Monica Crowley: Tea Party not a response to progressives, but to failures by the GOP

On radio this morning, Glenn interviewed Fox News contributor, radio host, columnist, and author Monica Crowley. They talked about her latest book, What the Bleep Just Happened: The Happy Warrior's Guide to a Great American Comeback, which breaks down the state of America three and a half years into the Obama administration, the role of the Tea Party in this election, and the culture that got us into this mess to begin with.

A rough transcript of the interview is below:

GLENN: Monica Crowley has an amazing radio show, she's done television as well. And she's also a writer. She's written a new book. And it really is, I mean if you're going out to get Cowards, grab this one as well, What the Bleep Just Happened: The Happy Warrior's Guide to a Great American Comeback. Hi, Monica, how are you?

CROWLEY: Great. Great to be here. Congratulations on your book too.

GLENN: Great. Tell me about the point of your book. It reads like a real easy conversation. Tell me about the main message of the book.

CROWLEY: Well, there are two main messages, Glenn. The first one is, I was thinking about how this administration has subjected this country to a new and astonishing piece of leftist madness just about every day of the last 3 1/2 years. And we spend a lot of time talking about how he is he distributing the wealth. And while that's true, I thought there's something bigger going on here than just the redistribution of wealth. And as I thought about it, and I thought about his entire domestic policy record, as well as his entire foreign policy record, and I put it all together in one place. And when you see it in one place in this book, the evidence is absolutely devastating to him.

But when you take a step back and you look at the forest through the trees, Glenn, what you see is that he is not simply redistributing America's wealth here at home. If he were just limited to doing that, we could replace and repudiate his leftist agenda in November and begin to heal the country. But what he has done over the last 3 1/2 years has been so much bigger than that. And by that, Glenn, I mean that he is redistributing everything that has made America great. So yes, our wealth, our economic energy, our political strengths, our military power, our cultural appeal, our borders, check out just what he did last week on the illegal immigration move. And our very exceptionalism.

GLENN: And our churches.

CROWLEY: So by redistributing everything that has made America great, he is actually diluting our very exceptionalism. And that is the bigger scheme that he has taken.

GLENN: Do you think that people are waking up to this, Monica?

CROWLEY: I do, Glenn, I do. And that's why I'm very optimistic in the book. And that's what I do. And it's the happy warrior's guide. You absolutely embody the happy warrior, Glenn, and I had you in mind when I came up with the concept here. Look, every time the American people have gone to the polls since this man has been elected, since 2008, the great silent majority, has stood up to repudiate in the radical agenda. So in 2009, in Virginia. 2010, Massachusetts Senate seat goes to a republican. Ted Kennedy's Senate seat for crying out loud. Republicans have a near sweep. 2012, Wisconsin, republican Governor Scott Walker holds on to his office by 7 points. I think the American people, Glenn, have had enough. I think they're on to what Obama has done. And I think now the time is right for every American, I mean this book is not just for conservatives or republicans or independents, it's for every American to embody that happy warrior spirit and say, you know what? Not only can America be saved, but she is worth saving.

GLENN: You know, here's the thing. I don't think, the conservatives, unless your friends are stupid, your conservatives have gotten it for a long time. But we haven't been able to make the case for one reason or another. And that's what we've tried to do with cowards. And you're doing here in a different way. I mean just, you just take page 91. 91 in Monica's book talks about the stimulus and all of the crazy things that are happening in the stimulus. Let me just give you a little bit of it. $1.2 million to study the mating habits of the woodchuck. $3.1 million to convert a ferry boat into a restaurant. $1 million to preserve a sewer in New Jersey as a historic monument. When your friends read the facts of what happened, and you lay them all out, in the last 3 1/2 years, that's when your friends, doesn't matter if they're left or right or conservative or liberal, that's when your friends look at that and say, you know what? I don't like George Bush and George bush did a lot of bad things, but this is insane.

CROWLEY: It's absolutely insane, Glenn. In fact, you left off my favorite one which tops the list in the book. $200,000 for gang tattoo removal in Los Angeles. So Glenn, I think you need to work a little harder because you're paying for the Crips and the Bloods to have their tattoos removed from their biceps. Look, our government has been out of control for a long time. And I hit the republicans in this book too. Because for decades, the republicans have gone down that road of big government, big spending. And when we talk about the Tea Party, and I know I'm going to be on GBTV next week when we're talking about the Tea Party and the importance of it. The rise of the Tea Party, a lot of people assume now or just believe that the Tea Party arose just as a reaction to all this leftist insanity coming from Barack Obama. This spending, this stimulus, socialized medicine. Actually, the Tea Party arose as a reaction to the fact that the Republican Party lost its way, lost its moorings on limited government and fiscal responsibility. If the republicans had stuck to their guns all along and stuck to their beliefs about what America was really all about from the very beginning, there would be no need for the Tea Party.

