The next great American leader? Glenn interviews him on radio today...

June 28, 2013

Writer

Glenn interviewed pastor and former NFL player Ken Hutcherson on radio today, a man Glenn feels will be (and already is) one of the great American leaders. He understands the time in which we live and speaks with authority, profound logic and reason.

Full transcript of interview below:

Ken, welcome to the program. How are you, sir?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Good morning, guys. You-guys work awful early.

GLENN: I know. I'm sorry. Well, you're in Seattle. You get up at, like, what? Noon? Ken, I wrote you last night and I said, I've been saying this stuff for a long time and they've never attacked me before. I think they're starting to be afraid. I think this is starting to connect and make sense to people, that civil rights are the rights that are outlined in the Bill of Rights and they are violating the First Amendment, the Second Amendment. They're violating the Fifth Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, the Tenth Amendment. They're violating those civil rights.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: You've got to understand pressure always determines the true character of any person. Good pressure, bad pressure, opposite pressure, but on this earth, Glenn, everyone better understand one thing: You won't feel pressure like you're going to feel　-- can you imagine any nonbeliever, any atheist, standing in front of Christ, trying to explain why they rejected him? Now, that's pressure, my brother. And as a Christian, I don't have that. I　-- Hey, I walk into a Ku Klux Klan meeting with gasoline unwound. That's just me, because I've got the greatest and the baddest one in the valley on my side. That's Jesus Christ. And Sharpton? Come on, guys. What a joke. He's turned into a joke.

GLENN: You have　-- you were there　-- you hated Martin Luther King while　-- while Al Sharpton says he started the, you know, youth movement for Martin Luther King. When you were 12, you were trying to break the bone of every body of every white concern you could. You were more of a panther person. You changed, but I really, truly believe that you have　-- Pat and I were talking about this the other day. We are not in the civil rights movement that you went through. I mean, I hope to God no man of any color or any religion or nonreligion ever in this country has to go through what African-Americans went through and, really, in some places, are still going　-- going through.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Yep, uh-huh.

GLENN: But this is　-- this is the same path and the time so to stop it is before it gets to the dogs. Am I not right on that?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: The main problem that we have is there's a lot of people, Glenn, in our society that is being discriminated against. Now, they don't mind throwing other groups in called the civil rights movement and the lawyers and the land group that they are fighting for is homosexuals and I don't like to call them gay because they have taken that word. Gay means you're happy, you're frolicking around, enjoying life, and they have stole that word and we need to take it back because when you allow those that are in opposition of you to take and determine what definitions are, then you will lose. We can't let Al Sharpton and others take the definition of what civil rights is. Civil rights is　--

GLENN: So what is the civil rights movement?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: 　-- you should the Constitution.

GLENN: Say it again. What is the civil rights movement? What is it really?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: The civil rights movement is understanding your freedom under the Constitution of these United States and if anyone tries to take those freedoms from you, you better rise up and fight and that's what we're doing together.

GLENN: You said to me on the plane, I've struggled too long as a black man to be an equal member of this society. Do you remember?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Oh, exactly. I said, Glenn, I fought for years and years and years as a black man to become equal. We're still fighting, but we won that fight, even in the courts, years ago, and I have felt that freedom and I'm going to use that freedom. I did not become a Christian, Glenn, to fight that same fight again as they look at me as a second class citizen.

