The Glenn Beck Program - Best of Program | Guests: Chad Felix Greene & Leon Wolf | 12/13/18

Episode Date: December 13, 2018

Best of Program | Guests: Chad Felix Greene & Leon Wolf | 12/13/18 - Built To Never Piss You Off? - Gay Conservatives = Non-Existent? (w/ Chad Felix Greene) - The Important Parts? (w/ Leon Wolf) ... - Death of 9-year-old McKenzie Adams? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 The Blaze Radio Network On Demand. Hey, welcome to the podcast. A great show for you today, surprisingly, don't you think? Yeah, I mean, we weren't trying to make it good. Yeah, and it's very rare. We'll hit them about once every 10 days where it's a good podcast. But today, you don't want to miss it.
Starting point is 00:00:20 We talk about Cohen and what this means with the National Enquirer. Also, a little bit about the Farm Bill. We have an interview with Chad Felix Green about being gay and conservative. He wrote this great article for the Federalist that says, you know, I'm gay, and it was less dangerous for me to be gay than it is for me to be conservative. Oh, and the reaction to it is priceless. Oh, my gosh. It just prove his point over and over again. The straight liberals that are like, you don't know what it means to be gay.
Starting point is 00:00:49 And you do? Anyway, we have that also a little bit about the Chinese and Canadians, what's happening there. And an update from a story we told you yesterday out of Tacoma. A guy who arrived on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day always wanted to go back. His wife of 71 years just passed away. I asked the audience, do you want to send him to the 75th anniversary of D-Day? You did an update with the family on today's podcast. You're listening to The Best of the Blenbeck program.
Starting point is 00:01:35 It's Thursday, December 13th. I love Patreon Mobile. I love Patreon Mobile, too. I don't know why people don't do this. I don't know either because I think people just get, you know, you get stuck in the rut of, you know, some company you've been with for a while with your cell phone. And you don't think about where your money's going.
Starting point is 00:01:49 But, I mean, it's going to a lot of times hardcore left-wing causes because these companies spend tens of millions of dollars supporting progressive candidates, progressive causes. And it's your money, right? You're paying it to them and they're paying it to the... It's a great thing is you still have the same great service, you know, using backbones and you have the great service. However, you're not paying all the...
Starting point is 00:02:10 extra fees to these companies that they're taking and diverting to causes that you hate. Yeah. It really doesn't make any sense to do it the other way. Patriot Mobile is fantastic. Go to PatriotMobil.com. Switch. They're going to help conservative causes. It's PatriotMobile.com slash Blaze.
Starting point is 00:02:26 Get started today when you use the offer code Blaze. They're going to waive your activation fee for up to two lines. Just stop supporting the left wing causes. PatriotMobil.com slash Blaze or 1-800. A Patriot for Patriot Mobile. It's worth a couple of minutes to make this switch. It makes a big difference. I'm very excited about the head of Google and everything that he's doing and wants to do and continues to do.
Starting point is 00:02:50 Right. Because they're completely neutral, you know, and trustworthy. Yes, he's not biased. No. He runs his company based on the fact that he's not biased. And of course, their motto itself is don't be evil. So, you know, they can't be. No, they changed that.
Starting point is 00:03:05 They did change that. So I guess now they can be evil. And be evil. They're like, you know what? We are doing a lot of evil things. It was too hard. Yeah. That's a pretty harsh line.
Starting point is 00:03:16 Pretty harsh line. Yesterday, he testified that, you know, your concerns about AI are very legitimate. However, the tech industry should be trusted to responsibly regulate themselves. Yes. I agree with that 100%. Because, again, they used to. they used to have a motto that was don't be evil. Right.
Starting point is 00:03:42 People who are evil, like, okay, the devil comes back. Okay, let's just say the Antichrist comes to earth. He's not going to have that motto. Right. No, he's not. No, he is not. No. He might, although he might say he does.
Starting point is 00:03:57 What do you mean? He might actually say. No, the devil, when you're evil, you have to come out and say. You have to say. It's like, are you a undercover cop? You have to say. to say yes. Yes.
Starting point is 00:04:08 So are you the Antichrist? He has to say yes. Are you doing evil? Yes, we are. Yes, okay. You caught me. I'm here to destroy mankind. You caught me.
Starting point is 00:04:20 Caught me again. A Scooby-Doo fan. That mystery machine every time. Wasn't it your conversation with, okay, what's his face? What's his face? The developer of the AI. Ray Cursewild.
Starting point is 00:04:35 Cursewile. And his thing was, Because, yeah, we're just going to develop it. And there are no concerns because our culture at Google is such that we wouldn't do anything wrong. We'll never do these things. That's what he said. We'll never do these things. And I said, when in the history of mankind has that worked?
Starting point is 00:04:54 Yeah. Name one time. Right. Well, now because it's better now. Because we're Google. Right. Or Google. And that's not enough for me.
Starting point is 00:05:04 Really? Yeah. Yeah. That seems to be lacking. And if they had Hugo Boss designed some snappy uniforms for everybody at Google. Do they look really cool?
Starting point is 00:05:14 Do they look really cool? And they hold up through history? Well, then you'll let them. You'll let them. Because nobody would dress like that. No. If they were evil. No, that's right.
