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Glenn's Show Prep

The Story of Passover

April 03, 2015
Wilson

Writer

A couple of week’s ago, Glenn invited Rabbi Bentzi Epstein to the studios to give a Torah lesson for anyone in the building interested in attending. Glenn found the session so compelling that he asked Rabbi Epstein to come back, this time with a full studio audience. Many only know the story of Passover from the Charlton Heston movies, so Glenn asked the rabbi to explain the true story behind this holiday and why it means so much to Jews and Christians around the world.

Glenn: Hello, America, and welcome to The Glenn Beck Program and to TheBlaze. This is the network that you are building. We have a studio audience today, and I’m glad you guys are all here. Is everybody ready to have a good time? All right, okay, so anyway, so, this weekend is Easter and Passover, and everything I knew about Passover I learned from Charlton Heston. So, I know squat about it, but I will tell you that in the last few years, I have gotten to know many Jewish people and many, many rabbis, and I love this religion. I love the people of this religion.

As I was in Israel at two o’clock in the morning, and I know nothing really, I mean, I’m the whitest white guy you’ve ever met. I lived in Seattle, Washington. I mean, nobody even has a tan there, and that’s where I grew up. I remember the first time that I ever saw an African-American, my father said, “Don’t stare.” I was just like, “Look how dark he is.”

The first time, I think, I don’t know, I didn’t card people as a kid, but I think the first time I ever met a Jewish person was when I moved to New York and I had a Jewish agent. I mean, I just didn’t know anybody. So, the culture is completely foreign to me, and so I’ve had a chance to discover it myself. I have several Jewish friends. Some practice, some don’t.

The ones who practice it have enriched my faith so deeply, because as Christians, we are scratching the surface. When you read the Torah, you start to see we don’t know jack as Christians. We just don’t have any concept of how rich all of this is. I honestly don’t think that we should close that book. I think we should embrace the Jewish people and learn from them because they have so much to teach. I absolutely love this, and so a Rabbi here in Dallas, Bentzie Epstein, is a man who has come in here, what were you, two weeks ago?

Rabbi: Two weeks ago.

Glenn: I asked him to start Torah studies for anybody in the building who wanted to learn the Torah, and so we had non-practicing Jews, we had Christians, we had everybody. We do this with Christians pastors as well, and we study the Bible. We had such a great time in that 90 minutes I thought we should do a show on Passover and let him just teach Passover.

Here’s the first thing I want to start with, if this is the Passover table, I don’t want to eat any of that. None of this looks yummy. So, maybe we’ll save that. Why don’t we start with everything I learned, I learned from Charlton Heston. So, that’s not much. I know the blood on the door, and I know you eat bitter herbs and everything else, but tell me the whole story of Passover.

Rabbi: Okay, so the first thing, my mother-in-law happens to be in your group as well. You know, she saw The Ten Commandments as a kid, and that was her education. As I’ve been teaching and going through history, I tell people whatever you learn from Hollywood is wrong. So, the only way you can go ahead and you can watch any of these shows, I said, is if you pay your kids, you know, $0.50, inflation, maybe a buck, for every mistake they find, because it gets so ingrained. Like at our Seder, my in-laws are here, and we talk about the Ten Commandments. All she can think of is Charlton Heston. That’s all she can think of.

Glenn: So, I think a lot of people are like that though. How much would it cost you if you did every dollar per mistake?

Rabbi: You know, it would take forever. I actually told a few of my students, I said, “Why don’t you tape the show?” I said, “And then we’ll have a little showing,” and we’ll stop the movie every scene, you know, and kind of see if they got anything right.

Glenn: Next year we have to do that. That would be fantastic.

Rabbi: But we need more than an hour. So, that’s kind of how these things go. So, Passover, we’re about to celebrate our 3328th Passover tomorrow night, okay? So, Passover, the actual Exodus in Egypt took place 3328 years ago. The Gregorian calendar, it would be 1313 B.C.E, and Jewish calendar would be year 2448, 2448 years from the creation of man, not the world. The world one is actually…well, before the world. Judaism has a fiscal calendar and a calendar year. Our fiscal calendar or our calendar year starts on Rosh Hashanah, right? That’s the anniversary of the world, anniversary of man.

