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Santorum speaks to Glenn about his surge in Iowa

January 03, 2012
Wilson

Writer

One man who has experienced a sudden surge in Iowa the past few days has been Rick Santorum, a candidate that Glenn has praised in the past. In fact, Glenn said that the two candidates he would vote for today would be Santorum and Bachmann, with Bachmann narrowly ahead of Santorum. Apparently others are realizing the value of a Rick Santorum as he is currently in the top three contenders in the polls alongside Mitt Romney and Ron Paul.

Read the transcript below:

GLENN: Today live from Dallas, Texas, the Lone Star state, tonight we begin our broadcast from GBTV on our brand new sound stage. We will show it to you. But today all eyes are on Iowa. That's why new frontrunner or the guy surging, Rick Santorum is on with us, now.

VOICE: Things are going back in a very healthy direction.

GLENN: Rick Santorum in Iowa, I think he could win tonight. I think it's because we didn't endorse him.

STU: (Laughing).

GLENN: Whenever that happens, they surge ahead. It is Rick Santorum, a good friend, a good friend of the program and a guy who is probably the strongest on the Middle East out there. Rick, how are you, sir?

SANTORUM: I'm doing great, Glenn. Thanks so much for having me on and thanks for all of the help that you've given me by giving me the opportunity to come on your program and for saying the kind things you have about me. I appreciate it very much.

GLENN: I will tell you this: We gave the opportunity to Newt Gingrich and it's really what you do with the time.

PAT: (Laughing).

GLENN: Rick, I want to ask

SANTORUM: Okay. I'll leave it at that.

GLENN: Yeah. I want to ask you a couple of a couple of tough questions because and you know that I'm your friend and I hope we're friends forever, but we're not electing a friend. We're electing the president of the United States and if you can't handle the Glenn Beck program, you know, what are you going to do. You shouldn't be the president of the United States. So let me ask you some tough questions. You supported Pat Toomey

PAT: No. Other way around.

GLENN: No, no.

SANTORUM: No. Other way around.

GLENN: Yeah, Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey. What the hell is wrong with you?

PAT: (Laughing.) That's about as direct as it gets right there.

SANTORUM: I like you know, when I was right after that happened in Pennsylvania, the question I got more than "how are you today" was "Why are you support Specter." And the answer to that question is it's a little complex but it's I did it because I thought it was in the best interest of the cause I believed in. As you know, Glenn, the most powerful branch of government unfortunately today is the is the judiciary and the Supreme Court and we were the 51/49 majority at the time in the United States Senate and President Bush was running for reelection and we believed there would be two and maybe even three Supreme Court nominees and Arlen Specter was slated to be chairman of the judiciary committee. Specter as you know from the days of Bork and Thomas was really the decider. If Specter supported the candidate for the court, he would pass. If he didn't, they wouldn't. That's because moderate Republicans and conservative Democrats basically followed his lead. And he came to me at the end of the campaign and asked for help. I had not been active in the campaign at all and he asked for help and I said, you know, Arlen, I've got concerns. I said, you're going to be chairman of the judiciary committee. He said I said, I'm not comfortable. He said, well, he says, I'll support whatever nominee the president puts up as long as I'm properly consulted as chairman of the committee and I'll make sure those nominations get through. And for me two to three Supreme Court justices for 30 years on the court was probably the most important thing we could have gotten out of that election. We had a 51 49 majority. Specter would hold onto the seat and guarantee the Supreme Court. We got Roberts, and I all the folks listening, go and read the reports. Read the news stories when Justice Alito's confirmation. There were repeated series of attacks on Alito. Every single time those attacks were waged, Arlen Specter was the first guy to jump up and knock them down. And I can say without question that Alito would not be on the court. It was a close vote. He would not have been on the court and we would not have a 5 4, well well, at least four and a half strong conservatives on that court right now and Alito being one of the best of them. So I

GLENN: Okay. All right. You're pissing me off because I really

SANTORUM: I made a decision which I felt was best. And let me just say this, Glenn. I knew it would cost I knew people would question me saying, oh, you're selling out, you're being for the liberal guy. No, I was being for what I thought was in the best interest of our country and I was willing to take the heat and continue to take the heat for doing so.

GLENN: Okay.

PAT: But it was based solely on Supreme Court decisions? Because the guy is not a conservative like you are.

SANTORUM: No, he's no, look, he's not a conservative.

PAT: No.

