paperwork and dummy units to fool both internal compliance teams and federal inspectors. The Super Micro prosecution is only the most recent proof that Beijing will not stop trying.

China is running a long game — economic, cyber and intelligence operations aimed at closing the gap we have spent decades building. The United States must run a longer one. America’s chip advantage is not just a technology story; it is the foundation of the American Dream — the engine of the industries, the jobs and the national power that make self-governance worth defending. By passing the Overwatch and Match Acts, Congress can turn a fragile policy advantage into durable American law.

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A Florida couple who welcomed a child genetically unrelated to them after an alleged embryo mix-up at a fertility clinic they subsequently sued will raise the child as their own after reaching an agreement with the child's biological parents, according to the couple.

Tiffany Score and Steven Mills welcomed a daughter, Shea, in December of last year. Later, genetic testing revealed that the baby was related to another set of parents, according to a lawsuit filed earlier this year against the now-defunct fertility clinic IVF Life, Inc., which operated as Fertility Center of Orlando before shuttering last month.

Score and Mills said they have come to a "mutually devised custody agreement" with Shea's biological parents, and plan to develop "a relationship of friendship and trust" together, according to ABC News.

The pair will continue to raise Shea as their own and will remain her custodial parents, according to the custody agreement filed on June 12, the outlet reported.

ROBOTS POWER BREAKTHROUGH IN PREGNANCY RESEARCH, BOOSTING IVF SUCCESS RATES

Jack Scarola, an attorney for the couple, said Score and Mills appreciate how news of their mix-up helped connect them with Shea's biological parents.

"Tiffany and Steve recognize the public interest in the details of their IVF experience, and they appreciate the role the news media has played in bringing them and Shea to the point where Shea's genetic parents were able to be identified and fears about Shea's future have been settled," Scarola said in a statement to ABC News.

"Tiffany and Steve are committed to respect[ing] the privacy concerns of Shea's genetic parents with whom they have begun and intend to continue to foster a relationship of friendship and trust. They are also committed to protecting Shea from harmful intrusion on her privacy," Scarola added.

In their lawsuit against IVF Life, Inc. and Dr. Milton McNichol, who led the fertility clinic before its closure, Score and Mills said they solicited the services of the clinic to assist them in the IVF process and contracted with the clinic for "cryogenic storage of three viable embryos," according to ABC News.

The couple claimed that the clinic then implanted an embryo in Score's uterus in March of last year that "was not one of the embryos produced by" her and her partner.

When their daughter was born in December, Score and Mills — who are both White — said their daughter "displayed the physical appearance of a racially non-Caucasian child." They then used genetic testing and confirmed the baby was not biologically related to them.

They called on the clinic to bring the lawsuit to the attention of "all of its patients who had embryos in storage" to determine whether they may have received an embryo belonging to Score and Mills.

Score and Mills also demanded that the clinic cover the cost of "genetic testing for all patients and the children of all patients whose birth resulted from embryo implantation through [the clinic's] services during the past five years," which is the time span when the clinic had their embryos.

The pair also urged the clinic to disclose any discrepancies in parentage.

HOW AI IS MAKING IVF MORE PREDICTABLE

In last week's custody filing, Score and Mills said they learned about the "embryo history of Plaintiffs and other patients" that "revealed laboratory-clinic errors that would substantiate claims for damages against the present defendants and others without the need to satisfy medical malpractice lawsuit prerequisites."

They said they decided to store one of their embryos at a different facility.

IVF Life, Inc. previously said it was "actively cooperating with an investigation to support one of our patients in determining the source of an error that resulted in the birth of a child who is not genetically related to them."

"Multiple entities are involved in this process, and all parties are working diligently to help identify when and where the error may have occurred," the clinic said in January. "Our priority remains transparency and the well-being of the patient and child involved. We will continue to assist in any way that we can, regardless of the outcome of the investigation."

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A ceasefire agreement between the world’s greatest military power and its leading terrorist regime is a big blanking deal.

But ask yourself: If the "agreement," which runs a page and a half, is so great, why hasn’t it been released?

In a cascade of criticism, leading Republicans, joining the predictable Democrats, have expressed unhappiness with President Trump’s secret deal. Their attitude ranges from deep skepticism to outright opposition.

And the media coverage, even accounting for the usual anti-Trump hostility, has been relentlessly negative.

