RADIO

Are Scientists Harvesting Human Embryos to Power Supercomputers?!

In a story straight out of The Matrix or Terminator, environmentalist scientists are harvesting human stem cells to build "batteries" for A.I. supercomputers. But what makes this even more terrifying is how it works: The most sought-after source of the stem cells for these "organoids" is embryos, and they only last about 100 days until they die. So, are we harvesting God's creation to power man's "creation?" Blaze Media editor-at-large James Poulos joins Glenn to explain the whole story ...

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: He is TheBlaze media editor at-large.

And TheBlaze TV host of Zero Hour. He's also the founder and editorial director of Return, which is a new vertical on TheBlaze.com.

We have several different things that we're working on. And one of them is return, just like on your keyboard, when you hit return.

It's all about tech.

He wrote a story that is one of the more disturbing, dystopian stories. And we've done our homework on this, to some degree.

Enough to go, oh, no. This is actually in practice, and being used by the University of Michigan, right now.

This is not some, you know, some day. And it's a little like the Matrix.

Environmentalists are worried about, how do we make enough power to be able to power AI?

Well, they have found a way. Called organoids.

Wait until you hear this.

James is with us now. Hello, James.

JAMES: Hey, Glenn. How are you?

GLENN: Well, I was better before I read your story on organoids. Yeah, I know.

This is bizarre and terrifying.

JAMES: Yeah. It's really disturbing. And it's been around for a little while. But it's really starting to kick into gear.

As you said, you know, AI consumes a ton of electricity. A lot of energy. You know, environmentalists have always hated nuclear power for pretty perverse reasons, I think.

So they're so afraid of using nuclear power, that what would invoke now is turning to us.

To be the batteries. Just take the stem cells out of embryos. Out of the labs. Sometimes out of tumors.

Turn them into brain cells, basically.

And use those as batteries, to power what they're calling bio processors. They say, it will use about a million times less power than a typical digital processor. And that's a good thing, they say.

You can access them remotely. And this is the new hype. You know, it's from the same folks who brought you the idea of going to carbon zero. Net zero carbon use. They look at human beings as a waste of space. A waste of energy.

And they want to harness that, to run AI that is supposed to be smarter than anyone can understand.

GLENN: So on final sparks website, this is the company that is doing this.

This linked to a daily mail article, that says organoids are tiny, self-organized, three-dimensional tissue cultures made from stem cells.

Stanford's website says stem cells come from two sources. Embryonic stem cells.

And then, you know, that's unused embryos, and they are then donated to science, or adult stem cells.

But those are really limited, and can only generate certain type of cells.

So they also say, final sparks website say, these organoids live for about 100 days.

So are we harvesting embryos? Using them to power a supercomputer for 100 days?

And then killing them, and looking for more embryo stem cells?

JAMES: Well, right.

So if you are uncomfortable as IFD, this is going to drive you nuts. There's an extra category of extra stem cells they've created called induced pluripotent cells. And basically, what you do, you start the embryonic process.

But you arrest it before it gets too far.

And then you harvest the stem cells out of this artificially induced embryonic organism, right? Human organism, and then you create a fork, and you just grow those cells.

You know, sort of the way in the way they grow fake meat cells. You know, it's really akin to cancerous cells, and the way that they grow.

Right. So this is something that is not one and done.

It's not like, well, maybe once upon a time, there was an embryo who had to die for the greater good.

No. This is a perpetual motion machine.

You have to keep harvesting.

GLENN: Yeah, every 100 days.

This is not a hypothetical, by the way.

Final Spark says, the University of Michigan already using this neuroplatform.

And this is -- this is because there's not enough energy, and these -- these organoids, use so much less energy, that if we just harvest these embryos, we can then -- AI can go on and live forever.

And we don't have energy problems.

Good Lord. That's terrifying!

JAMES: Yeah. At a certain point, if we were created in the image of God. How far can you stray from that, before something horrible happens?

None of this is a surprise. Nikola Tesla infamously said, you will live to see manmade horrors beyond your comprehension, and we're getting pretty close.

GLENN: Yeah.

You have -- you now have scientists who don't -- don't necessarily believe in God.

Think that they are creating a God. In AI.

Now, harvesting God's creation to power their new God.

Good Lord, help us.

JAMES: Yeah. Ask if you cross that Rubicon, where you say, we're going to turn these brain cells into cyborgs. Into Frankenstein cells. Then it's not very long before you say, well, gosh.

Why don't we just turn the whole human race into this kind of cyborg entity. You know.