GLENN: They have no idea. And that's the thing I'm still out on, because a lot of Americans were asleep under George W. Bush. And Obama woke them up. That's why when I gave that speech at C Pac a couple of years ago, the republicans hate my guts. The power establishment hates my guts on the progressive side because the progressive party is a disease in both parties. Progressivism is a disease in both parties. I woke up not under Barack Obama, I woke up under George W. bush. I'm watching the spending and everything else, and I'm like, what are we doing? These aren't my values. What are we doing here?

CROWLEY: That's exactly right. And you know what, Glenn, when you look at every major problem we have in America, from the debt to public education, and the crisis in the inner cities, every single major problem we've got here can be traced back to progressivism, liberalism, socialism, Marxism, whatever you want to call it. And actually, the label doesn't even matter. What matters is the content of the policies and the consequences. And when you look at western Europe and you see the collapse going on there after decades of socialism, and you see what's happening in this country under the guidance of what I call the kooks, and Obama is the big kookuna, as I call him in the book, this is not your grandfather's democrat party. This party was taken over by the kooks in 1968. They run it into the ground. They've taken a lot of republicans with them. And that's where we've gotten to the point, Glenn, where we've got $16 trillion in debt. What the bleep.

GLENN: What the Bleep Just Happened is the name of the book by Monica Crowley. Thanks for being on with us. Best of luck. We'll talk to you next week.

CROWLEY: My pleasure, Glenn.

GLENN: She's really a smart woman and deeply concerned and committed to the cause, no matter the expense. If you're going out and you're looking for a book to share with a friend, may I recommend Cowards. But a great companion piece. We've got to support these authors and we have to support this message and get it out as many ways as we possibly can. There are so many different writers out there that are telling kind of the same story, just different pieces of it. And we've got to give them to our friends. It's not just for us, we've got to get them to our friends and our family who you think you might be able to convince. What the Bleep, available in book stores everywhere.

Is the U.N. plotting to control 30% of U.S. land by 2030?

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A reliable conservative senator faces cancellation for listening to voters. But the real threat to public lands comes from the last president’s backdoor globalist agenda.

Something ugly is unfolding on social media, and most people aren’t seeing it clearly. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) — one of the most constitutionally grounded conservatives in Washington — is under fire for a housing provision he first proposed in 2022.

You wouldn’t know that from scrolling through X. According to the latest online frenzy, Lee wants to sell off national parks, bulldoze public lands, gut hunting and fishing rights, and hand America’s wilderness to Amazon, BlackRock, and the Chinese Communist Party. None of that is true.

Lee’s bill would have protected against the massive land-grab that’s already under way — courtesy of the Biden administration.

I covered this last month. Since then, the backlash has grown into something like a political witch hunt — not just from the left but from the right. Even Donald Trump Jr., someone I typically agree with, has attacked Lee’s proposal. He’s not alone.

Time to look at the facts the media refuses to cover about Lee’s federal land plan.

What Lee actually proposed

Over the weekend, Lee announced that he would withdraw the federal land sale provision from his housing bill. He said the decision was in response to “a tremendous amount of misinformation — and in some cases, outright lies,” but also acknowledged that many Americans brought forward sincere, thoughtful concerns.

Because of the strict rules surrounding the budget reconciliation process, Lee couldn’t secure legally enforceable protections to ensure that the land would be made available “only to American families — not to China, not to BlackRock, and not to any foreign interests.” Without those safeguards, he chose to walk it back.

That’s not selling out. That’s leadership.

It's what the legislative process is supposed to look like: A senator proposes a bill, the people respond, and the lawmaker listens. That was once known as representative democracy. These days, it gets you labeled a globalist sellout.

The Biden land-grab

To many Americans, “public land” brings to mind open spaces for hunting, fishing, hiking, and recreation. But that’s not what Sen. Mike Lee’s bill targeted.

His proposal would have protected against the real land-grab already under way — the one pushed by the Biden administration.

