Glenn Raves About His New Favorite Book

Glenn is something of an aficionado when it comes to books on Adolf Hitler. That's why he was surprised to learn about one originally written in the 1930s, but published in 2002 after the manuscript was discovered by the author's family. The book --- Defying Hitler: A Memoir --- was written as a warning to the world by a young man who witnessed Hitler's rise to power.

"You name it, and I've read it on Hitler. I have gotten all the way down to I Was Hitler's Chauffeur, which isn't worth the read," Glenn said jokingly. "You will learn more important things about what happened and what allowed Hitler to take place than any other book I've ever read about the Second World War."

Not to be outdone, co-host Jeff Fisher mentioned that he's currently "reading" a picture book about Hitler.

Enjoy this complimentary clip from The Glenn Beck Program:

GLENN: Have I told you guys about Defying Hitler? Did I tell you guys about it yesterday?

STU: No.

GLENN: Stu is fresh meat. Fresh meat.

JEFFY: Yeah, Stu has been gone.

GLENN: Stu, remember when I said, you need to read Garden of Beasts?

STU: Yes.

GLENN: And remember you guys heard it for about six months, until you couldn't take it anymore?

STU: Oh, my gosh. Yes. I finally had to read it.

GLENN: Right.

And then you read it, and you came back, and you were like...

STU: It was awesome.

GLENN: Right. And the reason I wanted you to read it was because it was a different perspective on Germany than you had ever read before, right?

STU: Uh-huh. Great book. By the way, supposedly going to be a movie at some point.

GLENN: I'm telling you, this one, A, it's a lot shorter. This book that I've recently found is 100 times Garden of Beasts.

And what it is, is a guy who was German, was growing up in Germany, came of age about 1920. So he was a teenager during the first world war. He started writing it in the '30s, but he's going after all his recollections, starting at 1914. So he remembers what Germany was.

STU: Uh-huh.

GLENN: Okay? Then he remembers the war. And he talks about the war and what happened. Then the 1920s. The Weimar Republic. Hyperinflation. He talks about that.

And then the coming of Hitler. And then Hitler and who he was and what happened.

This book was written in the '30s as a warning to the world. He escaped Germany and came to the United States. Became a professor. He became a huge author of historic books. He's -- he wrote the quintessential book on who Adolf Hitler really was, his character and his personality, back in like 1972. He dies.

His family finds on a shelf this manuscript in 2003 or 2006, something like that. It's published, becomes a big best-seller during the Bush years. I had never heard of it. Saw somebody reading it the other day. And I was like, what is that? Defying Hitler. And I said, "Ooh, that sounds good." And they started talking to me about it. You name it, and I've read on Hitler. I have gotten all the way down to I Was Hitler's Chauffeur, which isn't worth the read. But, anyway, I started reading this book. You will learn more important things about what happened and what allowed Hitler to take place than any other book I've ever read about the Second World War. It has a completely different point of view because he's not writing it from the point of view of the Nazis and what they were doing it. He's writing it from the point of view of the youth of the day.

And he was -- he was young. Okay? So he was in his teens when America -- or, when Germany was a certain way. And that 9/11 event, if you will, that changed them, was the first world war. Then they came back, and they were at each other's throats politically. And the churches were at each other's throats.

And then jobs were hard to find. And then they started printing money. And then money became -- you couldn't -- you know, we've read a million times that when you got paid, you stopped working, cashed your check, went in and bought anything you could in the store. Right?

STU: Uh-huh.

GLENN: Because a week from now, by the end of your workday, it would be -- your paycheck would be worthless.

STU: Uh-huh.

GLENN: What he talks about is -- and I've never heard this. It was the stock market that anybody -- anybody who didn't have a family, they took their money and they immediately poured it into the stock market. And they got wildly wealthy.

Now, think of this. Why don't we have hyperinflation? Why isn't our meat and milk and everything else -- why isn't that reflective of the $4 trillion that we have just pumped into the system, right?

If I said, ten years ago, you put $2 trillion into this system and you're going to start to see massive inflation. Okay? We're 4 trillion. Where's the inflation? You know this. I know you know this. You're going to go, of course, yes, when I say it.

The stock market. He need says, "Well, there's no -- the fundamentals are gone." What they should be saying is, "The stock market is reflective of hyperinflation." Because the stock market is a reflection of who has the money.

PAT: That and velocity.

GLENN: Right.