The terminator, at least the machines are stomping around, looking to wipe us out.

These machines look at us more as the solution than the problem. They just suck all our energy out of us.

GLENN: You know, I was reading a book about energy. And how all of this is going.

And it will. I mean, if it's an entity. That needs food. Needs energy.

To live. Just like us. You're trapped in the mountains.

You know, in -- in a snowstorm. And there's 20 of you. And you start dying.

You're going to start eating each other.

You have to survive. And that is what happens.

The same thing, it will eat whatever will give it the energy.

I would rather not train it to eat people. Or anything with -- to do with people.


JAMES: Well, especially when you have nuclear power there.

And to their credit, there are some tech guys out there who are working on advanced forms of nuclear power, clean energy coming out of things that you can do.

Splitting up atoms.

Yeah. There are Rhode Island risks there. But, gosh, if we are going to go down this road to any degree, where we will need significantly more energy, in order to -- you know, whether it's stay ahead of China, or whatever excuse you want to come up with.

Or for just the sake of -- of more human flourishing. Imagine that. Gosh, you have to -- you have to take a look at nuclear, before you start looking at the guy sitting next to you, as your source of energy.

GLENN: I saw a story yesterday, about here in Idaho. That they're shutting down the water on -- because of environmental reasons.

They're shutting down the water for I don't even remember. Half a million acres. Or more. Of farmland here.

They're just going to shut the water off. So all these farmers will lose their farmland. Coincidentally what is also happening, and exactly the same time, is they are opening up cobalt mines in Idaho. And these cobalt mines need tons of water to keep the drills cool and everything else.

And those are for batteries. So it appears, as if the state of Idaho, shafted the farmers. And said, forget about the food.

Transfer the water, to the cobalt mines. So we can have batteries.

That's more important.

And nobody has tied these two together yet.

It -- we're in trouble. We've misplaced our values.

JAMES: It's a big problem. And you know what else is crazy about Idaho, Glenn?

Right now, there's bitcoin mining going on in Idaho. A lot of people started to understand how Bitcoin works.

They're skeptical. But this is something that is still a first rate technology, that ordinary Americans can use, starting right now.

Takes maybe a minute or two to learn how to do it. But you can do it. When the Bitcoin miners take the energy that they need, in order to do what they do.

Legislators get upset. Oh, I don't know. This is using a lot of energy. So they're looking at curbing, the ability of the miners to lose electricity.

Or even charging them more for their electric lease. Meanwhile, when Facebook comes to town in Idaho and they say, hey, we're building a gigantic data center.

It's going to consume tons and tons of energy. The legislators say, well, if you're creating jobs, we will actually give you a tax cut.

This is how messed up our priorities are right now.

GLENN: Wow. I don't know if you saw The Godfather of AI.

But Jeffrey Hinton, he's the guy who left Google, if I remember right.

And he left -- he left Google, because he said, they were going into some unethical things. Is it was becoming a real danger. Do you remember this story?

JAMES: Yeah. That's right.

GLENN: Yeah. And he said he had real fear, at Google. That the -- that AI would fall into the hands of bad actors.

He just did an interview, where he -- he said that he was asked the question here.

If he was in favor of a super intelligent AI destroying humanity, and replacing it with something objectively better in terms of consciousness. He said, I'm actually for it.

But I think I would be wiser for me to say. That I'm against it.

He was then pressed on, and asked him, can you elaborate. And he said, well, people don't like being replaced. Well, yeah. No.

I'm good. He said, it's not -- it's -- it's not clear, that we're the best form of intelligence, that there is.

Obviously, from a person's perspective. Everything relates to people. But it may be that there comes a point, when we see things like humanist, as a racist term.

We're dealing with people, who are very, very smart and very, very clever.

But many of these people are anti-human. And they hide behind the environmentalist thing. To -- to get away with it.

JAMES: It's really diabolical. If you're looking for an intelligence that's higher than human intelligence. That actually doesn't want to kill us, but in fact loves us with a love beyond human comprehension. It's right there, in the form of God the creator.

And if you reject the existence of God, then it's just really looking like, these days only a matter of time, before you reject the existence of human beings too. I know it's not everyone.

I know there's some -- some atheists out there, that think human beings are still good. But it's looking like they're outnumbered.

And they're losing the battle for the soul of the atheist if you will -- these guys, they have really just -- they do hate humanity.

And they think that intelligence is more important than -- than love.