Glenn: But this is the month of like New Year’s, right?

Rabbi: Right, so this month, this is the month of Nisan, and the month of Nisan which is really the first month—

Glenn: Everybody gets a car?

Rabbi: A Nissan. So, I was wondering how they got the—

Glenn: Yeah, I know.

Rabbi: This is the first month of the year. So, in the Jewish calendar, for example, today would be the 13th day to the month of Nisan, year 5775. [So] 5775 connotates from the creation of man, and the 13th of Nisan is from the Exodus of Egypt, okay? The Exodus of Egypt is probably the most important event. It’s a piece of the most seminal event in Jewish history because that’s really…tonight or tomorrow night we’re all going to be sitting down at our Seders, you have the birth of the Jewish people. Okay, this is where the Jewish people were birthed into. Okay, it means 430 years before tomorrow night what happened was you had Abraham ink a deal with God to be the Jewish people. So, Jewish people then were 1743 B.C.E. was when the Jewish people, when Abraham inked a deal with God for the Jewish people to be the Jewish people.

Glenn: I’ve never heard anybody ink a deal with God. It’s funny. It’s like, “I’ve got some changes here on page three.”

Rabbi: The Bible talks about that God told Abraham, take some animals, cut them in half, put them on either side, and then God sent down a pillar of smoke in a fiery furnace and walked through the pieces of the animal, right? Genesis 15, right, that’s where that takes place, so actually it’s a real deal. That’s when we became the Jewish people, so Abraham is considered the patriarch of the Jewish people. Got it? You have Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, those are the three patriarchs. You had four matriarchs, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Leah, and they are the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish people. They created the spiritual DNA of the Jewish people. As a people, we became birthed on Passover, okay?

Glenn: Because that was the coming together and saying we’re all entering Exodus together. We are one as a people, and we are moving as one for the first time.

Rabbi: And we’re all accepting the deal that Abraham made with God. That’s actually what takes place, because one thing that we really don’t talk about a lot but you should know, only 20% of the Jewish people left Egypt. During the ninth plague, the plague of darkness, 80% of the Jewish people died because they said we would rather be slaves to Egypt than serve God. They said, “We’re outta here.” They said, “We’re not going.” God says you’ve got two choices, you could come with me or you can stay here dead.

Glenn: This is the thing that amazes me. When I first heard that, because I’ve heard 10%, but I’ll take your 20. Don’t argue with me, Rabbi. This is the thing that amazes me, because we think that is unusual, but there was only 20 to 30% of the American people that went to fight against the king. They weren’t all with George Washington. It was 30% was the number. The rest were either neutral or against it. If you look at what’s happening right now and you said, “Hey, we all have got to stand up,” you’d be lucky to get 20%. There would be a lot of people that believe, “No, this really isn’t right,” but standing up and doing something about it, that’s a small number. So, God always kind of unfortunately whittles it down and purifies those people right before there’s another great expansion.

Rabbi: Yeah. Actually Egypt is called a cauldron, right, a crucible. This is where the Jewish people were purified, and the 20% that left, all Jews today, descended from that.

Glenn: Now, how did they go from being purified…this is the thing I’ve never understood with The Ten Commandments, the Charlton Heston, is they’ve seen all these plagues. They’ve seen all these miracles. They walked across the Red Sea. They see Pharaoh’s armies destroyed. Moses leaves, and the minute he’s gone, it’s…it took a little longer than that?

Rabbi: Yeah, 40 days.

Glenn: Okay still, but 40 days and they are building an altar to—

Rabbi: A golden calf.

Glenn: I mean, what happens? How does that happen?

Rabbi: Actually it’s interesting. Really what happens on that piece is that the Jewish people are in the desert.

Glenn Because these are the good guys. These are the dedicated.

Rabbi: You should know, just in their defense, first of all, the 20% that left were not God-fearing people. When the Jewish people, seven days after we left, we came to the Reed Sea. It’s actually not the Red Sea. The Hebrew word is Yam Suph. Yam means sea. Suph means reeds, Sea of Reeds. It probably was the Red Sea. You know why the Red Sea is called the Red Sea?