In 2021, Biden launched a plan to “conserve” 30% of America’s lands and waters by 2030. This effort follows the United Nations-backed “30 by 30” initiative, which seeks to place one-third of all land and water under government control.

Ask yourself: Is the U.N. focused on preserving your right to hunt and fish? Or are radical environmentalists exploiting climate fears to restrict your access to American land?

  Smith Collection/Gado / Contributor | Getty Images

As it stands, the federal government already owns 640 million acres — nearly one-third of the entire country. At this rate, the government will hit that 30% benchmark with ease. But it doesn’t end there. The next phase is already in play: the “50 by 50” agenda.

That brings me to a piece of legislation most Americans haven’t even heard of: the Sustains Act.

Passed in 2023, the law allows the federal government to accept private funding from organizations, such as BlackRock or the Bill Gates Foundation, to support “conservation programs.” In practice, the law enables wealthy elites to buy influence over how American land is used and managed.

Moreover, the government doesn’t even need the landowner’s permission to declare that your property contributes to “pollination,” or “photosynthesis,” or “air quality” — and then regulate it accordingly. You could wake up one morning and find out that the land you own no longer belongs to you in any meaningful sense.

Where was the outrage then? Where were the online crusaders when private capital and federal bureaucrats teamed up to quietly erode private property rights across America?

American families pay the price

The real danger isn’t in Mike Lee’s attempt to offer more housing near population centers — land that would be limited, clarified, and safeguarded in the final bill. The real threat is the creeping partnership between unelected global elites and our own government, a partnership designed to consolidate land, control rural development, and keep Americans penned in so-called “15-minute cities.”

BlackRock buying entire neighborhoods and pricing out regular families isn’t by accident. It’s part of a larger strategy to centralize populations into manageable zones, where cars are unnecessary, rural living is unaffordable, and every facet of life is tracked, regulated, and optimized.

That’s the real agenda. And it’s already happening , and Mike Lee’s bill would have been an effort to ensure that you — not BlackRock, not China — get first dibs.

I live in a town of 451 people. Even here, in the middle of nowhere, housing is unaffordable. The American dream of owning a patch of land is slipping away, not because of one proposal from a constitutional conservative, but because global powers and their political allies are already devouring it.

Divide and conquer

This controversy isn’t really about Mike Lee. It’s about whether we, as a nation, are still capable of having honest debates about public policy — or whether the online mob now controls the narrative. It’s about whether conservatives will focus on facts or fall into the trap of friendly fire and circular firing squads.

More importantly, it’s about whether we’ll recognize the real land-grab happening in our country — and have the courage to fight back before it’s too late.


This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

URGENT: FIVE steps to CONTROL AI before it's too late!

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By now, many of us are familiar with AI and its potential benefits and threats. However, unless you're a tech tycoon, it can feel like you have little influence over the future of artificial intelligence.

For years, Glenn has warned about the dangers of rapidly developing AI technologies that have taken the world by storm.

He acknowledges their significant benefits but emphasizes the need to establish proper boundaries and ethics now, while we still have control. But since most people aren’t Silicon Valley tech leaders making the decisions, how can they help keep AI in check?

Recently, Glenn interviewed Tristan Harris, a tech ethicist deeply concerned about the potential harm of unchecked AI, to discuss its societal implications. Harris highlighted a concerning new piece of legislation proposed by Texas Senator Ted Cruz. This legislation proposes a state-level moratorium on AI regulation, meaning only the federal government could regulate AI. Harris noted that there’s currently no Federal plan for regulating AI. Until the federal government establishes a plan, tech companies would have nearly free rein with their AI. And we all know how slowly the federal government moves.

  

This is where you come in. Tristan Harris shared with Glenn the top five actions you should urge your representatives to take regarding AI, including opposing the moratorium until a concrete plan is in place. Now is your chance to influence the future of AI. Contact your senator and congressman today and share these five crucial steps they must take to keep AI in check:

Ban engagement-optimized AI companions for kids

Create legislation that will prevent AI from being designed to maximize addiction, sexualization, flattery, and attachment disorders, and to protect young people’s mental health and ability to form real-life friendships.

Establish basic liability laws

Companies need to be held accountable when their products cause real-world harm.

Pass increased whistleblower protections

Protect concerned technologists working inside the AI labs from facing untenable pressures and threats that prevent them from warning the public when the AI rollout is unsafe or crosses dangerous red lines.

