Blog
LatestArticlesVideos
Radio
LivePodcastSerialsStations
TV
Podcasts
The Glenn Beck ProgramThe Glenn Beck PodcastThe Beck Story
Fine Art
Real Estate
Shop
More
AboutCharityBooksSponsorsContact
SEARCH
Live Radio

©2024 MERCURY RADIO ARTS.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

TERMS OF USE | PRIVACY POLICY

Live

Glenn's Show Prep

Pro-Choice! Pro-Amnesty! Pro-Oprah! All the reasons you should NOT vote for Donald Trump

July 09, 2015
Staff

WRITER

It’s no secret that Stu isn’t a big fan of Donald Trump, but some listeners seem to think he’d be a great candidate. In fact, many polls have shown him near the top. People seem to love his “straight talk” and “hard stand” on illegal immigration. But what are his real policies? Stu dedicated the opening of last night’s show to explain — using facts and quotes from Trump himself - to show why there is NOTHING remotely conservative about Donald Trump and his candidacy.

Latest polls are out, and Jeb Bush is leading the field of 10,687 GOP presidential hopefuls with 19% of the vote. If that doesn’t make you suicidal, this will. In second place at 12% is Donald Trump, Donald freaking Trump. It’s so absolutely ridiculous. It kind of feels like we’re at the beginning of Back to the Future 2. If we had a DeLorean and fast-forwarded a couple years to life under President Trump, the country would look like Hill Valley when it was run by Biff Tannen.

That’s kind of a terrible analogy actually because Trump would never, ever win, never. He’s not going to win, but yet for some reason, people think he’s going to win. We do this every election, we say we’re going to stick to principle, and then we panic and go running to the first shiny thing that walks by. When I say we, I’m not really referring to this audience. I’m referring to America as a whole.

We have our own poll going on at GlennBeck.com, and Donald Trump does not perform very well with this audience. I’m so proud of you guys. Really, I am. How Trump gets anyone, let alone conservatives, to support him is the eighth wonder of the world or the Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse, depending on your level of fatalism, I guess that is. Not only is he the most obnoxious guy in the world, he’s arrogant, he’s one of the most annoying celebrities of all time, his views are as insane as his love for gaudy brass decor.

Enough is enough. Someone has to stand up and be the adult in the room, so today I offer America a public service. That’s right, it’s time. I present to you the ultimate takedown of Donald Trump, GOP candidate. We start with the Mexico stuff. Watch.

VIDEO

Donald Trump: They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. Some I assume are good people.

I love Mexico. I love the Mexican people. Two waiters came up to me tonight, “Mr. Trump, we love you.” I said, “Where you from?” “Mexico.” I said, “That’s great. I love you too.” These countries aren’t sending their finest. They’re sending people that are like got a lot of problems. Doesn’t that make sense?

I basically said this, we need to strengthen our borders, and they said I’m a racist.  

To get the cars and trucks and everything over here, let the illegals drive them in. They’re coming in anyway.

I do great with Latino voters. I employ so many Latinos. I have so many people working for me.

I’ve taken a lot of heat, and it’s unnecessary, very unfair heat, because first of all, I love the Mexican people. How can I not love people that give me tens of millions of dollars for apartments? You have to love them.

But I love them for a lot of reasons. I love them for their spirit.

And then I talk about Mexico, and I love Mexico, but every time I talk about it, they accuse me of being a racist.

You have illegals that are just pouring across the borders. I was really criticized for the border, but the truth is it’s true. They think it’s like Mother Teresa is coming across the border.

Well, I said drug dealers, I said killers, and I said rapists. They made the word rapists, they really picked that up.

I tell you, I love the folks from South America. They’re friends of mine. Many work for me. Many are friends. Many buy apartments from me. I have great love for the Mexican people, and I always have, and they like me.

No apology because everything I said is 100% correct. All you have to do is read the newspapers.