Glenn: No.

Rabbi: Because the reeds that grow on the bottom of the Red Sea are red, so they make the water look red.

Glenn: Okay.

Rabbi: Okay, so it’s really the technical term is the Reed Sea.

Glenn: Is there a Reed Sea other than the Red Sea?

Rabbi: I don’t believe so.

Glenn: Okay, so we think it’s the Red Sea.

Rabbi: It’s probably the Red Sea, and actually the Red Sea—

Glenn: So, if it’s reeds, it’s not really deep. It’s like the new one I think or maybe I saw…I also learned a lot from Prince of Egypt, that great cartoon, because in that cartoon there’s like a whale or something there by the water. Like wow, that’s cool, there’s a whale in the sea.

Rabbi: So, I mean, the reeds could be pretty tall. So, Sea of Reeds, it’s actually interesting because there’s a question about the Gulf of Suez or the Gulf of Aqaba, and it seems that really took place, that the splitting of the Reed Sea actually was the Gulf of Aqaba, not the Gulf of Suez. So, if you could imagine, here’s Egypt, okay, and here’s the two fingers. Here’s the Suez which eventually they turned into Suez Canal, and you have here the Gulf of Aqaba where you have all the oil stuff coming out of. They traveled across the desert to the Gulf of Aqaba, probably a place called Nuweiba Beach, okay? Nuweiba Beach is sort of almost a peninsula or a delta into the Sea of Reeds, and that’s why when the Egyptian army came chasing after us we couldn’t go no place.

Glenn: No place.

Rabbi: I never understood if here’s the Sea of Reeds and you’re camped right here, go north, go south. The answer is we’re on a delta. The mountains came up to the Sea of Reeds, and so we’re stuck on this delta. There’s only one way in, and that was through the Wadi, and down the pike was coming the Egyptians. So, we were trapped on the beachhead.

Glenn: Tell me about…because we talked privately about miracles, so tell me about the parting of the Red Sea and the choice you have to believe.

Rabbi: Okay, so this is quite fascinating. Most people, when it comes to miracles, they have a hard time figuring it out. You know, like if I levitate you off this couch—

Glenn: That would be cool.

Rabbi: That would be cool.

Glenn: If I levitated you off this couch, that would be very cool.

Rabbi: I love your couches. Once you sit in them, you don’t get up.

Glenn: I know.

Rabbi: Right, so people define miracles, if I picked up this building, wow, what a miracle.

Glenn: Right.

Rabbi: Judaism, that’s not how we define miracles. Judaism, we define miracles, God will always try to do a miracle…He will always try to do it within the bounds of nature, okay? So, it will always be as natural as it could be, and in fact, if you actually read the Torah, right, it says that Moses stuck his hand out over the sea, and it says an east wind blew all that night. The next morning, the Sea of Reeds split. At dawn, the Sea of Reeds split, and in we went. So, you see the sea splitting was a natural event. The wind blew.

Glenn: It was the stacking up of the water.

Rabbi: The stacking up of the water.

Glenn: Have you ever read Velikovsky, a guy named Velikovsky, Worlds in Collision? Has anybody ever read Worlds in Collision?

Rabbi: Is he in the Bible?

Glenn: No. He was a guy who actually was really besmirched. He was a scientist and besmirched. When Einstein died, he had just written Velikovsky a letter and said I am sorry that I was part of the besmirching of you. He said some of the stuff that you’ve said has turned out to be accurate, and he said I will make it my life’s mission to correct any of the stuff that I have done. He died a week later.

So, Velikovsky is still discredited, and it’s not that his conclusions are necessarily accurate, it’s his idea. He talked about worlds in collision. He talked about let’s go through the Bible, and let’s look now if the sun did stop, we should find that in many religions, and they might explain it differently.

If the Red Sea…and how he explained the Red Sea, he said could it have been that the fire coming down and stuff was maybe a very large meteor coming by that actually changed the gravitational pull and actually made the riverbed or the sea stand up? What he was saying was if God created the universe, He would use his own natural laws to do these things, so we should look for scientific ways and natural ways for miracles to happen. It’s how we translate them. I thought that was great.