Starting point is 00:05:25 Right. That's right. So you know they're specifically evil when they start dressing like that. So he got to talking about Google's AI as it applies to filtering out some of the hate, the hate speech and the nastyness.
Starting point is 00:05:44 Important work. He said he has found, through these algorithms, some hateful conspiratorial YouTube videos, and he described them as abhorrent, and he indicated that the company is going to work harder to improve its systems to get rid of this stuff. Things like one of the videos he mentioned
Starting point is 00:06:02 was one that's real popular, I think, among all conservatives. It's the one where Hillary Clinton and Uma Abidine attacked, killed, and drank the blood of a young girl. Oh, yeah. I think we've all been all over that video. How many? Finally it's out. How many times did we play that?
Starting point is 00:06:20 Yeah, finally it's out. Thank you for. Thank you. Somebody in the mainstream media. It's finally talking about how Hillary Clinton drinks blood of children. And Huma, Uma and Hillary, we're both, you know, killing and drinking the blood of the girls. Is that typical, like, you know, partisan spin, though? Are they trying to say they only drank the blood of one girl?
Starting point is 00:06:40 Yeah. Is that what they're trying to say? Come on now. You know, you know what's the word. Here's a deal. And we all know, they won't cover this. They won't cover this. That they're only drinking the remaining blood that the Jews didn't make into Mata.
Starting point is 00:06:54 Thank you. Right? Thank you. But because of the Jewish cabal, you know, you can never say that. Here's the thing about these algorithms. I don't need the algorithm to tell me that that. YouTube video isn't necessarily factually based. Wait a minute.
Starting point is 00:07:14 Can you not at least give the American people? Nope. Any credit? No. No. No. So we need these algorithms. Of course we do.
Starting point is 00:07:24 And that's good. That's good that AI is going to clean up all this stuff. So all the killing and drinking of blood of girls from our politicians, those videos are going to go away. So think about this. Think about this because we used to say, hey, listen, it was on Walter Cronkite. Yeah. It was on Walter Cronkite. I heard him say it.
Starting point is 00:07:43 Yeah. The more they take these algorithms and they say, yes, we're taking away all of the things that aren't true, the more, the more weak our mind becomes, because we're not searching for those things ourselves, the more we trust them. The less capable we will be. Correct. And the more we will say, look, the algorithm would have taken that out of it. it wasn't true. Right. I mean, we just become lambs for the slaughter.
Starting point is 00:08:13 And Google is so brilliant. Just brilliant. I learned this from, who was it, the guy who did the creepy line movie, I think. And he was talking about, look at, it was in one of the books. I can't remember. But look at the Google homepage.
Starting point is 00:08:36 When you go to Google, what's on the page of Google? Go to their homepage. The logo and... Just the search thing. Just the search. Okay. Go now to Yahoo. Totally clean.
Starting point is 00:08:46 Oh, yeah. There's all sorts of stuff on Yahoo. Yeah. Right? It's got politics. It has news. It has advertising. It has all of these things.
Starting point is 00:08:53 Google kept it clean because they wanted to say, we're completely neutral. We're nothing. We're not trying to sell you anything. We're not trying to do anything here at all. No ads? You can trust us. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:09:06 It's brilliant. That is their uniform from Hugo Boss. Their front page is their uniform. Which they've not changed since it was... No. debuted, I think, in 19, what, 97 or 98? They don't want... Hasn't changed a bit.
Starting point is 00:09:20 They don't want you. They want you to see the word Google and what you're looking for. So it's your friend. That is brilliant. It never pisses you off. Yeah. It's a brilliant strategy and it's a great hiding place. And it works so well.
Starting point is 00:09:36 that we continue to use it even though we know we probably shouldn't. How many times have we tried to get away from Google stuff? And you can't because every time you try a different engine, it doesn't work as well. And you're like, okay, I'm just going to Google it. Right? I mean, that's what I do every time.
Starting point is 00:09:54 I've tried Bing. I've tried, you know, Yahoo, Lycos. It's like, yes, Jeeves. It just don't work. It's like Google has become a verb. where like Kleenex just means to us tissue. Okay. And people, it's tissue.
Starting point is 00:10:14 It's tissue paper. It's not Kleenex. Kleenex is a brand. How did that happen other than they must have been out in the market for a long time before anybody caught on that, hey, you know, wiping a little box is a good thing. Here, you could have a tissue and it could be, I don't even know who makes tissue besides Kleenex, but I know everybody who's, you know, it does. But we still call it Kleenex.
Starting point is 00:10:38 Google is so far ahead of their competition. It's like if Kleenex competitors were like cardboard, you'd have a cardboard box and you'd reach in and you'd pull out another piece of cardboard. You'd be like, okay, can I have the Kleenex? Because it doesn't do it. There's nothing that is even close, I think, to Google. Again, it's so immersive, though. I mean, because if we say Google and we need an alternative, we will get 1,400 calls for people saying,
Starting point is 00:11:06 use duck duck go which is another I know search engine and duck duck go is it does actually seem to be pretty good and every time I've used it I've used it on Chrome the Google browser which doesn't do me any good at all I don't think that's the only reason why they have the browser
Starting point is 00:11:21 because they know you will escape someplace else it's like I said to Ray Kurzweil so Ray why would a company like Google allow me to Google things or allow me to find things that could dismantle them. If I was going to make a new thing, I couldn't do it online because you'd be monitoring everything.
