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Thomas Massie on New Healthcare Bill: 'It's Going to Be Worse Than Obamacare'

March 22, 2017
Staff

WRITER

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who has been an outspoken critic of the House's leadership Obamacare replacement, joined Glenn on radio today to discuss what he called the "dumpster fire that we're calling Obamacare-lite." Massie's office has received 275 calls from constituents opposing the bill and only four supporting it. He also shared a very troubling change made to the bill just last night, especially in light of Trump's promised commitment to veterans.

"They made another small tweak . . . when people find out about it they are not going to be happy. If you're a veteran and you could go to the VA, but you don't go to the VA, the tweak they made last night says you can't get the health care subsidies that everybody else gets when they go into the individual market," Massie reported.

The news didn't sit well with Glenn and his co-hosts.

"Oh, my gosh," Glenn said.

"What in the . . . what are they thinking! What is this?" Co-host Pat Gray exclaimed.

The House votes Thursday on the new bill in what will be Trump's first major legislative test.

Listen to this segment from The Glenn Beck Program:

GLENN: Thomas Massie, a critic of the House's leadership on Obamacare replacement bill is joining us now.

Thomas, how are you, sir?

THOMAS: I am doing great. It's a tale of two chambers today here on Capitol Hill.

GLENN: I bet it is.

THOMAS: You know, in one chamber, you've got Neil Gorsuch doing a great job on his confirmation hearings, and Trump looks like a hero because he listened to conservatives and took advice on the Supreme Court nominee. In the other chamber, you've got this Dumpster fire that we're calling Obamacare-lite, where Trump listened to the swamp creatures. And he's taken a hit in his popularity in trying to get people to vote for something that's not good.

GLENN: He's really come out strongly and said, "If you vote against it, you're going to -- you'll lose your reelection."

THOMAS: Yeah, well, he's got the zeal for the deal, and that's okay. But this is a bad deal.

PAT: Yeah.

THOMAS: And the phone calls to my office are 275 opposed to this bill and four supporting it.

JEFFY: There you go.

PAT: That's widespread.

THOMAS: Yeah, pretty wide.

PAT: Congressman, the other thing is the Republicans -- the G.O.P. yesterday just tweaked the provision to crack down on illegal immigrants getting this health care coverage. Right? They took that provision out of the bill.

So they've even done -- they've even done more than the Democrats kind of did with this particular thing because the Democrats kept telling us, no, illegal aliens will not be part of this. And now, as they tried to stop this from happening, it was taken out.

THOMAS: Well, they made another small tweak when people find out about it are not going to be happy. Which, if you're a veteran and you could go to the VA, but you don't go to the VA, the tweak they made last night says you can't get the health care subsidies that everybody else gets when they go into the individual market.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh.

PAT: What in the -- what are they thinking! What -- what is this?

JEFFY: What.

PAT: Wow.

THOMAS: You know, some of the changes they've made, they say, are because of the so-called birdbath.

GLENN: What the hell is that?

PAT: What's the birdbath?

GLENN: I'd like to drown a lot of these birds.

(laughter)

THOMAS: I call it the hogwash. But it's the bird rule in the Senate that's supposed to make the bill, you know, ecumenical -- or amenable to the parliamentarian. But I think they're just using it as an excuse to keep the things they want for the insurance lobby and to take out the things the insurance lobby doesn't want.

STU: We're talking to Congressman Thomas Massie.

Congressman, let me be a cynic here for just a moment. I was looking at the count from -- I think CNN has a web count from this bill. And I think you can lose, what, 21, is it?

THOMAS: That's right.

STU: Twenty-one votes. And the way they had it broken down was they had lost 19, and there were seven who were leaning no. And, man, does it not look to me that this thing is going to line up, and just, they're going to somehow get this through by one vote. The Freedom Caucus, who we're huge fans of, they're not doing the whole, everyone votes the same way thing on this bill, if I'm understanding that correctly. It seems like they're doing everything they can to kind of have this little wiggle room. And at the last second, they'll give a few things away, and they'll clear this by one vote. So that a lot of people, like yourself, who -- and you've been on record for this from the beginning, you know, fighting it, but everyone is going to be able to say, well, I didn't vote for it, but it's still going to get passed.

GLENN: I've seen this on House of Cards.

STU: That's how this works.

