One of the perennial arguments by atheists is that religion is dangerous and that religion has led to wars and untold suffering. I thought about that claim when I was interviewing Ray Comfort about his new book and video on atheism. He has some arresting statistics.

He documents that the ideas of Karl Marx, for example, led to the deaths of more than 90 million people. Joseph Stalin alone accounted for the deaths by murder or starvation of as many as 60 million. Mao Zedong is responsible for that many or more. Add to that the atheistic regimes of dictators like Vladimir Lenin and Adolf Hitler, and you can see that it is atheism that is has been the scourge of humanity.

In some of his earlier books, Dinesh D’Souza came to a similar conclusion that the atheist regimes were much more deadly than any religious conflict. He wrote that “death caused by Christian rulers over a five-hundred-year period amounts to only 1 percent of the deaths caused by Stalin, Hitler, and Mao in the space of a few decades.”

Dr. R.J. Rummel is professor emeritus of political science at the University of Hawaii. He estimates that since 1900, the total body count is approximately 262 million dead from the bloody hands of atheistic governments.

The Encyclopedia of Wars says that there have been 1,763 wars during human history. About 123 could be considered religious wars, and over half of those religious wars were pursued in the name of Islam. Even so, that number represents merely 7 percent of all wars. In other words, 93 percent of all wars were not religious but political in nature.

These are just a few facts and statistics to consider the next time you hear an atheist rail against religion and claim that religion is dangerous and the reason we have had so many wars and suffering in the world.

Federal courts have thrown out part or all of the voter-ID laws in states like North Carolina, Texas, and Wisconsin. Judges and politicians argue that they are racially discriminatory and completely unnecessary since voter fraud rarely occurs.

Americans apparently disagree. The latest Pew Research Center survey found that only 31 percent of Americans were confident that the votes were accurately counted in the 2012 election. Last night I was at a meeting where party officials were concerned about voter fraud and explained how the voter-ID laws reduced the amount of voter fraud that apparently was taking place in one Texas county.

John Fund has written about this subject in two books and numerous columns. His latest piece in National Review reminds us that concerns about voter fraud are legitimate and well documented. Political scientists writing in the Washington Post estimated that about 6.4 percent of non-citizens voted in 2008 and 2.2 percent of non-citizens voted in 2010.

Investigative reporter James O’Keefe and his team have shown how easy it is to impersonate someone else in order to affect the vote. His most recent outing in Michigan tested the state’s voter-ID law that allows non-ID holders to vote by merely filling out an affidavit. Such affidavits are rarely checked.

You have to love his sense of humor. He told different poll workers he was Detroit mayor Mike Duggan, Wayne State University Law School dean Jocelyn Benson, and columnist Nancy Kaffer – all whom strongly oppose voter-ID laws. He was even offered the ballot of Michigan rapper Emimen.

During this campaign season we will probably hear politicians and voters claim that America’s elections are rigged. That is not the case, but ballot integrity isn’t what it should be. And that is why millions of Americans are not convinced that voter fraud rarely occurs.

Religious liberty is one of the foundations of America, and it is a right enshrined in the First Amendment. But Mary Eberstadt is concerned about the widespread discrimination in today’s secular society. She explains why in her book, It’s Dangerous to Believe: Religious Freedom and Its Enemies. Her book begins with the many stories that I have presented in various commentaries and that we often discuss on radio each week with Kelly Shackelford of First Liberty. Then she goes on to explain how Christians can respond to critics by holding them to standards they supposedly accept.

Two examples show why Christians need to be concerned about this trend and need to learn how to respond. First, there is the sad story about Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich who was hounded out of his position merely because he supported Proposition 8 in 2008 in California. By the way, a majority of the voters in the state supported the proposition. Mary Eberstadt made the point that if someone this important and powerful could be forced out of a business, what chance do the rest of us have?

The second example is Michael Lindsay, president of Gordon College in Massachusetts. He and fourteen other Christians signed a letter asking for a “religious exemption” to the president’s planned executive order banning sexual orientation discrimination by federal contractors. It is worth mentioning that even Senator Elizabeth Warren supported a religious exemption in such cases.

The city of Salem suspended a long-term contract with Gordon. The Lynn School Committee ended its relationship with the college and refused to accept Gordon College students as student-teachers. Then the New England Association of Schools and Colleges announced that it was going to consider whether the college violated their standards for accreditation.

