Microsoft’s leftist roots run deep, from its problematic co-founder Bill Gates and his “philanthropic” ventures to its partnership that gave birth to MSNBC — recently rebranded to MS NOW — which regularly spews left-wing talking points dressed up as actual facts. It even went out of its way to stuff leftist news stories into the widgets bar of every Windows computer via its MSN news aggregator, a service that prioritizes left-wing content over the right. That’s all about to change, though, as a string of complaints over Windows’ waning security and stability lead Microsoft to make its operating system a little more user-friendly, and the MSN feed is one of the first bad ideas on the chopping block.

A brief history of MSN

Microsoft launched the Microsoft Network all the way back in 1995, and the company has crammed it into the desktop operating system ever since. Debuting on Windows 95, it started as an online dial-up service meant to compete directly with the early internet juggernaut that was AOL.

One year later, Microsoft secured a lucrative joint venture with NBC News. In an effort to consolidate power across established cable TV and the new internet machine, the companies formed MSNBC. The nexus of their partnership saw that NBC News continued to provide 24-hour news coverage through conventional channels while Microsoft delivered those stories to its online users, boosting viewership ratings for both brands on the way to the top.

By 1998, Microsoft spun the MSN brand out into the news aggregation service known today as MSN.com. For maximum visibility, Microsoft set MSN as the homepage of its Internet Explorer browser, which, at the time, dominated the web with a 90% market share over second-place competitor Netscape Navigator. You can even see an early version of the original MSN.com thanks to web archives.

Microsoft ultimately walked away from MSNBC in 2012, selling its stake in the partnership to pursue its own venture. No longer in need of NBC’s reporting alone, Microsoft became an independent news distributor under MSN.com. This move would give Microsoft full control over which news outlets it chose to feature, as well as the right to hoard the spoils of its ad revenue from these stories. To make MSN virtually unavoidable, Microsoft injected its media influence into the Windows task bar in late versions of Windows 10 and all of Windows 11 under the name Microsoft Start. Now, any time you glance down at the task bar on your Windows PC, you’ll see messages from MSN that cover weather, finances, “breaking news,” and other topics, all begging for you to click and read.

Today, the MSN feed is one giant leftist propaganda billboard meant to promote any outlet that doesn’t espouse right-leaning ideas or values. What’s worse is that Microsoft can use this baked-in “feature” to serve left-wing content by default to Windows machines at workplaces, schools, and homes around the nation. Everywhere.

Screenshot by Zach Laidlaw/Windows 11

Microsoft’s mission to win back user trust

Unfortunately for Microsoft, a series of blunders have left users unhappy with the company’s portfolio of platforms and services. Here are just a few of its recent mistakes.

Windows has suffered from several critical bugs since the start of the year, all chipping away at OS security and eroding user trust.Microsoft’s aggressive push to inject its AI platform, Copilot, into every app and service has been poorly received, with users complaining about its ubiquitous integration that has only complicated usability.Xbox has suffered from major annual losses, with significant drops in hardware earnings and a small drop in software revenue.Where Windows once dominated the low-tier and mid-tier PC market, Apple’s new affordable Macbook Neo poses a significant threat to a computer segment that Microsoft historically kept mostly to itself.

In short, Microsoft is feeling the heat of competition, self-inflicted failures, and customer dissatisfaction on multiple fronts, and the only way to earn back user trust is to fix some of its more egregious mistakes. One of these is Windows’ user experience.

A new ‘Start’ for Windows

Microsoft Start is divided into two sections — the “Discover” view is powered by MSN propaganda, and the “Widgets” view shows only pertinent information without political commentary. By default, Microsoft Start opens to the Discover feed, filled with news stories designed to capture your attention. It’s clickbait. Meanwhile, the more useful Widgets are hidden behind an extra click; the default widgets include useful information, like weather, sports, finances, events near you, and a couple of other stragglers.