THOMAS: Well, let me what they used to do under Boehner. A lot of times, when it was raising the debt limit or, you know, voting for an omnibus, they would -- when conservatives bucked up, they would go over and get Democrats to vote for it. And so they always had this safety margin. But they don't have that with this bill. And so they can -- it really is 21 votes they can afford to lose.

I've got a Whip vote on my i Phone. Hopefully nobody has hacked it yet. But -- as all the hackers now go after my phone. But 29 conservatives oppose this bill. Those are private conversations I've had with them. They're not leaning no, they're no. Twenty-nine conservatives. That's before you count the moderates who are against this bill. And they're not as audible or public in their opposition, but I think there are probably six of them that are hard-nosed and maybe a dozen more that are leaning no on the moderate side. So if this vote were right now absent the -- the kneecap breaking and the arm twisting, they would probably be short 20 votes. But as you say, the next 24 hours, we're going to see a lot of broken kneecaps.

(chuckling)

GLENN: So what happens after this? Let's take it both ways. This passes. What happens?

THOMAS: It's -- it's going to be worse than Obamacare. I tell people, if we're going to do socialized medicine, leave it up to the real architects like Jonathan Gruber. Because we're doing a horrible job of architecting socialized medicine. You cannot keep the requirement that healthy people and sick people pay the same price for insurance and then lose the individual mandate and expect that to work.

GLENN: It won't.

THOMAS: That market is going to go to hell in a handbasket very quickly. And healthy people are going to flee it. And that's my prediction. And we're going to own it. That means prices will spiral upward. And it will be ours to own. And I think the electoral danger here is to the Republicans in passing it, not opposing it. So that's -- I think it's going to be horrible, and that's my prediction.

GLENN: So let's say it doesn't pass and the thing just gets worse and worse and worse. I mean, either way, with -- presented with this, I just don't see the Republicans being able to win anything because if it doesn't past, most likely, it will just sit there and you guys won't do anything. And Obamacare is just -- it's bad. And people are feeling the pain. And they're not going to take it from somebody who had the House, the Senate, and the White House and couldn't fix this. They'll give it to the Democrats, and the Democrats will engineer a single-payer system. And, quite honestly, Donald Trump will sign it.

THOMAS: Well, I think we're being given a false choice here tomorrow, which, you know, they say you have a binary choice, either you pass this or pass nothing. That's a load of bunk. The negotiations actually start when one side says no. And conservatives tomorrow, hopefully there will be enough of us that say no that we can then have a negotiation. And Paul Ryan cannot go to the Democrats and try and architect another version of Obamacare. He has to do this with conservatives. And hopefully, Donald Trump will come and listen to individuals at Heritage and the other conservative organizations, like Freedom Works, that have credibility when we take another crack at this. I don't see Donald Trump as a person who is going to accept failure. If this bill fails tomorrow, we'll come up with a better one.

STU: Are you at all surprised to see him go to bat as hard as he is for this bill? I mean, it doesn't seem -- it's not like this is the bill he ran on. This is clearly a, you know, Paul Ryan type of thing that he just is kind of just getting behind, and I'm surprised to see him throwing his weight around, to try to push through this bill that really didn't -- isn't really similar to what he argued for in the campaign.

THOMAS: Yeah, well, he wasn't big on specifics in the campaign. And I think he believes that if we pass something, he can check this off, put it in the win column and go on to the next battle. You know, he's got a list of things he wants to accomplish.

The problem is I think he's just got the zeal for the deal here. And the deal is not a good deal. He needs to step back and look at it. I just think he's getting bad advice on this one. And I -- the fallout is going to be interesting because I also think he's being misled by Paul Ryan about how many votes there are to pass this thing.

And maybe he'll come to realize that taking advice from Paul Ryan wasn't the best way -- the best thing to kick off his presidency.

GLENN: I just can't believe -- and I don't know how his supporters are going to shake out, but I can't believe Paul Ryan who was, you know, cancer before the election -- he was cancer. Every conservative -- every Republican was like, I got to get rid of Paul Ryan, that he somehow or another is the savior that everybody is listening to or is shouting praises for with Donald Trump.

And I don't know how it's going to shake out because Donald Trump did say he was going to make sure everybody got covered. You want it to go the opposite way than what he does. This is this awful middle ground that we're negotiating. But I don't know how his voters are going to handle it. Because half of his people wanted, you know, Paul Ryan and everybody out. And half of his people wanted more health care from the government.