Starting point is 00:11:48 And why wouldn't it be in the best interest of the company to make sure that I'm thwarted some way or another? Or that I'm watched and you guys just take it. And was his answer, they just wouldn't? They just wouldn't. They just wouldn't. They're just too good. The culture at Google is too good. Well, they're not evil.
Starting point is 00:12:05 Right. They're not evil. That's when you're dangerous, though, right? When you think you're so good and your goals are so wonderful, it's when these really terrible decisions get made. It's because you're sure the end game, I know I'm right on. So, yeah, we have to cut corners here and here. That's why the creepy line is so spooky.
Starting point is 00:12:25 Because they came out and said, look, we know there's this creepy line, and we're going to go right up to that line, but never over it. Well, that line is probably pretty great. You know what I mean? Let's know. I don't. I don't about you, but when I, like, I'm paying my taxes and stuff, I don't say, I want to go right up to where I'm going to go to jail, but no further.
Starting point is 00:12:47 This is essentially the decision-making process of Joe Biden whenever he sees someone in a biker outfit. He's like, I've got to go right up to the creepy line and not cross it. But he doesn't know where the creepy line is. He constantly is over it. Yeah. I guarantee having him sit on your lap is past the creepy line. The best of the Glenn Beck program. America, I need you to brace yourself.
Starting point is 00:13:14 Okay? Just brace yourself. We're going to have a conservative on. And sure, that's not unusual. But in one minute, we are going to have a gay conservative on. What? I didn't even know they existed. And the left is saying that if you're gay and conservative, you just need to shut up.
Starting point is 00:13:34 And I think that's the words most uttered by anti-fascists. A fascinating story. A fascinating tale from one of the guys who is a contributor at the Federalist. He wrote a piece a couple of days ago, The Stigma Against My Conservative Politics is worse than the stigma of my being gay. Oh my gosh, that was setting hair on fire everywhere. We go there in one minute. This is the Glenn Beck program.
Starting point is 00:14:10 The stigma against my conservative politics is worse. than the stigma of being gay. Everything I was told to fear about being openly gay has become a reality in being openly conservative. Chad Felix Green wrote this story in The Federalist, and we have him now to talk not only about the article, but also the backlash on the article. Chad, how are you?
Starting point is 00:14:43 Good. Good. Thank you. Welcome to the program. So you are, tell me your evolution. Tell me when you came out, what you faced, what you feared when you came out? Well, I came out in 1998, shortly after Ellen did, and I was the first openly gay student
Starting point is 00:15:01 in my high school, and it was a huge dramatic issue. And everything that I had access to at that time was gay media that told me that I was going to be rejected by my family, my friends, I was in physical danger, and I was terrified every day about the impending doom that was going to happen to me. And over the years, I really only experienced people being accepting and loving and careful and sort of fragile around me for most of my experience. And I was very liberal in college and then honestly listening to – I started to explore you and Ann Coulter. And I realized that the foundation of my views leaned more towards libertarianism than progressivism. And I just sort of became a conservative by the sheer force of I had no other choice because I couldn't promote or accept progressive ideas.
Starting point is 00:16:04 Yeah, and you can't change what you believe. It becomes fundamental to you. So, Chad, do you actually mean that the stigma is worse because you're a conservative? than it was when you came out in 99? Absolutely. When I came out, people thought they were concerned about me. My grandmother, who was a very religious Christian, was worried about my religious experience. My dad was worried that I was going to get hurt, that I was going to become HIV positive, that sort of thing.
Starting point is 00:16:44 There were a lot of, what is your life going to be like now? Because people at that time really didn't see much of a lot. as an adult for a gay person. You kind of moved to a big city, disappeared. And that was, there was a lot of understanding that needed to happen. People just needed to experience me as a person and realize how normal and average I was. As a conservative, I experienced genuine hatred based on stereotypes and bigotry and prejudices. Okay, so wait, wait, before you start there, you were a liberal when you came out.
Starting point is 00:17:19 And so you didn't have any of the conservative hate on you because you were, you know, trying to destroy our society because you're a liberal and, you know, all of that stuff. Or, you know, none of the conservative hate that, you know, you're going to burn in the fires of hell and you should be destroyed. I certainly perceived it from watching, from reading LGBT media. and that's the reason why I started to explore conservative media because I really wanted to, I wanted to read your books, I wanted to read Anculder books, John Handy, everybody, and debunk everything. I wanted to prove that the right was hateful and wrong and accidentally realized that I agreed with you. But the truth is that nobody treated me. I experienced people who disagreed with me.
Starting point is 00:18:14 I experienced people who were ignorance that didn't really understand. I've never interpreted religious disagreement as hatred, because I've always seen it coming from a place of genuine concern and empathy. But you also don't deny that there are those people who are out there. And, you know, I mean, the Westboro Baptist Church, but it is bigger than that. There are a lot of people who have been gay throughout, you know, the human experience that have been, you know, deeply affected and hurt and persecuted because of their homosexuality? Yes.
Starting point is 00:18:51 Okay. And, of course, in the world right now, outside of the United States, it is a very real danger to be a gay person or perceived to be a gay person. Correct. All right. So what have you experienced now as a conservative? Well, the truth is that since I've been active online, And as a conservative, I spend most of my time trying to explain to people that I don't believe or embrace what they think I do. And in doing so, attempting to prevent them from trying to harm me in some way.
