Forget the Republicans, forget the Democrats - in order to restore America we have to get back to truth. Our currency says ‘In God we trust’ and people protest it. But what does that really mean? God is truth - and in order to gain the trust of the world again we have to value truth. Glenn explains in a stirring radio monologue today.
Read the full transcript of the segment below:
GLENN: You know what? Let me go in a surprising place and I'm not going to tell this story because I'll butcher it because I'm not a sports fan. But let me go to Ryan, is it Braun?
PAT: Yeah, Ryan Braun.
GLENN: Ryan Braun, this story from what I know of it is a story that, again, shows the health of our nation and the health of our citizens.
PAT: Yeah, you might think it's just about steroids, but it goes so far beyond that. Last year ‑‑ well, Ryan Braun is one of the best players in Major League Baseball. In 2007 he was rookie of the year. In 2011 he was NFL MVP. Last year I think the guy hit 43 home runs.
GLENN: Yeah.
PAT: And he was accused of steroid abuse. And he was suspended, and he fought it vehemently and denied it. And on a technicality, because of the way his sample was handled, he had his suspension overturned and he came out and made this statement, really strong statement that he would stake his life, that he guaranteed with his life that he had never ingested steroids or any performance‑enhancing drug. I mean, it was one of the strongest denials I think I've ever seen. And you thought, well, okay, maybe this guy really was innocent. And I think a lot of people were convinced because ‑‑
GLENN: Liars, truth ‑‑ liars, deceivers, lovers of themselves and not the truth.
PAT: And so the arrogance with which he ‑‑ and it looks now like arrogance because he continued the steroid abuse, they found him out again and a second time, and this time he's been suspended for the rest of the season and has admitted it. Now he comes out and says, "Oh, yeah, look, I'm not perfect. As I've said in the past, I'm not perfect. I don't remember you ever saying in the past you weren't perfect. You said you had perfectly performed your duties as a baseball player by never ingesting steroids. You kind of did say you were perfect on this issue. Now he's saying, "Oh, I'm not perfect. I made a mistake. Sorry."
GLENN: Now let me ‑‑ let me go to ‑‑ let me take from this story where his teammates are saying, "Hey, he said he wasn't perfect. None of us are perfect. Let's get over it." The truth matters.
Let me take you to another story now. Let me take you to a story, a personal story of a hedge fund manager that I was talking to and said, you know, what do you think of ‑‑ what do you think of the economy? What do you think's coming? He said, Glenn, I know what you think, he said, and, you know, we disagree on a lot of things, he said, but on this one you're right. He said, but for different reasons because I see it from the inside. He said, we're no longer investing in America. We don't like investments in America now. I said, why is that? He said, "Because we don't believe any of the data that's coming out. We can't believe that any of the data that the corporations or the government is actually churning out is real." So if we don't know what the real metrics are, if we don't know what the data is, how are we going to invest in anything? We'd rather put our money overseas, someplace else, someplace in Asia because we at least know that those metrics, while they may not be as good as the metrics that are happening here in America, we don't believe these metrics. We just don't think these are real." He said, so a collapse is coming. A reset has to happen.
Okay. So let me tie these two stories together. On our money we always focus on the God part on "In God we trust." On our money it says "In God we trust." Gold was up again yesterday. It's now, what, 1360 an ounce? Remember I was a villain when it fell down to 1100 and I said, "Now would be the time to buy some more. Because when everybody else is selling, that's the time to buy." It's back up over 1300. It might go down again, but it will go up again. Why? Why?
Do you know that J.P. Morgan now has less unallocated gold than they have ever had. People are saying, "I want gold. I want gold. I want my gold. I want my gold." So unallocated gold. And this is after the Germans came and said to the Federal Reserve, "We want our gold." That caused more people to go to the bank and say, "I want my gold. I want gold." They have less gold on hand unallocated, less gold on hand than ever before in recorded history. Why again? "In God we trust" is on the money. "In God we trust."