TRUMP'S IRAN AGREEMENT RAISES A BASIC QUESTION: IS IT ACTUALLY A DEAL?

"President Trump Lost This War," the New York Times editorial page declared yesterday.

"Trump made a terrible mistake starting this war. He prosecuted it recklessly and in open defiance of the law. The United States is emerging weaker — militarily, diplomatically and economically — and will pay strategic costs for years to come.

The details of the deal are unclear, but the announced framework suggests that Mr. Trump has won few of the terms he insisted that he would. It is a humiliating comedown for him and the nation he leads."

That theme emerges throughout the coverage. Washington Post foreign policy columnist David Ignatius says: "Let’s be frank: In diplomatic terms, this agreement is an exit ramp from a costly and unpopular war, not a victory parade. The deal falls far short of President Donald Trump’s early talk of regime change and unconditional surrender. Even one of Trump’s close advisers concedes: ‘It’s inconclusive right now, in the sense that you can’t say it was a huge success, and you can’t say it was a failure.’"

But what’s most striking is the Republican pushback, with some demanding that Congress must approve any peace deal. 

TRUMP VOWS 'ULTIMATE CONSEQUENCES' IF IRAN VIOLATES AGREEMENT, RESUMES NUCLEAR AMBITIONS

Sen. Thom Tillis says the agreement is "doomed to fail" because of the lack of congressional oversight. He also criticized some remarks by Pete Hegseth. "Now we are talking about a posture where we may accept the nuclear material remaining in Iran? How does that make sense at all?"

"If you want a deal to last," said Sen. James Lankford, "it can’t be an executive agreement."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a presidential pal, said the memorandum being described by Iran "sounds awful."

Speaking of uranium, the longtime hawk said: "If they can enrich it anywhere at all, then it’s the same as JCPOA," the 2015 Obama agreement that Trump canceled. Graham told Politico he is "skeptical that Iran will ever go there."

And conservative activist Erick Erickson, who has a popular radio show, says flatly: "Trump has surrendered to Iran."

TRUMP MAY HAVE WON A STRATEGIC PAUSE IN IRAN. NOW COMES THE HARD PART

Colby Hall, a Mediaite founding editor who has started a Substack site that includes the "morning frame," cited this example: 

"Marc Thiessen is not a Democrat. He is not even a Never Trumper. He is a Fox News contributor, a Washington Post columnist, and a foreign-policy voice close enough to Trump that his calls reportedly helped shape the president’s position on Ukraine. He has had dinner at the White House." 

Thiessen compared the $300 billion that the White House concedes Iran would receive for a reconstruction fund to "offering the Marshall Plan to rebuild Germany while the Nazis were still in power." The columnist "was applying the moral logic conservatives spent a decade constructing — that you don’t rebuild a hostile regime, you constrain it — to a deal signed by the president he helped elect."

He wasn’t alone. Fox anchor Bill Hemmer called the situation "precarious. It’s tough stuff because Iran’s history is to get to that table and just drag this thing out — month after month and eventually year after year." Hemmer asked, "about us getting suckered back into a long, stalemated negotiation."  

Many Fox critics conveniently forget the network has a large news division.

Here’s Politico: "President Donald Trump and his team are celebrating an Iran peace deal they say will end Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.

"But the accord rests on commitments that Iran hasn’t actually made yet. And it may never."

Axios reports that CIA Director John Ratcliffe told Trump and other senior officials that "evidence gathered by U.S. intelligence agencies raises serious doubts about Iran’s willingness to make the nuclear concessions the U.S. is seeking in any final deal, according to three sources familiar with those discussions."

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth "both expressed concerns and raised questions about the memorandum of understanding."

"Ratcliffe and Rubio said that based on that intel, they doubted the Iranians would agree to take the nuclear steps the U.S. was seeking." 

NETANYAHU'S ISRAEL GRAPPLES WITH TRUMP-IRAN DEAL AS DETAILS REMAIN UNCLEAR

That’s pretty sobering.

National Review’s Jim Geraghty sees "a well-established pattern of an administration that habitually over promises and under delivers. Vice President Vance, who apparently never wanted to start a war, now gets the job of a deal with one of the world’s most untrustworthy and treacherous regimes."

