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Matt Kibbe responds to Rove, establishment GOP

February 12, 2013
Wilson

Writer

Last week Karl Rove made his intentions clear: He’s going to bat for who he and the GOP establishment feel can "win" an election. Rove does not put much value into what the candidate's actual ideology is, which is kind of a sticking point for everyone who feels betrayed by the GOP (aka actual conservatives). What does Matt Kibbe of FreedomWorks feel about the Rove startup?

Transcript of the interview is below:

GLENN: Freedom Works is a group that has really changed the landscape, and I have to tell ya they have been under attack like nobody's business from the establishment. And the establishment is very powerful and very, very clever, and I am proud to stand with Matt Kibbe and his crew at Freedom Works. And Matt is on the phone with me now. Hi, Matt.

KIBBE: Hey, Glenn, how you doin'?

GLENN: I'm good. I ‑‑ I will tell you that I am ‑‑ I heard last week about Karl Rove and his plan. Basically he announced an attack on you guys, to stop anybody who's stopping these establishment members of congress or the Senate, stop anybody who's trying to take him out. And that's you. I mean, you guys are the ones who have done it. That's the TEA Party.

KIBBE: Yeah, he's specifically talking about some of the candidates who won but also guys like Richard Mourdock who put his foot in his mouth and didn't quite make it. But no, they're going after us, and I think that the measure here as uncomfortable as it is, all of us should be a little bit proud that we have the establishment so freaked out that they've decided to just come after us straight up. That tells me that we are accomplishing something, we're shaking things up. I think it's a paradigm shift and unfortunately none of us, Karl Rove batted zero. We got a few guys over the finish line like Ted Cruz and Jeff Flake.

GLENN: Which is great.

KIBBE: But because there wasn't a clear winner, it's a little bit like gang warfare now. They are trying to take us out and we're trying to defend our position based on the principles you were just talking about.

GLENN: But I will tell you this, man: I think if we play a national game, we lose. But if we play a local game and a state game, we win. I mean, look at the difference in the states. Because people, you know, in the TEA Party, the 9/12 project, Freedom Works, we're playing it at the state and we're winning. Look at the gains that conservatives and free market‑minded people have made in the last four years, all on the state level.

KIBBE: Yeah. And if you think about it, it's very consistent with our principles again. We believe in local. We believe in bottom up. We believe in individual autonomy governing at the local level, not some top‑down dictate from a czar. And that's ‑‑ when you think about our principles, I draw all my strategic influence from the principles. You've got to think locally. You've got to respect the bottom‑up power of citizens in an open‑ended democracy and you've got to let them make the decisions. And that's exactly what the establishment is fighting. But I think, you know, it's not that complicated for us to figure out how to win because it's very much dictated by the values in the Constitution, the values and individualism, that responsibility that each of us have to hold our politics and our government in check so that it doesn't steamroll right over us.

GLENN: I know that the mainstream media wants to seem like there's a war in the GOP, and they've been doing this for a while and trying to make us look like the extremists, but we're just the ones holding fast to the principles. Since when has that become extreme. And they're trying to ‑‑ they're trying to stir this war up, but there really is a war in the ‑‑ there's only going to be one survivor, don't you think? It's either going to be the establishment or it's going to be the grassroots, one of the two.

KIBBE: But they are trying to put the Genie back in the bottle. I don't think that you can control freedom, and with the Internet and with talk radio and the decentralization of information, there's no way that grassroots America's going to sit back down and do as they're told. And I think that's ‑‑ that's the desperation that you see on the other side. They see what's coming and they liked it the way it was. So I do think that they're pushing against a string when they try to stop millions and millions of voices who have power that they didn't have before.

GLENN: That is exactly why the president is issuing his executive order on the Internet tomorrow. He's asking companies to be responsible and just ‑‑ just answer these few things for us as the government and do these things. And I mean, it is the ‑‑ it's the beginning gateway to control of the Internet, I believe. But we'll ‑‑ we'll see his executive order tomorrow.