GLENN: So help Al Sharpton out here, Glenn, on　-- I mean, he doesn't　-- because his religion, whatever his religion is, I believe it's a religion of collectivism in the state. I don't know how he　-- I don't know how he says he believes in the salvation of Jesus Christ but then talks about collective salvation. I don't understand that, but explain to him, just on the religious front, how this is a civil rights movement.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: I think he has to understand that he has to open his eyes and open his heart because, for example, let me give you a good example. The President of the United States, if you remove his blackness, then just ask the question, is he a good President or is he a bad President for the United States? Just remove the blackness and make that decision. When it comes to Al Sharpton, Glenn, you've got to understand something. If you remove Al Sharpton's blackness, he disappears. He's transparent. There's nothing there because he bases his whole life on his blackness. Me, I'm a black man; but my blackness has submission to my Christianity. I am an American, proud to be an American, proud to be a black American. I'm not African-American. I've never been to Africa. I'm an American that is black and my　-- and I'm proud to be a black that submits to my Christianity. I am proud to be just a man. I mean a man's man, not a metro sexual, not one that gets his nails done. I mean a man that used to get out there and knock heads and get his fingernails dirty. I'm proud of being a man, but my manhood submits to my Christianity, but I don't see that in Al Sharpton. Any time anything happens that attacks his blackness, he fears it and　-- because he has nothing else to stand on. Thus, when the real civil rights movement of everyone steps up, when we're saying the Tea Party, don't take being discriminated against. If a black person was kicked out of a hotel for being black down in Florida, it would be an uproar, but since the Tea Party was kicked out because of their political views, that's going against America. That's why we're here going against the Constitution, with certain unalienable rights. That is the true fight we must start and we must fight today like never before.

GLENN: Here's the thing, Ken: Most of　-- most Americans have not been discriminated against. We have been　--

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Oh, woe, woe.

GLENN: No, no. I'm saying growing up　--

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: 　-- that's why we don't fight.

GLENN: Well, I know growing up, I grew up in Mount Vernon. You live in Seattle now. You know Mount Vernon. And Mount Vernon back in the Sixties and Seventies, I don't think I was discriminated against at all

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Not compared to what I went through.

GLENN: Exactly right.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: But are we going to go with the greed or are we going to go with right and wrong?

GLENN: Where was I discriminated against as a　-- I mean, I don't want to be a victim. Let me just say -- let me just start there. I don't want to be a victim. I don't want　-- what did you say?

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: I said, please don't go there with me.

GLENN: Right. So when you're talking about, you know, the Sixties and Seventies, I guess if you go back and look at it -- and I just asked you to show me where I was a victim.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: There you go.

GLENN: I don't care what happened in my past. I care what's happening right now.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Absolutely. And you better stand like we're going to and get ready for the shots. Get ready to be disliked. You know, the greatest　-- do you know what the greatest blessing in the world is, Glenn?

GLENN: The greatest blessing in the world, let me see if I can answer this, at least for me. The greatest blessing　--

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Outside of Jesus Christ being your savior, do you know what the greatest blessing in the world is?

GLENN: Yeah. The greatest blessing in the world is for me to have him as my constant companion.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: The greatest blessing outside of Jesus Christ, my brother, is to have　--

GLENN: Oh. Outside of　--

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: -- is to have people dislike you.

GLENN: Oh, okay. Yeah. I'm glad to say I think we have all of the right people hate us. I mean, I　-- you know, when George Soros threatened us and when the administration doesn't like us, when the GOP doesn't like us, I wear that as a badge of honor. I really do.

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: Please, Hey, can you get two badges? Let's wear them together.

GLENN: Ken, thank you. I appreciate it, man. Thank you so much and --

PASTOR HUTCHERSON: My pleasure, my brother. Let's go get them.