Rabbi: Actually the Jewish tradition teaches that when God came, like Noah and the flood, said God took two stars out of orbit and that flooded the world. It’s kind of quite fascinating. When you go through the Bible, it’s amazing. So, the Sea of Reeds, going back to the Sea of Reeds, it was a natural event, and yet in Judaism we consider that to be…the miracles that took place at the Sea of Reeds was five times, four times more than the miracles that took place in Egypt. Everyone knows the ten plagues, right? I didn’t watch the movie, so I can’t tell you.

Glenn: You didn’t watch the movie? Oh, you’ve got to come over to my house for Passover.

Rabbi: And so you go, you get the ten plagues, right? You have ten plagues there, right? And yet the plagues that took place at the Sea of Reeds were multiples of that. Fifty, two hundred, two hundred fifty plagues took place at the Sea of Reeds, right? It’s humongous, and yet like, “Well, what’s the miracle?” Like, big deal, you know, like whoopie-doo. The answer is as follows, and the answer to this is something so significant. The definition of a miracle is timing. The Jewish people stood at the Sea of Reeds, and the Egyptians are pounding now. They’re going to chop their heads off, right? They finally have them in their gun sights. You know, they’ve been taking it for a year, and you can’t fight God. Like, it’s hard to shoot God, right? They go ahead, and they’re about ready to take the Jewish people. They’re going to teach them a lesson, right? How many of them are they going to bring back? They’re going to wipe the floor with them, and they have them in their gun sights, right? The Jewish people are stuck, and we say, “God, help us.” God goes in, and God splits the sea, and we walk through. You have to pardon me. I don’t understand the Egyptians, okay?

Glenn: Yeah.

Rabbi: Ten plagues you’ve lived through, right? You’ve lost everything. You show up at the Sea of Reeds, and all of a sudden, the sea parts, and then you’re stupid enough to follow the Jews in?

Glenn: Yeah, I know, yeah, like way behind them too. If I’m like with them, that’s one thing.

Rabbi: What are you doing? Like, I just don’t get that. The Jewish people get in there, right? The Jewish people walk across. We go ahead, and we go through the Sea of Reeds, and it’s an amazing thing, right? In the last 3328 years, how many times has the Sea of Reeds split?

Glenn: Zero.

Rabbi: Zero, and before this time, how many times has the Sea of Reeds split?

Glenn: Zero.

Rabbi: So that, in Judaism, we put up a big sign, and we say “God.” We say that’s God because it’s timing. That’s God. That’s the miracle. The miracle is it never happens before. It happened just when we were there and we cried out to God. Stick out your hand and poof, poof, poof, and there we go. It’s like amazing.

WWIII: The new face of war

Oleg Nikishin / Stringer | Getty Images

Has World War III begun?

Over the weekend, Iran launched an unprecedented attack against Israel involving over 300 missiles and drones. This marked the first direct attack on Israel originating from Iranian territory. Fortunately, according to an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, 99 percent of missiles and drones were successfully neutralized by Israeli defense systems. Iran claimed that the operation against Israel had concluded and that no further offensive was planned, although the possibility of another attack is still present.

This has left many people, including Glenn, wondering the same thing: did we just witness the start of World War III?

Glenn recently had a World War II Air Force Veteran as a guest on his TV special, who told stories of the horrors he and his brothers-in-arms faced in the skies over war-torn Europe. This was a timely reminder of the terrors of war and a warning that our future, if it leads to another world war, is a dark one.

But, if Glenn's coverage of the Iranian attack revealed one thing, it's that World War III will look nothing like the world wars of the twentieth century. Long gone are the days of John "Lucky" Luckadoo and his "Bloody Hundredth" bravely flying their B-17s into battle. Over the weekend, we saw hundreds of autonomous drones and missiles clashing with extreme speed and precision over several different fronts (including space) simultaneously. This ain't your grandfather's war.

