Senator Rand Paul - 'Being conservative is not enough'

Joining Glenn on his radio program Monday morning, presidential hopeful Rand Paul shared his thoughts on liberty and conservatism.

After introducing his new book, Our Presidents and Their Prayers, Paul pointed out what it means to him to be a Libertarian.

"Because I believe that you should have the liberty to do anything you want, doesn't mean I believe that you should do anything that you want," Paul said.

Later, he talked about why being conservative is not enough.

"You have to be a conservative and a Libertarian, or someone who believes in liberty also," Paul said. "I think it is that spice of life that spices it up and says to young people, 'We want you you to be free.' We don't want you to be bound by the state."

During the interview, Glenn challenged Paul on "turning his guns" on Ted Cruz.

"I think that's probably a misinterpretation," Paul said. "We're not out there campaigning against him."

Listen to the full interview or read the dialogue below.

Programming Alert:

Glenn sits down for one on one interviews with presidential candidates and gets answers to the questions the mainstream media won't ask.

See the full schedule here.

Don't miss Glenn's sit-down interview with Rand Paul, airing on TheBlaze TV on Wednesday, October 28th at 5:00pm Eastern Time.

Sign up for TheBlaze TV today and get a free Roku streaming stick.

Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors.

GLENN: Senator Rand Paul. And presidential hopeful is joining us now. How are you doing, Rand?

RAND: Thanks for having me, Glenn.

GLENN: You bet. I want to start off with the new book. And I'm a little hacked off. I didn't get a copy of the book. It's all up in New York. Just the title of it. Our Presidents and Their Prayers is fascinating to me. Tell me about the book.

RAND: Well, so often people want to say, "Well, we have separation of church and state." Well, we do. But the main separation was to keep the government out of the church, and not vice-versa. And we went back and looked at all the prayers and proclamations. And every president, bar none, has had prayers and proclamations indicating that faith influenced their decision-making. And then I kind of weave in through that some of the story of my faith, which I tell people hasn't always been linear. It's been sort of a zigzag.

GLENN: Mine too. A few cliffs on mine.

(laughter)

RAND: But always been profound, and something that I really sometimes really struggled over, but something that is very important to me and that I don't run away from and I'm not embarrassed to say that my faith and belief in right and wrong and morality and looking at every government policy that way is important.

GLENN: This is -- to me, I would think that this is surprising to a lot of people that you would be the one that would take on faith because Libertarians, I think, mistakenly are thought of as people that don't believe in faith.

RAND: What I think the funny thing is, is because I believe that you should have the liberty to do anything you want, doesn't mean I believe that you should do anything that you want.

GLENN: Right.

RAND: And, in fact, I'm a big fan of Os Guinness. You know Os Guinness?

GLENN: No.

RAND: He wrote a book called The Suicide of the Free People. And in it, I think he has a profound statement. He says that liberty requires restraint, but the only restraint consistent with liberty is self-restraint. So liberty and virtue are important.

Don Devine has another book where he talks about this, that they kind of need each other. That if you liberty without any kind of sense of self-restraint, without any sense of belief in something greater, without any sense of conscience and right and wrong, that if you have a society without any of that, liberty could be a disaster.

GLENN: This goes to almost what Thomas Paine was told by Benjamin Franklin. You know, basically, "How dare you. It's cool that you don't believe in God. But you're being produced by a society that did believe no God and those standards are what produced a stable enough society to be able to get you to this place." So I don't understand the hostility sometimes that we --

RAND: Really it's a combination. Don Devine in his book, called America's Way Back, talks about one of the great things of our Founding was the synchronism of freedom and tradition, of bringing both together.

GLENN: Yes.

RAND: And Don Devine says that freedom needs tradition for law and order and for inspiration. But tradition needs liberty or tradition needs freedom to escape stagnation.

GLENN: Yes.

RAND: And really, they do need both. And being -- that's why being conservative is not enough. You have to be a conservative and a Libertarian, or someone who believes in liberty also. Because I think it is that spice of life that spices it up and says to young people, "We want you you to be free." We don't want you to be bound by the state.

GLENN: Last week, we heard that they were going to do -- the House is going to go with Paul Ryan. And I flipped my wig just a little bit. Maybe a lot. Because I think the G.O.P. is hanging themselves. I mean, you put another guy in who is going to do absolutely nothing and play the same game and block the liberty people, you're going to lose the presidential election. To me, this is why people like Donald Trump are, at least at this point, up at the top, because people are sick of the game. They're absolutely sick of the game.

What do you think should happen in the House?

RAND: Well, you know, I've traveled the country, and what I hear from Republicans is the same thing: Very unhappy. Republicans control the House, Republicans control the Senate, and they're doing nothing.