GLENN: You got it. Thank you. Pastor Ken Hutcherson, he is, I warn you, a lightning rod, a lightning rod, but he has Stage 4 cancer and is not afraid, is not afraid, and I　-- and I　-- you have to experience him. He's actually coming down to Salt Lake City next week and he's going to be speaking at a couple of places and one of those we added a couple of days ago and I don't even know if there is any tickets left. What is the name of that event for Hutcherson and David Barton in the speaker series? Do you know what the name of that particular one is? Go to mercuryone.org -- somebody do that for me. Would you do that for me real quick, Alex? Go to mercuryone.org and look in the speaker series and most of these are sold out, but you can still get tickets. They are　-- by the way, I think they're, like, $15 a seat but all of the money goes to Mercury One and that pays for the infrastructure of Mercury One. We do this event every year so we can pay for the administration of it and we give you something in exchange. So I'm not asking you for on a donation. We pay for the administration, so then all of the rest of the years　-- the year when there's a tragedy or there's something, I can say to you 100% of that goes to pay for　-- goes to this particular cause and we don't take any money. So that's why we're charging for the speaker series, but I want to give you something in return. But there's one in the speaker series that we just added a couple of days ago. I don't know if there's tickets left, but it is with David Barton, Rabbi Lapin, myself, and Ken Hutcherson and I said I think there's only about 2000 tickets to that and I said to somebody the other day, I said, I think this is the one　-- there are 2000 people, 20000 people coming to the Man in the Moon. I think this is the one that those　-- the people are going to　-- this and Pat's education seminar that people are going to say holy cow, holy cow, they're coming, they're coming and I want to be a part of that because we are　-- we're going to take the bull by the horns and I beg you, be prepared. Prepare any way that you　-- you would do that in your faith, but get the bad things out of your life, clean up your life, make amends for those things, ask forgiveness for those things. If you're an alcoholic, do the 12 steps. Do it all over again. Do it in the next couple of months. Get it all out of your life. If you're a Christian, renew your baptismal covenants. Understand the atonement. Get it out of your life, clean it up so you have nothing to fear, because if you are hiding from yourself, you're never going to be able to stand what's coming and we'll give you more on that. And you can get the tickets at mercuryone.org.

The loneliness epidemic: Are machines replacing human connection?

NurPhoto / Contributor | Getty Images

Seniors, children, and the isolated increasingly rely on machines for conversation, risking real relationships and the emotional depth that only humans provide.

Jill Smola is 75 years old. She’s a retiree from Orlando, Florida, and she spent her life caring for the elderly. She played games, assembled puzzles, and offered company to those who otherwise would have sat alone.

Now, she sits alone herself. Her husband has died. She has a lung condition. She can’t drive. She can’t leave her home. Weeks can pass without human interaction.

Loneliness is an epidemic. And AI will not fix it. It will only dull the edges and make a diminished life tolerable.

But CBS News reports that she has a new companion. And she likes this companion more than her own daughter.

The companion? Artificial intelligence.

She spends five hours a day talking to her AI friend. They play games, do trivia, and just talk. She says she even prefers it to real people.

My first thought was simple: Stop this. We are losing our humanity.

But as I sat with the story, I realized something uncomfortable. Maybe we’ve already lost some of our humanity — not to AI, but to ourselves.

Outsourcing presence

How often do we know the right thing to do yet fail to act? We know we should visit the lonely. We know we should sit with someone in pain. We know what Jesus would do: Notice the forgotten, touch the untouchable, offer time and attention without outsourcing compassion.

Yet how often do we just … talk about it? On the radio, online, in lectures, in posts. We pontificate, and then we retreat.

I asked myself: What am I actually doing to close the distance between knowing and doing?

Human connection is messy. It’s inconvenient. It takes patience, humility, and endurance. AI doesn’t challenge you. It doesn’t interrupt your day. It doesn’t ask anything of you. Real people do. Real people make us confront our pride, our discomfort, our loneliness.

We’ve built an economy of convenience. We can have groceries delivered, movies streamed, answers instantly. But friendships — real relationships — are slow, inefficient, unpredictable. They happen in the blank spaces of life that we’ve been trained to ignore.

And now we’re replacing that inefficiency with machines.

AI provides comfort without challenge. It eliminates the risk of real intimacy. It’s an elegant coping mechanism for loneliness, but a poor substitute for life. If we’re not careful, the lonely won’t just be alone — they’ll be alone with an anesthetic, a shadow that never asks for anything, never interrupts, never makes them grow.

Reclaiming our humanity

We need to reclaim our humanity. Presence matters. Not theory. Not outrage. Action.

It starts small. Pull up a chair for someone who eats alone. Call a neighbor you haven’t spoken to in months. Visit a nursing home once a month — then once a week. Ask their names, hear their stories. Teach your children how to be present, to sit with someone in grief, without rushing to fix it.