The Dispatch says: "If the deal has in fact been finalized… the administration’s unwillingness to share the details suggests the terms are, as many have feared, tantamount to surrender. Why not transparently share something of which you are proud?"

All we really have here is an agreement to keep on talking. Maybe it will all work out in the end, but right now it seems like a distant desert mirage.

Trump is declaring the "deal" a success. But with the still-secret arrangement, it’s hard to argue that the 80-year-old president has handled this well.

Footnote: Trump over the weekend posted a picture of himself with Kim Jong Un. What did that North Korean visit and all those love letters get us last time? Yet Trump appears to be signaling he wants to try again.

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A top Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) official has been accused of helping funnel more than $1.2 million in donor funds to a confidential informant who infiltrated a neo-Nazi organization — a source prosecutors say was also the official’s secret romantic partner.

The details were revealed in a superseding indictment filed June 2 by the Department of Justice (DOJ) against the SPLC, which has faced mounting scrutiny over allegations that it funded individuals tied to extremist groups it publicly opposed.

According to the document, the director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project was in a secret romantic relationship with a paid field source who infiltrated a neo-Nazi organization known as the National Alliance at the direction of SPLC. 

The SPLC director reportedly shared a home with the source and allegedly used a fake company to funnel charitable funds to the partner. A significant portion of the money reportedly ended up in a shared bank account used to fund their life together.

NEO-NAZIS, ‘SADISTIC’ BIKERS AND CHARLOTTESVILLE ORGANIZER: 5 OF THE MOST SHOCKING SPLC INFORMANTS

Based on details laid out in the superseding indictment, the individual was identified only as the "person who would become Director of the SPLC's Intelligence Project." The official reportedly conducted the financial transactions between 2015 and 2021.

According to congressional and SPLC documents, the director at that time was Heidi L. Beirich, an extremism researcher who served in the role from 2012 to 2019.

The SPLC declined to comment to Fox News Digital.

DOJ SAYS SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER FUNNELED $3M+ TO WHITE SUPREMACIST AND EXTREMIST GROUPS

Prosecutors allege that a fake shell company created by the SPLC, known as "Tech Writers," was used to funnel donor money directly to the official's romantic partner.

"The SPLC actively led donors to believe that their donations would be used to ‘dismantle’ violent extremist groups," the indictment stated. "However, the SPLC hid from donors the fact that a portion of their donated funds was being secretly used to support extremist groups and to fund their violent, racist, and extremist activities."

Investigators reportedly traced roughly $140,000 in donor funds directly from the SPLC's main operating account through the Tech Writers shell company and ultimately into the couple's shared personal bank account.

Prosecutors said those funds accounted for roughly two-thirds of the money held in the couple's joint accounts and were used to pay everyday household and living expenses.  

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"They were there for Norway…"

"They" are nine Norwegian commandos cross-country skiing through deeply wooded, mountainous terrain in 1943, then trudging through deep snow to reach the Vemork hydroelectric power plant in the town of Rjukan, high above a waterfall and as formidable an edifice as one can imagine from that era.

Vemork was also site of the world’s only plant for mass production of "heavy water," on which the Nazis had placed their primary bet to produce atomic weapons during World War II. After the invasion and occupation of Norway in April 1940, the Reich’s munitions research team soon figured out that Vemork was critical to their plans.

Physicist Werner Heisenberg was one of the key leaders of the Nazi nuclear program, and in 1942 he had promised all of the Nazi and Wehrmacht leadership a bomb "the size of a pineapple" that could destroy cities.

THE RACE AGAINST TIME TO DESTROY IRAN’S ILLICIT NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAM HEATS UP AMID FRESH STRIKES

The key to that bomb was the heavy water produced at Vemork, so the Nazis hardened the defenses around the plant and kept increasing them as the Allies’ interest in destroying the plant became obvious.

The tale of the race between the Nazis and the Allies for nuclear weapons and the specific drama surrounding Vemork is recounted in the bestseller of a decade ago: "The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler's Atomic Bomb" by Neal Bascomb. Director and producer Michael Bay optioned the rights to make the movie based on the riveting account by Bascomb, but it has not yet been made.

It is a shame that Bay hasn’t made the movie yet, as such a film would be a short-cut for those who don’t understand why President Donald Trump is singularly focused on ensuring the Islamic Republic of Iran cannot make or buy a nuclear weapon.