Starting point is 00:19:27 I've, of course, been physically threatened, as all conservatives on Linear. I've had to make sure that my personal life is very protected because people do actively try to get you fired. They will try to, they'll send police office to your house. They will harass your friends and family. Early on when my Facebook was opened, my friends and family received harassment from people based on things that I said. I had to protect all of that. No one ever did that to me as a gay person. I never experienced people saying, finding out that I was gay and then treating me badly.
Starting point is 00:20:03 The moment that people associate me with being a conservative, I'm instantly a Nazi, if not Jewish. I'm mentally a racist and a bigot, and I'm deserving of genuine hatred. And that's a startling experience to interact with people and realize that they genuinely hate you based on something that they genuinely don't understand about you. This is the Glenn Beck program. We're talking to Chad Felix Green. He wrote the article in the Federalist, The Stigma Against My Conservative Politics is worse than the stigma of being gay. tell me about stop flaunting your conservatism. One thing that people say constantly, and you'll tell a lot of this when someone asked you as being conservative worse than being gay, was no, being conservative means you're a bad person.
Starting point is 00:20:57 I'm often told, well, if you don't want to experience the hatred, stop being a bigot or stop harassing people who you hate from their perception. perceptions. And I always sort of associated that with if I just stopped talking about conservative issues, if I just stopped correcting lies and inaccuracies that I see in media, if I just stopped talking back to the left, they would leave me alone. And that's exactly the advice that I got when I was younger and I would tell people I was gay and I feared negative backlash. People say, well, why do you have to tell everybody? Just don't tell anybody's no one's business. That's what I experienced today is in my regular life, most people don't, you know, most people I know aren't interested in politics, but they'll say, well,
Starting point is 00:21:49 why do you do it then? Why don't you just stop? And there isn't an appreciation of what we actually do. They just assume that we're sort of complaining about the hatred that we're inviting on ourselves. And they don't really understand that we are fighting for something that we actually believe in and that the hatred that we're getting forward is based on fighting. But they'll say that, you know, you're gay, you're born that way, you have no choice. And that's not political viewpoint. Right. Take that of argument apart.
Starting point is 00:22:29 It's, I think that's a huge concept here is people saying, well, you can stop being conservative or they assume that I'm conservative because I am self-hating or because I'm ignorant in some way or because I haven't been exposed to the right type of people that I will get better and become progressive. And the reason that I used that analogy that I didn't choose to be conservative is based on my personal experience of I fought it every step of the way. I love that. Chad, I love that. I love that. love that because you are intellectually honest and the biggest problem that we have in America is it's a lot of people will not explore because they'll start to and if they start to see that
Starting point is 00:23:20 maybe their side is weak and I mean on both sides any side they start to see that they're maybe they're not right they'll stop because they instinctively know if I find out that this is true then I've got to change everything and my life is going to be much different and they don't want to do it. They're afraid. So congratulations on not being that person. Anyway. Thank you. It would have been a whole lot easier if I had. I bet it would. I bet it would. But no, it's a, I realized that the foundation of what, of, the foundation of LGBT is progressivism. You can't escape that. And, you know, I have a husband, and that didn't come from conservative ideas. That came from progressive pushing. But the
Starting point is 00:24:04 foundation of progressivism denies liberty. It denies individuality. It denies freedom. And that's where I realized that I had a significant breaking point. I kind of, we'll talk about it, the left and the right today as the left is being progressivism. And everyone who doesn't agree with progressivism finds themselves on the right. And as I explored these ideas and tried to challenge them, I realized I am pro-life. I am pro-gun in that I think you should be able to defend yourself. You know, I am smaller government. I don't want to depend on the government for everything. I don't want to give all of my money to the government for these kinds of things. And so in a way, I really don't, I really don't believe that it's as simple as this is too hard.
Starting point is 00:24:55 I could just become a liberal. I would be lie if I did. that. Being conservative is the consequence of my intellectual honesty about what I believe. That's great. We're talking to Chad Felix Green of the Federalist. And something interesting happened, I think, Chad, with the wording of the headline of your story, which is the stigma against my conservative politics is worse than the stigma of being gay. And it didn't identify in the headline that you are actually gay. And what it led to, at least what I saw online, was an army of straight liberal people trying to teach you a lesson of what it means to be gay and what it's like for people who went through that experience.
Starting point is 00:25:35 What does it like to get hit up by a bunch of straight liberals and giving you lessons on being gay? It's very common. I'm always assumed to be a straight white Christian based on my looks. It's an interesting, you know, I've red hair that I am just assumed. And so it's become a running joke that I will simply respond by saying gay Jew. Because people just, they make the, they come in with the assumption, the only people who are bad fall into this category and the only people who think like this are bad, therefore you must be one of those people. And I constantly, you know, we talk about identity politics as a negative thing. I actually use my privilege as somebody who is a minority to sort of force many on the left to realize that they are close-minded on this, that this isn't a world view that's exclusive to ignorance or that's exclusive to any particular race or religion or anything, that this is, you know, me being gay and Jewish does not impact my views on, you know, tax policy.