Turn phones off at dinner. Make Sunday afternoons human time. Listen. Ask questions. Don’t post about it afterward. Make the act itself sacred.

Humility is central. We prefer machines because we can control them. Real people are inconvenient. They interrupt our narratives. They demand patience, forgiveness, and endurance. They make us confront ourselves.

A friend will challenge your self-image. A chatbot won’t.

Our homes are quieter. Our streets are emptier. Loneliness is an epidemic. And AI will not fix it. It will only dull the edges and make a diminished life tolerable.

Before we worry about how AI will reshape humanity, we must first practice humanity. It can start with 15 minutes a day of undivided attention, presence, and listening.

Change usually comes when pain finally wins. Let’s not wait for that. Let’s start now. Because real connection restores faster than any machine ever will.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Exposed: The radical Left's bloody rampage against America

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

For years, the media warned of right-wing terror. But the bullets, bombs, and body bags are piling up on the left — with support from Democrat leaders and voters.

For decades, the media and federal agencies have warned Americans that the greatest threat to our homeland is the political right — gun-owning veterans, conservative Christians, anyone who ever voted for President Donald Trump. President Joe Biden once declared that white supremacy is “the single most dangerous terrorist threat” in the nation.

Since Trump’s re-election, the rhetoric has only escalated. Outlets like the Washington Post and the Guardian warned that his second term would trigger a wave of far-right violence.

As Democrats bleed working-class voters and lose control of their base, they’re not moderating. They’re radicalizing.

They were wrong.

The real domestic threat isn’t coming from MAGA grandmas or rifle-toting red-staters. It’s coming from the radical left — the anarchists, the Marxists, the pro-Palestinian militants, and the anti-American agitators who have declared war on law enforcement, elected officials, and civil society.

Willful blindness

On July 4, a group of black-clad terrorists ambushed an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Alvarado, Texas. They hurled fireworks at the building, spray-painted graffiti, and then opened fire on responding law enforcement, shooting a local officer in the neck. Journalist Andy Ngo has linked the attackers to an Antifa cell in the Dallas area.

Authorities have so far charged 14 people in the plot and recovered AR-style rifles, body armor, Kevlar vests, helmets, tactical gloves, and radios. According to the Department of Justice, this was a “planned ambush with intent to kill.”

And it wasn’t an isolated incident. It’s part of a growing pattern of continuous violent left-wing incidents since December last year.

Monthly attacks

Most notably, in December 2024, 26-year-old Luigi Mangione allegedly gunned down UnitedHealth Group CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan. Mangione reportedly left a manifesto raging against the American health care system and was glorified by some on social media as a kind of modern Robin Hood.

One Emerson College poll found that 41% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 said the murder was “acceptable” or “somewhat acceptable.”

The next month, a man carrying Molotov cocktails was arrested near the U.S. Capitol. He allegedly planned to assassinate Trump-appointed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and House Speaker Mike Johnson.

In February, the “Tesla Takedown” attacks on Tesla vehicles and dealerships started picking up traction.

In March, a self-described “queer scientist” was arrested after allegedly firebombing the Republican Party headquarters in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Graffiti on the burned building read “ICE = KKK.”

In April, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s (D-Pa.) official residence was firebombed on Passover night. The suspect allegedly set the governor’s mansion on fire because of what Shapiro, who is Jewish, “wants to do to the Palestinian people.”

In May, two young Israeli embassy staffers were shot and killed outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. Witnesses said the shooter shouted “Free Palestine” as he was being arrested. The suspect told police he acted “for Gaza” and was reportedly linked to the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

In June, an Egyptian national who had entered the U.S. illegally allegedly threw a firebomb at a peaceful pro-Israel rally in Boulder, Colorado. Eight people were hospitalized, and an 82-year-old Holocaust survivor later died from her injuries.