In an upcoming Windows update, Microsoft Start will show the Widgets view first, with the Discover feed as optional. Don’t get too excited, though. Microsoft will continue to pack left-wing stories into Microsoft Start, but on the upside, users can soon ignore it wholesale, making PCs a little less politically intrusive.

When asked about the decision, Microsoft said, “We’re working to make Widgets feel less distracting and overwhelming by making the experience quiet by default. To do this, we’re testing a new set of default settings designed to reduce unexpected alerts and visual interruptions.”

Get rid of MSN now

The refreshed Microsoft Start is currently only available in preview builds of Windows for developers. However, you don’t have to wait to banish the MSN feed from your taskbar. If you really want to kick it to the curb now, open Microsoft Start, click on the Settings gear at the bottom, uncheck the green toggle beside “Discover,” and that’s it! Microsoft Start will now default to the widgets view, which you can customize to your liking.

Screenshots by Zach Laidlaw/Windows 11

You’re now free from leftist propaganda, at least in this section of your Windows PC.

​Tech 

An Oklahoma homeowner was arrested and jailed after fatally shooting a squatter in his vacant residence earlier this month — and an attorney is saying a self-defense claim may be difficult to prove.

Timothy Smith, 59, is facing charges of first-degree manslaughter and reckless conduct with a firearm after shooting a squatter in his vacant house in Oklahoma City on May 1, KOCO-TV reported.

‘At trial, I’m sure the defense will be self-defense. What’s going to make that difficult? He told the police that he didn’t see a weapon in the hand of the victim.’

Smith on Friday remained behind bars in the Oklahoma County Detention Center. Jail information indicates Smith’s next court date is June 18 and that he’s also charged with assault and battery with a deadly weapon.

Smith told detectives he and his daughter checked on his house after having previous issues there with homeless people, KOCO reported.

Smith entered the home with a gun and found Justin King in the back bedroom with a woman, the station said.

Smith and his daughter told the pair to leave, but Smith said King stepped toward him, KOCO reported.

With that, Smith aimed at “the area” of King, and the gunshot struck King in the neck, the station said.

Criminal defense attorney Ed Blau told KOCO a self-defense claim on Smith’s part is complicated because Smith was not living in the home at the time of the shooting.

“There’s not the death penalty for squatting in the state of Oklahoma,” Blau told the station. “You can’t just take a gun in and shoot somebody.”

Blau added to the station that a self-defense argument also may be difficult to prove because Smith admitted to detectives that he did not feel threatened.

RELATED: Couple returns from vacation to find squatters who ate their brisket, drank their alcohol, and left meth in car, police say

“It would be difficult to have a stand-your-ground defense hold up,” Blau noted to KOCO.

The attorney added to the station that “at trial, I’m sure the defense will be self-defense. What’s going to make that difficult? He told the police that he didn’t see a weapon in the hand of the victim.”

Blau also told KOCO that while Oklahoma’s Castle Doctrine allows homeowners to use force against intruders in their primary residences, it’s different for vacant houses.

“If a trespasser or a burglar breaks in or comes into your home that you live in, and you’re there, you can pretty much shoot them or do whatever you want to with them because of the Castle Doctrine here in Oklahoma,” Blau told the station. “In a situation like this, an abandoned house, it’s much different. You can’t go in, put yourself in a situation, and say, ‘This is my house, so I felt I had the right to shoot him.'”

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Squatter, Fatal shooting, Oklahoma, Homeowner shoots squatter, Manslaughter, Oklahoma city, Castle doctrine, Self-defense, Arrest, Crime 

Rural America was once a refuge from radical leftists. Fewer amenities and job opportunities were a price some conservatives were willing to pay if it meant their traditional values and patriotism didn’t have to compete with progressivism.

But those pastoral sanctuaries are being blotted out one by one thanks to two new phenomena: hicklibs and fail-libs.

“As media and universities became more radical, their disciples moved into rural America through government-mandated institutions like schools and libraries,” says BlazeTV host Auron MacIntyre.