We also say "In the full faith and credit of the United States of America." Well, that's gone. There is no full faith and credit in the United States of America. And that's why it doesn't say that on our money. It says "In God we trust." And everybody always fights, "Oh, God, oh, God." Let me speak ‑‑ let me speak a language that everybody can accept. What is another name for God or another, another descriptive word for "God"? People will say, "Well, God is love." Well, yes, God is love, but what is love? When you boil it down to its essence, God is love, but love is truth. You can't be a parent and not tell your kids the truth. You can't ‑‑ and we've all done it. We know this to be true because we've all watched American Idol. And we've all said, where was their parent? Was there nobody that loved them enough to tell them the truth? "You suck!" Was there no one that loved them enough to tell them the truth? God is not love. God is truth. If you want to ‑‑ if you want to make yourself feel better because you hate God so much or you just think God is some sort of fable or whatever, every time you look at that, just replace the word "God" with "Truth." "In truth we trust." Whose truth? Universal truth. When we say "In God we trust," we're talking about the principles of the Ten Commandments. And I don't know anybody that won't give me seven out of the Ten Commandments. I'm the Lord thy God. There should be no other gods before me. Okay. "Well, I don't believe in God." All right. Great. What do you believe in? Because you do have a god. You serve something. You worship something. "Well, I worship reason." Okay. All right. That's your god. But let's get down to the essence of the ones that we can absolutely agree on. We all agree you can't murder people. It doesn't say thou shall not kill. It says thou shall not murder. We can all agree on that. You get into the thou shalt not kill, "Well, what about war?" Okay. Well, it doesn't say that. It says murder. Can we all agree we don't murder people? "Yes" is the answer. Thou shalt not steal, can we all agree on that? Can we all agree on "covet"? Do you know we're in society now where we can't even agree on coveting. We are a society built on covetness. We are doing nothing more than coveting all day. "They have something. Have you seen this? Have you seen what they have? They have the latest. They have the greatest. Have you seen what's out? I want that. I want that. I want that." My parents used to say there's a difference between need and want. You'll always have what you need, but you may not always get what you want. When's the last time you said that? When's the last time you heard another parent say that? When is the last time you heard that message coming from anybody of any kind of power? You may not always get what you want because life isn't fair. Well, we don't do that anymore because our society is built on covet. I will covet my neighbor's goods. I will even covet my neighbor's wife.
But in our heart of hearts and in our darkest moments and when we have really, truly found truth in our life, every single one of us would admit coveting someone else's stuff is not good. Lying is not good, cheating is not good, stealing is not good, murder is not good. That's the truth. And so when we go down to the basic, "In truth we trust," what it says on our money is we will not lie, we will not steal, we will not covet and because of that you can trust that the system will work.
PAT: I see what you're saying. You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime, you just might find you get what you need. You'd get what you need.
GLENN: You know, if we were living in the 1960s, that would be so relatable but I just really, it's just really ‑‑
PAT: Still.
GLENN: We are living in a time that if we can restore the basic truth. Forget about the Republicans. Forget about the Democrats. Forget about all of that stuff. Forget about all the trappings and all the things that man has made. We have to boil it down to the essence of truth. And if we will just live those truths, we can restore things. But until you do, the hedge fund managers are not going to invest. They will invest someplace else because they don't believe that we won't lie, cheat and steal all the way to the top. All the way to the bottom. And baseball will go on because baseball is baseball and who really gives a flying crap if they are all on crack cocaine. I don't really care. But in the end our society doesn't make it. If we don't teach the truth matters. And I'm sorry. Sitting out for 65 games isn't a big enough punishment. Is there ever going to be anybody that says the truth matters, and if you won't tell the truth, we don't want you around. And if that means that we suffer for a while, I am convinced, I am convinced, and I know because I know the millennial ‑‑ what is the millennial choir? The ‑‑ jeez, I can't remember. It's the 2,000 voice choir and orchestra out of California and Arizona. These people are amazing. 2,000 you voices, all volunteer. How do you get people to volunteer and to really be that dedicated? 2,000 people, how do you get them to do it? By having standards. I'm convinced that if you just start having standards and people say, "You know what? I don't really care. If it's only five of us over here, it's only five of us, but we're going to live our lives this way," you are going to be the biggest success story of all time.