From EMP strikes to cyber attacks, here are FIVE ways the face of war has changed:

EMP attacks

New York Daily News Archive / Contributor | Getty Images

The entire modern world, on every level, is completely dependent on electricity. From your home refrigerator to international trade, the world would come to a grinding halt without power. And as Glenn has pointed out, it wouldn't even be that hard to pull off. All it would take is 3 strategically placed, high-altitude nuclear detonations and the entire continental U.S. would be without power for months if not years. This would cause mass panic across the country, which would be devastating enough on its own, but the chaos could be a perfect opportunity for a U.S. land invasion.

Nuclear strikes

Galerie Bilderwelt / Contributor | Getty Images

Nuclear war is nothing new. Many of us grew up during the Cold War, built fallout shelters, and learned to duck and cover. But times have changed. The Berlin Wall fell and so did the preparedness of the average American to weather a nuclear attack. As technology has advanced, more of our adversaries than ever have U.S. cities within their crosshairs, and as Glenn has pointed out, these adversaries are not exactly shy about that fact. Unfortunately, the possibility of an atomic apocalypse is as real as ever.

Immigration warfare

Nick Ut / Contributor | Getty Images

The strategy of strangling an opposing nation's economy to gain the upper hand is a wartime tactic as old as time. That's why the Border Crisis is so alarming. What better way to damage an opponent's economy than by overburdening it with millions of undocumented immigrants? As Glenn has covered, these immigrants are not making the trek unaided. There is a wide selection of organizations that facilitate this growing disaster. These organizations are receiving backing from around the globe, such as the WEF, the UN, and U.S. Democrats! Americans are already feeling the effects of the border crisis. Imagine how this tactic could be exploited in war.

Cyber shutdowns

Bill Hinton / Contributor | Getty Images

Cyber attacks will be a major tactic in future wars. We've already experienced relatively minor cyber strikes from Russia, China, and North Korea, and it is a very real possibility that one of our adversaries inflicts a larger attack with devastating consequences on the United States. In fact, the WEF has already predicted a "catastrophic" cyber attack is imminent, and Glenn suggests that it is time to start preparing ourselves. A cyber attack could be every bit as devastating as an EMP, and in a world run by computers, nothing is safe.

Biological assault

WPA Pool / Pool | Getty Images

Don't trust the "experts." That was the takeaway many of us had from the pandemic, but something less talked about is the revelation that China has manufactured viruses that are capable of spreading across the globe. We now know that the lab leak hypothesis is true and that the Wuhan lab manufactured the virus that infected the entire world. That was only ONE virus from ONE lab. Imagine what else the enemies of America might be cooking up.

The government is WAGING WAR against these 3 basic needs

NICHOLAS KAMM / Contributor | Getty Images

The government has launched a full-on assault against our basic needs, and people are starting to take notice.

As long-time followers of Glenn are probably aware, our right to food, water, and power is under siege. The government no longer cares about our general welfare. Instead, our money lines the pockets of our politicians, funds overseas wars, or goes towards some woke-ESG-climate-Great Reset bullcrap. And when they do care, it's not in a way that benefits the American people.

From cracking down on meat production to blocking affordable power, this is how the government is attacking your basic needs:

Food

Fiona Goodall / Stringer | Getty Images

Glenn had Rep. Thomas Massie on his show where he sounded the alarm about the attack on our food. The government has been waging war against our food since the thirties when Congress passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938. They started by setting strict limits on how many crops a farmer could grow in a season and punishing anyone who grew more—even if it was intended for personal use, not for sale on the market. This sort of autocratic behavior has continued into the modern day and has only gotten more draconian. Today, not only are you forced to buy meat that a USDA-approved facility has processed, but the elites want meat in general off the menu. Cow farts are too dangerous to the environment, so the WEF wants you to eat climate-friendly alternatives—like bugs.

Water

ALESSANDRO RAMPAZZO / Contributor | Getty Images

As Glenn discussed during a recent Glenn TV special, the government has been encroaching on our water for years. It all started when Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972, which gave the government the ability to regulate large bodies of water. As the name suggests, the act was primarily intended to keep large waterways clear of pollution, but over time it has allowed the feds to assume more and more control over the country's water supply. Most recently, the Biden administration attempted to expand the reach of the Clean Water Act to include even more water and was only stopped by the Supreme Court.