They think the brain is more important than the heart. And, you know, it all sounds interesting, when it's at the level of theory. But when you ask them to develop it out of practice. It doesn't mean replacing humans. It means wiping them out.

GLENN: So which -- which movie do I think is more likely?

I mean, I never thought the Matrix. But the Matrix, you know, batteries. Human batteries. And it creating a utopia. In people's minds.

Or do you see us.

I mean, remember, the beginning of Skynet. And the terminator.

The first line, I think in that movie, is the machines rose from the ashes in the nuclear fire.

And it was AI that had been used by the Pentagon, and the world's war machines.

And then we blew ourselves up.

And AI decided, we were the problem. And started to wipe us out.

Here we are, talking about the absolute unthinkable. World War III.

Which would end in nuclear war.

And wipe almost all life off the planet.

And we're giving the keys to much of our work.

We just had Jack Carr on yesterday.

Where he was talking about -- you know, he said, nobody would tell me exactly.

But if I talk to enough people. They're putting it all together. And they can look at it.

Oh, we're turning the keys over. To our -- of our killing machines.

Over to AI soon.

That -- that is not -- that can't be a good thing. Which -- which movie are we -- are we going towards? It's kind of like, you know, Brave New World. Or 1984.

I think we're 1984.

Are we headed more towards the terminator, or the Matrix?

VOICE: Well, you know, we have lots of sci-fi movies to choose from. I would point toward. We have sci-fi horror films that we can look to. We got movies like Event Horizon.

We have series like Hell Raiser.

Where the bad guys are inter-dimensional demons, who get summoned by human beings and lead them into hell.

We have David Cronenberg.

He has other films, that really show you, that there is that side of technology they can't be makes you sort of -- fills you with child like wonder.

And all these promises of flourishing beyond imagination.

There is a dark side too.

If we pretend the dark side is not there.

That's usually the way we get led astray in the worst possible way.

GLENN: So is there anything that can be done, going back to the first topic of using stem cells from embryos for human brains. Into these organoids.

Is there anything we should be looking towards. Or pushing for?

Or what?

GLENN: Well, I think, number one, we have to ask ourselves serious questions about how enslaved we are going to be, if we are always looking to China.

If we look at China. And say, they're taking over.

We can't beat them, unless we join them.

Or we have to fight fire with fire. If we're constantly comparing ourselves with what China is doing. We will lose touch with who we really are, as Americans, and depending as how things shake out as human beings.

That's point one. I think point two.

Is, yeah. Okay. You want to innovate on energy.

Look to nuclear. This is not some bizarre technology. It's been around for a long time.

Some countries. That the French. The Japanese. They have Fukushima. They have tsunamis all the time. Not a problem in the United States.

There are ways of doing points of energy, that don't involve turning human beings into these sort of Frankenstein cyborgs and using them for energy.

GLENN: James, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

RADIO

WARNING: Will the "AI Bubble" CRASH the Stock Market?

The AI revolution promises to change everything, but what if it’s leading us straight into another financial collapse? Glenn Beck and economist Peter Atwater break down the eerie parallels between today’s AI boom and the 2008 housing crash, revealing how speculative hype, overvalued tech giants, and circular corporate investments are inflating a dangerous bubble. Could this “AI gold rush” be the next market disaster waiting to happen?

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Is it not a bubble?

I don't know. Are we close to AGI or not close to AGI.

Again, I don't know.

Is it to change things? Yes. I saw a story in our show prep today. I'm not going to get a chance to get it. It's about other countries that are building these giant server farms. Their electricity and their water is being shut off because all of it being diverted to these big server farms. And if we're not careful, that's exactly what's going to happen to us.

Peter Atwater is a guy that Stu and I have been talking about for a while because he's comparing this AI bubble. He's like, "Look, I wanted to show you a chart. I'm not smart enough to figure out the chart. But let me show you a chart, and I want to show you a chart that I did in, like, 2007 or 2008 with the housing bubble! Wow, they kind of look exactly the same. And it's a little frightening."

Peter is with us now. Peter Atwater from the College of William & Mary. He's an adjunct lecturer there. He's the guy who coined the term K-shaped recovery.

Welcome to the program, how are you, sir?

PETER: I'm great, Glenn. Thanks very much for having me.

GLENN: You bet. Okay. So can you explain the housing -- or, not the housing bubble.

The AI bubble. Do you believe it is? And if so, why? And what does that mean?

PETER: I do believe it is.

And I study confidence and its impact on what we do.

And so what I see in the AI bubble is a lot of similarities to what we saw during the housing bubble. Where everybody wants to be involved.