THOMAS: Yeah. Well, maybe the silver lining in this is that when Trump moves on to tax reform or immigration that he's promised or taking care of the veterans, he will listen to somebody other than Paul Ryan after Paul Ryan drags him through this debacle. And hopefully the American people don't get drug through it. Hopefully this bill fails, and they don't have to be subjected to this experiment in Donald Trump listening to the swamp and coming up with policy.

Hopefully he'll listen to those voices from the outside like he did so well with Neil Gorsuch.

GLENN: I will tell you that the stock market priced in -- you're seeing the stock market cave. The stock market priced in a repeal of Obamacare. They priced in tax cuts. They're now saying that the tax cuts are going to be a lot lower than they thought. And the stock market is on thin ice now because they had priced in all these things, and it doesn't look like some of these things are going to happen. Does the financial situation worry you at all?

THOMAS: Let me tell you something that's false that's being repeated on Capitol Hill. They're saying that this stuff has to happen like clockwork. And if we don't do health care reform, we can't do tax reform. That's absolutely false. If you go back and look at how the Democrats implemented Obamacare, they did a reconciliation bill, literally a week after they did Obamacare so that they could fix it. And they included student loans in that.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

THOMAS: You can put whatever you want in reconciliation. You can double up and put more than one thing in it. It doesn't have to be health care in this reconciliation bill. Tax reform can still happen. It is not linked to this debacle of a health care bill that we're calling Obamacare-lite.

GLENN: Representative Thomas Massie, thanks so much. And thanks for your leadership on this. We're counting on you guys to do the right thing and actually return us to a free market which would be very, very nice.

THOMAS: Well, thank you, Glenn. It's called the walk of shame here in Congress. When somebody votes one way, and then before the vote closes, they twist their arm and get them to walk down to the counter and turn in a different voting card. Hopefully, we won't see too many conservatives take that walk of shame tomorrow.

GLENN: Are you feeling the pressure? I mean, how much pressure is on these guys?

THOMAS: Well, Trump was in Kentucky a day before yesterday, in my state. And the week before that, Pence was there. And Donald Trump was giving rides to Kentucky congressmen on Air Force One. But I noted, I haven't even gotten a ride on Amtrak One yet.

(chuckling)

GLENN: Wow. Wow.

THOMAS: So I think the pressure is on the other members who they think are more likely to switch.

GLENN: Are you concerned that the -- you know, Trump does not forget who was against him. Are you concerned at all that they will campaign against you?

THOMAS: That's not really a concern for me. I've had so many people here in DC -- it would be ironic if he joins the swamp creatures and goes after conservatives back in their districts, but I don't think that's going to happen. I think when this is all said and done, he may be more upset with Reince Priebus and Paul Ryan than he is with the people that supported him in his election, frankly.

GLENN: Thomas Massie, thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Shocking: Chart-topping ‘singer’ has no soul at all

VCG / Contributor | Getty Images

A machine can imitate heartbreak well enough to top the charts, but it cannot carry grief, choose courage, or hear the whisper that calls human beings to something higher.

The No. 1 country song in America right now was not written in Nashville or Texas or even L.A. It came from code. “Walk My Walk,” the AI-generated single by the AI artist Breaking Rust, hit the top spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart, and if you listen to it without knowing that fact, you would swear a real singer lived the pain he is describing.

Except there is no “he.” There is no lived experience. There is no soul behind the voice dominating the country music charts.

If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

I will admit it: I enjoy some AI music. Some of it is very good. And that leaves us with a question that is no longer science fiction. If a machine can fake being human this well, what does it mean to be human?

A new world of artificial experience

This is not just about one song. We are walking straight into a technological moment that will reshape everyday life.

Elon Musk said recently that we may not even have phones in five years. Instead, we will carry a small device that listens, anticipates, and creates — a personal AI agent that knows what we want to hear before we ask. It will make the music, the news, the podcasts, the stories. We already live in digital bubbles. Soon, those bubbles might become our own private worlds.

If an algorithm can write a hit country song about hardship and perseverance without a shred of actual experience, then the deeper question becomes unavoidable: If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

What machines can never do

A machine can produce, and soon it may produce better than we can. It can calculate faster than any human mind. It can rearrange the notes and words of a thousand human songs into something that sounds real enough to fool millions.