Electricity

David McNew / Staff | Getty Images

Dependable, affordable electricity has been a staple of American life for decades, but that might all be coming to an end. Glenn has discussed recent actions taken by Biden, like orders to halt new oil and gas production and efforts to switch to less efficient sources of power, like wind or solar, the price of electricity is only going to go up. This, alongside his efforts to limit air conditioning and ban gas stoves, it almost seems Biden is attempting to send us back to the Stone Age.

4 signs that PROVE Americans are hitting rock bottom

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

As we approach the presidential election in November, many Americans are facing dire economic straits.

Glenn has shown time and time again that Bidenomics is a sham, and more Americans than ever are suffering as a result. Still, Biden and his cronies continue to insist that the economy is booming despite the mounting evidence to the contrary. But who is Biden fooling? Since the beginning of the year, gas has gone up an average of 40 cents a gallon nationwide, with some states seeing as much as a 60-cent per gallon increase. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Foreclosures and bankruptcies are on the rise, evictions are surging, and America is experiencing a record amount of homelessness. We can't survive another Biden term.

Americans across the country are hitting rock bottom, and here are four stats that PROVE it:

Evictions

John Moore / Staff | Getty Images

Across the country, people are being evicted from their homes and apartments. Between 2021 and 2023, evictions increased by 78.6 percent. With inflation driving up prices and employers struggling to raise wages to compensate, rent is taking up an increasingly larger percentage of people's paychecks. Many Americans are having to choose between buying groceries and paying rent.

Foreclosures

Justin Sullivan / Staff | Getty Images

Renters aren't the only ones struggling to make their monthly payments, foreclosures are on the rise. This February saw a 5 percent increase in foreclosures from last year and a 10 percent increase from January. More and more Americans are losing their homes and businesses.

Bankruptcies

Chris Hondros / Staff | Getty Images

High interest rates and inflation have driven bankruptcies through the roof. Total filings have risen 13 percent and business bankruptcies rose 30 percent in 2023. It's getting harder and harder for businesses to stay afloat, and with California's new law requiring most restaurants to pay all employees a minimum of $20 an hour, you can expect that number to keep climbing.

Homelessness

FREDERIC J. BROWN / Contributor | Getty Images

The result of all of these issues is that it is getting harder and harder for Americans to afford the basic necessities. January of 2023 saw a record-breaking 650,000+ homeless Americans, a 12 percent jump from the previous year. More Americans have hit rock bottom than ever before.

Stop blaming Gen Z for the problems WE created

Editor's note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.

I want to talk to Generation Z. I’ve seen some clips of you complaining about your 9-to-5 jobs on social media and how life is really hard right now. To be honest, my first reaction was, “Suck it up, buttercup. This is what life is really like.” In a sense, that’s true. But in another sense, I think you’re getting a bad rap. You are facing unique problems that my generation didn’t face — problems that my generation had a hand in creating.

But I also think you don’t understand the cause of these problems.

I would hate to be in your position. When I was your age, we didn’t have to deal with any of the challenges you’re facing. In one sense, your life has been tough. At the same time, compared to previous generations, your life has been very easy. Everybody was rushing to save you, to protect you. You were coddled, which makes your life harder now.

You’ve grown up with social media and the definition of narcissism: somebody gazing into the pond looking at themselves all the time. I don't mean this as an offense, and I am not just including you in this. We’ve become a culture of narcissists. It’s all about “me, me, me, me.”

If you end up thinking more collectivism is the solution, then you haven't done enough homework.

You’ve been in territory that my generation never had to enter. You’ve already navigated a landscape that we didn't have to, where nothing is true, and you can’t trust anybody. I wouldn’t trust anybody either if I were in your position. But I do know a few things to be true and a couple of things I can trust.

First, life is worth it. Life is tough, but it is worth it in the end.

Second, life is not about stuff. As a guy who is kind of a pack rat, I can tell you that none of that stuff will create happiness in your life. In fact, I think your generation has a better handle on happiness in some ways than anybody in mine. You’re starting to realize that pharmaceuticals may not be as good as natural solutions in a lot of situations, that the huge house may not be as satisfying as just having a smaller house, that living your life instead of having to work all the time may be a better way to live.