Prevent AI from having legal rights

Enact laws so AIs don’t have protected speech or have their own bank accounts, making sure our legal system works for human interests over AI interests.

Oppose the state moratorium on AI 

Call your congressman or Senator Cruz’s office, and demand they oppose the state moratorium on AI without a plan for how we will set guardrails for this technology.

Glenn: Only Trump dared to deliver on decades of empty promises

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The Islamic regime has been killing Americans since 1979. Now Trump’s response proves we’re no longer playing defense — we’re finally hitting back.

The United States has taken direct military action against Iran’s nuclear program. Whatever you think of the strike, it’s over. It’s happened. And now, we have to predict what happens next. I want to help you understand the gravity of this situation: what happened, what it means, and what might come next. To that end, we need to begin with a little history.

Since 1979, Iran has been at war with us — even if we refused to call it that.

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell.

It began with the hostage crisis, when 66 Americans were seized and 52 were held for over a year by the radical Islamic regime. Four years later, 17 more Americans were murdered in the U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut, followed by 241 Marines in the Beirut barracks bombing.

Then came the Khobar Towers bombing in 1996, which killed 19 more U.S. airmen. Iran had its fingerprints all over it.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, Iranian-backed proxies killed hundreds of American soldiers. From 2001 to 2020 in Afghanistan and 2003 to 2011 in Iraq, Iran supplied IEDs and tactical support.

The Iranians have plotted assassinations and kidnappings on U.S. soil — in 2011, 2021, and again in 2024 — and yet we’ve never really responded.

The precedent for U.S. retaliation has always been present, but no president has chosen to pull the trigger until this past weekend. President Donald Trump struck decisively. And what our military pulled off this weekend was nothing short of extraordinary.

Operation Midnight Hammer

The strike was reportedly called Operation Midnight Hammer. It involved as many as 175 U.S. aircraft, including 12 B-2 stealth bombers — out of just 19 in our entire arsenal. Those bombers are among the most complex machines in the world, and they were kept mission-ready by some of the finest mechanics on the planet.

   USAF / Handout | Getty Images

To throw off Iranian radar and intelligence, some bombers flew west toward Guam — classic misdirection. The rest flew east, toward the real targets.

As the B-2s approached Iranian airspace, U.S. submarines launched dozens of Tomahawk missiles at Iran’s fortified nuclear facilities. Minutes later, the bombers dropped 14 MOPs — massive ordnance penetrators — each designed to drill deep into the earth and destroy underground bunkers. These bombs are the size of an F-16 and cost millions of dollars apiece. They are so accurate, I’ve been told they can hit the top of a soda can from 15,000 feet.

They were built for this mission — and we’ve been rehearsing this run for 15 years.

If the satellite imagery is accurate — and if what my sources tell me is true — the targeted nuclear sites were utterly destroyed. We’ll likely rely on the Israelis to confirm that on the ground.

This was a master class in strategy, execution, and deterrence. And it proved that only the United States could carry out a strike like this. I am very proud of our military, what we are capable of doing, and what we can accomplish.

What comes next

We don’t yet know how Iran will respond, but many of the possibilities are troubling. The Iranians could target U.S. forces across the Middle East. On Monday, Tehran launched 20 missiles at U.S. bases in Qatar, Syria, and Kuwait, to no effect. God forbid, they could also unleash Hezbollah or other terrorist proxies to strike here at home — and they just might.

Iran has also threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz — the artery through which nearly a fifth of the world’s oil flows. On Sunday, Iran’s parliament voted to begin the process. If the Supreme Council and the ayatollah give the go-ahead, we could see oil prices spike to $150 or even $200 a barrel.

That would be catastrophic.

The 2008 financial collapse was pushed over the edge when oil hit $130. Western economies — including ours — simply cannot sustain oil above $120 for long. If this conflict escalates and the Strait is closed, the global economy could unravel.

The strike also raises questions about regime stability. Will it spark an uprising, or will the Islamic regime respond with a brutal crackdown on dissidents?

Early signs aren’t hopeful. Reports suggest hundreds of arrests over the weekend and at least one dissident executed on charges of spying for Israel. The regime’s infamous morality police, the Gasht-e Ershad, are back on the streets. Every phone, every vehicle — monitored. The U.S. embassy in Qatar issued a shelter-in-place warning for Americans.

Russia and China both condemned the strike. On Monday, a senior Iranian official flew to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin. That meeting should alarm anyone paying attention. Their alliance continues to deepen — and that’s a serious concern.