There's a social frenzy to it. There's a want to, you know, make a lot of money, to see the opportunity in it.

There's a lot of speculation.

And what matters so much, to me as a researcher, is that this network that existed in the -- in the housing bubble. Where mortgages were sliced and diced.

And you had these conveyor belts that moved everything from, you know, mom and pop's house to folks all over the world.

GLENN: Right.

PETER: Now, it's within the AI system. Where you have enormous amounts of capital moving, but also equipment.

So it looks a lot like the Just In Time Network that we saw stumble during COVID.

GLENN: Okay. That doesn't make me happy. But there's a difference between the housing bubble, where it was all being inflated and resold and repackaged. And this, which does seem to be a game-changer on productivity. Where housing was not.

This seems to be like it could be a real game changer for economies. Agree or disagree?

PETER: Oh. There's no question, it will be a game changer. But we can think about it the same way we said dot-com was going to be a game changer. Like railroads. And all of these other things that we have in terms of speculative mania.

There's real productivity. Real improvement that comes from it. But what happens is that investors anticipate it happening far sooner, in far larger scale.

And much more profitably than it ever does.

GLENN: So what are you predicting? How is this going to -- how is this going to happen?

What's a bad case scenario, not necessarily worst?

I don't know if I can handle worst. Bad case scenario, and realistic scenarios.

PETER: Yeah. So to me, the realistic scenario is that valuations come down dramatically. At the same time, the build-out continues at a much lower pace.

And eventually, maybe a decade from now, it all settles out.

But in the meantime, there's a lot of financial pain that's going to go along with it. Particularly because today, more than 40 percent of an S&P 500 ties to AI.

GLENN: Like seven companies. Right?

PETER: Seven companies, and -- and the ones that are closest to them. So that, you know, retirees, pension plans, you know, folks that invest in index funds, have a super sized allocation to AI whether they realize it or not.

GLENN: Can you give me an example of this happening in history, that's not housing, but more industry?

PETER: Sure. You can go back to radio. In the -- in the 20s. I mean, RCA was a mammoth weight in the markets. Because people were incredibly excited about it.

You saw it even -- go back even further to canals. We -- we love new technology. Particularly where we can identify the efficiencies that we see coming from it.

STU: One of the things that's really interesting about the trends you've highlighted, Peter, is this sort of circuitous relationship with these companies. It's too complicated to go through all of it.

Just to give you one quick relationship here. And tell me if I'm understanding this right.

OpenAI, of course, buys a bunch of chips from NVIDIA. They're spending a ton of money with NVIDIA. NVIDIA is investing $100 million into OpenAI. OpenAI is -- has a 300 billion-dollar cloud deal with Oracle.

Oracle is spending tens of billions of dollars in chips with NVIDIA. And then NVIDIA is investing into OpenAI. There's a bunch of these arrows, that are pointing in this circular directions. And it seems like companies are flowing money back and forth to each other, and all these arrangements. And you wonder if there's any disruption here.

Are we looking at some sort of short-term collapse of all this stuff.

PETER: The -- the dog eating its tail phenomenon is extraordinary here. And what's so unusual about this one is, in prior bubbles, the -- the conveyor belts were among smaller participants.

But in this one, we had the largest technology companies in the world, to spinning money around, among themselves.

It looked like one of those Esther drawings, where the waterfall just keeps moving in perpetuity. And the challenge, particularly given that OpenAI is at the center of it, is that this is a company that is barely profitable. That is committing to hundreds of billions of dollars in commitments.

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: So what does it look like if it starts to fall apart? And what are the signs we should be watching for?

PETER: So what we know right now, is that everybody wants to be affiliated with AI in some way.

And so you end up with these late arrivals to the party.

And typically when a bubble bursts, the last guy to the party, is the first to leave. When you think of this in the context of a mortgage bubble.

Where it was the subprime lenders who showed up right at the tail end.

And then collapsed first. So I'm -- I'm watching to see these companies that are barely AI-related, that have tried to position themselves as being AI industry leaders. Who are likely to fail in the not too distant future.

They just need rarefied air to exist.

GLENN: Like what companies?

PETER: I don't have specific names to throw out there.

GLENN: Sure. Okay.

PETER: But they're typically smaller highly leveraged offerings. To very, very compelling, but untested technologies.

GLENN: Now, this would be -- I mean, if it collapses, I mean, that would be horrific for our economy.