SANTORUM: That, you know, he did support some things and changed his opinion. He supported the partial birth abortion ban which he know he hadn't in the past and, you know, I will say that when I asked him for his help and support on key issues, most of the time he did help us out. But look, I understand this was going to be a he's not a conservative. I mean, I agree with that. I mean, he eventually switched to become a Democrat.

GLENN: He was a Democrat in the beginning.

PAT: But

PAT: I didn't leave the Republican Party, Glenn. The Republican Party left me.

STU: Rick, this is interesting because I think I understand your point on the Supreme Court and I think it's valid and Bush was fantastic

GLENN: It is.

STU: with Supreme Court justices. But isn't the point that isn't your point for endorsing Specter there because you believe he was more electable than Toomey who is the conservative, which is the same point people make against you with Romney now?

GLENN: No. No, he's not making that.

SANTORUM: No, I'm not saying that. Look, I don't know, Pat Toomey might have been able to won, he might not have been. Certainly would have been harder. You know, Bush lost the State of Pennsylvania that year in 2004. He lost it by 2 or 3 points. You know, Pat Toomey didn't get elected to the Senate. But I was got elected in the Senate, a pretty good year for Republican which 2004 was not. And the gubernatorial candidates for Pennsylvania, our candidate for governor who led the ticket like Bush would have won by 10 and Pat won by 1. So, you know, I don't know whether he would have won or not but it would have been certainly a much harder race. I don't think there's any question about that. And with a one seat majority, I was looking for something where I could, if I could say, look, by supporting Specter, we could guarantee Supreme Court nominees, that's a pretty good that's a pretty good reason to support someone in my opinion.

GLENN: Okay. Rick, earmarks.

SANTORUM: Yeah.

GLENN: You've defended Rick Perry brought this up and you defended earmarks. How can you possibly

SANTORUM: Yeah, what I said was that for 200 plus years in American history, if you look at the Constitution, Glenn, the Constitution says that the congress shall appropriate money. The congress is supposed to spend money, not the president. The congress spends this money. What happened was there was abuse. And there was abuse that led to higher spending. And when and people justifiably got upset. But the idea that congress shouldn't allocate money is against what the Constitution, in fact, requires the congress to do. What happened is that congress were using earmarks to get folks to vote for higher spending, which is what exploded this deficit in the last few years after I left the United States Senate. And so what I've said is

GLENN: No, no, no, no. No, no, no.

SANTORUM: That when that happened and Pat Toomey tied together what?

GLENN: No, no. No, no. I'm not going to let you get away I'm not going to let you get away with, "And then I left the Senate and spending was..." spending has been out of control for 20, 30 years.

SANTORUM: I would agree, but it's look at the rates of spending in discretionary accounts in Washington over the past 15 years and you will see, you know, low single digit increases in discretionary spending up until the time Obama came in and they exploded. And that's when people got all bent out of shape about earmarks and there was a rally, legitimately so to end it because they were being used to get people to vote for that higher spending. So look, I've said I'll support a ban of earmarks, and I do support a ban of earmarks. I will say that Jim DeMint who led this charge also supported earmarks. Ron Paul supported earmarks. Because, in fact, I don't know of too many people who didn't do earmarks because all of us thought it was our responsibility under the Constitution and representing our several states to make sure that when federal dollars were spent, they were allocated equally among the states as our job was to do.

GLENN: All right. You are and I've said this for years. You're probably the only guy that really I can't say that. You're one of the leaders on really understanding what is happening in the Middle East, what we face, the threat from Iran. We've talked about this, Rick, for what? Five years, seven years?

SANTORUM: Oh, more than that, Glenn. We've been talking about it since, I remember at least 2005 and maybe before.

GLENN: Yeah. So we I mean, we've been talking about this for a very long time. You knew who the twelfth imam was before anybody knew who it was. However, let me go here: I saw that you which I agree with. I saw that you said this weekend that you would launch a strike against Iran if they have nuclear weapons. They're in the straits of

SANTORUM: Well, no, I said I would launch a

GLENN: Make sure they don't.

SANTORUM: Look, I laid out a variety of things that I would do. And I said if all those things failed, then you have to set an ultimatum and say that, you know, we can't have a policy, Glenn, that says Iran shouldn't get a nuclear weapon and then don't do anything to stop them from getting it.

GLENN: Correct.

SANTORUM: That is the paper tiger and weakness because as you know, as you know the Middle East, the weak course is not one that's particularly well respected.

GLENN: No.