But it cannot care. It cannot love. It cannot choose right and wrong. It cannot forgive because it cannot be hurt. It cannot stand between a child and danger. It cannot walk through sorrow.

A machine can imitate the sound of suffering. It cannot suffer.

The difference is the soul. The divine spark. The thing God breathed into man that no code will ever have. Only humans can take pain and let it grow into compassion. Only humans can take fear and turn it into courage. Only humans can rebuild their lives after losing everything. Only humans hear the whisper inside, the divine voice that says, “Live for something greater.”

We are building artificial minds. We are not building artificial life.

Questions that define us

And as these artificial minds grow sharper, as their tools become more convincing, the right response is not panic. It is to ask the oldest and most important questions.

Who am I? Why am I here? What is the meaning of freedom? What is worth defending? What is worth sacrificing for?

That answer is not found in a lab or a server rack. It is found in that mysterious place inside each of us where reason meets faith, where suffering becomes wisdom, where God reminds us we are more than flesh and more than thought. We are not accidents. We are not circuits. We are not replaceable.

Europa Press News / Contributor | Getty Images

The miracle machines can never copy

Being human is not about what we can produce. Machines will outproduce us. That is not the question. Being human is about what we can choose. We can choose to love even when it costs us something. We can choose to sacrifice when it is not easy. We can choose to tell the truth when the world rewards lies. We can choose to stand when everyone else bows. We can create because something inside us will not rest until we do.

An AI content generator can borrow our melodies, echo our stories, and dress itself up like a human soul, but it cannot carry grief across a lifetime. It cannot forgive an enemy. It cannot experience wonder. It cannot look at a broken world and say, “I am going to build again.”

The age of machines is rising. And if we do not know who we are, we will shrink. But if we use this moment to remember what makes us human, it will help us to become better, because the one thing no algorithm will ever recreate is the miracle that we exist at all — the miracle of the human soul.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Is Socialism seducing a lost generation?

Jeremy Weine / Stringer | Getty Images

A generation that’s lost faith in capitalism is turning to the oldest lie on earth: equality through control.

Something is breaking in America’s young people. You can feel it in every headline, every grocery bill, every young voice quietly asking if the American dream still means anything at all.

For many, the promise of America — work hard, build something that lasts, and give the next generation a better start — feels like it no longer exists. Home ownership and stability have become luxuries for a fortunate few.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them.

In that vacuum of hope, a new promise has begun to rise — one that sounds compassionate, equal, and fair. The promise of socialism.

The appeal of a broken dream

When the American dream becomes a checklist of things few can afford — a home, a car, two children, even a little peace — disappointment quickly turns to resentment. The average first-time homebuyer is now 40 years old. Debt lasts longer than marriages. The cost of living rises faster than opportunity.

For a generation that has never seen the system truly work, capitalism feels like a rigged game built to protect those already at the top.

That is where socialism finds its audience. It presents itself as fairness for the forgotten and justice for the disillusioned. It speaks softly at first, offering equality, compassion, and control disguised as care.

We are seeing that illusion play out now in New York City, where Zohran Mamdani — an open socialist — has won a major political victory. The same ideology that once hid behind euphemisms now campaigns openly throughout America’s once-great cities. And for many who feel left behind, it sounds like salvation.

But what socialism calls fairness is submission dressed as virtue. What it calls order is obedience. Once the system begins to replace personal responsibility with collective dependence, the erosion of liberty is only a matter of time.

The bridge that never ends

Socialism is not a destination; it is a bridge. Karl Marx described it as the necessary transition to communism — the scaffolding that builds the total state. Under socialism, people are taught to obey. Under communism, they forget that any other options exist.

History tells the story clearly. Russia, China, Cambodia, Cuba — each promised equality and delivered misery. One hundred million lives were lost, not because socialism failed, but because it succeeded at what it was designed to do: make the state supreme and the individual expendable.

Today’s advocates insist their version will be different — democratic, modern, and kind. They often cite Sweden as an example, but Sweden’s prosperity was never born of socialism. It grew out of capitalism, self-reliance, and a shared moral culture. Now that system is cracking under the weight of bureaucracy and division.

ANGELA WEISS / Contributor | Getty Images

The real issue is not economic but moral. Socialism begins with a lie about human nature — that people exist for the collective and that the collective knows better than the individual.

