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WATCH: TheBlaze staffer shocked to find out he knew Washington Navy Yard shooter

September 17, 2013
Wilson

Writer

Chris Childs, director for Pat & Stu realized something shocking yesterday: he knew Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis. Childs had frequented the Ft. Worth, TX Thai restaurant where Alexis had worked, and had had many conversations with the suspected killer.

"Well, the first time we met obviously was at the restaurant, and I had gone in there with a couple of friends from my previous job before I started working at TheBlaze and we were big lovers of Thai food and we found this place and he was a waiter, a waiter kind of just hanging out," Childs explained.

"How did he seem to you? Did he seem like a guy who would ever do something like this?" Pat asked.

"Absolutely not," Childs responded.

Childs said that Alexis was very nice and pretty quiet, and that he was really into the video games Call of Duty and World of Warcraft.

"Did you ever have any sense at all that he was trouble at all," Glenn asked.

"No, that's the thing that floors me is he was not that type of person. He never seemed angry, he never seemed like he was bitter about anything and even when I was talking to one of my friends who was with the owner of the restaurant last night, he was saying they're all just floored."

WATCH:

Full Transcript below:

Last night I was on the show and the picture came on the screen of the guy who was the killer, and I did the show. And right after a couple of our employees came and said, "Glenn, we know this guy." Now, Chris is the guy who's known as the guy who wears the Hawaiian shirt at TheBlaze and Mercury studios.

PAT: And he wears it every day.

STU: It's on his business card.

GLENN: No, he's got different shirts and it's not just that one Hawaiian shirt.

PAT: No, several.

GLENN: He's got every Hawaiian shirt that has ever been made, I believe.

STU: (Laughing.)

GLENN: And I'm not one to mock somebody's sense of fashion, I just want you to know that.

STU: That's just because you know we will mock you in return.

GLENN: Yes. So Chris comes up and he said, "I know this guy, know him quite well. He works at a Thai restaurant in Fort Worth that I go to." Now, all of this has been verified, but this was 5:00 yesterday afternoon. Brought Chris in this morning. He's actually the director of the Pat and Stu show. He's the guy in the control room that makes all the calls, which, he hasn't made the call, and I guess this might be mine, to cancel the show, but ‑‑

STU: (Laughing.)

GLENN: But anyway, we wanted to bring Chris in and talk a little bit about, how did you meet him and who was he?

CHRIS: Well, the first time we met obviously was at the restaurant, and I had gone in there with a couple of friends from my previous job before I started working at TheBlaze and we were big lovers of Thai food and we found this place and he was a waiter, a waiter kind of just hanging out.

PAT: So you'd just, you would go in there and strike up a conversation with him when you went in to eat?

CHRIS: Yeah. Because you didn't go to Happy Bowl for a quick lunch. I mean, it was a good solid hour and a half just because it was, you know ‑‑

GLENN: Well, it's a happy bowl.

CHRIS: Huh?

GLENN: It's a happy bowl.

CHRIS: It's a happy bowl.

GLENN: It implies happiness.

CHRIS: Yeah, happiness takes time.

GLENN: Yes, it does. Now, did you know, for instance, that he was a Buddhist?

CHRIS: No, I didn't.

GLENN: Okay.

CHRIS: I mean, I know that he was living with the owner of the restaurant, Wi, and I know Wi was a Buddhist. So it doesn't surprise me that ‑‑

GLENN: You and who else?

CHRIS: Huh?

GLENN: You and who else?

STU: No, stop. Let him do the stupid story, please.

GLENN: No, come on. That's ‑‑ you don't get a guy named Wi very often.

STU: You do many times in certain areas of the world, yes, you do.

GLENN: Okay. All right. So ‑‑

CHRIS: I knew that ‑‑ you're killing me, just killin' me. Wi was a Buddhist and so it doesn't ‑‑ like I said, it doesn't surprise that ‑‑

GLENN: If we could just get ‑‑ if we could just get Hu into this story.

CHRIS: Who?

PAT: We're done with the whole thing.

STU: See, we have plenty of opportunities to do the Hu joke and the Wi joke. Can we get the story from a guy who actually knew?