Starting point is 00:26:47 and that they have to address their own prejudices and realize that they simply disagree with what's, the reality is they disagree with what I'm promoting, but it has nothing to do with who I am, and that's what I'm trying to get across when I do that. You also said lumping Milo in with typical conservatives. Talk a little bit about that. Oh, well, you know, to every gay conservative and every conservative, myelah, is controversial. I appreciated him early on because he was kind of the Lady Gaga, the Madonna of the movement. And, you know, if we went back a decade or so ago and he were a liberal, he would be a media sensation. His type of, his type of flambalance in Columbia is what South Park and family guy and, and, and, liberal humor was. And I appreciated that he pushed the boundaries of the freedom of speech limits, and he kind of exposed the fact that colleges were growing more intolerant.
Starting point is 00:27:57 But I don't always find him to be principled as a conservative. I find him to be more of a contrarian, and that's fine. There's a place to that. But the reality is that I am compared to him, and every gay conservative is. And we are in a lot of ways, the concept that we are valid to begin with is based on him as a template, and they view him as a scam artist. So one of the stereotypes that I fight all the time is that I'm doing this for attention or I'm doing this as a scam or a con, that this isn't really, I don't know what they think I'm gaining from it, but that I'm doing this in a provocative way just to be provocative.
Starting point is 00:28:40 And so I find that frustrating. And so when they look at Milo's sort of extreme expression, they say, well, that's just what conservatives are like. He's just honest about it. And it's frustrating because we spend so much of our time trying to dispel a lot of the mythology around that. And you know what's interesting is this is what happens. This is the difference between conservatives, hopefully conservatives and progressives. One is a group hive mind that everybody has to be in a bucket and everybody is alike. and there's no differences.
Starting point is 00:29:12 And hopefully, libertarian conservatives, no, we're all different. I don't answer for him and I don't agree with him, but we're kind of on the same side on this particular issue and we're not on this issue. I applaud your article and your courage to say it. You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program. Like listening to this podcast if you're not a subscriber. Leon Wolf is the managing editor for Theblaze.com. and he's in to talk to us a little bit about Michael Cohen and also if we have time, China and Canada,
Starting point is 00:29:58 because this is extraordinarily revealing. And I think China just caught on to what Donald Trump and America may actually be doing with this trade war. Let's start with Michael Cohen. Sure. Let's do it. So yesterday he was sentenced to three years. Right. And what is the important part of this to you?
Starting point is 00:30:21 The important part is not just Cohen, but of course the company that produces the National Inquirer also basically entered a plea agreement. You have two people now, both friendly to Trump, previously very loyal to Trump, who have admitted basically in sworn statements and plea agreements that they were ordered by Donald Trump to commit felonies. Now, the National Inquirer came out and kind of changed their story a bit. And it's my understanding that this one is we were working with the campaign, not necessarily Donald Trump directly, which changes it and makes it even more significant, does it not? It does. And so people struggle to understand this. And I was talking with Jason Butchrell about this just before I came on here. People don't understand why is this a campaign finance violation.
Starting point is 00:31:09 Can they prove that it came through the campaign? It's actually the fact that the money didn't go through the campaign is what makes it a campaign finance violation. because it's a legitimate campaign expense to spend money to protect the reputation of the candidate, right? But that's the purpose of the money expenditure. If you're going to do that, you have to either declare it as a campaign expenditure or the people who make the expenditure have to report it as a contribution in kind. One of those two things has to happen. Neither of them did happen.
Starting point is 00:31:36 It was clearly designed to evade the reporting requirements of the FEC, and that's what makes it a campaign finance violation in this case. And so both of them are making the case that, They were doing this at a request from Donald Trump. And so it's, as I understand this, and you're a former attorney, so you, you know this. You're not only in campaign finance, right? Yeah, I did campaign finance for over two years. Okay.
Starting point is 00:32:00 That was almost exclusively what I did. So when it comes to this, it's a felony because if I told Stu, hey, go kill this person. I'm being held just as culpable for the, for the murder. as he is, correct? Right. And, you know, look, any campaign, any presidential campaign in particular,
Starting point is 00:32:23 they're so large, of a general election candidate, you know, a serious candidate, is going to probably have some campaign finance violations, just because it's such a difficult thing to keep up with
Starting point is 00:32:32 and maintain 100% compliance. But if you have a willful violation, as this appears to clearly have been, that's what brings into the level of, out of, oh, we're just going to find you X number of dollars and people have to go to jail.
Starting point is 00:32:44 Okay, so let me give you, let me take you through a couple, couple of things. First of all, Dinesh D'Souza, that was clearly a political hit. Rosie O'Donnell was much worse. You're saying an inconsistent application of the law, right? Is it what you're talking about there? So, I mean, if you're going to put Dinesh D'Souza in prison, Rosie O'Donnell should have gone to prison as well. She was much worse, did basically the same thing, except she knowingly was doing it, admittedly saying, you know, I'm using different names and everything else. She knew exactly what she was doing. Not a problem for Rosie O'Donnell.
Starting point is 00:33:16 when it comes to Barack Obama, campaign finance violations. I think it was $2 million campaign finance violation. He paid a fine. Why is this one different? Because of what I just said. I mean, I think the expectation is that in the course of handling all the various different donations and recording all the donations in kind, you almost always miss some. That's like an expected thing.