But also, what -- what happens with the race with China? I mean, China is deeper into this than we are, at like crazy.

How -- how does this affect China, what happens to the race, how does -- I mean, how does this not move forward?

PETER: So I am by no means a China expert, but I would expect that if our confidence in AI begins to fall, confidence in AI more broadly will come under question.

STU: Hmm.

PETER: So they then face questions in terms of policy maker credibility. In terms of, why did you commit so much to this?

No difference than a CEO faces that test, when a bubble bursts.

GLENN: So what does success look like to you?

Because I'm not sure -- I had a really fascinating conversation a couple of weeks ago.

And he's going to come on the show in a couple of weeks with Max Tegmark, who is a brilliant AI ethicist. And we were talking about AI, AGI. And he believes that that may not be happening. And he makes a great case on this.

But is that the goal, or, I mean. Because what -- what is the goal that we're not going to hit, that would fall short?

That would cause this kind of stuff?

PETER: So I think you -- we tend to fall short in terms of immediate usage. So volume short.

But also profitability.

You know, if you go back through dot-com bubble. They all imagined this huge, you know, pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. And you're seeing the same wild fascination with the potential profitability for AI.

And, again, that may come, but it's unlikely too come at the speed and magnitude that people now expect. I mean, we're -- we're fans of science.

GLENN: Boy, I mean, in a way, that would be really, really good.

Because that -- what I worry about is AI advancing as quickly as everybody says it is. And then what happens to all the jobs so quickly. I mean, you just can't absorb that kind of an impact. If it happens that fast. So I don't know which is better.

PETER: So typically, we'll see a backlash against new technology. I mean, if you go back to the 1920 bubble burst. And you saw this backlash to, you know, innovate technologies like the vacuum. And the ironing board. And all these things that people said, took jobs away. Well, we'll have that same thing in all likelihood. And this time, too, to a point you made earlier, likely compounded by a greater awareness of the environmental consequences of this, and also, the cost that it creates in the average consumer, in terms of the utility bills.

GLENN: Hmm.

Can you explain one more thing? Because you're the guy who invented the K-shaped recovery. And as Stu and I talked about the K-shaped recovery -- can you explain that? K-shaped recovery.

PETER: Sure. So when COVID hit, I immediately saw that if you were a white-collar worker who could work from home, your confidence improved immediately. Whereas, if you were a, you know, somebody who worked if a warehouse. Or stocked shelves in the supermarket. Or hospital worker.

Your confidence didn't start to improve for a long time.

And from that, what I have seen is that the economy that results from these two different tracks of confidence, are vastly different.

And today, those are the top, whether it's because of the markets, or because of corporate earnings, growth. Those at the top feel invulnerable.

And they're spending like it. They're investing like it. They're living like it. They're living like there's no tomorrow.

Well, on the other hand, those at the bottom today, aren't sure how they will make it through the take. They're delinquent on their car loans. They're now worried about health care costs. And so to me, this K that -- this divide has created two classes of Americans.

You have the increasingly desperate, and those who feel invulnerable.

GLENN: That does not sound stable long-term.

PETER: It doesn't feel stable to me too.

And I worry that those who are in a position to do something about it, we're spending so much of our time in this country, fighting between the left and the right, and we're not seeing that our biggest divide is up and down.

That those at the bottom, there's a bipartisan hopelessness that exists.

GLENN: Hmm.

PETER: That I feel like Washington is not paying enough attention to.

THE GLENN BECK PODCAST

Advice for Men in Their 20s & 30s to Achieve YOUR Life Goals

Watch Glenn Beck's FULL Interview with Matt & Maxim Smith HERE

Are young men prepared for a future dominated by AI, surveillance, and shifting societal rules? Glenn Beck sits down with Matt and Maxim Smith to explore how young men can reclaim their agency and build real-life skills in an uncertain and ever-changing world.

Order a copy of Matt and Maxim Smith's Book: “The Preparation: How to Become Confident, Competent, and Dangerous” HERE

RADIO

Trump told me why he's "DESTROYING" the White House...

Construction for President Trump's ballroom has begun on the East Wing of the White House, and every Democrat in America has lost their mind. Does the President have the authority to alter a historic structure like the White House? Glenn and Stu discuss, as Glenn shares the story where he reveals even Trump was shocked at how easy it was to get the alterations approved.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

STU: Well, you still haven't really addressed why Donald Trump for is knocking down the White House for his own --

GLENN: Well, he just hates America.

STU: That's -- what I've been reading. Yeah.