GLENN: I don't ‑‑

STU: ‑‑ the murderer here? I mean, is that too much to ask?

PAT: So the obvious question then is, Chris, how did he seem to you? Did he seem like a guy who would ever do something like this?

CHRIS: Absolutely not. He's that stereotypical ‑‑

PAT: Quiet?

CHRIS: ‑‑ quiet. He would ‑‑

PAT: Nice? Was he nice?

CHRIS: Oh, he was really friendly, really nice.

PAT: Really?

CHRIS: And just, you know, he would sit up at the ‑‑ sit up at the counter and take orders and just be as nice as could be. And he would ‑‑ you know, I do know that he taught himself the language of Thai, self‑taught, which was real easy since the owners were also from Thailand. So I'm sure he had lots of people to practice on.

STU: When he ‑‑ would you say, was there any conversations you have outside of, you know, pad Thai‑related conversations? Did you talk to him about what he did in his life, did you talk to him about ‑‑

GLENN: Because you said to me yesterday you knew that he was into the shooter video games.

CHRIS: Oh, yeah.

GLENN: You said he was really into them.

CHRIS: Really into them. When a new game would come out, there's a couple of guys that I worked with that were also kinda sorta into shooter games but by the first new one would come out, he would know a lot about the game, like maps and that kind of stuff.

PAT: So you would talk to him about these video games?

CHRIS: Yeah.

PAT: Like Call of Duty or what?

CHRIS: Yeah.

PAT: Resident Evil?

CHRIS: Yeah. And I think he was a Warcraft guy too.

PAT: Now, were you the one, because somebody has said that he played these games up to 16 hours a day. Is that information coming from ‑‑

CHRIS: That didn't come from me but it wouldn't surprise me because I think basically all he did was work a little bit at the restaurant and then go home and ‑‑

GLENN: Did he seem like an angry guy?

CHRIS: No. No, that was the thing.

GLENN: Because they're reporting today that he had problems with white people.

PAT: And anger management.

CHRIS: Yeah, I read that, but he didn't show that towards us. I mean, we were a table full of white guys.

PAT: And clearly you're as white as it gets.

STU: (Laughing.)

PAT: I mean, nobody is whiter than you, Chris. Am I right?

CHRIS: That's coming from you?

PAT: Yes. You're even whiter than I am.

GLENN: Well, because of the Hawaiian shirt, I think.

PAT: Yes, I think the Hawaiian shirt really ‑‑

GLENN: Only because of wearing the Hawaiian shirt.

CHRIS: I am wearing pants today. So that is a good thing.

PAT: That is a good thing.

GLENN: I will tell you that I have been thinking about instituting a "You must wear pants" policy.

STU: We just had an adult on TV brag about wearing pants.

GLENN: Yeah. I know. We are really kind of ‑‑ you know, operating in television and operating in television in the South is a little different.

PAT: It is different.

GLENN: You're like, I decided not to wear pants today. "Okay."

STU: So how many times would you say you frequented this restaurant? It was a place you went a lot? I mean, did you get a lot of conversation?

GLENN: Yeah, how many times did you actually ‑‑

CHRIS: I probably went there, once we found the place, we went up there quite often, like once or twice a week.

GLENN: Is he a guy that if you would have walked on the street, he would have said, "Chris"?

CHRIS: Probably not. Because he was that ‑‑ I don't think he was that kind of guy really. He wasn't outgoing or anything. I mean, he's literally real quiet. I would have been the one to say, "Hey, Aaron, how's it going?" He would be like, "Oh, hey, dude." You know, I mean, it was just, he was not very ‑‑

PAT: So you guys never, you never did anything with him outside of the restaurant?

CHRIS: No.

STU: You weren't in his wedding or anything?

CHRIS: No.

GLENN: Did you ever have any sense at all that ‑‑

CHRIS: None.

GLENN: ‑‑ he was trouble at all?

CHRIS: None.

GLENN: Anybody walk away from that conversation and say...

PAT: That guy's got some issues?

GLENN: That guy's got some issues, man, there's something about that guy?