PAT: I mean, there's a couple of --

GLENN: So they don't -- so the people who got the money are the big corporations, the big banks. They're not giving it to you and me.

So we don't have too many dollars chasing too far goods. They do. And so that's why big elaborate houses are still going through the roof. The rich are starting to feel that inflation. And it's concentrated in the stock market. Okay?

STU: Uh-huh.

GLENN: Well, that's the same thing that happened in Germany. They started constantly -- but everybody was doing it. I'm sorry, the youth without children were taking -- they were buying a little bit of food to last them the week to the next paycheck. Then they were taking all that money and putting it into the stock market. And the stock market did what it's doing now.

And now here's what happened: Now, think of this. I've never heard this point of view before. And I think this is accurate.

He says in reading -- remember, he's writing in the mid-'30s as a warning to the West. You don't know who this guy is, and you don't know what happened to Germany.

The older people in Germany are not with him. The youth are with him. And here's why: Because they were too young to really understand the real German society. The German ethics and being kind to each other because they went -- they came of age during the war. And then they came to age during the war. And then right after the war, then the people turned on themselves, were arguing politics, demonizing each other. The Weimar Republic came in, delegitimized the money. All morals went out the window.

So if you're 25, you have no kids, you're going out to the cabaret every night, you are with -- you have a ton of money because you put it all in the stock market. You're living large. You're a titan. You're getting all of the girls. Your life is absolutely sweet.

Then what happens? At the end of the Weimar Republic, a sensible guy comes in, an older statesman comes in and says, "I can fix the hyperinflation." He fixes the hyperinflation. He fixes the fact that -- he says, "For two years, during this guys' rule, we're not even talking about politics anymore."

No one is arguing politics. We're on the road back to the way we were.

But all those youth who were bank presidents -- they were 25-year-old bank presidents, they're not bank presidents anymore. Because they were all discredited because it was a game of -- it was a shell game. It was like Wall Street, you know, the movie. Just a shell game. So those guys don't -- they have to go now into other jobs and work hard for their money. And those days are over for them. Those glory days. They want the glory days. So when Hitler comes in and says, "We're going to set the rules. We're going to privatize business with us -- and if you're in with the Nazi party, you're going to be able to make it." They recognize this game of -- just do -- the ends justify the means.

And I could have that life back. So the youth throw their lot in with Hitler. And that's why it worked. I had never heard of that before.

STU: It's really interesting.

GLENN: That's like the first third of the book. It's really good. Called Defying Hitler.

STU: I'm in. I'm in. I just finished Hitler: Ascent.

GLENN: I have not read that one.

STU: It's the new like -- the ascent is till 1939. So it's a two-part series. The 1,000 books per edition. A dozen pages per edition. You know, one of those types of books. But, I mean, fascinating.

Just the chapter on Hitler and the churches is so worth your time. If you've ever had the argument with someone on Facebook where they say, "These mass murders are fueled by religion." Hitler? He was. Look at this quote by Hitler. He says --

GLENN: All prior to 1933.

STU: All of it happened really early on, in the first few weeks of his reign as chancellor. But, I mean, the behind-the-scenes quotes they have from this guy, his entire mission was to discredit the churches afterwards.

It was like, living space, get rid of the Jews, then let's get rid of the churches.

GLENN: Shocking.

STU: That was his plan. And he used those relationships, tried to destroy the churches, and the quotes they have from him and Goebbels, and -- it's amazing.

GLENN: Hitler's Ascent?

STU: Hitler: Assent. It's -- Volker Ullrich is the guy who wrote it. It's the new sort of --

GLENN: Oh, Volker? Yeah.

STU: Oh, yeah.

I mean, it's amazing.

It's the new, like, biography on Hitler. The new one. Every ten to 15 years a new one gets written.

GLENN: Yeah. And that's the problem too because the farther we get away from these guys --

STU: It's a double-edged sword.

GLENN: Yeah, it's a double-edged sword. You want to be -- the time to write it is when some of the people are still alive, but they're not powerful. So at the end of their life. So they can still -- you can still check and say, right? Right? Right?

STU: Yeah.

GLENN: And if you use original sources, you're good. So the first ones that are written in the first 30 years are probably a little skewed. Probably. Unless they're attached entirely to original first person sources.

STU: Right. And so you had -- you've had this where -- Joachim Fest had one, which was influenced by a lot of the people who were alive, but a lot of the people who wanted to rehabilitate their reputations.

Albert Speer, being the main one. And that one came later.