SANTORUM: And so when you say that you have a policy, which we do, which every presidential candidate does except Ron Paul that says that Iran should not get a nuclear weapon, then you better have a policy that, you know, actually tactical things that you're going to do to make sure that doesn't happen.

GLENN: Okay.

SANTORUM: And I laid them out in sequence. The last of the sequence was if all else fails, then we have to be very public that we will work with the State of Israel and that we will use whatever force is necessary, air strikes, to degrade those facilities.

GLENN: Okay.

SANTORUM: Before they get a nuclear weapon.

GLENN: Here's the here's the thing. We are stretched so thin financially.

SANTORUM: We will be stretched even more thin if Iran has a nuclear weapon, Glenn, and starts launching attacks in the Middle East, against the State of Israel, in this country. You think the economy's struggling now, just wait until we have a series of terrorist attacks because Iran will feel impervious to being attacked because they have a nuclear weapon.

GLENN: I know.

SANTORUM: That is something that

GLENN: You and I, Rick, I'm playing devil's advocate here. I cannot there is a strong part of me that says enough of the wars. Enough of the wars. What are we fighting? Five wars right now?

SANTORUM: We're trying to prevent a war here. We're trying to prevent one of the most nefarious the most nefarious regime in the entire world from you know, this is the equivalent as you know, Glenn, you know this. This is the equivalent of Al Qaeda or maybe even worse than Al Qaeda being in control of a country with enormous resources and capability.

GLENN: No, this is Hitler.

SANTORUM: We're trying to prevent them from having the failsafe so they can go out and reign terror around the world.

GLENN: The the idea that Iran is in the Straits of Hormuz right now firing missiles

SANTORUM: They think we're weak. They think we won't do anything. They're testing. They continue to prod, poke and test the will of the American president and he continues to show that he is going to be complacent and allow them to have their way. That's what this president has shown from the attempted attacks here in this country on a Saudi ambassador, the improvised explosive devices that have been used for years now to kill our troops that are manufactured in Iran. Iran as you saw on the front page of the Washington Post yesterday with and you've talked about this on your program with its influence now growing in Central and South America, we can sit on the sidelines and say, well, we'll just, you know, we'll let them go ahead and do this because we're tired of war. And then we will really be tired of war because it will be on our shores.

PAT: For so long now we've been asking you how you turn this thing around from the 1 to 2% that you were receiving and now here you are suddenly surging. This has got to feel pretty good. You are at 15% according to the latest poll. You have a real legitimate shot at winning this. This would really give you a shot in the arm if you finish in, I'd say the top three, wouldn't it?

SANTORUM: Yeah, I think the top three is what we're shooting for. I mean, obviously 10, 12 days ago we were in last place and we were getting the question that we got here on the program last time I was on: What's wrong with you, Rick? I mean, you're not doing anything, it's not happening. I'd like to support you, but... and I've always said, you know, I'm going to go out and do what I've done here, Glenn. I mean, I love you, I really do. I love you as a brother and I agree with you on 90 plus percent of the things but, you know, what, Glenn, when we disagree, I'm not going to sugar coat it to you. I'm going to tell you exactly what I believe and I respect the fact that, you know, you have a different opinion on things but I also respect you enough to be able to tell you, you know, that I what I think and lay it all out there. And the people of Iowa, I've heard this repeatedly. They said, you know what, I don't agree with you on everything but I think you are an honest guy, you actually are saying what you believe is the right thing to do, and I trust you. And nobody I mean, we can't all run for president. Therefore there's no perfect candidate. And so you take what you think is the best and when you disagree, you at least understand that they are doing it for the reasons they believe in their heart is the right thing to do. And that's what I'm trying to lay out here in Iowa, and the people of Iowa have responded to it.

GLENN: Good luck tonight, Rick. Good luck.

SANTORUM: Thank you, my friend, and I really appreciate it. By the way, I do appreciate, I mean this all sincerity. I appreciate you asking me the tough questions and the things that we disagree on because, you know, if you don't put those out there, then people can go and think what they want. And there are disagreements but I hope you believe as I hope you know this

GLENN: I wouldn't

SANTORUM: I'm doing it because I do believe it's the best thing for the country.

GLENN: I wouldn't lose a second of time worrying about what you were doing behind anybody's back or behind closed doors. Not one second of time would I worry about that.

SANTORUM: Thank you, my friend.

GLENN: God bless you.

SANTORUM: And if you go to RickSantorum.com and help us out, I'd appreciate it. Thank you.