MORNING GLORY: PRESIDENT TRUMP IS ON THE CUSP OF A HISTORIC ACHIEVEMENT

Trump is motivated by the same conviction that drove British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin Roosevelt to throw everything into the Manhattan Project while also doing everything to disrupt Hitler’s bid for nukes. The leaders of the United Kingdom and United States knew that German dictator Adolf Hitler would use any weapon he could obtain, even as Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu know the fanatics atop the rump regime in Iran would use any weapon they could build or buy.

The conviction that your enemy cannot be deterred by any ordinary means but is in fact a theocracy run by fanatics who believe they can usher in the end of times and the return of the "Twelfth Imam" focuses the mind. Or ought to.

"Twelver" beliefs — the anchor religious convictions of the regime established by the Ayatollah Khomeini when he led the Iranian Revolution of 1979 — astonish the secular West, especially its progressive activists. The left in the West dismiss the Iranian theocratic convictions as absurd fantasies that surely no government could embrace.

TRUMP RIPS OBAMA'S 'STUPID' IRAN DEAL, CLAIMS FORMER PRESIDENT THOUGHT 'HE COULD BRIBE THEM'

They ought to watch 16 minutes of the recent episode of "Life, Liberty and Levin" in which Mark quickly traces the core ideology of the remaining "leadership" in Iran with the help of the writings of late scholar of Islam Bernard Lewis and of the deceased Khomeini himself. 

Trump and Netanyahu have directed the destruction of the physical plant of Iran’s nuclear program though not the new facility under construction in the deep caverns being dug at Pickaxe Mountain in Iran. Fanatics don’t stop even when they are set back. The religious extremists of Iran are certain to try again to build — or buy — the nuclear weapons they will use.

The German National Socialists — the Nazis — were of course led by Hitler who had no scruples about burning everything down even as his Reich collapsed in on every front. The same is true of Iran’s religious fascists who have been led by Ayatollahs Khomeini and Khamenei from 1979 to February 28 of this year. These Islamist fascists murdered tens of thousands of their own people over two days in January. They have no limits when it comes to violence.

IRAN’S HIDDEN MOUNTAIN NUCLEAR SITE RAISES URGENT THREAT, MUST BE ‘NEUTRALIZED': REPORTS

It may be Khamenei’s son now calling the shots in the wounded and reeling Iran, or it may be the latest commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Ahmad Vahidi, profiled on June 13 in The Wall Street Journal.

Whoever is the new "Supreme Leader" may approve of a deal with the United States but the nature of the regime cannot change. The acquisition of nuclear weapons as a means to destroy Israel first and then the United States is a matter of deep theological conviction to the regime. (There are no "moderates" in the regime’s leadership, only extremists with camouflage and unapologetic Twelvers who are always the ones with guns.)

Base camp for understanding the current and future battles with Iran should be reading or listening to "The Winter Fortress." The Allies eventual and thrilling success at Vemork did not end the Nazi push for nukes. The third and successful operation against the plant — followed by intense bombing — only damaged and delayed Hitler’s plans and programs.

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The courage and heroic success of the commandos did not end the war but did allow for time for victory in the European Theater. Another massive bombing mission was required the next year to force the Nazis to abandon their plans for Vemork.

Whether President Trump has achieved as much as is possible to end the Iranian regime’s nuclear program and destabilize the regime’s grip on the vast majority of Iranians who loathe their tyrants without the deployment of ground forces remains to be seen. The necessity of a president finally willing to take action to devastate the program has existed for two decades. Bravo to Trump for his orders.

But there is no destroying the knowledge about how to get to their bombs, knowledge the Iranians have steadily gained since 1979. There is no altering Twelver theology or Khomeinist ideology. The new radicals atop the ruins will try to start again, just as the Nazis did in 1943. Shattered and broke with a suffering population, the quarter million radicals ruling Iran with iron fists and terrorist tactics are not a group of Gorbachevs about to launch a "glasnost" and "perestroika."

That’s the reality. How America deals with it ought to be led by the example of FDR and Churchill when the threat was as real as it remains today.

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This is about a game, about overcoming adversity, about beating the odds, and about a city that is at once great and glamorous, yet oppressively hard to live in.