It is easy to see the irony. Three centuries after the original Salem witch trials, Gordon College was subjected to a secularist witch trial. This is why Christians need to understand what is happening and take a bold stand for religious liberty.

Every four years there is usually a debate about the accuracy of the polls. So here is my quadrennial commentary on polling. First, let’s look at their statistical accuracy. A typical three-day poll of 1000 people if proportioned among the 3000 counties can accurately represent American adults 19 out of 20 times within three percentage points.

The real question about the polls isn’t whether they are statistically accurate but whether they are polling the right people and whether the people being polled are giving honest answers. We should assume that reputable polling firms do conduct polls that accurately mirror race, sex, age, geography, and educational makeup.

What is more difficult to determine is whether they have polled the right people. Are they polling likely voters or all Americans in general? Four years ago, just over half (57.5%) of all American adults voted. A poll that can closely predict the electoral outcome needs to be taken of likely voters.

Another question is whether people being polled are giving honest answers. Pollsters have found that when asked certain questions about issues or candidates, they may give the answer they think the pollster wants. Experts refer to this as a “social desirability bias.” In the past, many of the state marriage protection amendments passed with a higher percentage than what was predicted in the polls.

There is also what is known as the “Bradley effect.” Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley was an African-American who lost in 1982 despite being ahead in the polls. Some voters told pollsters they were undecided or going to vote for Bradley because they didn’t want to say they weren’t voting for the black candidate. This year, voters might feel they should say they will vote for Hillary Clinton as the first woman president or may feel it is unpopular to say they are voting for Donald Trump.

All of this to say that polls can be statistically accurate if they poll the right people and get honest answers. Sometimes that’s not the case.

The circumstantial evidence was very clear but the Obama administration told us that it was just a coincidence. The government secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of euros and Swiss francs that coincided with the January release of four Americans held hostage in Iran. On my radio program I played a Fox Business Network interview with Pastor Saeed Abedini, who was told at the airport that he and the other hostages would be waiting for hours until another plane landed.

We all know what this was: it was a ransom payment. But the administration denies this and wants us to believe it was merely a coincidence. Once again, the Obama administration is engaged in gaslighting.

You may not be familiar with the term. Gaslighting comes from the play and the movie “Gas Light.” It describes how sociopaths and narcissists lie and manipulate victims who eventually begin to doubt their own memory and perception. In this case, the Obama administration wants you to believe their version and doubt your perception.

We can also think of other cases of gaslighting. The attack on Benghazi on September 11, 2012 looked like a terrorist attack to all of us. Nearly 150 gunmen wearing flak jackets attacked the compound with guns, RPGs, and other weapons. It looked like a coordinated attack, but we were told that it was a spontaneous demonstration over an Internet video that was posted weeks earlier.

How about this one? Remember when the president told us at least 30 times that “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor” and “if you like your plan, you can keep your plan.” Later he tried to explain that we misunderstood what he promised. Our memory and perception of his claim was in error.

This, my friends, is called gaslighting. The president and his administration want you to believe their version and assume your memory and perception are wrong. But after nearly eight years of this, I think we all now know who is wrong.

Thomas Sowell recently wrote about what he thinks is the dumbest idea in politics. Now when you are talking about politics and public policy, there are lots of dumb ideas, but this one might be top of the list.

He thinks that the most stupid idea you can find in politics is “the assumption that people would be evenly or randomly distributed in incomes, institutions, occupations, or awards.” He argues that this assumption is the basis for so many political crusades and personal careers as grievance mongers.

What set him off were a number of articles that have appeared recently about the fact that females are underrepresented among the highest rated chess players and how women and minorities are under-represented in high tech jobs in Silicon Valley. Are girls who want to play chess finding doors slammed in their face? Are women and minorities who want degrees in computer science being prevented from pursuing that career? There is no evidence of that.

When you get into racial and ethnic differences, there is where this false assumption in the grievance industry really shows up. Differences in outcomes are just naturally assumed to be due to racism or discrimination of some type. Thomas Sowell points out that something as simple as age differences might explain the different economic circumstances.

For example, if every 20-year-old Puerto Rican in America had an identical income of every Japanese American (and identical incomes at every other age), the Japanese Americans as a group would still have a higher average income than Puerto Ricans in the U.S. Why? The median age of Japanese Americans is more than 20 years older. They have more work experience so they have higher incomes.