I want to talk to those of you who feel like it’s not worth even trying to go to work because you’ll never get anywhere. You work 40 hours a week or more, and you still can't afford a place to live. You’re still living with your parents. You can’t afford food. I think you're right to feel frustrated because the problems you're facing weren't always the case.

I blame a lot of the current problems we’re facing today on the hippies. That may be wrong, but I hate hippies. Hippies have been screwing things up since the 1960s. While on their socialist march, they have become everything that they said they were against: lying, greedy politicians. They just won’t let go of their power even though their time has passed.

These are the people who have come up with policies that make you feel like this is the way the world is. I hope I can convince you that it doesn’t have to be this way. This isn’t the way our country has always been. We don’t have to keep these people in power. Actions have consequences. Votes have consequences. These people allow crime, looters, squatters, riots, and somebody needs to pay for that.

You say you can’t afford health care. I understand. Since Obamacare passed, the cost of individual health insurance has doubled. You need to remember that politicians promised that if we passed this massive health care overhaul, it would mean a savings of $2,500 per family. You're in school. You must know that $2,500 savings is not the same as an 80% increase. Moreover, the cost of hospital stays is up 210%. I understand when you say you can't afford health care at these costs. Who could afford health care? Who could afford insurance?

The generation coming of age is right to feel frustrated.This mess — with high costs and a massive debt burden — was not of their making.

Iwant to talk to Generation Z. I’ve seen some clips of you complaining about your 9-to-5 jobs on social media and how life is really hard right now. To be honest, my first reaction was, “Suck it up, buttercup. This is what life is really like.” In a sense, that’s true. But in another sense, I think you’re getting a bad rap. You are facing unique problems that my generation didn’t face — problems that my generation had a hand in creating.

But I also think you don’t understand the cause of these problems.

If you end up thinking more collectivism is the solution, then you haven't done enough homework.

I would hate to be in your position. When I was your age, we didn’t have to deal with any of the challenges you’re facing. In one sense, your life has been tough. At the same time, compared to previous generations, your life has been very easy. Everybody was rushing to save you, to protect you. You were coddled, which makes your life harder now.

You’ve grown up with social media and the definition of narcissism: somebody gazing into the pond looking at themselves all the time. I don't mean this as an offense, and I am not just including you in this. We’ve become a culture of narcissists. It’s all about “me, me, me, me.”

You’ve been in territory that my generation never had to enter. You’ve already navigated a landscape that we didn't have to, where nothing is true, and you can’t trust anybody. I wouldn’t trust anybody either if I were in your position. But I do know a few things to be true and a couple of things I can trust.

First, life is worth it. ≈

Second, life is not about stuff. As a guy who is kind of a pack rat, I can tell you that none of that stuff will create happiness in your life. In fact, I think your generation has a better handle on happiness in some ways than anybody in mine. You’re starting to realize that pharmaceuticals may not be as good as natural solutions in a lot of situations, that the huge house may not be as satisfying as just having a smaller house, that living your life instead of having to work all the time may be a better way to live.

I want to talk to those of you who feel like it’s not worth even trying to go to work because you’ll never get anywhere. You work 40 hours a week or more, and you still can't afford a place to live. You’re still living with your parents. You can’t afford food. I think you're right to feel frustrated because the problems you're facing weren't always the case.

I blame a lot of the current problems we’re facing today on the hippies. That may be wrong, but I hate hippies. Hippies have been screwing things up since the 1960s. While on their socialist march, they have become everything that they said they were against: lying, greedy politicians. ≈

These are the people who have come up with policies that make you feel like this is the way the world is. I hope I can convince you that it doesn’t have to be this way. This isn’t the way our country has always been. We don’t have to keep these people in power. Actions have consequences. Votes have consequences. These people allow crime, looters, squatters, riots, and somebody needs to pay for that.

If you end up thinking more collectivism is the solution, then you haven't done enough homework.

You say you can’t afford health care. I understand. Since Obamacare passed, the cost of individual health insurance has doubled. You need to remember that politicians promised that if we passed this massive health care overhaul, it would mean a savings of $2,500 per family. You're in school. You must know that $2,500 savings is not the same as an 80% increase. Moreover, the cost of hospital stays is up 210%. I understand when you say you can't afford health care at these costs. Who could afford health care? Who could afford insurance?