That same month, a pro-Palestinian rioter in New York was arrested for allegedly setting fire to 11 police vehicles. In Los Angeles, anti-ICE rioters smashed cars, set fires, and hurled rocks at law enforcement. House Democrats refused to condemn the violence.

Barbara Davidson / Contributor | Getty Images

In Portland, Oregon, rioters tried to burn down another ICE facility and assaulted police officers before being dispersed with tear gas. Graffiti left behind read: “Kill your masters.”

On July 7, a Michigan man opened fire on a Customs and Border Protection facility in McAllen, Texas, wounding two police officers and an agent. Border agents returned fire, killing the suspect.

Days later in California, ICE officers conducting a raid on an illegal cannabis farm in Ventura County were attacked by left-wing activists. One protester appeared to fire at federal agents.

This is not a series of isolated incidents. It’s a timeline of escalation. Political assassinations, firebombings, arson, ambushes — all carried out in the name of radical leftist ideology.

Democrats are radicalizing

This isn’t just the work of fringe agitators. It’s being enabled — and in many cases encouraged — by elected Democrats.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz routinely calls ICE “Trump’s modern-day Gestapo.” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass attempted to block an ICE operation in her city. Boston Mayor Michelle Wu compared ICE agents to a neo-Nazi group. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson referred to them as “secret police terrorizing our communities.”

Apparently, other Democratic lawmakers, according to Axios, are privately troubled by their own base. One unnamed House Democrat admitted that supporters were urging members to escalate further: “Some of them have suggested what we really need to do is be willing to get shot.” Others were demanding blood in the streets to get the media’s attention.

A study from Rutgers University and the National Contagion Research Institute found that 55% of Americans who identify as “left of center” believe that murdering Donald Trump would be at least “somewhat justified.”

As Democrats bleed working-class voters and lose control of their base, they’re not moderating. They’re radicalizing. They don’t want the chaos to stop. They want to harness it, normalize it, and weaponize it.

The truth is, this isn’t just about ICE. It’s not even about Trump. It’s about whether a republic can survive when one major party decides that our institutions no longer apply.

Truth still matters. Law and order still matter. And if the left refuses to defend them, then we must be the ones who do.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

America's comeback: Trump is crushing crime in the Capitol

Andrew Harnik / Staff | Getty Images

Trump’s DC crackdown is about more than controlling crime — it’s about restoring America’s strength and credibility on the world stage.

Donald Trump on Monday invoked Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, placing the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department under direct federal control and deploying the National Guard to restore law and order. This move is long overdue.

D.C.’s crime problem has been spiraling for years as local authorities and Democratic leadership have abandoned the nation’s capital to the consequences of their own failed policies. The city’s murder rate is about three times higher than that of Islamabad, Pakistan, and 18 times higher than that of communist-led Havana, Cuba.

When DC is in chaos, it sends a message to the world that America is weak.

Theft, assaults, and carjackings have transformed many of its streets into war zones. D.C. saw a 32% increase in homicides from 2022 to 2023, marking the highest number in two decades and surpassing both New York and Los Angeles. Even if crime rates dropped to 2019 levels, that wouldn’t be good enough.

Local leaders have downplayed the crisis, manipulating crime stats to preserve their image. Felony assault, for example, is no longer considered a “violent crime” in their crime stats. Same with carjacking. But the reality on the streets is different. People in D.C. are living in constant fear.

Trump isn’t waiting for the crime rate to improve on its own. He’s taking action.

Broken windows theory in action

Trump’s takeover of D.C. puts the “broken windows theory” into action — the idea that ignoring minor crimes invites bigger ones. When authorities look the other way on turnstile-jumping or graffiti, they signal that lawbreaking carries no real consequence.

Rudy Giuliani used this approach in the 1990s to clean up New York, cracking down on small offenses before they escalated. Trump is doing the same in the capital, drawing a hard line and declaring enough is enough. Letting crime fester in Washington tells the world that the seat of American power tolerates lawlessness.