So, there you go. He’s obviously riding the populist wave there. He’s trying to give voice to people’s frustration with illegal immigration, and he’s done it, of course, with the eloquence of a baboon. Yes, I am not a fan of spineless companies like NBC Universal, Macy’s, the PGA, and others who are disassociating themselves with Trump. Let’s be honest, the progressive mob is trying to add another scalp, and some conservatives are having an understandable response. They can’t stand the media, they see a Republican getting attacked by the media for being outspoken, and they rush to his defense. I get it, but please, please, let’s take off our reactionary caps for a minute and put on our thinking caps.

But Stu, he’s right on the money. These darn illegals are sinking the ship. At least Trump is saying something. Okay, great. I will give him his fair shake. Let’s see where he stands on immigration policy. Watch.

VIDEO

Donald Trump: The biggest problem is that you have some great, wonderful people coming in from Mexico that are working the crops, they’re working cutting lawns, they’re doing a lot of jobs that I’m not sure that a lot of Americans are going to take those jobs. And that’s the dichotomy. That’s the big problem because you have a lot of great people coming in doing a lot of work, and I’m not so sure that a lot of other people are going to be doing that work. So, it is a very tough problem, but I do say this, you have a law, or at least you have to establish a law, and I guess we’re sort of a country and other people aren’t supposed to be coming into our country illegally.

Bill O’Reilly: Now, the 15 million illegal aliens already in the United States, what do you do with them?

Donald Trump: I think right now you’re going to have to do something. It’s hard to generalize, but you’re going to have to look at the individual people, see how they’ve done, see how productive they’ve been, see what their references are, and then make a decision.

Bill O’Reilly: All right, on a case-by-case—going to take a long time and a lot of people.

Donald Trump: A long time, but you know, you have some great, productive people that came.

You have to give them a path. You have 20 million, 30 million, nobody knows what it is. It used to be 11 million. Now, today I hear it’s 11, but I don’t think it’s 11. I actually heard you probably have 30 million. You have to give them a path, and you have to make it possible for them to succeed. You have to do that.

You have to give them a path, a path to citizenship. Where have I heard that one before? I know, Jeb Bush and Lindsey Graham and of course every Democrat as well. He’s zero for one there. There could be negatives of talking tough, but I’m willing to accept that if you’re going to get the truth and the policy that I want, but I don’t want someone making stupid mistakes that the media can easily exploit.

With Trump, you’re getting all of the negatives of someone who says tough, dangerous, stupid things along with the policy of Jeb Bush and Lindsey Graham. Let’s try some other issues though. How about taxes? When Trump ran for president in 1999, he proposed a gigantic wealth tax on the American people, a 14.25% levy that he calculated would raise $5.7 trillion and wipe out the debt forever in one fell swoop—a wealth tax, going into your bank account and pulling out money from bank accounts. Obama is into his second term, and he hasn’t even suggested that.

On the plan, Trump said, “By my calculations, 1 percent of Americans who control 90 percent of the wealth in this country would be affected by my plan.” Is this the guy in the second place of the GOP primary or a guy second in line to get into a rape tent at Occupy Wall Street? The only place that’s conservative is in Sean Penn’s wildest economic fantasies. But Trump has never been a conservative. He’s got some serious political identity issues.

Since the 80s, he struggled so much with his identity, he has switched parties five times. Remember, a few months ago when people wanted George Stephanopoulos fired because he gave to the Clinton Foundation, remember that? Well, Donald Trump has given even more to the Clinton Foundation than Stephanopoulos did. He’s given over $100,000 to the Clintons. So, we want to fire a media member for donating to the Clintons but want to hire a GOP candidate that’s done the same? Is that what you want in a candidate who is likely to face, I don’t know, a Clinton? Really?

It doesn’t stop there though. Since 1990, he’s given at least $541,650 to Democrats, far more than he gave to Republicans. The guy gave money to Rahm Emanuel and Harry Reid, Harry freaking Reid. So, that’s zero for two, okay?

Now let’s go to an easy one. Everyone gets this one right, right? Abortion—1999, Trump said, “I’m totally pro-choice. I hate it and I hate saying it. And I’m almost ashamed to say that I’m pro-choice but I am pro-choice because I think we have no choice.” What? And “I believe it is a personal decision that should be left to the women and their doctors.” Here’s what he says now.

VIDEO

Donald Trump: So, it’s pro-life, right, but it’s life of the mother, very important, incest and rape.