CHRIS: No, that's the thing that floors me is he was not that type of person. He never seemed angry, he never seemed like he was bitter about anything and even when I was talking to one of my friends who was with the owner of the restaurant last night, he was saying they're all just floored.

STU: Oh, man. The interviews with the owner of the restaurant were heartbreaking because the guy seems to be a standup guy.

CHRIS: Yeah.

STU: And once a small business. He, you know, brought this guy into his home.

GLENN: He ‑‑ yeah, tried to help him.

STU: Tried to help him.

CHRIS: Aaron was the best man at his wedding last year.

GLENN: No, I think he was supposed to be and then he had to miss it, didn't he? He went some ‑‑

CHRIS: I didn't make the wedding, either, but I know he was supposed to be.

GLENN: Would you have ‑‑ you're a good customer. If you would have been invited to the ‑‑

CHRIS: I would have gone, absolutely. Wi's a good guy. It's a really good family.

GLENN: Who?

CHRIS: And it's ‑‑ you guys.

STU: I don't want to say us guys. It's Glenn.

PAT: Yeah, it's just Glenn.

STU: Just Glenn doing this today.

GLENN: So good. I mean, it's just so good, all the way through I had Wi and Hu jokes the whole time.

STU: That was you exercising restraint.

Britain says “no work without ID”—a chilling preview for America

OLI SCARFF / Contributor | Getty Images

From banking to health care, digital IDs touch every aspect of citizens’ lives, giving the government unprecedented control over everyday actions.

On Friday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer stood at the podium at the Global Progressive Action Conference in London and made an announcement that should send a chill down the spine of anyone who loves liberty. By the end of this Parliament, he promised, every worker in the U.K. will be required to hold a “free-of-charge” digital ID. Without it, Britons will not be able to work.

No digital ID, no job.

The government is introducing a system that punishes law-abiding citizens by tying their right to work to a government-issued pass.

Starmer framed this as a commonsense response to poverty, climate change, and illegal immigration. He claimed Britain cannot solve these problems without “looking upstream” and tackling root causes. But behind the rhetoric lies a policy that shifts power away from individuals and places it squarely in the hands of government.

Solving the problem they created

This is progressivism in action. Leaders open their borders, invite in mass illegal immigration, and refuse to enforce their own laws. Then, when public frustration boils over, they unveil a prepackaged “solution” — in this case, digital identity — that entrenches government control.

Britain isn’t the first to embrace this system. Switzerland recently approved a digital ID system. Australia already has one. The World Economic Forum has openly pitched digital IDs as the key to accessing everything from health care to bank accounts to travel. And once the infrastructure is in place, digital currency will follow soon after, giving governments the power to track every purchase, approve or block transactions, and dictate where and how you spend your money.

All of your data — your medical history, insurance, banking, food purchases, travel, social media engagement, tax information — would be funneled into a centralized database under government oversight.

The fiction of enforcement

Starmer says this is about cracking down on illegal work. The BBC even pressed him on the point, asking why a mandatory digital ID would stop human traffickers and rogue employers who already ignore national insurance cards. He had no answer.

Bad actors will still break the law. Bosses who pay sweatshop wages under the table will not suddenly check digital IDs. Criminals will not line up to comply. This isn’t about stopping illegal immigration. If it were, the U.K. would simply enforce existing laws, close the loopholes, and deport those working illegally.

Instead, the government is introducing a system that punishes law-abiding citizens by tying their right to work to a government-issued pass.

Control masked as compassion

This is part of an old playbook. Politicians claim their hands are tied and promise that only sweeping new powers will solve the crisis. They selectively enforce laws to maintain the problem, then use the problem to justify expanding control.

If Britain truly wanted to curb illegal immigration, it could. It is an island. The Channel Tunnel has clear entry points. Enforcement is not impossible. But a digital ID allows for something far more valuable to bureaucrats than border security: total oversight of their own citizens.

The American warning

Think digital ID can’t happen here? Think again. The same arguments are already echoing in Washington, D.C. Illegal immigration is out of control. Progressives know voters are angry. When the digital ID pitch arrives, it will be wrapped in patriotic language about fairness, security, and compassion.