What Trump is doing for D.C. isn’t just about law enforcement — it’s about national identity. When D.C. is in chaos, it sends a message to the world that America is weak. The capital city represents the soul of the country. If we can’t even keep our own capital safe, how can we expect anyone to take us seriously?

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

Reversing the decline

Anyone who has visited D.C. regularly over the past several years has witnessed its rapid decline. Homeless people bathe in the fountains outside Union Station. People are tripping out in Dupont Circle. The left’s negligence is a disgrace, enabling drug use and homelessness to explode on our capital’s streets while depriving these individuals of desperately needed care and help.

Restoring law and order to D.C. is not about politics or scoring points. It’s about doing what’s right for the people. It’s about protecting communities, taking the vulnerable off the streets, and sending the message to both law-abiding and law-breaking citizens alike that the rule of law matters.

D.C. should be a lesson to the rest of America. If we want to take our cities back, we need leadership willing to take bold action. Trump is showing how to do it.

Now, it’s time for other cities to step up and follow his lead. We can restore law and order. We can make our cities something to be proud of again.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

POLL: Can Trump make D.C. great again?

Drew Angerer / Staff | Getty Images

For years, Washington, D.C., has been a symbol of everything wrong with big government—riddled with crime, manipulated stats, and soft-on-crime policies that let gangs terrorize innocent citizens while the elite turn a blind eye. Now, President Trump is stepping up, deploying federal agents after a savage attack on a hero like Edward Coristine, vowing no more "Mr. Nice Guy" as he promises to jail criminals, clear out the homeless encampments, and restore order just like he sealed the border. This isn't just a crackdown; it's a reclamation of our capital from the chaos liberals have unleashed.

Glenn has already covered this on his radio show, exposing how legacy media and Democrats twist crime numbers. They claim that there was a 35% drop in crime while ignoring FBI data showing only a 10% decline, and murders are still sky-high compared to pre-pandemic days. Trump's policies draw parallels to the 1990s, when Congress took control and turned things around, proving that strong leadership can counteract progressive failures. With Democratic mayors crying "power grab" in failing cities like Chicago and Baltimore, it's clear: Trump's bold move is a lifeline for liberty, not a threat. Our capital should be a shining example of America, where leaders can work in peace and foreign representatives can see what this nation stands for without fearing for their lives.

Our nation's heart is at risk from the gaslighting establishment that benefits from disorder, absurdly framing Trump's actions as a "military takeover." Is this the leadership America needs, or will we let the swamp dictate the narrative?

Glenn wants to know what YOU think: Can we trust the media's spin? Should Trump expand this fight? Make your voice heard in the poll below:

Glenn's Show Prep

The next great American leader? Glenn interviews him on radio today...

The loneliness epidemic: Are machines replacing human connection?

Seniors, children, and the isolated increasingly rely on machines for conversation, risking real relationships and the emotional depth that only humans provide.

Loneliness is an epidemic. And AI will not fix it. It will only dull the edges and make a diminished life tolerable.

Outsourcing presence

Reclaiming our humanity

Exposed: The radical Left's bloody rampage against America

For years, the media warned of right-wing terror. But the bullets, bombs, and body bags are piling up on the left — with support from Democrat leaders and voters.

Willful blindness

Monthly attacks

Democrats are radicalizing

America's comeback: Trump is crushing crime in the Capitol

Trump’s DC crackdown is about more than controlling crime — it’s about restoring America’s strength and credibility on the world stage.

When DC is in chaos, it sends a message to the world that America is weak.

Broken windows theory in action

Reversing the decline

POLL: Can Trump make D.C. great again?

Do you support President Trump's deployment of federal agents to crack down on D.C. crime?

Do you believe liberal media and Democrats are manipulating crime stats to undermine Trump's efforts?

Is Trump's plan to jail criminals and relocate the homeless a necessary step to restore order in our capital?

Do you see Democratic policies as the root cause of rising violence in cities like D.C., Chicago, and Baltimore?

Should Trump extend this federal intervention to other failing blue cities to protect American liberty?