From Pharaoh to Hamas: The same spirit of evil, new disguise

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

The drone footage out of Gaza isn’t just war propaganda — it’s a glimpse of the same darkness that once convinced men they were righteous for killing innocents.

Evil introduces itself subtly. It doesn’t announce, “Hi, I’m here to destroy you.” It whispers. It flatters. It borrows the language of justice, empathy, and freedom, twisting them until hatred sounds righteous and violence sounds brave.

We are watching that same deception unfold again — in the streets, on college campuses, and in the rhetoric of people who should know better. It’s the oldest story in the world, retold with new slogans.

Evil wins when good people mirror its rage.

A drone video surfaced this week showing Hamas terrorists staging the “discovery” of a hostage’s body. They pushed a corpse out of a window, dragged it into a hole, buried it, and then called in aid workers to “find” what they themselves had planted. It was theater — evil, disguised as victimhood. And it was caught entirely on camera.

That’s how evil operates. It never comes in through the front door. It sneaks in, often through manipulative pity. The same spirit animates the moral rot spreading through our institutions — from the halls of universities to the chambers of government.

Take Zohran Mamdani, a New York assemblyman who has praised jihadists and defended pro-Hamas agitators. His father, a Columbia University professor, wrote that America and al-Qaeda are morally equivalent — that suicide bombings shouldn’t be viewed as barbaric. Imagine thinking that way after watching 3,000 Americans die on 9/11. That’s not intellectualism. That’s indoctrination.

Often, that indoctrination comes from hostile foreign actors, peddled by complicit pawns on our own soil. The pro-Hamas protests that erupted across campuses last year, for example, were funded by Iran — a regime that murders its own citizens for speaking freely.

Ancient evil, new clothes

But the deeper danger isn’t foreign money. It’s the spiritual blindness that lets good people believe resentment is justice and envy is discernment. Scripture talks about the spirit of Amalek — the eternal enemy of God’s people, who attacks the weak from behind while the strong look away. Amalek never dies; it just changes its vocabulary and form with the times.

Today, Amalek tweets. He speaks through professors who defend terrorism as “anti-colonial resistance.” He preaches from pulpits that call violence “solidarity.” And he recruits through algorithms, whispering that the Jews control everything, that America had it coming, that chaos is freedom. Those are ancient lies wearing new clothes.

When nations embrace those lies, it’s not the Jews who perish first. It’s the nations themselves. The soul dies long before the body. The ovens of Auschwitz didn’t start with smoke; they started with silence and slogans.

Andrew Harnik / Staff | Getty Images

A time for choosing

So what do we do? We speak truth — calmly, firmly, without venom. Because hatred can’t kill hatred; it only feeds it. Truth, compassion, and courage starve it to death.

Evil wins when good people mirror its rage. That’s how Amalek survives — by making you fight him with his own weapons. The only victory that lasts is moral clarity without malice, courage without cruelty.

The war we’re fighting isn’t new. It’s the same battle between remembrance and amnesia, covenant and chaos, humility and pride. The same spirit that whispered to Pharaoh, to Hitler, and to every mob that thought hatred could heal the world is whispering again now — on your screens, in your classrooms, in your churches.

Will you join it, or will you stand against it?

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Bill Gates ends climate fear campaign, declares AI the future ruler

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

The Big Tech billionaire once said humanity must change or perish. Now he claims we’ll survive — just as elites prepare total surveillance.

For decades, Americans have been told that climate change is an imminent apocalypse — the existential threat that justifies every intrusion into our lives, from banning gas stoves to rationing energy to tracking personal “carbon scores.”

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates helped lead that charge. He warned repeatedly that the “climate disaster” would be the greatest crisis humanity would ever face. He invested billions in green technology and demanded the world reach net-zero emissions by 2050 “to avoid catastrophe.”

The global contest is no longer over barrels and pipelines — it is over who gets to flip the digital switch.

Now, suddenly, he wants everyone to relax: Climate change “will not lead to humanity’s demise” after all.

Gates was making less of a scientific statement and more of a strategic pivot. When elites retire a crisis, it’s never because the threat is gone — it’s because a better one has replaced it. And something else has indeed arrived — something the ruling class finds more useful than fear of the weather.The same day Gates downshifted the doomsday rhetoric, Amazon announced it would pay warehouse workers $30 an hour — while laying off 30,000 people because artificial intelligence will soon do their jobs.

Climate panic was the warm-up. AI control is the main event.