GLENN: Right. And how crazy excited the left should be that he's knocking down something built by slaves. They're like, we've got to preserve that.

Slaves made that!

It's weird.

STU: I actually do have questions about this though.

GLENN: What? What question do you have?

STU: Well, and they come from, you know, everybody's source of thinking these days. Which are group texts.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

STU: I'm on with some friends. I have some really basic questions of like, I feel like, there would be a conversation and a bill passed if we're going to put a giant new building at the White House.

GLENN: No.

STU: That's not how it works at all.

Is it? How's it work? How does this work?

GLENN: You ready? So the president says, I want to change the White House.

STU: Okay.

GLENN: And the White House architect says, how would you like to change it?

And he says, this way. And they say, okay.

Well, you need to approve all the permits. Okay. I approve all the permits.

Okay. We change it. That's literally how it happens.

STU: Really? They can do anything they want.

GLENN: Well, I mean, within reason.

When I say within reason.

I think with restraint from public outcry.

Like, I want to paint the White House black.

Well, you know, as president, you can do whatever you want.

But I don't think that will fly with the American people.

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: So there some standards in there. I will tell you about a conversation I had with Trump next.
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(OUT AT 10:29 AM)

GLENN: Welcome to the Glenn Beck Program. We're glad you're here.

Thank you so much for listening. You know, Stu has been freaking out about the White House.

STU: I'm not -- I'm not freaking out. I just think it's an interesting. I thought there would be more of a process to something like this.

GLENN: No.

STU: Because I certainly was not think at this point, the American people understand what is about to happen. Which is like, the White House is about to double in size.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

STU: My -- just by my eyeball look at it.

It looks like it will maybe be more than two times the size.

GLENN: It's going to be large! But it's not the actual White House. It's part of the east wing.

STU: That's -- that's a totally misleading commentary.

GLENN: No. It's not.

GLENN: Because the White House is the original piece from the 1700s. Okay?

That's the center house. The east wing and the West Wing was not done until FDR. They were added later.

STU: It was a big deal.

GLENN: The biggest change in the White House since FDR. And happened in our lifetime. Right after 9/11.

The White House became enormous. But it was all underground.

STU: Okay.

GLENN: They completely changed everything underground.

STU: Yes.

GLENN: And we didn't have a conversation about that at all.

STU: Because it's underground!

I assume all sorts of things are happening underground. Our well-known monuments and buildings.

GLENN: Right. Sure.

STU: But this is -- this is -- it's not a -- they keep saying this.

They're going to be changed the West Wing.

GLENN: No. The East Wing.

STU: They're going to be changing the East Wing. That's not what they're doing. This is like doubling the size of the White House.

Now, I'm not opposed to that idea.

I'm just sort of surprised that it wasn't like a big conversation and a bill.

GLENN: All right. Okay. Okay. You ready?

So was Donald Trump.

STU: What do you mean?

GLENN: So I'm in the White House with him. And I'm up in the private quarters with him.

And he is showing me some things that he is doing. And talking to me about some other things that I can't talk about. Because he doesn't want.

I don't know.

STU: He doesn't want to discuss it.

GLENN: I didn't want to discuss it. And I don't know why.

Because it's all really good stuff.

So, anyway, we're taking about it. And then he brings up the ballroom.

And we're walking down the stairs, from the residents, and we're going into the ballroom.

And he says, you know, this is the ballroom that Abraham Lincoln had dinners here.

I said, you know, it's that window over there, that Fredrick Douglass had to open up the window and had to crawl in because they wouldn't let him in because he was black. And Abraham Lincoln was like, let him in. He's my friend. Why is coming through the window?

And we were talking about all the history of the ballroom. And that it's very, very small.

Because it was built in the 1700s. And we keep using that ballroom. And he's like, we have to have a bigger ballroom.

We have it out in the wet, and the cold and the rain. Yada, yada, yada.

And so he said, we come over to a window. And he's like, right there, I will build a big, beautiful ballroom.

And it's going to better than anybody thinks. It's going to be the biggest, most beautiful ballroom. And I'm just trying not to laugh. Because that's the way he describes it.

And he said, you know, surprised that I could do that.

And I said, I bet. How long is that going to take? What's that process like?

And he's like, right. That's what I asked.

He said, I went to the -- I went to the -- I don't know, chief usher or somebody. Whoever is in charge of the White House. I think it's the chief usher. He said, I think we should have a ballroom. He's like, what do I do?

And he said, well, you just have to talk to the architect.