“Thus the hicklib was born.”

A hicklib, MacIntyre explains, is “usually a social outcast, a failson who needs a moral explanation for why he hates the community he never fit into.”

“His resentment searches for a theory that will dignify his rage, and the progressive missionaries installed in his local institutions are happy to provide one,” he says.

The message is one of moral superiority: America is evil; those who disagree are “racist, sexist, backwards religious fanatics, destroying the lives of minorities”; and “white Christian culture” is the real evil in the world.

“The hicklib’s failures to fit in become proof of moral superiority,” says MacIntyre.

Having found a solution to his inferiority complex, he sets out on a new mission.

“The hicklib shows up at town council meetings in a Black Lives Matter shirt to denounce minority oppression in a community with no actual black people. That absence naturally becomes further proof of the town’s intolerance,” says MacIntyre.

“He loudly organizes Pride events attended by two other hicklibs. That little clique stages protests, distributes flyers, and imitates urban activist rituals. By practicing the sacraments of their faith, they hope to summon the spirit of the age to judge their reactionary little town.”

The hicklib, MacIntyre argues, has become a “plague” for rural communities.

But as plagues often do, the hicklib has evolved.

“As the value of college degrees collapse, a new breed is emerging: the fail-lib,” says MacIntyre.

Unlike the failure-to-launch hicklib, the fail-lib is outwardly successful.

“The fail-lib worked hard in high school and gave progressive teachers every approved answer. She wrote her college entrance essay on the oppression of trans women of color in coal mining. On campus, she became an activist. She secured a degree in some woke humanities discipline and earned straight A’s by repeating everything her communist professor told her,” MacIntyre illustrates.

But despite her academic success, the fail-lib fails to land the “cushy corporate HR job” her expensive college degree promised her. Turns out, college degrees no longer come with the status they used to, and the “poor, oppressed immigrants” she’s long defended are now the preferred candidates.

Instead of moving to a big, liberal city like she planned, the fail-lib is forced to dwell among the rural “townies” she disdains.

She “was promised luxury and elite influence; now she serves the people she despises while searching for any opportunity to make their lives worse,” says MacIntyre, speculating that the rise of artificial intelligence will only “intensify this problem.”

“The fail-lib might make less money than you; she may be less respected than you; she may even be despised by the townies she once mocked, but in her heart, she knows she’s superior, and nothing could ever convince her otherwise.”

To hear more, watch the video above.

Want more from Auron MacIntyre?

To enjoy more of this YouTuber and recovering journalist’s commentary on culture and politics, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​The auron macintyre show, Auron macintyre, Hicklibs, Fail-libs, Rural 

What happens when a government can order technology companies to create a back door into encrypted communications that even they cannot access?

A rare cross-border coalition of Canadian civil-liberties advocates and Republican lawmakers is warning that Canada’s proposed surveillance legislation could threaten privacy rights on both sides of the border.

‘Privacy is not a luxury in a free society.’

Sweeping vulnerability

Supporters of proposed Bill C-22 say such powers are necessary to help law enforcement investigate terrorists, organized crime, and other serious threats in an age of encrypted messaging. Critics counter that once a vulnerability is built into a system, it cannot be confined to one country, one agency, or one investigation.

Last Friday, the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms presented a petition to the office of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. More than 40,000 people signed the petition opposing Bill C-22, which would expand the government’s ability to obtain electronic communications and other digital evidence during criminal and national security investigations.

US opposition

VPN providers are already threatening to leave the Canadian market if the bill becomes law. In a May 7 letter, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, warned Canada’s Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree that the legislation could jeopardize privacy rights in both countries.

“Canada’s Bill C-22, currently under consideration in Parliament, would drastically expand Canada’s surveillance and data access powers in ways that create significant cross-border risks to the security and data privacy of Americans,” the lawmakers wrote.

