CNN Host Don Lemon: I've been called a bigot and a racist...by the left AND the right

June 22, 2015

WRITER

Why do some people succeed on TV, but many, many others fail? People want to hear the truth, and they can tell when they aren't getting it. CNN's Don Lemon understands this. Don joined the radio show Monday morning for a fascinating interview, and the two discussed the dangers of political correctness, the way the left and the right put people into boxes, and more.

Below is a rush transcript of this interview, it may contain errors:

GLENN: I think it's extraordinarily difficult to be your own man in today's world. To actually stand up for what you believe in and to hell with the consequences. To be in the media and go against your audience or your perceived audience or your bosses is also very difficult. Because everybody wants to put you in a little box. If you're on Fox, you are a racist bigot Republican. If you're on NBC, you are a -- a racist bigot liberal.

But those are not necessarily the boxes that we all fit in, now, is it? In fact, I think very few of us fit into the boxes that society has given us. But once in a while on television, you will see somebody that you think you really disagree with, say something that you're like, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait. What was that? One guy who I think is demonstrating time and time again that he is brave to buck the norm, even though I don't believe he's a conservative by any stretch of the imagination. And I don't think we agree on a lot of policies. I have a feeling we agree on many principles. This man said this recently on CNN.

DON: Political correctness has become dangerous. We have to stop looking for reasons to be offended. We have to allow people leeway to make mistakes in conversations without calling them racists, bigots, stupid, dumb, sellout, or whatever the word your word choice might be. On and on. Not everyone is going to -- or should they have to agree with you. In fact, it's better when people don't agree with you. That's how we learn. That's what conversation is really about. It's not supposed to be an agree fest. After almost 25 years in the news business, you know who is the most easily offended and the least tolerant? Liberals and progressives. Because many of them don't really want to hear anyone else's opinions, but their own. Here's a tip: If you only agree with people who hold your same political affiliation or who are of your particular race, your particular gender, or ethnicity, you are part of the political correctness run amuck problem.

GLENN: Holy cow.

Don Lemon from CNN is joining us now. Hello, Don.

DON: Good morning. How are you?

GLENN: Very good. Thanks.

DON: Good morning. Afternoon. Good day. I'm great.

GLENN: It's good to have you on the problem.

DON: It's good to hear that. It's good to hear that.

GLENN: Good to hear what?

DON: I'm glad you played that. I actually said that on the radio program that I'm on. I said much more interesting things on CNN. I guess would be subversive from what you call mainstream media, but that's what I believe. I really do believe that.

GLENN: Do your bosses know that you believe that?

DON: Yeah, they do actually. They do know. I think that's why I'm there. You know, I've been called a bigot and a racist by the right. I've been called a bigot racist by the left. Mostly on the left I'm a sellout or an uncle Tom. I don't believe in pandering I believe in telling people the truth. And people don't always want to hear the truth. And I believe many times liberals don't want to hear the truth. You know, if you don't see their world point of view, they get really vicious because, you know, what are you kidding me? You're a black man, and you don't believe certain things that I believe. You know, it's just really interesting, that box that they put you in.

But the right puts me in a box too, which kind of is disappointing. Because when you say I'm not conservative, I am conservative on some issues, and I'm liberal on other issues. And I just kind of make up my own mind. I think I'm more conservative on fiscal issues. And on social issues, you know, I happen to be a person of color and I happen to be gay, and I think I'm a little more liberal on social issues. But, you know -- so as I said, I'm my own man.

GLENN: So here's what we noticed on, and this is why I wanted to have you on. First of all, to say, thank you for being a man of conscience. Because if I can always guess what somebody is going to say, they're nothing, but a shill.

DON: Yeah.

GLENN: Because it's no way to be consistent with the politically powerful all the time. Really? You agree with everything everybody is always saying? You're just a shill. And I cannot guess where you're coming from. And I find that refreshing.

What is it going to take to get more people to get away from the political parties and the political -- the political correctness and start being their own man or woman?

DON: Well, I think it's -- I think we listen to the loudest voices the most, and we shouldn't. Because the loudest voices aren't always the majority. And I think the majority of people feel the same way we do, Glenn. That we should not be run by the right or the left or, you know, conservative versus liberal. We should be -- you know, we should listen to what is right. And I think it's going to take people like us standing up and giving voice to that.

So, you know, I was reading something this morning. I don't normally read social media. But I was in traffic. And I was just sort of reading around. And someone said, you know, I don't know anyone in my circle who likes Don Lemon and why does he still have a job. And the reason I still have a job is because listen to me. People tune into my show every night because they want to hear the truth. They don't want to be pandered to.

You know I thought about when I was at the White House Correspondents Dinner recently, and there was a person at MSNBC. And they're like -- and I saw them, and they said, look, I don't understand your success lately. Like, you're really taking off. What's going on?