Starting point is 00:33:43 And then the FBC catches you and you file an amended statement and you pay a fine. It's sort of like taxes, right? Like, every, they always say, like, you don't, you have no idea if you're really filing everything perfectly. And if they really look into it, they're going to find something that you screwed up, even completely unintentionally. Right. But with Al Capone, there was another set of books. Exactly. Exactly.
Starting point is 00:33:59 So the differences between, oh, I had a good faith belief that I could claim this as an exemption. And I hit $150,000 worth of income intentionally from the IRS. Those are two different penalties. So what is the Trump explanation for this? So Trump's explanation is, it's a plausible one. Okay, I wouldn't laugh it out of court if I were a judge, is that, you know, the money was not spent to protect his reputation as a candidate. It was spent to protect his reputation with his family,
Starting point is 00:34:30 prevent his wife and his kids from being embarrassed. That's the thing. It is the Bill Clinton excuse. Right. And kind of an interesting analogy, you know, we've been through this once before, actually. People have already forgotten it, even though it's been less than 20 years ago. But John Edwards, as you recall, was prosecuted for literally this exact same thing. John Edwards had an affair. He used campaign finance money to pay off his mistress to
Starting point is 00:34:51 stay quiet. He is prosecuted for this. Now, ultimately, that was part of his argument to the jury, which was successful at least in hanging the jury, was, you know, look, this is, this is, you know, A, it's a legitimate campaign expense because it's protecting my reputation as a candidate. And B, you know, it's not a campaign finance violation because I have other interests that were involved that I'm trying to protect with that. So unfortunately, that one, we didn't get like a court ruling on, like a judicial decision that sets a precedent as to whether that's a valid argument or not, but there's at least an argument that a jury, and look, John Edwards is not a sympathetic guy. His wife was dying of cancer, okay?
Starting point is 00:35:27 The jury had every reason to hate him and come down like a ton of bricks on him, but for whatever reason, enough of them bought that on the jury that he ended up walking. I don't think it was Washington Examiner that kind of did a story on this and made the point of, when a presidential candidate, for example, their example was, goes to get a haircut. You have to get a haircut to, you know, to look good on camera. And so he goes and he pays for his own haircut. In theory, you could say that's a campaign finance violation because he's spending money to improve his candidacy.
Starting point is 00:35:55 But of course, that would be completely ridiculous. And if you go down that same line, is there kind of a line of a defense there? Like, yes, he's spending money that will help him as a candidate in theory, but this was more of a private thing. And that's why they should have, why they should overlook it. I think Donald Trump could make a case he was more afraid of Melania than he was the American people. It could be. It could be, but the problem that he's going to face is going to be what did what did Cohen and the National Inquirer people tell the DA, right? What did Donald Trump
Starting point is 00:36:25 say to them? And of course, a lot of that we don't know yet. If they have him saying, this will destroy my campaign. Right. Then it's a different story. And that's, and that's the big thing because if it's just Cohen's word, it means nothing. Yeah, but if it's the Cohen's word and the National inquirer's word. It means nothing. It means nothing. But if they have texts and emails and recorded phone conversations, then it's different. It could be big. And that's, and that is big because, you know, as we say this, this is not part of the Mueller investigation, right? This is all Southern District of New York. They have the policy. They're not going to indict a sitting president. This is all about what the House is going to do. Right. And it's all about
Starting point is 00:37:05 what the Democrats can convince people politically is an impeachable offense. I mean, that's what impeachment is. It's not a legal thing. It's a political thing. It's a political thing. You are, Ford said it best. You've done, you were a, you were an attorney for campaign finance violations. Impeachable offense, this, where it stands today. Let me say this. I've seen people prosecuted for less, okay? But those people were not the president of the United States.
Starting point is 00:37:30 That's a, that's a completely different, it is a completely different ballgame. Okay. Let me, let me switch to China and Canada because there's something going on and most people are not paying attention to this. China has now just disappeared a Canadian suit. They got another one this morning. They got another one. Yes. Explain who they are.
Starting point is 00:37:54 I'm handicapped because I came and got off a plane and got right here. So I don't know the particular. But it's a fairly low level. It's not anybody who's on the level of the one that the Canadians, you know, snatched from the Chinese. It's not like the CFO of a major company. It's still more, I think, on the level of message sending than actual retaliation. So what happened is we said we there's a there's a Chinese official in Canada.
Starting point is 00:38:19 Sorry, his her father is high up in the Communist Party, but she runs a company that has been known to be dirty for a very long time, stealing all kinds of stuff from America. And so Donald Trump said, we want her extradited into the United States. You can't go home. China flipped out. Now China has just taken two business people from Canada, and they're saying, you better release ours because two can play at this game. This is really, I think, what is really happening on China. And this is the beginning of a very strong Cold War here between us. We are saying it's the trade war is not just about trade imbalance. It is about stop stealing our stuff.
Starting point is 00:39:07 Right. So I'm, you know, I have been waiting for someone to do something like this, like what Trump has done for a long time. Like I'm not, I've never thought tariffs were the answer. I still don't think they're the answer. But it is an issue, the Chinese theft of American intellectual, but they just have no respect for Western intellectual property. It's a known problem that has been for years and years and years. And we've all been screaming for somebody needs to do something. And now Trump has done something. I think that's a good for. step, but what we're seeing is that this is a very dangerous game to play, right? Because the Canadians, you know, Trudeau has got to go to his people and say, I have a reason for holding this CFO of, you know, China. And Trump has got to come to the American people and say, we have a reason for this person we've arrested. The Chinese government, they don't have to explain this to their own people. They can snatch as many of our people and Canadians as they want and just disappear them off the street. And they don't have to go and say, oh, you know, well, here's why. There's just, somebody's just gone.