Kershaw's in 2000, I think, was seen as the standard. And this one I think -- because while you're right, a lot of these guys aren't around anymore to tell the stories, more and more documentation has come out.

And really, I mean, the fuel for the industry, if you want to say the Hitler -- you know, the Goebbels diaries. Those changed the world on how much we understand. The guy was writing a diary entry about every meeting he was having during the era.

GLENN: That's the great thing -- and the Founders too.

But with Founders, they stopped using those diaries. They stopped using the original sources because it didn't give them the narrative they were looking for.

The narrative on the Nazis is, they were bad guys. And so their diaries back all of that stuff up. So as long as you're pegged to original sources, you're good.

STU: This has been Hitler book corner.

PAT: I just finished Hitler's Mailman's Neighbor.

GLENN: Did you? Wow.

STU: Oh, wow.

PAT: Yeah. He died in 1934. So he doesn't have a lot of perspective. But he talked about the junk mail he heard Adolf got early in his chancellorship.

GLENN: Original sources and footnoted?

PAT: All footnoted.

STU: Can I get your copy? Do you mind if I borrow it?

PAT: 823 pages of footnotes.

GLENN: So the three books -- the three books -- one I'm talking about is Defying Hitler. Hitler Ascent is Stu's. And Hitler's Mailman's Next-door Neighbor.

PAT: Mailman Next-door Neighbor is the third one.

GLENN: Thank you very much.

PAT: Uh-huh.

STU: It's a long read. Pat's, I will say is a little bit academic.

GLENN: There's no pictures even of the mailbox.

PAT: It's 2400 pages.

GLENN: And he dies before 33.

PAT: He dies --

JEFFY: My Hitler book has pictures.

GLENN: Amazing.

What do clay pots have to do with to preserving American history?

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

Why should we preserve our nation’s history? If you listen to my radio program and podcast, or read my columns and books, you know I’ve dedicated a large part of my life and finances to sourcing and preserving priceless artifacts that tell America’s story. I’ve tried to make these artifacts as available as possible through the American Journey Experience Museum, just across from the studios where I do my daily radio broadcast. Thousands of you have come through the museum and have been able to see and experience these artifacts that are a part of your legacy as an American.

The destruction of American texts has already begun.

But why should people like you and me be concerned about preserving these things from our nation's history? Isn’t that what the “big guys” like the National Archives are for?

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls. In 1946, a Bedouin shepherd in what is now the West Bank threw a rock into a cave nestled into the side of a cliff near the Dead Sea. Instead of hearing an echo, he heard the curious sound of a clay pot shattering. He discovered more than 15,000 Masoretic texts from the third century B.C. to the first century A.D.

These texts weren’t just a priceless historical discovery. They were virtually perfect copies of the same Jewish texts that continue to be translated today. Consider the significance of that discovery. Since the third century B.C. when these texts were first written, the Jewish people have endured a continued onslaught of diasporas, persecutions, pressures to conform to their occupying power, the destruction of their temple, and so much more. They had to fight for their identity as a people for centuries, and finally, a year after the end of the Holocaust and a year before the founding of the nation of Israel, these texts were discovered, confirming the preservation and endurance of their heritage since ancient times — all due to someone putting these clay pots in a desert cave more than 2,000 years ago.

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

So, what do these clay pots have to do with the calling to preserve American history? I didn’t understand that prompting myself until the horrible thought dawned on me that the people we are fighting against may very well take our sacred American scriptures, our Declaration of Independence, and our Bill of Rights. What if they are successful, and 1,000 years from now, we have no texts preserved to confirm our national identity? What kind of new history would be written over the truth?

The destruction of American texts has already begun. The National Archives has labeled some of our critical documents, like our Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, as “triggering” or “containing harmful language.” In a public statement, the National Archives said that the labels help prepare readers to view potentially distressing content:

The Catalog and web pages contain some content that may be harmful or difficult to view. NARA’s records span the history of the United States, and it is our charge to preserve and make available these historical records. As a result, some of the materials presented here may reflect outdated, biased, offensive, and possibly violent views and opinions. In addition, some of the materials may relate to violent or graphic events and are preserved for their historical significance.

According to this statement, our founding documents are either “outdated, biased, offensive,” “possibly violent,” or a combination of these scathing descriptions. I’m sorry, the Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.” Our Constitution is not “outdated and biased,” and our Bill of Rights certainly is not “offensive and possibly violent.” They are glorious documents. They should be celebrated, not qualified by such derogatory, absurd language. Shame on them.