Now we pray

We are either on the verge of a remarkable strategic victory or a devastating global escalation. Time will tell. But either way, President Trump didn’t start this. He inherited it — and he took decisive action.

The difference is, he did what they all said they would do. He didn’t send pallets of cash in the dead of night. He didn’t sign another failed treaty.

He acted. Now, we pray. For peace, for wisdom, and for the strength to meet whatever comes next.


This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Globalize the Intifada? Why Mamdani’s plan spells DOOM for America

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If New Yorkers hand City Hall to Zohran Mamdani, they’re not voting for change. They’re opening the door to an alliance of socialism, Islamism, and chaos.

It only took 25 years for New York City to go from the resilient, flag-waving pride following the 9/11 attacks to a political fever dream. To quote Michael Malice, “I'm old enough to remember when New Yorkers endured 9/11 instead of voting for it.”

Malice is talking about Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist assemblyman from Queens now eyeing the mayor’s office. Mamdani, a 33-year-old state representative emerging from relative political obscurity, is now receiving substantial funding for his mayoral campaign from the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

CAIR has a long and concerning history, including being born out of the Muslim Brotherhood and named an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror funding case. Why would the group have dropped $100,000 into a PAC backing Mamdani’s campaign?

Mamdani blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone.

Perhaps CAIR has a vested interest in Mamdani’s call to “globalize the intifada.” That’s not a call for peaceful protest. Intifada refers to historic uprisings of Muslims against what they call the “Israeli occupation of Palestine.” Suicide bombings and street violence are part of the playbook. So when Mamdani says he wants to “globalize” that, who exactly is the enemy in this global scenario? Because it sure sounds like he's saying America is the new Israel, and anyone who supports Western democracy is the new Zionist.

Mamdani tried to clean up his language by citing the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, which once used “intifada” in an Arabic-language article to describe the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. So now he’s comparing Palestinians to Jewish victims of the Nazis? If that doesn’t twist your stomach into knots, you’re not paying attention.

If you’re “globalizing” an intifada, and positioning Israel — and now America — as the Nazis, that’s not a cry for human rights. That’s a call for chaos and violence.

Rising Islamism

But hey, this is New York. Faculty members at Columbia University — where Mamdani’s own father once worked — signed a letter defending students who supported Hamas after October 7. They also contributed to Mamdani’s mayoral campaign. And his father? He blamed Ronald Reagan and the religious right for inspiring Islamic terrorism, as if the roots of 9/11 grew in Washington, not the caves of Tora Bora.

   Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

 

This isn’t about Islam as a faith. We should distinguish between Islam and Islamism. Islam is a religion followed peacefully by millions. Islamism is something entirely different — an ideology that seeks to merge mosque and state, impose Sharia law, and destroy secular liberal democracies from within. Islamism isn’t about prayer and fasting. It’s about power.

Criticizing Islamism is not Islamophobia. It is not an attack on peaceful Muslims. In fact, Muslims are often its first victims.

Islamism is misogynistic, theocratic, violent, and supremacist. It’s hostile to free speech, religious pluralism, gay rights, secularism — even to moderate Muslims. Yet somehow, the progressive left — the same left that claims to fight for feminism, LGBTQ rights, and free expression — finds itself defending candidates like Mamdani. You can’t make this stuff up.

Blending the worst ideologies

And if that weren’t enough, Mamdani also identifies as a Democratic Socialist. He blends political Islam with Marxist economics — two ideologies that have left tens of millions dead in the 20th century alone. But don’t worry, New York. I’m sure this time socialism will totally work. Just like it always didn’t.

If you’re a business owner, a parent, a person who’s saved anything, or just someone who values sanity: Get out. I’m serious. If Mamdani becomes mayor, as seems likely, then New York City will become a case study in what happens when you marry ideological extremism with political power. And it won’t be pretty.

This is about more than one mayoral race. It’s about the future of Western liberalism. It’s about drawing a bright line between faith and fanaticism, between healthy pluralism and authoritarian dogma.

Call out radicalism

We must call out political Islam the same way we call out white nationalism or any other supremacist ideology. When someone chants “globalize the intifada,” that should send a chill down your spine — whether you’re Jewish, Christian, Muslim, atheist, or anything in between.

The left may try to shame you into silence with words like “Islamophobia,” but the record is worn out. The grooves are shallow. The American people see what’s happening. And we’re not buying it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.