This lie is contrary to the truths on which America was founded — that rights come not from government’s authority, but from God’s. Once government replaces that authority, compassion becomes control, and freedom becomes permission.

What young America deserves

Young Americans have many reasons to be frustrated. They were told to study, work hard, and follow the rules — and many did, only to find the goalposts moved again and again. But tearing down the entire house does not make it fairer; it only leaves everyone standing in the rubble.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them. The answer is not revolution but renewal — moral, cultural, and spiritual.

It means restoring honesty to markets, integrity to government, and faith to the heart of our nation. A people who forsake God will always turn to government for salvation, and that road always ends in dependency and decay.

Freedom demands something of us. It requires faith, discipline, and courage. It expects citizens to govern themselves before others govern them. That is the truth this generation deserves to hear again — that liberty is not a gift from the state but a calling from God.

Socialism always begins with promises and ends with permission. It tells you what to drive, what to say, what to believe, all in the name of fairness. But real fairness is not everyone sharing the same chains — it is everyone having the same chance.

The American dream was never about guarantees. It was about the right to try, to fail, and try again. That freedom built the most prosperous nation in history, and it can do so again if we remember that liberty is not a handout but a duty.

Socialism does not offer salvation. It requires subservience.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Rage isn’t conservatism — THIS is what true patriots stand for

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

Conservatism is not about rage or nostalgia. It’s about moral clarity, national renewal, and guarding the principles that built America’s freedom.

Our movement is at a crossroads, and the question before us is simple: What does it mean to be a conservative in America today?

For years, we have been told what we are against — against the left, against wokeism, against decline. But opposition alone does not define a movement, and it certainly does not define a moral vision.

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

The media, as usual, are eager to supply their own answer. The New York Times recently suggested that Nick Fuentes represents the “future” of conservatism. That’s nonsense — a distortion of both truth and tradition. Fuentes and those like him do not represent American conservatism. They represent its counterfeit.

Real conservatism is not rage. It is reverence. It does not treat the past as a museum, but as a teacher. America’s founders asked us to preserve their principles and improve upon their practice. That means understanding what we are conserving — a living covenant, not a relic.

Conservatism as stewardship

In 2025, conservatism means stewardship — of a nation, a culture, and a moral inheritance too precious to abandon. To conserve is not to freeze history. It is to stand guard over what is essential. We are custodians of an experiment in liberty that rests on the belief that rights come not from kings or Congress, but from the Creator.

That belief built this country. It will be what saves it. The Constitution is a covenant between generations. Conservatism is the duty to keep that covenant alive — to preserve what works, correct what fails, and pass on both wisdom and freedom to those who come next.

Economics, culture, and morality are inseparable. Debt is not only fiscal; it is moral. Spending what belongs to the unborn is theft. Dependence is not compassion; it is weakness parading as virtue. A society that trades responsibility for comfort teaches citizens how to live as slaves.

Freedom without virtue is not freedom; it is chaos. A culture that mocks faith cannot defend liberty, and a nation that rejects truth cannot sustain justice. Conservatism must again become the moral compass of a disoriented people, reminding America that liberty survives only when anchored to virtue.

Rebuilding what is broken

We cannot define ourselves by what we oppose. We must build families, communities, and institutions that endure. Government is broken because education is broken, and education is broken because we abandoned the formation of the mind and the soul. The work ahead is competence, not cynicism.

Conservatives should embrace innovation and technology while rejecting the chaos of Silicon Valley. Progress must not come at the expense of principle. Technology must strengthen people, not replace them. Artificial intelligence should remain a servant, never a master. The true strength of a nation is not measured by data or bureaucracy, but by the quiet webs of family, faith, and service that hold communities together. When Washington falters — and it will — those neighborhoods must stand.

Eric Lee / Stringer | Getty Images

This is the real work of conservatism: to conserve what is good and true and to reform what has decayed. It is not about slogans; it is about stewardship — the patient labor of building a civilization that remembers what it stands for.

A creed for the rising generation

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

For the rising generation, conservatism cannot be nostalgia. It must be more than a memory of 9/11 or admiration for a Reagan era they never lived through. Many young Americans did not experience those moments — and they should not have to in order to grasp the lessons they taught and the truths they embodied. The next chapter is not about preserving relics but renewing purpose. It must speak to conviction, not cynicism; to moral clarity, not despair.