Mark: Okay. So, say a woman is pregnant, and it’s not in any of those exception categories, but she chooses to have an abortion.

Donald Trump: It depends when. The answer is—excuse me, if it’s not in those, I’m pro-life. Mark, very simple, pro-life.

Very simple. I mean, that was seriously one of the single worst explanations of being pro-life I’ve ever heard someone give. Now, remember how suspicious we all were of Mitt Romney’s conversion to pro-life? You’re going to let Trump get away with that? I’d say he’s zero for three.

Okay, well, at least he’s got to have a good take on who the worst president of all time is. You know, he’s a businessman. Maybe it’s FDR for price controls and confiscating gold, right?

VIDEO

Donald Trump: I think Bush is probably the worst president in the history of the United States.

 Bush has been so bad, maybe the worst president in the history of this country. He has been so incompetent, so bad, so evil that I don’t think any Republican could’ve won.

Bush, worst president. I mean, he wasn’t perfect, really, but Bush, over helicopters burning in the desert Jimmy Carter, over creator of the welfare society LBJ, over racist Woodrow Wilson? And sure, he doesn’t say he likes Obama now. Of course, he’s not going to say that now, but when he was running the first time, Trump said Obama had a chance of going down as a great president.

VIDEO

Donald Trump: I think he has a chance to go down as a great president. Now, if he’s not, if he’s not a great president, this country is in serious trouble.

I think he’s going to lead through a consensus. It’s not going to be just a bull run like Bush did. He just did whatever the hell he wanted. He’d go into a country, attack Iraq, which had nothing to do with the World Trade Center, and just do it because he wanted to do it.

Just from a judgment perspective, he thought Obama was going to rule by consensus? Really? He also went on to call him—he said he was one of Obama’s biggest cheerleaders. It’s not a surprise because in the past Trump wrote, “We must have universal healthcare.”

He indicated his ideal vice president would be diehard Obama supporter Oprah Winfrey, and he was a registered Democrat until 2009—not 1979, 2009.

Surely there’s got to be something he’s good on, some issue that we can see a shred of conservatism present. He is a business guy, of course. How about eminent domain? Years ago, Trump was looking to add a few more parking spots to one of his casinos in Atlantic City. To do so, he needed to acquire the property of Vera Coking, a senior citizen who had lived there for over three decades. So, did he make her an offer she couldn’t refuse? No, he decided to use eminent domain. Yes, this conservative argued that the government needed to take a wrecking ball to this sweet old woman’s home, her private property, because it was an eyesore.

VIDEO

Donald Trump: Everybody coming into Atlantic City sees that property, and it’s not fair to Atlantic City and the people. They’re staring at this terrible house instead of staring at beautiful fountains and beautiful other things that would be good.

John Stossel: Basic to freedom is that if you own something, it’s yours, that the government doesn’t just come and take it away from you.

Donald Trump: Do you want to live in the city where you can’t build schools? Do you want to live in the city where you can’t build roads or highways or have access to hospitals? Condemnation is a necessary evil.

John Stossel: But you’re not talking about a hospital. You’re talking about a building a rich guy finds ugly.

Thank God for John Stossel. He publicly humiliated her, demeaned the place she called a home, all so he could have a few extra parking spaces and have more people gamble a few more dollars at his crappy casinos.

That’s not all on eminent domain, of course, because the big one is when the government destroyed people’s homes in Connecticut so an office building could be built in the Kelo decision which might be the worst Supreme Court ruling of my lifetime. Trump said he backed the government 100%. Eminent domain is more than something he supports. It’s his business plan. In fact, a nice chunk of Trump’s wealth has come from using the force of government to take property from private individuals to line his pockets. Beyond the sheer lack of basic humanity, it definitely takes a liberal progressive to do something like that.

There is nothing remotely close to conservative about Donald Trump, and thus there is no reason he should garner your support, zero, nada, zip. If you want a pro-amnesty, pro-wealth tax, pro-donating to Rahm Emanuel and Harry freaking Reid and his likely opponent Hillary Clinton, pro-choice but pro-life during election season, thinks Bush is the worst president in history, wants Oprah to be the VP, self-described Obama cheerleader, believe we must have universal healthcare, pro-using the government to steal homes from elderly people, pro-a losing candidate that has zero chance of winning, and a progressive, then Donald Trump is totally your guy.