Perhaps you can now see why Thomas Sowell thinks this assumption about equality is a dumb idea. When you factor in relevant criteria and also recognize people have different gifts and talents, you begin find reasons why there are economic differences in society.

Bob Kocher served as a special assistant to President Obama for health care and economic policy. In fact, he was the only physician on the National Economic Council advising the president. So it is remarkable that his most recent op-ed had the title: “How I Was Wrong About ObamaCare.”

He and many others pushing the Affordable Care Act believed that the consolidation of doctors into larger physician groups would improve health care delivery and patient care. Some of his colleagues even wrote that this would “unleash forces that favor integration across the continuum of care.”

The prediction about consolidation did take place. Last year alone there were 112 hospital mergers. Unfortunately, their prediction that would improve health care was wrong. The idea was that organizing medicine into these networks would lower costs and improve options for doctors and patients. It turns out that these networks are barriers to better care.

A small, independent practice usually knows their patients better than any large health system can. They are also more likely to innovate and bring about change. One example Bob Kocher uses is electronic health records. The larger hospitals and physician groups have asked to delay implementation. By contrast, independent primary-care doctors are able to change their care models within weeks. It doesn’t take them years to root out waste or to redesign schedules so patients can see their doctors.

These large health systems are like a big car manufacturer that can provide you with lots of options on your car. They can give you personalized options but rarely provide you with personal care. By contrast, the smaller practices can make changes faster and do provide more personal patient care.

I appreciate Bob Kocher for honestly admitting that when it came to this feature of ObamaCare, he and others on the president’s team were wrong.

This year we will be hearing quite a bit about the Trans Pacific Partnership, also known as TPP. It not only will be part of the presidential campaign, but there is good reason to believe an important vote will be taken on it after the November election.

The TPP agreement establishes a Trans-Pacific Partnership Commission that has sweeping regulatory powers. It is charged with overseeing the implementation and operation of the agreement and has the power to amend it or modify it. In fact, the White House says the TPP is a “living agreement” that can be updated at any time.

Curtis Ellis was on my radio program recently. He said this commission is “an international regulatory agency [that] will be staffed by faceless, unelected bureaucrats tasked with writing rules on immigration, food, energy, medicine, Internet, copyright, patents and business within our borders as well as across our borders.”

The TPP could be compared to the EU, which originally started out at a coal and steel cooperative, then evolved into the European Common Market, and now is the European Union. Months ago, the president made it clear that the U.S. wasn’t interested in the UK if they left the EU because he wanted to negotiate with a big bloc like the EU. The U.S. Trade Representative reinforced those comments by saying that the administration only wanted to build trade platforms like the TPP.

As Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton helped negotiate the TPP but then renounced it last fall, perhaps to fend off the challenge from Bernie Sanders. Some skeptics believe that is merely a tactical feint, and that she will push TPP through after the election. Donald Trump has consistently been against the TPP.

The TPP is a bad trade deal, but that won’t stop many in this administration that will push for a critical vote by the end of the year.

It isn’t any real surprise that voters this year aren’t too excited about the two major party candidates. Some apparently don’t want to choose between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. They are taking a second look at third party candidates.

That is probably why support for these candidates seems to be increasing. An article in The Hill reports that Libertarian Gary Johnson has gone from 4.5 percent to 7.2 percent in the RealClearPolitics polling averages. Green Party candidate Jill Stein has also seen an increase from 2.5 percent to 3.5 percent.

Will these third party candidates affect the election? Just ask Democrats who are convinced that Ralph Nader’s 2.5 percent in Florida led to the 2000 election of George W. Bush over Al Gore. Some Republicans believe that the 19 million votes in 1992 cast for Ross Perot cost George H.W. Bush the election.

The possible impact on this year’s election may be a factor, but it is unclear how much. Most polls show Libertarian Gary Johnson pulling more from conservative voters than from liberals. Just the opposite seems to be true for Green Party candidate Jill Stein. It is also interesting that a Quinnipiac poll found that Donald Trump did better in swing states against Hillary Clinton when all four candidates were included in the poll questions.

Will any third party candidate make it to the debate stage? That is unlikely since you need to be receiving at least 15 percent of the vote. Ross Perot was able to get on the 1992 stage. I don’t see Gary Johnson joining Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

However, the impact of a third party candidate in a swing state could be significant. Ralph Nader had an impact in Florida. Gary Johnson or Jill Stein could have an impact in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, New Mexico, or Florida. That is why it is worth watching third party candidates and their campaigns.