Young people are searching for meaning in a culture that mocks truth and empties life of purpose. Conservatism should be the moral compass that reminds them freedom is responsibility and that faith, family, and moral courage remain the surest rebellions against hopelessness.

To be a conservative in 2025 is to defend the enduring principles of American liberty while stewarding the culture, the economy, and the spirit of a free people. It is to stand for truth when truth is unfashionable and to guard moral order when the world celebrates chaos.

We are not merely holding the torch. We are relighting it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Glenn Beck: Here's what's WRONG with conservatism today

Getty Images / Handout | Getty Images

What does it mean to be a conservative in 2025? Glenn offers guidance on what conservatives need to do to ensure the conservative movement doesn't fade into oblivion. We have to get back to PRINCIPLES, not policies.

To be a conservative in 2025 means to STAND

  • for Stewardship, protecting the wisdom of our Founders;
  • for Truth, defending objective reality in an age of illusion;
  • for Accountability, living within our means as individuals and as a nation;
  • for Neighborhood, rebuilding family, faith, and local community;
  • and for Duty, carrying freedom forward to the next generation.

A conservative doesn’t cling to the past — he stands guard over the principles that make the future possible.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: You know, I'm so tired of being against everything. Saying what we're not.

It's time that we start saying what we are. And it's hard, because we're changing. It's different to be a conservative, today, than it was, you know, years ago.

And part of that is just coming from hard knocks. School of hard knocks. We've learned a lot of lessons on things we thought we were for. No, no, no.

But conservatives. To be a conservative, it shouldn't be about policies. It's really about principles. And that's why we've lost our way. Because we've lost our principles. And it's easy. Because the world got easy. And now the world is changing so rapidly. The boundaries between truth and illusion are blurred second by second. Machines now think. Currencies falter. Families fractured. And nations, all over the world, have forgotten who they are.

So what does it mean to be a conservative now, in 2025, '26. For a lot of people, it means opposing the left. That's -- that's a reaction. That's not renewal.

That's a reaction. It can't mean also worshiping the past, as if the past were perfect. The founders never asked for that.

They asked that we would preserve the principles and perfect their practice. They knew it was imperfect. To make a more perfect nation.

Is what we're supposed to be doing.

2025, '26 being a conservative has to mean stewardship.

The stewardship of a nation, of a civilization.

Of a moral inheritance. That is too precious to abandon.

What does it mean to conserve? To conserve something doesn't mean to stand still.

It means to stand guard. It means to defend what the Founders designed. The separation of powers. The rule of law.

The belief that our rights come not from kings or from Congress, but from the creator himself.
This is a system that was not built for ease. It was built for endurance, and it will endure if we only teach it again!

The problem is, we only teach it like it's a museum piece. You know, it's not a museum piece. It's not an old dusty document. It's a living covenant between the dead, the living and the unborn.

So this chapter of -- of conservatism. Must confront reality. Economic reality.

Global reality.

And moral reality.

It's not enough just to be against something. Or chant tax cuts or free markets.

We have to ask -- we have to start with simple questions like freedom, yes. But freedom for what?

Freedom for economic sovereignty. Your right to produce and to innovate. To build without asking Beijing's permission. That's a moral issue now.

Another moral issue: Debt! It's -- it's generational theft. We're spending money from generations we won't even meet.

And dependence. Another moral issue. It's a national weakness.

People cannot stand up for themselves. They can't make it themselves. And we're encouraging them to sit down, shut up, and don't think.

And the conservative who can't connect with fiscal prudence, and connect fiscal prudence to moral duty, you're not a conservative at all.

Being a conservative today, means you have to rebuild an economy that serves liberty, not one that serves -- survives by debt, and then there's the soul of the nation.

We are living through a time period. An age of dislocation. Where our families are fractured.

Our faith is almost gone.

Meaning is evaporating so fast. Nobody knows what meaning of life is. That's why everybody is killing themselves. They have no meaning in life. And why they don't have any meaning, is truth itself is mocked and blurred and replaced by nothing, but lies and noise.

If you want to be a conservative, then you have to be to become the moral compass that reminds a lost people, liberty cannot survive without virtue.

That freedom untethered from moral order is nothing, but chaos!

And that no app, no algorithm, no ideology is ever going to fill the void, where meaning used to live!

To be a conservative, moving forward, we cannot just be about policies.