But the Knicks, in winning their first championship in 53 years, are not just a New York story. Their teamwork, discipline and dedication became a national story, a Cinderella story. They touched hearts in a very cynical culture. 

Imagine if politicians acted like this. If they put aside their hyper-partisanship and ideological agendas for the good of the country. If their default setting was cooperation and compromise rather than grabbing credit and demonizing opponents. Okay, you’re right. It’s too hard to imagine. 

It’s not about how many points Jalen Brunson scored (45 in Game 5, when he single-handedly carried the Knicks to victory). It’s about how he was long dismissed as weak and undersized (by NBA standards). The 6-foot-2 Brunson, who wasn’t drafted until the second round, had something to prove. Think of all the folks who feel underrated or misunderstood at their job, and how deeply they want to be recognized for their value.

TAYLOR SWIFT DANCES, SHIMMIES AND STEALS HEADLINES AS KNICKS ERASE 29-POINT HOLE IN NBA FINALS STUNNER

It’s about the greatest city on earth, which is also the most frustrating city on earth. I once wrote that New Yorkers live under conditions that would cause riots in any other city, and I haven’t changed that view. Everybody is squeezed together. It’s absurdly overcrowded. 

As a guy from Brooklyn, who played in a league and in the asphalt jungle, where if you lost you had to sit on the sidelines for a good long time, I don’t pretend to be unbiased. We played touch football in the street and had to stop every time a car came. That was before we got on the grass field because someone cut a hole in the chain-link fence. Very Noo Yawk. 

Every day more than 4 million people pack themselves into subways, mostly at the bottom of deep tunnels, and at rush hours must stand through stop and go service. Homelessness is a problem both in the subways and on the streets.

CHAOS UNFOLDS IN NEW YORK CITY AFTER KNICKS WIN FIRST NBA CHAMPIONSHIP IN DECADES

Many folks live in tiny apartments, with small dens having to double as bedrooms, and pay mightily for the privilege.

And yet, as street crowds gathered across the five boroughs, they broke into a rendition of the Frank Sinatra song: "I want to be a part of it, New York, New York…"

Other cities, of course, have similar problems, so New York is just urban America writ large: Taller buildings, dirtier streets, piled-up garbage, more panhandlers, struggling schools, odious smells.

KNICKS FANS SEND NYC INTO CHAOS AFTER FRANCHISE REACHES FIRST NBA FINALS SINCE 1999

And the traffic is horrendous. Only Los Angeles is worse. Don’t show me any surveys, I know. Try getting into the Lincoln Tunnel.

That’s why authorities slapped a $9 entrance fee on anyone driving into Manhattan below 60th Street. And parking: Fugeddaboudit! 

Unfortunately, some thugs turned violent after the Knicks’ victory. There were 63 arrests, 10 cops injured, four people stabbed and a 17-year-old boy shot in the foot. That’s the dark side of New York, which coexists with places like Broadway and Fifth Avenue.

TEEN PUNCHED AND KICKED INTO A COMA AFTER KNICKS-SPURS ALTERCATION NEAR MADISON SQUARE GARDEN: POLICE

When I was based in New York, the biggest stories involved crime. Race riots. Murders. The Central Park Five. The Zodiac Killer. Al Sharpton got stabbed. 

Things are nowhere near as bad these days in the Apple and other cities, but there are still plenty of neighborhoods where you cross the street to avoid trouble. 

When I was leaving in 1990 to return to Washington, I wrote a magazine piece with Donald Trump on the cover. The hotel-builder’s tabloid exploits, breathlessly chronicled by the New York Post — this was even before "The Apprentice" – symbolized a culture in which readers thrive on celebrity gossip to distract them from the daily dreariness of their lives. He always called me back. I figured, well, I’ll never have to deal with this guy again.

STEPHEN A SMITH ELECTS NOT TO DUNK ON TRUMP FOLLOWING KNICKS NBA FINALS VICTORY

I was at Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals when Willis Reed limped onto the court for their first championship. I watched on TV in 1973 when the team, now with Earl the Pearl, won again. Little did I know there would be a half-century wait till the next one, so many years of so many awful teams.  

There’s also a heartwarming father-son tale, with Jalen’s dad, a journeyman player with the 1999 Knicks who lost the Finals to the San Antonio Spurs, being avenged — and the normally stoic younger Brunson dissolving into tears as they hugged. 