There you have it, America. The science is settled. Let’s just once and for all stop with the Donald. Let’s just stop. As Glenn would say, never again is now.

Featured image: NEW YORK, NY - JULY 06:  Donald Trump attends the 2015 Hank's Yanks Golf Classic at Trump Golf Links Ferry Point on July 6, 2015 in New York City.  (Photo by Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images)

Warning: Stop letting TikTok activists think for you

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Bad-faith attacks on Israel and AIPAC warp every debate. Real answers emerge only when people set aside scripts and ask what serves America’s long-term interests.

The search for truth has always required something very much in short supply these days: honesty. Not performative questions, not scripted outrage, not whatever happens to be trending on TikTok, but real curiosity.

Some issues, often focused on foreign aid, AIPAC, or Israel, have become hotbeds of debate and disagreement. Before we jump into those debates, however, we must return to a simpler, more important issue: honest questioning. Without it, nothing in these debates matters.

Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

The phrase “just asking questions” has re-entered the zeitgeist, and that’s fine. We should always question power. But too many of those questions feel preloaded with someone else’s answer. If the goal is truth, then the questions should come from a sincere desire to understand, not from a hunt for a villain.

Honest desire for truth is the only foundation that can support a real conversation about these issues.

Truth-seeking is real work

Right now, plenty of people are not seeking the truth at all. They are repeating something they heard from a politician on cable news or from a stranger on TikTok who has never opened a history book. That is not a search for answers. That is simply outsourcing your own thought.

If you want the truth, you need to work for it. You cannot treat the world like a Marvel movie where the good guy appears in a cape and the villain hisses on command. Real life does not give you a neat script with the moral wrapped up in two hours.

But that is how people are approaching politics now. They want the oppressed and the oppressor, the heroic underdog and the cartoon villain. They embrace this fantastical framing because it is easier than wrestling with reality.

This framing took root in the 1960s when the left rebuilt its worldview around colonizers and the colonized. Overnight, Zionism was recast as imperialism. Suddenly, every conflict had to fit the same script. Today’s young activists are just recycling the same narrative with updated graphics. Everything becomes a morality play. No nuance, no context, just the comforting clarity of heroes and villains.

Bad-faith questions

This same mindset is fueling the sudden obsession with Israel, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in particular. You hear it from members of Congress and activists alike: AIPAC pulls the strings, AIPAC controls the government, AIPAC should register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The questions are dramatic, but are they being asked in good faith?

FARA is clear. The standard is whether an individual or group acts under the direction or control of a foreign government. AIPAC simply does not qualify.

Here is a detail conveniently left out of these arguments: Dozens of domestic organizations — Armenian, Cuban, Irish, Turkish — lobby Congress on behalf of other countries. None of them registers under FARA because — like AIPAC — they are independent, domestic organizations.

If someone has a sincere problem with the structure of foreign lobbying, fair enough. Let us have that conversation. But singling out AIPAC alone is not a search for truth. It is bias dressed up as bravery.

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

If someone wants to question foreign aid to Israel, fine. Let’s have that debate. But let’s ask the right questions. The issue is not the size of the package but whether the aid advances our interests. What does the United States gain? Does the investment strengthen our position in the region? How does it compare to what we give other nations? And do we examine those countries with the same intensity?

The real target

These questions reflect good-faith scrutiny. But narrowing the entire argument to one country or one dollar amount misses the larger problem. If someone objects to the way America handles foreign aid, the target is not Israel. The target is the system itself — an entrenched bureaucracy, poor transparency, and decades-old commitments that have never been re-examined. Those problems run through programs around the world.

If you want answers, you need to broaden the lens. You have to be willing to put aside the movie script and confront reality. You have to hold yourself to a simple rule: Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

That is the only way this country ever gets clarity on foreign aid, influence, alliances, and our place in the world. Questioning is not just allowed. It is essential. But only if it is honest.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

A nation unravels when its shared culture is the first thing to go

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Texas now hosts Quran-first academies, Sharia-compliant housing schemes, and rapidly multiplying mosques — all part of a movement building a self-contained society apart from the country around it.