So he went to the White House architect. Now, this is a guy who makes sure the integrity of the White House stays. Okay?

You can't make it into a modern house. Okay? You're not going to redesign the inside. You can add some gold I guess.

You can add a lot of gold, I guess. You can't make it into. You can't wreck the integrity of the White House.

And he said, you know, I just put these flagpoles in. And he's like, all I had to say was, I want to put some flagpoles in.

He said, yes, sir. Where?

He's like, what?

One in the front. One in the back. They were like, okay. Tell us where.

We went out into the yard. Right here. Right there.

And they put them up. And so he's talking to the White House architect. And he said, we've got to have a ballroom. And I think we should have it over here in the East Wing. A big, beautiful -- and he said, but what is this going to take?

And he's like, well, it's going to be very expensive. Are you expecting the people to pay?

And he's like, no, I'll raise the money for it. I'll pay for it, and I'll raise the money, extra, so American people are not going to pay for it.

And the architect said, well, then all you have to do is sign the permits.

And he's like, what?

And he said, well, you have to go through the permitting process.

He's like, how long will that take?

He said, well, the President is the one who controls the process and signs the permits. So as on short as you would like it to be, Mr. President.

And he's like, are you kidding me? And he looked at me, he's like, I'll have this done by spring of next year.

So he can change it. The -- what you have to understand is, the -- the east wing and the West Wing, those -- those are FDR.

So FDR went into a works project. And he added those wings.

The east wing is where the first lady's offices are.

Just the east wing is like, you know, it's -- it's just the east wing.

And it's --

STU: Okay. Shade of the east wing?

GLENN: Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, and so what he's doing is he's taking some of it town, and he's going to link it to the ballroom. And the bail room is going to be the biggest, beautiful ballroom in Washington DC.

It's going to link from there. So you will walk -- if you're in the White House, you will walk from the front door, through the -- the dining room.
Or, the east dining room. You'll go into the East Wing, and you'll go to the ballroom.

STU: I'm looking -- I'm at the renderings as we speak. And that's exactly --

GLENN: I've not even seen the renderings. Just describe it to me. Can I see it?

STU: No. They're mine. This is my computer.

GLENN: Okay.

STU: This is the -- I can't obviously show it to the people here. You can see it over here.

GLENN: Okay. It's big, beautiful. What a surprise, the tables are golden.

STU: By the way, it's different --

GLENN: That's amazing. Holy cow.

STU: My conversation about whether this is the -- the -- you can't. It's already zoomed in. They're not the best images.

Here.

GLENN: There's nothing wrong with that. What is wrong with that? It looks just like the White House.

It fits. It's appropriate.

STU: I was in the middle of saying. It's -- my conversation on this is not whether it is -- looks good or is appropriate or anything like.

I actually think his point on the ballroom is so obvious, every president should have been making it.

The fact that we don't have a big room to have state dinners in.

GLENN: Right.

STU: Unless you wanted to do them off campus everywhere else.

You have to have that, and why not have it at the White House. It makes a lot of sense.

GLENN: Except, I don't want to pay for it, as a citizen. I don't want a dime going for it.

You know what? Hey, all you Frenchies, you can eat on the lawn. Literally, on the lawn.

Just throw the food out on the lawn.

Yeah, I mean, I'm fine with that.

But if he wants to pay for it. If he wants to get rich people to pay for it, go for it.

I don't want any of my tax dollars going for it.

STU: Right. So my criticism is not how it looks. And that we need it.

We actually showed the inside of it. It seems like the facility we should have for these type of events.

We're going to have them somewhere. Why not have them there?

GLENN: Right. And who better to build it than one of the best builders of all time.

STU: Donald Trump. We've had this conversation about how you project American power.

GLENN: Yes.

STU: And I think Trump's approach to -- particularly in the Middle East. I think it's been effective around the world. Of these trappings actually are effective in diplomatic relations with other nations. Donald Trump has a lot of places that are lined in gold. That can have meetings. It's not like that's what he wants it for. The left tries to portray. Of course, he does.

No. It means something to him. And he knows how these people think.

GLENN: No. No.

Because I asked. I -- I won't tell the whole story.

But I really want to, really desperately.

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: But, you know, he's gilding everything.

And that's not necessarily my favorite look.

STU: Right.

GLENN: And -- and he -- he came in, Tania and I were alone in the Oval for a while. And we were talking about it.

And he comes in. He says, you know, I'm doing all of this.

You see all the gold? Yes. You can't miss it. You can't miss the gold.