If you look at the history of movies and television shows, everyone loves a good comeback. And the Knickerbockers provided just that in this series.

WNBA COACH DOUBLES DOWN ON JALEN BRUNSON DOUBTS DESPITE KNICKS REACHING NBA FINALS

In every win, the team fell behind by double digits and clawed their way back — especially in Game 4, when the New Yorkers, despite a record-breaking 29-point deficit, won it in the final second with that now-famous tip-in by OG Anunoby. Saturday night’s clincher was also won in the final seconds.

Doesn’t that stir every youngster or former youngster who dreamed of hitting the last-inning homer or catching the winning touchdown pass?

It was also nice to see the immature, 7-foot-5 Victor Wembanyama, who acted like a creepy villain, miss the last shot in each of the last two contests.

KNICKS SURVIVE TO TAKE 2-0 NBA FINALS LEAD AFTER JALEN BRUNSON'S CLUTCH SHOT SINKS SPURS

I know, it’s only a game. There will be other games, other sports, other heroes. 

But this one touched a raw nerve because the Knicks, who won 13 straight, were always coming from behind, fueled by a beautiful passing offense, and were written off as lucky overachievers who would wilt like fading flowers when facing a "real" tough team.

Haven’t all of us, at some time or another, felt disrespected and disregarded by clueless bosses? 

Start spreading the news…

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I was born into a family that believed in God, loved America and taught that every human being possesses human dignity. Long before prejudice and identity-based politics became fixtures of American life, I learned a simple truth that guided my family’s work and shaped the civil rights movement itself: we are one blood, one human race.

My family background is very diverse. My grandmother’s family came from the west coast of Africa. My grandfather’s family came from Ireland. My mother’s family included Cherokee roots. I have spent my entire life living the reality that America is not a collection of competing tribes. America is one people under God.

My uncle, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., did not dedicate his life to teaching Americans to see one another as permanent enemies. He did not divide people into categories of oppressors and oppressed. He called us to a higher standard — to judge one another by character, to pursue justice without hatred and to recognize our shared humanity under God.

That is why I am deeply concerned by the growing industry of division that has taken root in America — and by the role the Southern Poverty Law Center has played in fueling it.

DR. BEN CARSON: I KNOW HOW BAD THE SPLC WAS, IT CAME AFTER ME AND PUT ME AT RISK

For decades, the SPLC has positioned itself as a leading authority in the fight against hatred and extremism. Yet recent allegations detailed in a federal superseding indictment raise serious questions about whether the organization has lived up to the principles it claims to defend.

According to those allegations, individuals associated with organizations that the SPLC itself labeled as extremist or hate groups allegedly received substantial payments over many years. The indictment describes hundreds of thousands, and, in at least one case, more than a million dollars, in payments to sources connected to White supremacist, neo-Nazi and Ku Klux Klan organizations.

These allegations deserve careful scrutiny.

SPLC SCANDAL UNDERSCORES HOW THE DEMAND FOR RACISM OUTSTRIPS THE SUPPLY | BOBBY BURACK

Americans who faithfully donate their hard-earned money to combat racism and hatred deserve transparency and accountability. Many of those donors are sincere people who believe they are supporting a noble cause. They have the right to know how their donations have been used and whether the organizations they support are practicing the values they publicly preach.

The concerns extend beyond financial questions. For years the SPLC and similar organizations have helped cultivate a worldview that teaches — especially young people — to see our nation through the lens of permanent racial conflict. Rather than emphasizing reconciliation, shared citizenship and common humanity, they too often reinforce the idea that Americans are defined primarily by their differences.

This is not the vision that inspired the civil rights movement. It is certainly not the vision that inspired Uncle M.L.

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As my uncle taught, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

I know something about being labeled. For years, I have been characterized in ways that bear little resemblance to who I am or what I believe — I have even been labeled by the SPLC itself! So let me be clear: I reject racism. I reject hatred. I reject White supremacy. I reject any ideology that seeks to elevate one group above another.

The answer to racism is not more division. The answer is truth and love.

Today, I still have a dream that Americans will see one another not as enemies, but as neighbors. Acts 17:26 tells us that we are one blood. Science testifies that we are one human race. If we remember this core truth, we can build a future worthy of the sacrifices made by those who came before us.

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