I said a couple of weeks ago I'm done with the GOP. I think most people are. They've shown themselves to be waste of time and waste of skin really, quite honestly, most ‑‑ most times. When they do ‑‑ when we are strong enough in states and even like Ted Cruz, they spent money against Ted Cruz. They have done this with a lot of Freedom Works and TEA Party candidates. They try everything they can to make sure those guys do not get in. Isn't it time just to say, "I don't really care, and it's time for a third party."

KIBBE: You know, I think it might be. The only hesitation I would have is that there's a lot of legal barriers to a third party. The GOP and the DNC have strategic advantages in the tax law and how campaign finance allows them to do certain things that a third party can't do. But I'm starting to think that it's possible. Because I used to say we had to take over the Republican Party. I'm open to the possibility that, you know, if the GOP doesn't want us, we should go somewhere else.

GLENN: That's right.

KIBBE: But I'm not so convinced that we haven't already taken over the GOP. And if you look at who we've repopulated the Republican Party with purely by accident; we weren't setting out to create more diversity, we weren't setting out to create the GOP stars that would show up on the convention floor in Tampa, but lo and behold who did you see? You saw Ted Cruz. Tim Scott, the only black person in the Senate, TEA Party insurgent from South Carolina. Marco Rubio. You go down the list of all these young stars that the GOP has now embraced as their own. Guess what. They were candidates that the GOP opposed every step of the way.

GLENN: Yeah, but you also have people like John Boehner who is just an abomination to freedom. He is a huge barrier to freedom.

KIBBE: Yeah, I think you'll find establishment guys like that, sort of leftovers from a bygone era in every political party. Politics is not the most beautiful thing in the world and I think if we created a successful party, built a stage that became the new winning majority, all of a sudden everyone would pretend to be us. And I think if you look at John Boehner and Eric Cantor and a lot of the Republicans that are essentially protecting the status quo, at one time or another maybe in their careers, even today they pretend to be us. They talk the talk but they never ‑‑

GLENN: You can see them through them, though. The American people, I'm not really worried about ‑‑ I'm not really worried about cash, quite honestly, because I think the Internet has made people so free and it's ‑‑ I trust somebody, a friend of mine sending me something and saying, "Hey, this guy is really good." I trust that much more than an ad, and look how much Karl Rove spent. I mean, you know, the TV ads and all that stuff, we don't buy that stuff anyway. We want to hear it from our friends. We want to be involved at the grassroots level. We really are doing ‑‑ you know, they accused us of Astroturf. They've got all the Astroturf, and the GOP is part of it as well. They are trying to talk the talk. But the good news is we don't buy it. We don't buy it. And more and more people are saying, "You know what? I used to be a diehard. I gave money. I campaigned. I'm not going to work for them anymore. I'm not going to give my money to them anymore because I don't believe them. I think the GOP has a massive wake‑up call coming their way because they will just find themselves alone with a few old people, you know, with lots of money, and what's that going to get you? That's going to get you lots of ads on TV that nobody will believe.

KIBBE: Yeah, David Dewhurst, I think he outspent Ted Cruz 5 to 1 and, you know, the TV ads don't matter that much anymore. This is ‑‑ again this is why they are so freaked out. Freedom is trending and to go back to the Internet, that is the fight. I think civil liberties and free speech on the Internet is perhaps the most important fight.

GLENN: Yes.

KIBBE: Because that's the vehicle by which people beat the government.

GLENN: All right. So give me one thing that we should watch for on the State of the Union tonight.

KIBBE: Watch him not talk about anything that matters. Literally.

GLENN: I see that every day.

KIBBE: He's going to talk about infrastructure which is code for more spending and more Keynesian expansion of projects that don't matter based on money that we don't have and probably printed and created out of thin air. And he's going to talk ‑‑ the irony is he's going to talk about expanded power for the EPA even though places like Pennsylvania, the energy boom in Pennsylvania, North Dakota perhaps was the source of the few votes that he did get.