These are only the beginning stages of rewriting our history. What if they start banning these “triggering” documents from public view because they might offend somebody? Haven’t we torn down “triggering” statues before? What if we are no longer able to see, read, and study the actual words of our nation's founding documents because they are “harmful” or “possibly violent”? A thousand years from now, will there be any remnant to piece together the true spirit behind the nation that our founders envisioned?

The Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.”

That is why in 2008, I was prompted to preserve what I could. Now, the American Journey Experience Museum includes more than 160,000 artifacts, from founding-era documents to the original Roe v. Wade court papers. We need to preserve the totality of our nation’s heritage, the good, the bad, and the ugly. We need to preserve our history in our own clay pots.

I ask you to join with me on this mission. Start buying books that are important to preserve. Buy some acid-free paper and start printing some of the founding documents, the reports that go against the mainstream narrative, the studies that prove what is true as we are continually being fed lies. Start preserving our daily history as well as our history because it is being rewritten and digitized.

Somebody must have a copy of what is happening now and what has happened in the past. I hope things don’t get really bad. But if they do, we need to preserve our heritage. Perhaps, someone 1,000 years from now will discover our clay pots and, Lord willing, be able to have a glimpse of America as it truly was.

Top 10 WORST items in the new $1.2 TRILLION spending bill

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Biden just signed the newest spending bill into law, and Glenn is furious.

Under Speaker Johnson's leadership, the whopping $1.2 TRILLION package will use your taxpayer dollars to fund the government through September. Of course, the bill is loaded with earmarks and pork that diverts money to fund all sorts of absurd side projects.

Here is the list of the ten WORST uses of taxpayer money in the recently passed spending bill:

Funding venues to host drag shows, including ones that target children

David McNew / Contributor | Getty Images

Money for transgender underwear for kids

Funding for proms for 12 to 18 year old kids

Bethany Clarke / Stringer | Getty Images

Border security funding... for Jordan and Egypt

Another $300 million for Ukraine

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

$3.5 million for Detroit's annual Thanksgiving Day parade

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$2.5 million for a new kayaking facility in Franklin, New Hampshire

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$2.7 million for a bike park in White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia, a town with a population of less than 2,300 people

$5 million for a new trail at Coastal Carolina University

$4 million the "Alaska King Crab Enhancement Project" (whatever that means)

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There is no doubt about it—we are entering dark times.

The November presidential election is only a few months away, and following the chaos of the 2020 election, the American people are bracing for what is likely to be another tumultuous election year. The left's anti-Trump rhetoric is reaching an all-time high with the most recent "Bloodbath" debacle proving how far the media will go to smear the former president. That's not to mention the Democrats' nearly four-year-long authoritarian attempt to jail President Trump or stop his re-election by any means necessary, even if it flies in the face of the Constitution.

Meanwhile, Biden is doing worse than ever. He reportedly threw a tantrum recently after being informed that his polls have reached an all-time low. After Special Counsel Robert Hur's report expressed concerns over Biden's obviously failing mental agility, it's getting harder for the Democrats to defend him. Yet he is still the Democratic nominee for November, promising another 4 years of catastrophic policies, from the border to heavy-handed taxation, should he be reelected.

The rest of the world isn't doing much better. The war in Ukraine has no clear end in sight, drawing NATO and Russia closer and closer to conflict. The war in Gaza is showing no sign of slowing down, and as Glenn revealed recently, its continuation may be a sign that the end times are near.

One thing is clear: we are living in uncertain times. If you and your family haven't prepared for the worst, now is the time. You can start by downloading "Glenn's Ultimate Guide to Getting Prepared." Be sure to print off a copy or two. If the recent cell outage proved anything, it's that technology is unreliable in survival situations. You can check your list of supplies against our "Ultimate Prepper Checklist for Beginners," which you can find below:

Food

  • Canned food/non-perishable foods
  • Food preparation tools
  • Go to the next level: garden/livestock/food production

Water

  • Non-perishable water store
  • Water purification
  • Independent water source

Shelter

  • Fireplace with a wood supply
  • Tent
  • Generator with fuel supply
  • Go to the next level: fallout shelter

Money

  • Emergency cash savings
  • Precious metals

Medicine

  • Extra blankets
  • Basic first aid
  • Extra prescriptions
  • Extra glasses
  • Toiletries store
  • Trauma kit
  • Antibiotics
  • Basic surgery supplies
  • Potassium Iodate tablets