We have not exerted the power of the purse. So I've been saying over and over again, "Yes, we need to exert the power of the purse." So my question is, "Will the next Speaker exert the power of the purse?" He's going to have a chance. We have a debt ceiling. What are they going to do? Is the new Speaker just going to raise the debt ceiling without demanding any reforms?

In 2011, we played this gambit, and the president said, "Oh, I won't negotiate with a gun to my head," but then it turned out the president did negotiate. We got something called the sequester, which was an across-the-line slowing down of the rate of growth of government. It wasn't even a cut. At the time I didn't think it was enough.

But you know who abandoned it? Paul Ryan. Paul Ryan and Patty Murray got together about a year, a year and a half ago, and the people on the right said, we got to have more money for the military. And the people on the left said, we got to have more money for welfare. So what did they do? They got together, and they did the secret handshake and we got more money for both. But that means that Paul Ryan was instrumental in getting rid of the sequester.

So my question now, "Do we really believe that he's going to use the debt ceiling to get reforms, or that he's not going to bust the budget caps?" I think they're going to bust the budget caps for military and welfare in December.

GLENN: When we look at people like Bernie Sanders -- I watched the debate with the Democrats. And I listen to Bernie Sanders, and I think, "I got a lot in common with Bernie Sanders." None of it on policy. None of it on policy. His solutions are hairbrained.

RAND: Sounds like Donald Trump to me. Has the correct anger and angry at Washington, but the policy may not exactly be there.

GLENN: Not really. I don't even think Donald Trump is this accurate. Bernie Sanders is talking about the way capitalism is being done is immoral. And he can make a good case for it. The way the crony capitalists are in with the people in Washington, the way Washington is being run is immoral.

RAND: Yeah, the problem though is Bernie complains about crony capitalism, and he kind of gets it right. But he equates it with all of capitalism, and he actually promotes something called Democratic socialism.

GLENN: Yes. Yes.

RAND: And I've been trying to point out -- because I'm on a lot of college campuses. We have a big following in college campuses -- that there's nothing sexy, and there's nothing cool about socialism. What there is, is the implied force that goes along with taking away your choice.

They tell you, you cannot make reindeer. You cannot make cars. You cannot sell water. Only the state tells you what you can do. It's the most anti-choice economic system. If you don't listen, they fine you. If you don't pay the fine, they imprison you. If you will not listen, ultimately, what has happened in history -- and people get mad when I say this -- but they exterminate you. And that's what happened under Stalin.

People say, "Oh, no, no, he wants Democratic socialism." The problem is, a majority can be just as bad as one single authoritarian. And that's why we shouldn't allow any of our rights to be subject to a majority. Our Founding Fathers understood that. They understood that your rights come from your Creator, and no majority should be able to take them away from you.

GLENN: Let me ask you a tough question. I'm frustrated. And this is something we've talked about before. I'm frustrated with any of the -- any of the guys, you Santorum, Cruz, trying to think who else --

PAT: Jindal.

GLENN: Anybody that would take -- you guys have targets like crazy. Donald Trump. Take -- you can -- Jeb Bush, take them.

Why have you decided to turn your guns on Ted Cruz at this point, where I would love for everybody on our side just to get along. Turn the guns on the other guys and talk liberty together.

RAND: Yeah, I think that's probably a misinterpretation. I'm on a lot of programs. People like you ask my questions, and I tend to respond to them and answer the questions.

But we've had nothing where we're sort of promoting any kind of animosity with Ted Cruz. We answer questions. If you ask me, you know, do I disagree with his vote on criminal justice this week, where he voted against the criminal justice reform, I will tell you that. But we're not out there campaigning against him.

GLENN: Well, you're saying that he has no future in the US Senate. Isn't that kind of --

RAND: I was asked a question. That is my honest answer. And the reason is, is that, he has a different vision than I do. His vision is, there's plenty of people, if you just rouse them up on our side to win elections. My opinion is, you have to rouse up and energize the electorate, the grassroots that are on our side, but you also have to reach out and get new people. I do not believe we will win by just rattling our cages for the base. We should energize the base, and we should be true to our principles. But I've been taking our principles to the south side of Chicago, to Philadelphia, to Baltimore, to Ferguson.

GLENN: You've done more in that than anybody I've ever seen in my life.

RAND: But I think it's also how you win elections. I mean, that's how you win a general election, is you got to get people in the middle and on the other side, who have never seen or heard or met a real live Republican, to start thinking about voting Republican. And that's just a difference in, I guess, vision of how you win elections. Philosophically, we're fairly close. You know, our voting records are fairly similar.