And I said, well, I don't really care about what people think about me. And one of the anchors there, who you know I won't name, he said, well, what do you think about when you watch me? And I said, I don't watch you that much. And he said, why not? And I said, because I always know what you're going to say. Before you open your mouth, I know what you're going to say.

If I watch, Megyn, I don't know what Megyn is going to say. Megyn may call out Karl Rove or somebody on the left. And I'm usually go, yes! You're right! Not because I disliked the person, but because I thought that they were wrong on that particular issue. And just because I thought they were wrong on that particular issue, it doesn't mean that I don't like them or that I won't do business with them or I won't listen to them. That's all part of it. That's what we're supposed to do. I don't agree with my mother all the time, but it doesn't mean we hate each other

GLENN: Don, A, how did we get here? And, B, how do we reverse-engineer this?

DON: Well, I think we have to start listening to each other. And we have to stop sort of castigating each other and calling each other names. I mean, you know. You have names. Sport names. But when you call people rude names, you know, just because, that's fine. But if you say something is of this -- like if you say, something is, you know, akin to fascism. It is akin to racism. Or whatever.

You don't have to say, hey, you're racist. Or you're a fascist. It's because you may have those particular qualities, but it doesn't mean you're of it. And I think we have to start listening to each other. And I think somehow -- I don't know how we're going to do it. But all the people who have people sort of just wrapped around their fingers or in their heads and they continue to pander to those people, we have to somehow figure how to call out their lies and get people to realize that they're being pandered to. Because if you watch certain news programs, they say what people -- what they think people want to hear. Because they want to have -- I think people want to have their beliefs reinforced. Which is good. That's fine. But if you're in the news media, you have to tell people the truth. And that doesn't always necessarily mean reinforcing what you believe.

So somehow we have to figure out how to do that. And I think it's going to be -- it's incumbent on people like you who have a platform that I'm very -- I shouldn't say jealous of. But I would -- envious of it is a better word. I would love to have the platform that you have and the freedom that you have, Glenn. It's phenomenal and I commend you for it.

GLENN: Well, thank you very much. Let me ask you two questions.

DON: Yep.

GLENN: MSNBC was covering what was happening in Charleston on Friday. And we went down and I just asked people who wanted to go lay flowers at the church and just say a prayer and join hands and sing a hymn or two to join me and go down there. No political thing. I didn't talk to any cameras. I did nothing. I just wanted to go down. My wife and I show our support. So we go down. MSNBC is in the middle of a report. And can you play a little of this, Pat?

Thomas Roberts is the anchor who is reporting from Charleston. And in the middle of something else, this is what happens.

THOMAS: -- but hearing emotional testimony from the family. But can we look over here right now? I mean, it's kind of heartbreaking. They're singing and a whole flood of people showed up. At the same time this arraignment was taking place. So you're hearing from the family, and then this whole group of people showed up. And they're singing a gospel song? And you heard from the family members of those who were lost. I apologize.

GLENN: Okay. Stop for a second. Stop. Pat.

So he loses -- he breaks down. And feels the goodness from the people of South Carolina. When I got onto the plane and we were leaving, somebody brought that to my attention and said, my gosh, Glenn, MSNBC didn't know that it was you guys. Didn't know that it was your group. And I thought to myself, if they did, do you think it would have played out that way? Are we allowed to be -- are we allowed to be who we are? Or do we have to be in these little boxes? Would it played out the same way, Don, if he knew it was me?

DON: I can't answer that. Listen, I don't know for sure. But my honest truth, because I'm always honest, for me, is probably not. You know, I think Thomas is -- you know, I know him. He's a pretty honest broker. But, you know, MSNBC, I don't know. Because I don't think MSNBC is a fan of yours. So, you know, it would have been great if they had known that. That's what -- the weird thing is that people who are out there listening, the people who are on social media, whatever, they think that because you and I disagree with each other, that we don't like each other. Or -- they don't realize that if we see each other in public or at a certain event or whatever, we'll actually say hello and have a conversation. And I think that many people sort of take it to the extreme. Say, you have to make that known, Glenn, that you don't like -- by having me on your program. Now, just because you disagree with me, doesn't mean that you don't like me or you have --

GLENN: Quite honestly, Don. We were talking beforehand. I don't know what I disagree with you on. I know we have disagreed with you on stuff. But that's normal.

DON: That's normal.

GLENN: That is normal. I mean --

DON: Right.

GLENN: We grew up in a country where we used to disagree with people. But we didn't demonize them. We didn't -- they weren't the enemy. Now -- I was talking to my children last night. And they said, dad, you know you're going to have to take on the left and the right on some issues. And I said, I know that, honey. I know that. There's going to be people -- but it's the fringes.