Transportation

  • Bicycle
  • Car
  • Extra fuel

Information

  • Birth certificates
  • Insurance cards
  • Marriage license
  • Immunization records
  • Mortgage paperwork
  • Car title and registration
  • House keys, car keys
  • Passports
  • Family emergency plan
  • Prepping/survival/repair manuals
  • Go to the next level: copy of the Bible, the U.S. Constitution, and other important books/sources

Skills

  • Cooking
  • Gardening
  • Sewing
  • First Aid
  • Basic maintenance skills
  • Go to the next level: farming/ranching
  • Self-defense training

Communication

  • Family contact information and addresses
  • HAM radio

Miscellaneous

  • Flashlights and batteries
  • Lamps and fuel
  • Hardware (tools, nails, lumber, etc)
  • Extra clothes
  • Extreme weather clothes and gear
  • Gas masks and filters
  • Spare parts for any machinery/equipment

Is Trump's prosecution NORMAL?  This COMPLETE list of ALL Western leaders who served jail time proves otherwise.

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Mainstream media is on a crusade to normalize Donald Trump's indictments as if it's on par with the electoral course. Glenn asked his team to research every instance of a Western leader who was jailed during their political career over the past 200 years—except extreme political turmoil like the French Revolution, Napoleonic Wars, Irish Revolution, etc.—and what we discovered was quite the opposite.

Imprisoning a leader or major political opponent is not normal, neither in the U.S. nor in the Western world. Within the last 200 years, there are only a handful of examples of leaders in the West serving jail time, and these men were not imprisoned under normal conditions. All of these men were jailed under extreme circumstances during times of great peril such as the Civil War, World War II, and the Cold War.

What does this mean for America? Are Trump's indictments evidence that we are re-entering times of great peril? Below is a list of Western leaders who were imprisoned within the last 200 years. Take a look and decide for yourself:

Late 1800s

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Jefferson Davis: The nearest occurrence to a U.S. President to serve jail time was in the case of Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederate States of America. Jefferson was captured in Georgia by Northern Soldiers in 1865 and locked up in Fort Monroe, Virginia for two years. He was offered a presidential pardon but refused out of his loyalty to the confederacy.

Early 1900s

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Eugene V. Debs: Debbs, a Midwestern socialist leader, became the first person to run for president in prison. He was locked up at a federal penitentiary in Atlanta having been convicted under the federal Sedition Act for giving an antiwar speech a few months before Armistice Day, the end of World War I. Many of his supporters believed his imprisonment to be unjust. Debs received 897,704 votes and was a distant third-part candidate behind Warren G. Harding, the Republican winner, and James M. Cox, the second-place Democrat. Harding ordered Debs’s release from prison toward the end of 1921.

Nazi sympathizers and collaborators: After the end of World War II in 1945, several European leaders who had "led" their countries during the Nazi occupation faced trial and imprisonment for treason. This list included Chief of the French State Philippe Pétain, French Prime Minister Pierre Laval, and Minister-President of Norway Vidkun Quisling. The latter two were also executed after their imprisonment. President of Finland Risto Ryti and Prime Minister of Finland Johan Wilhelm Rangell were also tried and jailed for collaborating with the Nazis against the Allied Powers.

Late 1900s

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The end of the Cold War: The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was one of the pivotal moments that brought the Cold War to a close and marked the end of Communist East Germany. With the fall of the wall and the collapse of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), the former leaders were brought to trial to answer for the crimes committed by the GDR. General Secretary Erich Honecker and General Secretary Egon Krenz were both put on trial for abuse of power and the deaths of those who were shot trying to flee into West Germany. Honecker was charged with jail time but was released from custody due to severe illness and lived out the rest of his life as an exile in Chile. Krenz served 4 years in jail before his release in 2001. He is one of the last surviving leaders of the Eastern Bloc.

Lyndon LaRouche: Larouche was a Trotsky evangelist, public antisemite, and founder of a nationwide Marxist political movement, became the second person in U.S. history to run for President in a prison cell. Granted, he ran in every election from 1976 to 2004 as a long-shot third-party candidate. When he tried to gain the Democratic presidential nomination, he received 5 percent of the total nationwide vote. Even though in 2000 he received enough primary votes to qualify for delegates in a few states, the Democratic National Committee refused to seat his delegates and barred LaRouche from attending the Democratic National Convention.