And he's like, you know, it's so important. These foreign leers, they all come from palaces. And they don't understand. And I know, you know, the White House is different. America is different. But they understand power in a different way.

And he said, they are coming from these old countries. And these big buildings.

And these palaces.

And he said, it is important for us to project power.

STU: Yes!

GLENN: And that's -- and that is why he's doing this. Not because he likes gold. He's doing it to project power and wealth.

Notice how many prime ministers.

They're all flying in all the time, from all over the world. You know, I've never seen a president meet with so many foreign dignitaries in the White House all the time!

STU: Yeah. And the media likes to say, well, that's because he's self-important.

And he's --

GLENN: No. He's projecting American power.

STU: Yes. I think so too.

When I say it's important to him.

That's why it's important to him.

He believes it's an important tool in that world.

GLENN: Correct. It's not him.

He knows the language they speak. And not just body language or, you know, spoken language.

All of the entire -- that's what protocol is all about. It all means something.

STU: And so my criticism -- and it's not even criticism.

My observation is not whether it fits. Or whether we need it, or whether it's appropriate.

My -- I don't think my observation here in the group text, that we started this with, which is that, holy crap.

I don't think the American people have any idea what's about to happen. Like every time I bring this up to Glenn.

And we have to understand how these conversations work.

I say, people will look at the White House. And it will be totally different.

He's like, oh, president Tyler did on more than that. In 1940 -- shut up!

That's what I get from Glenn.

Oh, well, there was more changes underground. You don't understand the piping -- that he totally changed the -- the -- the piping back in 1807. You moron!

Okay. I'm sorry.

I didn't know that. What I think of. And, you know, FDR made these changes.

My whole life, it's been the same, pretty much from the outside.

I know what the White House looks like. You go up there, I look at the White House.

It looks like the White House.

It is not going to look like the White House when this is over. It is going to look like the White House plus another White House next to it.

And it's going to be, I think, massively impressive. But I'm surprised there's not more conversation about this.

GLENN: When was the last time you were in Washington, DC?

STU: The inauguration.

GLENN: So you would not believe the difference in the White House grounds.

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: The difference from, you know, when I went with George Bush.

You could stand right at the front gate.

STU: Right.

GLENN: You can't do that anymore.

They've taken the park. The park in the back is all gone.

The security --

STU: Just for security.

GLENN: Everything. All of the trees. Everything that has been done to not see the White House.

Except, for that iconic front.

STU: Yeah.

GLENN: You know what I mean?

Everything is -- is not really -- you don't see it like you used to anymore. You don't walk up to it.

STU: The last -- I was in town for the inauguration. Last time I actually walked by the White House.

It's been a long time.

GLENN: Oh, you would not.

You will not recognize it.

I mean, just driving by and seeing it.

You will get pictures and everything else. But walking by it.

Today, you wouldn't recognize it.

It's -- it's -- what has -- what has happened with security is so sad. When I have the bell from the White House front desk, they're will it used to be a little desk right in the front, right as you walk in. There was a desk, and a bell. And I -- I have it. I think it is from Tyler's, you know, administration.

STU: Of course.

GLENN: And you would walk in. And you would hit the bell. And you would say, I want to see the president.

And somebody would say, okay. All right. Sit over there.

And you would wait. And you might wait all day, but you got -- you can walk in without an appointment and see the president of the United States.

You're not getting within two blocks of the White House right now.

It's sad. It's sad what's happening.

STU: Yeah. And for good. I wouldn't disagree with that either.

It's for good reason, security-wise.

I think back, the classic. I think what everybody thinks of when they think of the White House.

Is the scene from Superman two.

GLENN: Try to remember.

STU: When they showed the White House. And it's supposed to be -- it's a motion picture.

But they were too lazy to actually get video footage of the White House.

So it's just a still.

And you can tell, because there's like things that should be moving. That aren't moving. Right.

GLENN: Is that because --

STU: I think that's Superman.

GLENN: On Independence Day, they blew it up.

STU: But that's another example.

You had that picture of what the White House looked like. And, you know, I guess from certain angles, it looks pretty much the same. From the front. You won't notice it. Because it's kind of wrapped around the back. The back is pretty iconic too.

It's not going to look like that anymore.

In some ways, it will look a lot better or impressive.

It is a major change. That when you say, hey, they're redoing the West Wing, putting a ball room in there. That's not what they're doing.

GLENN: East.

STU: Sorry, East. I hate Glenn.


GLENN: I'm only saying it because I know how much he hates it.