“We write to express our concerns that, if enacted, Bill C-22 would allow Canadian government officials to compel American companies to build backdoors into their encrypted systems, thereby introducing systemic vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers, foreign adversaries, and cybercriminals.”

The lawmakers also warned that the bill’s language is sufficiently broad to permit secret ministerial orders.

“If a U.S.-based provider is forced to redesign its system to facilitate Canadian authorized access to content that is currently inaccessible even to the provider itself, the resulting capability cannot be geographically limited,” they wrote. “This directly threatens the privacy of U.S. persons who expect and depend upon robust encryption to protect sensitive communications, health data, financial records, and personal correspondence from unwarranted intrusion.”

RELATED: Albertans are ready to vote on Canadian secession — so why is their premier stalling?

Separatist leader Mitch Sylvestre at a rally in front of the Elections Alberta headquarters in Edmonton, Canada. Henry Marken/Getty Images

Stark terms

At a Friday news conference before submitting the petition to Carney, JCCF board member John Robson, a prominent Ottawa historian and journalist, described the bill in stark terms.

“I’m here on Parliament Hill today because we are delivering a petition with 42,344 signatures asking Parliament not to proceed with Bill C-22 … because [Prime Minister Mark Carney] is the moving force behind this bill, and we’re hoping to persuade him that all these signatures from Canadians across the country … represent legitimate, serious concerns about the scope of this bill,” Robson said.

Robson noted that many Canadians and the constitutional scholars at the JCCF “are concerned about Bill C-22 because it would require service providers to compile Canadians’ electronic data, to develop systems for extracting information from it and turning it over to the government.”

“It’s not that Canadians … are against law enforcement having appropriate powers, including to fight organized crime,” Robson said.

“It’s one more ham-fisted way of targeting ordinary, law-abiding people instead of adopting tailored measures suitable to the real crime problems. And privacy is not a luxury in a free society.”

​Canada, Mark carney, Digital surveillance, Vpns, Privacy, Hackers, Jim jordan, Lifestyle 

As soon as polls closed in Texas on Tuesday, the Associated Press called a decisive victory for state Attorney General Ken Paxton, presumably ending Sen. John Cornyn’s 35-year political career. The 30-point margin was also another feather in Donald Trump’s cap.

“Last night was very powerful,” the president said at the start of Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting at the White House. In an earlier Truth Social post, he called Cornyn a friend and promised to headline “big, beautiful rallies” for Paxton in the upcoming months.

For the rest of the day, Trump posted screenshots of news outlets covering a 100% success rate in primary endorsements so far this year.

‘It’s an all time total collapse and embarrassment for the GOP establishment.’

In addition to showcasing Trump’s endorsement weight, the runoff election results also exposed the weakness of the Senate Republican establishment. For months, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Tim Scott took to the morning news shows extolling Cornyn’s virtues while insisting that he was the key to keeping Texas safely red. The NRSC posted lists of Paxton’s various personal and professional scandals, as Cornyn called his opponent an embarrassment.

In his concession speech Tuesday night, Cornyn committed to supporting Paxton as the party’s nominee, despite spending months calling him scandal-ridden and morally unqualified to hold office. Chastened Senate Republicans are likewise reversing course.

“A vote for Ken Paxton in November is a vote for a safer, stronger, and more prosperous America. He has my endorsement and support,” Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) posted to X on Tuesday night. He had previously endorsed Cornyn. “[James] Talarico is too radical for Texas. Ken will be a key member of our Senate Republican majority fighting for America First.”

The same night, the NRSC deleted every critical post of Paxton it had made over the past year, even though its statement on the general election does not mention him by name. Some conservative activists now want the organization to clean house. Breitbart News Washington bureau chief Matthew Boyle personally tagged NRSC staffers in posts on X, needling them for backing the wrong horse.

“It’s an all time total collapse and embarrassment for the GOP establishment,” Boyle wrote.