GLENN: Yeah, his win.

KIBBE: It's the irony. But he's going to talk about all the wrong things. He's going to go so far left that he's going to create a real problem for his own party because they still have to win in red districts and red states, and that's a huge opportunity for us in 2014.

GLENN: All right. Matt, God bless you. We'll talk to you soon.

KIBBE: Thanks, Glenn.

GLENN: You bet. Matt Kibbe. You know, I don't trust organizations. I trust people. And I've seen Matt Kibbe for a long time behind the scenes, and I trust Matt Kibbe.

The Crisis of Meaning: Searching for truth and purpose

Mario Tama / Staff | Getty Images

Anxiety, anger, and chronic dissatisfaction signal a country searching for meaning. Without truth and purpose, politics becomes a dangerous substitute for identity.

We have built a world overflowing with noise, convenience, and endless choice, yet something essential has slipped out of reach. You can sense it in the restless mood of the country, the anxiety among young people who cannot explain why they feel empty, in the angry confusion that dominates our politics.

We have more wealth than any nation in history, but the heart of the culture feels strangely malnourished. Before we can debate debt or elections, we must confront the reality that we created a world of things, but not a world of purpose.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

What we are living through is not just economic or political dysfunction. It is the vacuum that appears when a civilization mistakes abundance for meaning.

Modern life is stuffed with everything except what the human soul actually needs. We built systems to make life faster, easier, and more efficient — and then wondered why those systems cannot teach our children who they are, why they matter, or what is worth living for.

We tell the next generation to chase success, influence, and wealth, turning childhood into branding. We ask kids what they want to do, not who they want to be. We build a world wired for dopamine rather than dignity, and then we wonder why so many people feel unmoored.

When everything is curated, optimized, and delivered at the push of a button, the question “what is my life for?” gets lost in the static.

The crisis beneath the headlines

It is not just the young who feel this crisis. Every part of our society is straining under the weight of meaninglessness.

Look at the debt cycle — the mathematical fate no civilization has ever escaped once it crosses a threshold that we seem to have already blown by. While ordinary families feel the pressure, our leaders respond with distraction, with denial, or by rewriting the very history that could have warned us.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

We have entered a cultural moment where the noise is so loud that it drowns out the simplest truths. We are living in a country that no longer knows how to hear itself think.

So people go searching. Some drift toward the false promise of socialism, some toward the empty thrill of rebellion. Some simply check out. When a culture forgets what gives life meaning, it becomes vulnerable to every ideology that offers a quick answer.

The quiet return of meaning

And yet, quietly, something else is happening. Beneath the frustration and cynicism, many Americans are recognizing that meaning does not come from what we own, but from what we honor. It does not rise from success, but from virtue. It does not emerge from noise, but from the small, sacred things that modern life has pushed to the margins — the home, the table, the duty you fulfill, the person you help when no one is watching.

The danger is assuming that this rediscovery happens on its own. It does not.

Reorientation requires intention. It requires rebuilding the habits and virtues that once held us together. It requires telling the truth about our history instead of rewriting it to fit today’s narratives. And it requires acknowledging what has been erased: that meaning is inseparable from God’s presence in a nation’s life.

Harold M. Lambert / Contributor | Getty Images

Where renewal begins

We have built a world without stillness, and then we wondered why no one can hear the questions that matter. Those questions remain, whether we acknowledge them or not. They do not disappear just because we drown them in entertainment or noise. They wait for us, and the longer we ignore them, the more disoriented we become.

Meaning is still available. It is found in rebuilding the smallest, most human spaces — the places that cannot be digitized, globalized, or automated. The home. The family. The community.

These are the daily virtues that do not trend on social media, but that hold a civilization upright. If we want to repair this country, we begin there, exactly where every durable civilization has always begun: one virtue at a time, one tradition at a time, one generation at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

A break in trust: A NEW Watergate is brewing in plain sight

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

When institutions betray the public’s trust, the country splits, and the spiral is hard to stop.