We have to defend the sacred, the unseen, the moral architecture, that gives people an identity. So how do you do that? Well, we have to rebuild competence. We have to restore institutions that actually work. Just in the last hour, this monologue on what we're facing now, because we can't open the government.

Why can't we open the government?

Because government is broken. Why does nobody care? Because education is broken.

We have to reclaim education, not as propaganda, but as the formation of the mind and the soul. Conservatives have to champion innovation.

Not to imitate Silicon Valley's chaos, but to harness technology in defense of human dignity. Don't be afraid of AI.

Know what it is. Know it's a tool. It's a tool to strengthen people. As long as you always remember it's a tool. Otherwise, you will lose your humanity to it!

That's a conservative principle. To be a conservative, we have to restore local strength. Our families are the basic building blocks, our schools, our churches, and our charities. Not some big, distant NGO that was started by the Tides Foundation, but actual local charities, where you see people working. A web of voluntary institutions that held us together at one point. Because when Washington fails, and it will, it already has, the neighborhood has to stand.

Charlie Kirk was doing one thing that people on our side were not doing. Speaking to the young.

But not in nostalgia.

Not in -- you know, Reagan, Reagan, Reagan.

In purpose. They don't remember. They don't remember who Dick Cheney was.

I was listening to Fox news this morning, talking about Dick Cheney. And there was somebody there that I know was not even born when Dick Cheney. When the World Trade Center came down.

They weren't even born. They were telling me about Dick Cheney.

And I was like, come on. Come on. Come on.

If you don't remember who Dick Cheney was, how are you going to remember 9/11. How will you remember who Reagan was.

That just says, that's an old man's creed. No, it's not.

It's the ultimate timeless rebellion against tyranny in all of its forms. Yes, and even the tyranny of despair, which is eating people alive!

We need to redefine ourselves. Because we have changed, and that's a good thing. The creed for a generation, that will decide the fate of the republic, is what we need to find.

A conservative in 2025, '26.

Is somebody who protects the enduring principles of American liberty and self-government.

While actively stewarding the institutions. The culture. The economy of this nation!

For those who are alive and yet to be unborn.

We have to be a group of people that we're not anchored in the past. Or in rage! But in reason. And morality. Realism. And hope for the future.

We're the stewards! We're the ones that have to relight the torch, not just hold it. We didn't -- we didn't build this Torch. We didn't make this Torch. We're the keepers of the flame, but we are honor-bound to pass that forward, and conservatives are viewed as people who just live in the past. We're not here to merely conserve the past, but to renew it. To sort it. What worked, what didn't work. We're the ones to say to the world, there's still such a thing as truth. There's still such a thing as virtue. You can deny it all you want.

But the pain will only get worse. There's still such a thing as America!

And if now is not the time to renew America. When is that time?

If you're not the person. If we're not the generation to actively stand and redefine and defend, then who is that person?

We are -- we are supposed to preserve what works.

That -- you know, I was writing something this morning.

I was making notes on this. A constitutionalist is for restraint. A progressive, if you will, for lack of a better term, is for more power.

Progressives want the government to have more power.

Conservatives are for more restraint.

But the -- for the American eagle to fly, we must have both wings.

And one can't be stronger than the other.

We as a conservative, are supposed to look and say, no. Don't look at that. The past teaches us this, this, and this. So don't do that.

We can't do that. But there are these things that we were doing in the past, that we have to jettison. And maybe the other side has a good idea on what should replace that. But we're the ones who are supposed to say, no, but remember the framework.

They're -- they can dream all they want.
They can come up with all these utopias and everything else, and we can go, "That's a great idea."

But how do we make it work with this framework? Because that's our job. The point of this is, it takes both. It takes both.

We have to have the customs and the moral order. And the practices that have stood the test of time, in trial.

We -- we're in an amazing, amazing time. Amazing time.

We live at a time now, where anything -- literally anything is possible!

I don't want to be against stuff. I want to be for the future. I want to be for a rich, dynamic future. One where we are part of changing the world for the better!

Where more people are lifted out of poverty, more people are given the freedom to choose, whatever it is that they want to choose, as their own government and everything.

I don't want to force it down anybody's throat.

We -- I am so excited to be a shining city on the hill again.

We have that opportunity, right in front of us!

But not in we get bogged down in hatred, in division.

Not if we get bogged down into being against something.

We must be for something!

I know what I'm for.

Do you?