Starting point is 00:40:07 And that's the concern is that there are a lot of American Canadian nationals over there. If we start engaging in this tit for tat, who knows where that could end up? Who knows where that could end up? But it's an interesting first step in, you know, if it is a negotiating employee, we'll see how it works. Real quick, in 60 seconds. Tell me what you think is going to happen in both of those cases where they leave. This pure speculation, I'm asking to look in 2019, we're going to see impeachments? in the House or just investigations?
Starting point is 00:40:40 I don't think so. I don't think we're going to see impeachment proceedings in the House unless something else major comes out. I don't think this campaign finance thing is going to be enough for the Democrats to roll the dice on that. Because you have to know Republicans are not going to buy this. They have to know it's a dead end in the Senate no matter what happens. If some other damaging information comes out, if Trump's approval rating dips down into the 20s, if the economy goes sour, maybe we see a different analysis. But I doubt it.
Starting point is 00:41:07 Canada, China, the United States, trade. How does this get worse in 2019 to a happy ending? Or does it get worse? And we're not headed towards a happy ending a year from now. Cautiously optimistic that it's going to get better. I think that both sides are at the point
Starting point is 00:41:29 and there is dialogue that's going on. I think both sides are at the point that they can still back away from the precipice on this one. And I hope that that's what ends up happening. But, you know, it is, listen, it is very important for us to protect our intellectual property rights. And I hope that some, I'm hopeful that some kind of deal will get worked out to where that will happen. We both have a lot to lose. And I think they have more to lose than we do.
Starting point is 00:41:52 I agree. Just on technology, at least today. Now is the time to play this card if you're going to, if you're actually going to play it. Leon, thank you very much. Appreciate it. This is the best of a Glenn Beck program. Mackenzie Adams, a little girl who she was nine and committed suicide. I don't even know how that happens to a nine-year-old.
Starting point is 00:42:25 This story is so tragic on many levels. Edwina Harris, the aunt of Mackenzie Adams, is with us now. First of all, Edwina, our deepest, deepest sympathies go out to you and the family. I cannot imagine what you guys are going through now. Thank you. It's been really hard. So, first of all, tell me a little bit about McKenzie. Tell me who she was.
Starting point is 00:42:55 McKenzie was a very bubbly little girl, very smart, very funny. She liked to tell jokes like a granddad. Love family, love to travel, zoo, go out to eat, the beach, you know. just a really sweet, fun, and energetic kid. So she was being bullied in school, and she was being bullied, if I'm not mistaken, because she was friends with a white kid? Is that true? It's more to it, of course.
Starting point is 00:43:33 Because, you know, of course, she was a cute little girl, you know, had a lot of love. You know, every jealousy is not just what you have, but it's who you have around you as well. So that was some of it. And the family that she really loved her unconditionally, as if she was theirs because they only have one child as well. So she was like his sister. They were really, really close. And they would pick her up for school sometimes, and she would go in. And was it white kids or black kids that were, or both that were.
Starting point is 00:44:06 It was both. That was bullying her. was both man does it ever does it ever get better um in alabama um so uh so what was happening with the bullying that you can talk about like what was being said um basically what you guys have read uh the name called of the bee and black nigger and um papers it was said kill yourself kill yourself things like that yeah and of course McKenzie you know we come uh our home we're we're Baptist so she comes from a faith-based home we you know we go to church we believe in God and faith and all those things so what she did is not something that's taught you know that's
Starting point is 00:44:54 not even something that's even brought up you know as far as suicide and killing yourself and death and things of that nature um so she's taught to love everybody and but the booing you know Of course, my mom is a respected individual in this community, which is something that has been lacking to be said because my mom has master's degrees. She worked for D.H.R. and the mental health center as well. So the people that's in the school system has worked with my mom in one form or fashion or another because my mom dealt in children's services. So the talks of bullying my mom addressed because she knew about it. The talks of how to deal with it. My mom was, these are the things that she's in her profession has always helped other people get through.
Starting point is 00:45:41 So, so. So, so. So, so. So. So. So. So. That happened at school that had to push her there because she had a loving environment that wouldn't have.
Starting point is 00:45:51 We hear. Right. We, that all she had to do was. Do you know. Do you know what happened on Monday that pushed it over the edge? That is something we are still working on. And I'm working diligently. with Chief Austin to find that information out because, you know, kids have their cell phones.
Starting point is 00:46:10 And there's a lot of things that we're finding that we're still searching and trying to get final answers about. So. Now, I read that she was a great student, hundreds on all of her tests. Right. But then recently that started to fall apart. So that was a warning sign that was something was going on. And she did talk to your mother.
Starting point is 00:46:34 mother did talk to the teachers, right? Absolutely. My mom went to the school, my sister called school. My mom went up there a couple of times. And as I said, my mom worked with the schools in both cities because of her profession, and they were more so of colleagues. And so she talked to them and they assured her that they would make sure that she'll be fine. She can come talk to them anytime she wanted.