DON: Right.

GLENN: The majority of people are not like that. It's just the fringes.

DON: Yes.

GLENN: But we're responding to the fringes.

DON: I told you, the loudest voices -- we respond to the loudest voices, and that's not the majority. I think most of the people in this country want -- want the country to work. They want our lawmakers to work things out. They want them to come to consensus. But we've paid attention to the extremes and the loudest voices. And that's not the majority, and we have to stop doing that. And we have to do what we're doing. We should go around the country and do something for -- to get people to start talking together. I wish I had known. I wasn't reporting from there this weekend. But I wish I had known you were doing something. I don't mind. I don't mind promoting something that you're doing.

GLENN: No, no. That's not why we did it.

DON: I know that's not why you did it. But I'm just saying, if I was on the air and I knew it was you, I would say that it's you because I think it's more important to say that so that people know. Because this guy -- this hateful guy who went into this church, he's accused -- we say alleged. But he's [inaudible]. But this guy who allegedly went into this church, he wanted to start a race war. That's what he said. That's what's alleged that he said. He thinks that people are divided. All the people that are coming together in Charleston are showing him, he's wrong. It's people of all different backgrounds. All different ethnicities. All different political beliefs. They're coming together because they realize, at the end of the day, regardless of all the hyphens, we're all Americans. And most of us in America are God -- God-fearing people, and we want to live together.

[BREAK]

GLENN: A host of CNN weeknights at 10:00 p.m. Don Lemon is with us. Don, you just said that you kind of wish that there was something that would, you know, kind of travel the country and talk about these things and try to bring things -- bring people together. We have just launched something that I would like you to look into. Called never again is now. All life matters. And what we're starting -- I think the biggest thing we can all agree on, and that is the rights of the Christians, the Muslims who aren't Muslim enough, the atheist, the homosexuals that are being thrown off the roofs by ISIS. We have to do --

DON: I saw your report on that. Awesome.

GLENN: Yeah, we have to help these people. We have to help these people. And we're going to be down in Birmingham, Alabama, on 8/28. And I'd love to invite you to come on down.

DON: If you invite me, I'm there. I'll come.

GLENN: Holy cow. That was easy.

DON: Yeah, that was easy. It's that easy.

GLENN: How about the -- and it requires that you give me personally $10,000.

[laughter]

DON: No. I just -- I'm about the truth. And I've been doing it for quite a while. And you know who realizes that, is Rand Paul? I started this thing on CNN called No Talking Points. Rand Paul and I had a huge row (phonetic) on CNN once about -- because he just wouldn't answer my question directly. I just wanted him to answer my question directly. And he went round and round and round. And this was during the last presidential cycle.

And I said, you know what, I just want politicians -- I don't care what party they're with -- just to -- if I say, what color is the sky? I don't want you to say, well, my grandmother used to say that back then the sky was -- the sky is blue today. And don't give me all this other stuff. We'll get to the other stuff, if you just answer my question.

And so, you know, since then, he'll come on the show. And I say, you know, people think we hate each other and you know, Twitter blows up every time we're on. And he said, well, that's why I like coming on your show. And the same with Donald Trump who is coming on my show as well this week. Because, you know, they're honest people. And they realize people don't just -- shouldn't normally just kiss each other's butt. I should be able to say, Glenn, I don't agree with you on that, and here's why. And we can still go on to have other conversations about other things. It's just that simple.

GLENN: I'm trying to get -- I'm trying to get the past that you think Donald Trump is a normal guy.

DON: I don't think he's normal.

GLENN: Okay. All right. Good. Okay. Good.

DON: There's nothing normal about Donald Trump.

GLENN: Okay. Good. All right.

DON: But he appreciates you if you stand up to him, is what I'm saying.

GLENN: Yes. Yes, I'll agree with that.

Don, best of luck to you. And I'm glad we opened this dialogue with each other. And I hope to see you on 8/28. We'll be in touch. Give you all the details. But I appreciate a man that doesn't always say what I believe, but always says what he believes.

DON: Yeah.

GLENN: Because that's an honest search for truth. And you engage in that. And I appreciate it. God bless. Thanks, Don.

DON: Huge fan. Please consider coming on my show as well.

GLENN: Thanks a lot, Don. I appreciate it. Back in a minute.

Faith, family, and freedom—The forgotten core of conservatism

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?

How America’s elites fell for the same lie that fueled Auschwitz

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.

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Transcript

How America’s elites fell for the same lie that fueled Auschwitz

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 wins when good people mirror its rage.

Ancient evil, new clothes

A time for choosing

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

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

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

The new currency of power

Two futures — both ending in tyranny

The forgotten way

The only way