GLENN: You are coming up to the CNBC debate. It's all going to be about the economy and business.

Conventional wisdom would say that a businessman like Donald Trump, I think, if the country goes into economic insecurity, where we have a disruption of the economy like we did in 2008, I think Donald Trump would rocket to the top because a lot of people see him as a businessman because they watch his TV show.

And they just think that he's the guy to get it done. Why should you be the guy, being a doctor and a senator, not necessarily a businessman, why should you be the guy that America listens to?

RAND: Because I think that government is inversely proportional to liberty. That the bigger your government is, the less liberty you have. And that I think a free people are also a prosperous people. The freer you are, the more prosperous we will be. The reason why I think, you know, it would be a mistake to sort of elect or nominate someone who believes in their all-powerful, all-knowing sort of narcissism is that --

GLENN: Are you calling Donald Trump a narcissist?

RAND: Yeah, I know that's a stretch. I know that's a stretch. But that might be an understatement, actually.

GLENN: I was going to say. Because that's pretty kind. We've called him worse.

RAND: Yeah, but I think the thing is that worries me about it, from a point of view of liberty, is that when someone says they're all-knowing and that they are so smart, they can figure things out, it sounds like they want you to give them more power. And the biggest problem I see in our country is that we've given too much power to the presidency. And that over 100 years, more and more power has gravitated in Republican administrations and Democrat administrations, until the presidency has become maybe 1,000 fold more powerful than Congress.

So I don't want an all-powerful president. I don't want a president who promises me he's so smart that he can take care of me if I just give up a little bit more liberty. So that does worry me. That concerns me a great deal. But I do think that we need to know -- you know, he has this little slogan. He wants to make America great again.

Well, you have to understand what made America great to begin with. And what made us great to begin with is that we allowed people to be free to trade with each other, and we allowed them the freedom to interact and the freedom to make choices in the marketplace. But we didn't use big government like through eminent domain to come in and take the property of a small property owner and give it to a casino magnate. That wasn't part of the liberty. It isn't part of the liberty that anybody I know in the liberty movement would accept.

GLENN: I don't know if you know this, but Zemeckis has come out, the director of Back to the Future II, and he says Biff Tanner (sic) in Back to the Future II was modeled after Donald Trump.

(laughter)

RAND: It doesn't surprise me.

GLENN: Yeah. Are you concerned that Canada just elected a celebrity playboy. What was the country that I just --

STU: Guatemala.

GLENN: Guatemala just elected a comedian. Are you concerned at all that governments all around the world have so discredited themselves that we're quickly sliding towards a Weimar Republic re-do?

RAND: I think that when you look at it, there is a great deal of anger towards government. In fact, that's why I ran for office. Because I was unhappy with government. I tell people, I was tired of throwing things at my TV. You know, because I was so unhappy with what they were saying and doing.

And, frankly, the Tea Party movement arose because people were unhappy with Republicans. I was unhappy with Republicans who voted to do the bank bailout. But I was also unhappy with the Republicans who created new entitlement programs and doubled the size of the debt when they were in charge. And I ran, frankly, because I thought Republicans needed a better voice. But the interesting thing is -- and this boggles my mind that Trump could attract anybody from the Tea Party because he was for all the things we opposed. He was for the bailout of the banks. He was for the bailout of the car companies.

GLENN: Are you surprised at the Tea Party? Because I'm just devastated by 20 percent of the Tea Party saying, "Yeah, he's my guy." What is that?

RAND: I don't think we're getting to polling that's very accurate yet.

GLENN: Okay.

RAND: I think we're getting to polling that is of leaners. Because most of the polls -- two-thirds of the people in the polls are saying, "Well, I'm undecided." Then they're saying, "Well, no, no, who are you for if you had to make a choice?" So really this is a poll that is of undecided. It's doing a disservice to the whole process to bank so much information and so much of a conclusion from it. In fact, I tell people, because a lot of people in the media weren't very good at math, is that because there's a number, they think it's math. Oh, someone has 21 percent. Oh, that's math. It must be certain. Well, there's no certainty at all to these things. And I predict you'll see a great deal of upheaval and switch by the time we get to an election.

GLENN: I think so too. Rand Paul, joining us Wednesday. We will talk about the economy and fiat currency and, hopefully, a little more about his book, Our Presidents and Their Prayers. That will be on Wednesday's television show, only on TheBlaze TV. Tonight, an hour with Ted Cruz that you don't want to miss.

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.

The Bubba Effect erupts as America’s power brokers go rogue

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.

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

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Parallel societies do not end well

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

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

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

A crisis of confidence

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

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

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

Brandon Bell / Staff | Getty Images

Stand up and tell the truth

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

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

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

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

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

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

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.