It is time to talk honestly about what is happening inside America’s rapidly growing Muslim communities. In city after city, large pockets of newcomers are choosing to build insulated enclaves rather than enter the broader American culture.

That trend is accelerating, and the longer we ignore it, the harder it becomes to address.

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world.

America has always welcomed people of every faith and people from every corner of the world, but the deal has never changed: You come here and you join the American family. You are free to honor your traditions, keep your faith, but you must embrace the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. You melt into the shared culture that allows all of us to live side by side.

Across the country, this bargain is being rejected by Islamist communities that insist on building a parallel society with its own rules, its own boundaries, and its own vision for how life should be lived.

Texas illustrates the trend. The state now has roughly 330 mosques. At least 48 of them were built in just the last 24 months. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex alone has around 200 Islamic centers. Houston has another hundred or so. Many of these communities have no interest in blending into American life.

This is not the same as past waves of immigration. Irish, Italian, Korean, Mexican, and every other group arrived with pride in their heritage. Still, they also raised American flags and wanted their children to be part of the country’s future. They became doctors, small-business owners, teachers, and soldiers. They wanted to be Americans.

What we are watching now is not the melting pot. It is isolation by design.

Parallel societies do not end well

More than 300 fundamentalist Islamic schools now operate full-time across the country. Many use Quran-first curricula that require students to spend hours memorizing religious texts before they ever reach math or science. In Dallas, Brighter Horizons Academy enrolls more than 1,700 students and draws federal support while operating on a social model that keeps children culturally isolated.

Then there is the Epic City project in Collin and Hunt counties — 402 acres originally designated only for Muslim buyers, with Sharia-compliant financing and a mega-mosque at the center. After public outcry and state investigations, the developers renamed it “The Meadows,” but a new sign does not erase the original intent. It is not a neighborhood. It is a parallel society.

Americans should not hesitate to say that parallel societies are dangerous. Europe tried this experiment, and the results could not be clearer. In Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, entire neighborhoods now operate under their own cultural rules, some openly hostile to Western norms. When citizens speak up, they are branded bigots for asserting a basic right: the ability to live safely in their own communities.

A crisis of confidence

While this separation widens, another crisis is unfolding at home. A recent Gallup survey shows that about 40% of American women ages 18 to 39 would leave the country permanently if given the chance. Nearly half of a rising generation — daughters, sisters, soon-to-be mothers — no longer believe this nation is worth building a future in.

And who shapes the worldview of young boys? Their mothers. If a mother no longer believes America is home, why would her child grow up ready to defend it?

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world. If we lose confidence in our own national identity at the same time that we allow separatist enclaves to spread unchecked, the outcome is predictable. Europe is already showing us what comes next: cultural fracture, political radicalization, and the slow death of national unity.

Brandon Bell / Staff | Getty Images

Stand up and tell the truth

America welcomes Muslims. America defends their right to worship freely. A Muslim who loves the Constitution, respects the rule of law, and wants to raise a family in peace is more than welcome in America.

But an Islamist movement that rejects assimilation, builds enclaves governed by its own religious framework, and treats American law as optional is not simply another participant in our melting pot. It is a direct challenge to it. If we refuse to call this problem out out of fear of being called names, we will bear the consequences.

Europe is already feeling those consequences — rising conflict and a political class too paralyzed to admit the obvious. When people feel their culture, safety, and freedoms slipping away, they will follow anyone who promises to defend them. History has shown that over and over again.

Stand up. Speak plainly. Be unafraid. You can practice any faith in this country, but the supremacy of the Constitution and the Judeo-Christian moral framework that shaped it is non-negotiable. It is what guarantees your freedom in the first place.

If you come here and honor that foundation, welcome. If you come here to undermine it, you do not belong here.

Wake up to what is unfolding before the consequences arrive. Because when a nation refuses to say what is true, the truth eventually forces its way in — and by then, it is always too late.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Shocking: AI-written country song tops charts, sparks soul debate

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.