The new currency of power

The world once revolved around oil and gas. Today, it revolves around the electricity demanded by server farms, the chips that power machine learning, and the data that can be used to manipulate or silence entire populations. The global contest is no longer over barrels and pipelines — it is over who gets to flip the digital switch. Whoever controls energy now controls information. And whoever controls information controls civilization.

Climate alarmism gave elites a pretext to centralize power over energy. Artificial intelligence gives them a mechanism to centralize power over people. The future battles will not be about carbon — they will be about control.

Two futures — both ending in tyranny

Americans are already being pushed into what look like two opposing movements, but both leave the individual powerless.

The first is the technocratic empire being constructed in the name of innovation. In its vision, human work will be replaced by machines, and digital permissions will subsume personal autonomy.

Government and corporations merge into a single authority. Your identity, finances, medical decisions, and speech rights become access points monitored by biometric scanners and enforced by automated gatekeepers. Every step, purchase, and opinion is tracked under the noble banner of “efficiency.”

The second is the green de-growth utopia being marketed as “compassion.” In this vision, prosperity itself becomes immoral. You will own less because “the planet” requires it. Elites will redesign cities so life cannot extend beyond a 15-minute walking radius, restrict movement to save the Earth, and ration resources to curb “excess.” It promises community and simplicity, but ultimately delivers enforced scarcity. Freedom withers when surviving becomes a collective permission rather than an individual right.

Both futures demand that citizens become manageable — either automated out of society or tightly regulated within it. The ruling class will embrace whichever version gives them the most leverage in any given moment.

Climate panic was losing its grip. AI dependency — and the obedience it creates — is far more potent.

The forgotten way

A third path exists, but it is the one today’s elites fear most: the path laid out in our Constitution. The founders built a system that assumes human beings are not subjects to be monitored or managed, but moral agents equipped by God with rights no government — and no algorithm — can override.

Hesham Elsherif / Stringer | Getty Images

That idea remains the most “disruptive technology” in history. It shattered the belief that people need kings or experts or global committees telling them how to live. No wonder elites want it erased.

Soon, you will be told you must choose: Live in a world run by machines or in a world stripped down for planetary salvation. Digital tyranny or rationed equality. Innovation without liberty or simplicity without dignity.

Both are traps.

The only way

The only future worth choosing is the one grounded in ordered liberty — where prosperity and progress exist alongside moral responsibility and personal freedom and human beings are treated as image-bearers of God — not climate liabilities, not data profiles, not replaceable hardware components.

Bill Gates can change his tune. The media can change the script. But the agenda remains the same.

They no longer want to save the planet. They want to run it, and they expect you to obey.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Why the White House restoration sent the left Into panic mode

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

Presidents have altered the White House for decades, yet only Donald Trump is treated as a vandal for privately funding the East Wing’s restoration.

Every time a president so much as changes the color of the White House drapes, the press clutches its pearls. Unless the name on the stationery is Barack Obama’s, even routine restoration becomes a national outrage.

President Donald Trump’s decision to privately fund upgrades to the White House — including a new state ballroom — has been met with the usual chorus of gasps and sneers. You’d think he bulldozed Monticello.

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s ‘visionary.’

The irony is that presidents have altered and expanded the White House for more than a century. President Franklin D. Roosevelt added the East and West Wings in the middle of the Great Depression. Newspapers accused him of building a palace while Americans stood in breadlines. History now calls it “vision.”

First lady Nancy Reagan faced the same hysteria. Headlines accused her of spending taxpayer money on new china “while Americans starved.” In truth, she raised private funds after learning that the White House didn’t have enough matching plates for state dinners. She took the ridicule and refused to pass blame.

“I’m a big girl,” she told her staff. “This comes with the job.” That was dignity — something the press no longer recognizes.

A restoration, not a renovation

Trump’s project is different in every way that should matter. It costs taxpayers nothing. Not a cent. The president and a few friends privately fund the work. There’s no private pool or tennis court, no personal perks. The additions won’t even be completed until after he leaves office.

What’s being built is not indulgence — it’s stewardship. A restoration of aging rooms, worn fixtures, and century-old bathrooms that no longer function properly in the people’s house. Trump has paid for cast brass doorknobs engraved with the presidential seal, restored the carpets and moldings, and ensured that the architecture remains faithful to history.

The media’s response was mockery and accusations of vanity. They call it “grotesque excess,” while celebrating billion-dollar “climate art” projects and funneling hundreds of millions into activist causes like the No Kings movement. They lecture America on restraint while living off the largesse of billionaires.