Starting point is 00:47:02 If anything was happening, she just looking. He just should let them know, and that was to the assistant principal, to the counselor, and my mom was not able to speak with one of the teachers, but she was able to speak to another one. So, yeah, they assured my mom. And my mom wouldn't keep sending my niece back if she didn't get that assurance from people that she's worked with before. And the main bullying kid, he was suspended for bullying earlier, was he not? Now, I don't know about suspension, but I do know he was put in in school suspension. Well, you know, in school, the ISS, not completely suspended from school, which is what he needed to be expelled from school, but he was put in in school suspension, yes.
Starting point is 00:47:47 And with that came documenting documentation, which my mother does possess a carbon copy of that information where that incident took place when he was put in in school suspension and my niece was wrote up for standing up for herself. So I can't, I just, I, you know, I have kids. And at nine years old, I mean, I'm worried about my, you know, my 14-year-old son and my 12-year-old girl. And I see the rate of suicide going through the roof. And something is happening with our kids. But at nine, it's, it's, this is just, it's stunning.
Starting point is 00:48:30 and I've been thinking about you guys and praying about you and your family, but I also feel so, I'm so worried about her friend who, I mean, how is, do you have any idea how the family is dealing with us? So he doesn't feel like my friend just because I was white or just because we were friends or whatever the reason that she's dead now. I just, this, this is such a tragedy. He's actually at the beach right now. They, I don't, I'm not sure if they're going to return him,
Starting point is 00:49:11 which I highly recommend, and that's my recommendation for any parent. They really feel in their heart that my mother did what she said, which was went to the school and reported it, that if you feel in your heart that my mother did what she said, because you know my mom, everybody needs. there and owes my mom and my dad, their respective individuals in this county to move your kids. Because if this is what they want to say, what more will they do if it was your child? If your kids are feeling threatened at school, please move them.
Starting point is 00:49:46 Please move them. Because sending your kids out of your home from your protection to give them to someone that it will fail to protect them, that is not a good feeling. I am a mother. I am also in the school systems in Atlanta as well, and I take what I do very seriously. When you have allowed your kids leave your home and come into my possession, they're now my children, and I'm going to protect them in every fire of my being. I am not a punk educator.
Starting point is 00:50:16 I am not scared of these kids that think that bullying is okay. I stand up to these kids, just as I did in high school. When this happened, an outful of people that I had protected from, I honestly have forgotten, because it was my heart to do that. If I saw somebody being mistreated, I would step up for them. But I was also one of the popular kids. So I was in band and cheerleading and different things like that. But that was my duty in my position, just as I have one now in media, in Atlanta,
Starting point is 00:50:43 to stand up and be this voice for those people that seem that can't do that. And those individuals like they're doing, I don't know how this happened to your niece, when all you did was to care of me, all through high school, all through middle school, or whatever the time frame it was that I could. those individuals and it wasn't just one or two, you know, 40, 50 different people that, and I was like, oh, my God, I said, girl, what are you? You know, I forgot because that's just who I am.
Starting point is 00:51:07 That's just what my family, who my family is, and for it to happen to my niece, it was heartbreaking because nobody stood up for my niece. Nobody, the karma that we've done for people, the good, my niece had to suffer with this. No teacher stood up like my mom and my dad and myself have stood up. in the education system, my aunts that are teachers and professors and, you know, doctors and education. Nobody stood up for my niece.
Starting point is 00:51:35 Nobody stood up for my baby. Nobody. Really? You have started a go-fund me page called the McKenzie Foundation. You can find it just by searching for McKenzie Foundation. And you have a goal of $10,000. You've already gotten $3,000. And you want to focus.
Starting point is 00:51:57 not just on the bullied, but you also want to focus on the bully him or herself. In what way? Well, when this happened, some of those guys that I did go to school with, and some people I didn't know, they said, well, is when I just want to be honest with you, I was the bully. And the reason I'm telling you is because I trust you, but I also read where the person that I used to bully in school was stating a story how their life is still in turmoil because they have been bullied for so long in school. So it doesn't stop when you're an adult.
Starting point is 00:52:35 These things live with you for the rest of your lives. So said, so many people that I've been reading that have been inboxing me. So I want to bring in those people that have opened up to me and there was a bully. Right now I'm talking with them to see what was happening in your life at this time that made you feel that coming to school to bully someone else was okay. And the stories vary. It's from things that happened with drug addiction. It was a single parent home.
Starting point is 00:53:03 Other family members were bullying them, so they came to school and bullied someone else. So the bully has to heal first. Because if we can target and help the bully, they won't bully someone else because it takes a bully for there to be bullying. Edwina Harris, the aunt of McKenzie Adams, my wife and I wish we could be at the funeral on Saturday. I don't know why. I just feel so attached to McKenzie and what she went through and the little boy as well. And I just want you to know that you're in our thoughts and in our prayers and blessings to you and the family.
Starting point is 00:53:53 And may this turn out to be in the long. run, something that will bring honor to McKenzie's name for a long, long time to come. Yes, sir. Thank you so much. If you would like to donate, you can go to GoFundMe. It's the McKenzie Foundation. They're trying to reach $10,000 to be able to have some of these former bullies come in and maybe make a difference.
Starting point is 00:54:24 It's worth a try. Gofundme. The Blaze Radio Network on demand.

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