The NRSC faced a dilemma that Paxton’s backers will now confront. One of the most senior Republicans in the Senate, Cornyn has been a GOP fundraising heavyweight — a potentially significant factor in what is shaping up to be a strong Democratic year. He was also a former NRSC chair in 2010 and 2012. He could have largely funded his own race.

Paxton, however, will need party money to keep pace with newly emboldened Democrats who are pouring money into Talarico’s campaign. Furthermore, Paxton’s impeachment, messy divorce, and fraud allegations provide plenty of fodder for Democrat attack ads.

RELATED: JD Vance might be unstoppable in 2028

Akos Stiller/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Trump delivered his endorsement for Paxton on May 19 on Truth Social, after early voting had already begun in Texas. He did not notify the NRSC or Senate Republicans in advance of his post.

“He essentially let them know he didn’t care about their preferences at all,” Josh Blank, director of research for the Texas Politics Project, told RCP. “From a Republican elite perspective, not only does it look like you have to spend more money in Texas now, but you have to convince your donors that Ken Paxton is a good vehicle for that money — and Paxton has a challenging past to reconcile.”

As if on cue, the first Talarico ad dropped by Democrats detailed the many controversies that have dogged Paxton’s career. His wife filed for divorce in 2025, citing adultery. Former staffers have testified that he used his office to convince a friend to give his mistress a job.

In 2023, the Texas House of Representatives impeached Paxton on 20 articles for bribery, obstruction of justice, and abuse of power, but the state Senate voted to acquit and reinstate him. In 2024, he paid $300,000 and completed community service to settle an indictment for securities fraud.

Nevertheless, Cornyn’s re-election bid was already flailing even before Trump weighed in. Conservative voters were not enamored with his 2022 efforts to pass a bipartisan red-flag law. Last year, the National Association for Gun Rights PAC endorsed Paxton. In 2023, Cornyn suggested Trump might not be electable any more, a comment he walked back in 2024 and last year. But Trump remembered.

“I worked well with him, but he was not supportive of me when times were tough,” Trump wrote in a congratulatory post for Paxton.

Despite outspending the Paxton campaign 17-1 in advertising alone, Cornyn remained in a statistical tie with his opponent for most of his campaign.

“I think Paxton probably still could have won without Trump’s endorsement, but not at that magnitude. It was a blowout,” Conservative Partnership Institute Vice President of programs Rachel Bovard told RCP. “The Senate Republican conference is the chummiest place in America. Their political loyalties are to each other. So I think the dynamic is going to shift a little bit. The conference is being remade, and I don’t know that it’s going to be much help to Trump for the rest of the year.”

RELATED: How Trump can fix his endorsement problem

Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

From the beginning of Paxton’s bid, it became clear that the race would become about who could relate better to Trump. Cornyn was never the thorn in the president’s side that Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) or Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) often were.

But things came to a head when some media reports indicated that Trump was about to endorse Cornyn, at the urging of Senate Republicans. Then Paxton delivered a public promise to drop his campaign if the Senate passed the SAVE America Act, a voting reform bill that would require proof of identity and citizenship to vote.

“That was a pivotal moment in this election cycle,” Blank said. “Paxton demonstrated to Trump the lengths he would go to support his agenda and a key distinction between himself and Cornyn.”

The SAVE America Act passed the House but has not yet moved through the Senate. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) has said there is not enough support in the Senate to use a filibuster to pass the bill. Cornyn was one of several institutionalist members who said it is important to keep the 60-vote threshold, even if it means not passing the legislation. In March, Trump insisted that he would not sign any legislation until Congress passed the SAVE America Act, and he told the Senate to “kill the filibuster” to get it done.

“Cornyn long held that he did not think the filibuster should be changed because he held a certain amount of fealty to the institution of the U.S. Senate. Paxton demonstrated his fealty to the president, and that was ultimately much more persuasive,” Blank said.

Some analysts say this further cements Trump’s political kingmaker status, at least within the Republican Party, even while his popularity is sinking.