The selective guardians of history

Where was this sudden reverence for history when rioters torched St. John’s Church — the same church where every president since James Madison has worshipped? The press called it an “expression of grief.”

Where was that reverence when mobs toppled statues of Washington, Jefferson, and Grant? Or when first lady Melania Trump replaced the Rose Garden’s lawn with a patio but otherwise followed Jackie Kennedy’s original 1962 plans in the garden’s restoration? They called that “desecration.”

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s “visionary.”

The real desecration

The people shrieking about “historic preservation” care nothing for history. They hate the idea that something lasting and beautiful might be built by hands they despise. They mock craftsmanship because it exposes their own cultural decay.

The White House ballroom is not a scandal — it’s a mirror. And what it reflects is the media’s own pettiness. The ruling class that ridicules restoration is the same class that cheered as America’s monuments fell. Its members sneer at permanence because permanence condemns them.

Julia Beverly / Contributor | Getty Images

Trump’s improvements are an act of faith — in the nation’s symbols, its endurance, and its worth. The outrage over a privately funded renovation says less about him than it does about the journalists who mistake destruction for progress.

The real desecration isn’t happening in the East Wing. It’s happening in the newsrooms that long ago tore up their own foundation — truth — and never bothered to rebuild it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Trump’s secret war in the Caribbean EXPOSED — It’s not about drugs

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

The president’s moves in Venezuela, Guyana, and Colombia aren’t about drugs. They’re about re-establishing America’s sovereignty across the Western Hemisphere.

For decades, we’ve been told America’s wars are about drugs, democracy, or “defending freedom.” But look closer at what’s unfolding off the coast of Venezuela, and you’ll see something far more strategic taking shape. Donald Trump’s so-called drug war isn’t about fentanyl or cocaine. It’s about control — and a rebirth of American sovereignty.

The aim of Trump’s ‘drug war’ is to keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

The president understands something the foreign policy class forgot long ago: The world doesn’t respect apologies. It respects strength.

While the global elites in Davos tout the Great Reset, Trump is building something entirely different — a new architecture of power based on regional independence, not global dependence. His quiet campaign in the Western Hemisphere may one day be remembered as the second Monroe Doctrine.

Venezuela sits at the center of it all. It holds the world’s largest crude oil reserves — oil perfectly suited for America’s Gulf refineries. For years, China and Russia have treated Venezuela like a pawn on their chessboard, offering predatory loans in exchange for control of those resources. The result has been a corrupt, communist state sitting in our own back yard. For too long, Washington shrugged. Not any more.The naval exercises in the Caribbean, the sanctions, the patrols — they’re not about drug smugglers. They’re about evicting China from our hemisphere.

Trump is using the old “drug war” playbook to wage a new kind of war — an economic and strategic one — without firing a shot at our actual enemies. The goal is simple: Keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

Beyond Venezuela

Just east of Venezuela lies Guyana, a country most Americans couldn’t find on a map a year ago. Then ExxonMobil struck oil, and suddenly Guyana became the newest front in a quiet geopolitical contest. Washington is helping defend those offshore platforms, build radar systems, and secure undersea cables — not for charity, but for strategy. Control energy, data, and shipping lanes, and you control the future.

Moreover, Colombia — a country once defined by cartels — is now positioned as the hinge between two oceans and two continents. It guards the Panama Canal and sits atop rare-earth minerals every modern economy needs. Decades of American presence there weren’t just about cocaine interdiction; they were about maintaining leverage over the arteries of global trade. Trump sees that clearly.

PEDRO MATTEY / Contributor | Getty Images

All of these recent news items — from the military drills in the Caribbean to the trade negotiations — reflect a new vision of American power. Not global policing. Not endless nation-building. It’s about strategic sovereignty.

It’s the same philosophy driving Trump’s approach to NATO, the Middle East, and Asia. We’ll stand with you — but you’ll stand on your own two feet. The days of American taxpayers funding global security while our own borders collapse are over.

Trump’s Monroe Doctrine

Critics will call it “isolationism.” It isn’t. It’s realism. It’s recognizing that America’s strength comes not from fighting other people’s wars but from securing our own energy, our own supply lines, our own hemisphere. The first Monroe Doctrine warned foreign powers to stay out of the Americas. The second one — Trump’s — says we’ll defend them, but we’ll no longer be their bank or their babysitter.

Historians may one day mark this moment as the start of a new era — when America stopped apologizing for its own interests and started rebuilding its sovereignty, one barrel, one chip, and one border at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.