Something drastic is happening in American life. Headlines that should leave us stunned barely register anymore. Stories that once would have united the country instead dissolve into silence or shrugs.

It is not apathy exactly. It is something deeper — a growing belief that the people in charge either cannot or will not fix what is broken.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf.

I call this response the Bubba effect. It describes what happens when institutions lose so much public trust that “Bubba,” the average American minding his own business, finally throws his hands up and says, “Fine. I will handle it myself.” Not because he wants to, but because the system that was supposed to protect him now feels indifferent, corrupt, or openly hostile.

The Bubba effect is not a political movement. It is a survival instinct.

What triggers the Bubba effect

We are watching the triggers unfold in real time. When members of Congress publicly encourage active duty troops to disregard orders from the commander in chief, that is not a political squabble. When a federal judge quietly rewrites the rules so one branch of government can secretly surveil another, that is not normal. That is how republics fall. Yet these stories glided across the news cycle without urgency, without consequence, without explanation.

When the American people see the leadership class shrug, they conclude — correctly — that no one is steering the ship.

This is how the Bubba effect spreads. It is not just individuals resisting authority. It is sheriffs refusing to enforce new policies, school boards ignoring state mandates, entire communities saying, “We do not believe you anymore.” It becomes institutional, cultural, national.

A country cracking from the inside

This effect can be seen in Dearborn, Michigan. In the rise of fringe voices like Nick Fuentes. In the Epstein scandal, where powerful people could not seem to locate a single accountable adult. These stories are different in content but identical in message: The system protects itself, not you.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf. That does not mean they suddenly agree with everything that person says. It means they feel abandoned by the institutions that were supposed to be trustworthy.

The Bubba effect is what fills that vacuum.

The dangers of a faithless system

A republic cannot survive without credibility. Congress cannot oversee intelligence agencies if it refuses to discipline its own members. The military cannot remain apolitical if its chain of command becomes optional. The judiciary cannot defend the Constitution while inventing loopholes that erase the separation of powers.

History shows that once a nation militarizes politics, normalizes constitutional shortcuts, or allows government agencies to operate without scrutiny, it does not return to equilibrium peacefully. Something will give.

The question is what — and when.

The responsibility now belongs to us

In a healthy country, this is where the media steps in. This is where universities, pastors, journalists, and cultural leaders pause the outrage machine and explain what is at stake. But today, too many see themselves not as guardians of the republic, but of ideology. Their first loyalty is to narrative, not truth.

The founders never trusted the press more than the public. They trusted citizens who understood their rights, lived their responsibilities, and demanded accountability. That is the antidote to the Bubba effect — not rage, but citizenship.

How to respond without breaking ourselves

Do not riot. Do not withdraw. Do not cheer on destruction just because you dislike the target. That is how nations lose themselves. Instead, demand transparency. Call your representatives. Insist on consequences. Refuse to normalize constitutional violations simply because “everyone does it.” If you expect nothing, you will get nothing.

Do not hand your voice to the loudest warrior simply because he is swinging a bat at the establishment. You do not beat corruption by joining a different version of it. You beat it by modeling the country you want to preserve: principled, accountable, rooted in truth.

Adam Gray / Stringer | Getty Images

Every republic reaches a moment when historians will later say, “That was the warning.” We are living in ours. But warnings are gifts if they are recognized. Institutions bend. People fail. The Constitution can recover — if enough Americans still know and cherish it.

It does not take a majority. Twenty percent of the country — awake, educated, and courageous — can reset the system. It has happened before. It can happen again.

Wake up. Stand up. Demand integrity — from leaders, from institutions, and from yourself. Because the Bubba effect will not end until Americans reclaim the duty that has always belonged to them: preserving the republic for the next generation.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

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.

The melting pot fails when we stop agreeing to melt

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.