“There is zero doubt tonight that Donald Trump is in complete and total control of the Republican Party,” pollster and political consultant Frank Luntz posted on X on Tuesday night.

He can beat just about any Republican in just about any state in just about any primary. He is chief strategist, chief advocate, and chief voice of the GOP. His name may not be on the ballot in November, but make no mistake: Nothing and no one will have a bigger impact on voter behavior.

Trump’s involvement hardly guarantees Paxton’s win in November. The attorney general has advantages with name recognition and his record of winning statewide elections in the past. But Talarico is surging with his own fundraising, and Texas Republicans sometimes have a turnout problem in years when Trump is not on the ballot.

“We would expect most Cornyn-supporting Republican voters to support Ken Paxton come November, because they’ve voted for him in the past,” Blank said. “But if even a small share of Republicans decide that Ken Paxton is ethically unfit for office, as John Cornyn argued and spent nearly $100 million promoting, that makes a competitive election that much more competitive.”

In a Wednesday appearance on “The Hugh Hewitt Show,” Thune described the GOP’s newfound advocacy for Paxton.

“Obviously, we are making the pivot,” Thune said.

“He’s all-in, ready to go for the fall election, and not taking any time off, already on the phone raising money and all the things you’re going to have to do to be successful.”

Editor’s note: This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.

​Ken paxton, Texas, James talarico, John cornyn, Donald trump, Gop, Senate republicans, Save act, Opinion & analysis 

As theories about aliens, flying saucers, and disclosure swirl in the wake of the UFO file dump, an Allie Beth Stuckey interview from a few years ago has resurfaced.

In 2023, the “Relatable” host interviewed Jeremiah Roberts and Andrew Soncrant, hosts of the popular Christian apologetics podcast “Cultish,” a show that explores cults, high-control religious groups, and related movements from theological, sociological, and psychological angles.

Allie cut straight to the chase and asked the duo if aliens, UFOs, and the like are even something Christians should concern themselves with: “I could see a lot of people listening to this and be like, ‘Well, that’s just too much for me. It’s kind of scary. It’s kind of overwhelming.’ … Why do Christians — why should Christians really care about this?”

The answer they gave was compelling.

According to Roberts and Soncrant, the alien conversation “shouldn’t be taboo” for Christians. If anything, it’s a subject that demands a biblical response.

“Everything — all the creation, both visible and invisible — they’re created by Christ and for Christ,” says Roberts, “so we as Christians, we should have confidence that this whole discussion of aliens, demons, unidentified aerial phenomena exists in the universe that Christ is upholding by the word of his power, so that’s why this is something as Christians we can’t ignore.”

Soncrant agrees and cites 1 Peter 3:15: “But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.”

“We need to be able to have a defense — a reasonable defense — for what we are seeing with this phenomenon,” he says.

Soncrant argues that when Christians “shrink back from popular culture,” they “end up letting the secular world interpret the evidences through their own presuppositions and come up with conclusions that are antithetical to the biblical worldview.”

“We need to be in God’s word, and we need to be speaking out in the public sphere. That’s why God commands us to,” he declares.

Roberts notes that when they first began “Cultish” in 2018, his friend and Presbyterian minister Colin Samul reached out and urged them to prepare to speak on the alien/UFO subject.

Samul predicted they would see “the whole UFO conversation showing up in the news on a regular basis” and encouraged them to “embrace” the subject in a biblical way so that they could then field questions from their audience.

“And sure enough, a lot of what he initially talked to me about has come to fruition,” says Roberts.

Today, both he and Soncrant continue today to address the alien/UFO debate through a biblical lens, offering a reasoned Christian response to recent UAP disclosures and the growing cultural fascination with non-human intelligence.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

To enjoy more of Allie’s upbeat and in-depth coverage of culture, news, and theology from a Christian, conservative perspective, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Relatable, Allie beth stuckey, Jeremiah roberts, Andrew soncrant, Cultish, Disclosure