You are also starting your life with thousands of dollars in debt. Your parents didn't have that burden. People used to be able to work their way through college and graduate debt-free. Others were able to get jobs that quickly paid off their debt. You can't do that now. Once the government said that they were going to guarantee all student loans, university costs skyrocketed, and it hasn't stopped. You can thank the progressive President Lyndon B. Johnson for that.

The people who created this mess cannot fix it. But it can be fixed.

You are also starting your life with thousands of dollars in debt. Your parents didn't have that burden. People used to be able to work their way through college and graduate debt-free. Others were able to get jobs that quickly paid off their debt. You can't do that now. Once the government said that they were going to guarantee all student loans, university costs skyrocketed, and it hasn't stopped. You can thank the progressive President Lyndon B. Johnson for that.

Once the government said that they were going to guarantee everybody’s college tuition, universities found out that they could just charge more because the government would give you virtually any amount in your loan. And they have been charging more and more ever since. In 1965, the average college tuition was $450 a year. Adjusted to inflation, that's $4,000 a year. You're currently paying an average of $26,000 a year as opposed to the inflation-adjusted $4,000.

What happened? The answer is always the same: government regulations. Gas is up. Why? Government regulations. Can't afford a house? Well, that's due to several things. Many of them revolve around the fed and our national debt. But the simple answer is the same: government regulations.

Moreover, the U.S. government has run a staggering national debt. We have been concerned about it forever, but the people in power haven't been listening to your mom and dad and people like me. A lot of other people just thought, "Oh, well. We could get away with it. We're the United States of America, after all. Somehow or another, it will all work out."

People like me have been saying, "No. We can't pass this on to our children." You're now seeing what we have passed on. When you say that the adults are responsible for creating this world of problems, in some ways, you’re right. We were lied to, and as many people do, they want to believe the lie because it makes them feel better.

There are big lies being pushed in your generation as well. You're being told that a man is a woman and a woman is a man. At the same time, you’re being told that gender doesn't even exist at all. It makes us feel better to go along with the lie because we don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.

My generation believed the same kind of lie about our national debt. We were told that we could spend all this money on subsidized programs because it would provide you, our children, with a better life. Some people warned, "Wait, how will they pay this off? This will cost them." We didn't want to believe them. The lie sounded better, and it was easier to believe that than the truth. We never saw the consequences, and even if we did, they were always way out in the future. Nobody wanted to listen to the doomsday people saying, "No. It's going to come faster than you think."

And that time is right now. Our government now is printing $1 trillion every 100 days. That's never been done before. We have more debt than any country has ever had in the history of the world. But we’re not alone. Every country is doing this. They’re going into debt like we’ve never seen before, and we’re all about to pay for that. It’s going to make your life even harder.

There are Democrats and Republicans who still believe in spending all kinds of money and getting us involved in every global conflict. Then there are constitutional conservatives who believe that we should conserve the things that have worked and throw out the things that don’t and follow our Constitution and Bill of Rights. You haven't really learned about those most likely. But you should. All of our problems are caused by the government and the people who feel they can bypass the Constitution. That's what this election is really all about.

You might say, “I don’t really care. I don’t like either of the political parties.” I know a lot of people who don’t like either of them, but one is going to try to cut the size of this government and one is going to spend us into collapse.

The people who created this mess cannot fix it. But it can be fixed. You need to learn enough about the truth, about why this has happened to us, and about how our Constitution lasted longer than any other Constitution in the world. The average is 17 years. This thing has lasted hundreds of years. Why? How? And why is it falling apart today? That's what you should dedicate some of your time to figuring out today.

You can complain about the way things are. I complain. Everybody complains. But don't wallow there. Learn what caused this. And if you end up thinking more collectivism is the solution, then you haven't done enough homework. They always end the same way, and that's exactly where we're headed right now. We can either repeat the dreadful past of nations that have tried it before us, or we can choose freedom, liberty, and prosperity. The ball is in our court.