But the goal isn’t compassion. It’s control of your movement, your money, your speech, your future.

We don’t need digital IDs to enforce immigration law. We need leaders with the courage to enforce existing law. Until then, digital ID schemes will keep spreading, sold as a cure for the very problems they helped create.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

The West is dying—Will we let enemies write our ending?

Harvey Meston / Staff | Getty Images

The blood of martyrs, prophets, poets, and soldiers built our civilization. Their sacrifice demands courage in the present to preserve it.

Lamentations asks, “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?”

That question has been weighing on me heavily. Not just as a broadcaster, but as a citizen, a father, a husband, a believer. It is a question that every person who cares about this nation, this culture, and this civilization must confront: Is all of this worth saving?

We have squandered this inheritance. We forgot who we were — and our enemies are eager to write our ending.

Western civilization — a project born in Judea, refined in Athens, tested in Rome, reawakened in Wittenberg, and baptized again on the shores of Plymouth Rock — is a gift. We didn’t earn it. We didn’t purchase it. We were handed it. And now, we must ask ourselves: Do we even want it?

Across Europe, streets are restless. Not merely with protests, but with ancient, festering hatred — the kind that once marched under swastikas and fueled ovens. Today, it marches under banners of peace while chanting calls for genocide. Violence and division crack societies open. Here in America, it’s left against right, flesh against spirit, neighbor against neighbor.

Truth struggles to find a home. Even the church is slumbering — or worse, collaborating.

Our society tells us that everything must be reset: tradition, marriage, gender, faith, even love. The only sin left is believing in absolute truth. Screens replace Scripture. Entertainment replaces education. Pleasure replaces purpose. Our children are confused, medicated, addicted, fatherless, suicidal. Universities mock virtue. Congress is indifferent. Media programs rather than informs. Schools recondition rather than educate.

Is this worth saving? If not, we should stop fighting and throw up our hands. But if it is, then we must act — and we must act now.

The West: An idea worth saving

What is the West? It’s not a location, race, flag, or a particular constitution. The West is an idea — an idea that man is made in the image of God, that liberty comes from responsibility, not government; that truth exists; that evil exists; and that courage is required every day. The West teaches that education, reason, and revelation walk hand in hand. Beauty matters. Kindness matters. Empathy matters. Sacrifice is holy. Justice is blind. Mercy is near.

We have squandered this inheritance. We forgot who we were — and our enemies are eager to write our ending.

If not now, when? If not us, who? If this is worth saving, we must know why. Western civilization is worth dying for, worth living for, worth defending. It was built on the blood of martyrs, prophets, poets, pilgrims, moms, dads, and soldiers. They did not die for markets, pronouns, surveillance, or currency. They died for something higher, something bigger.

MATTHIEU RONDEL/AFP via Getty Images | Getty Images

Yet hope remains. Resurrection is real — not only in the tomb outside Jerusalem, but in the bones of any individual or group that returns to truth, honor, and God. It is never too late to return to family, community, accountability, and responsibility.

Pick up your torch

We were chosen for this time. We were made for a moment like this. The events unfolding in Europe and South Korea, the unrest and moral collapse, will all come down to us. Somewhere inside, we know we were called to carry this fire.

We are not called to win. We are called to stand. To hold the torch. To ask ourselves, every day: Is it worth standing? Is it worth saving?

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Pick up your torch. If you choose to carry it, buckle up. The work is only beginning.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Stop coasting: How self-education can save America’s future

Joe Raedle / Staff | Getty Images

Coasting through life is no longer an option. Charlie Kirk’s pursuit of knowledge challenges all of us to learn, act, and grow every day.

Last year, my wife and I made a commitment: to stop coasting, to learn something new every day, and to grow — not just spiritually, but intellectually. Charlie Kirk’s tragic death crystallized that resolve. It forced a hard look in the mirror, revealing how much I had coasted in both my spiritual and educational life. Coasting implies going downhill. You can’t coast uphill.

Last night, my wife and I re-engaged. We enrolled in Hillsdale College’s free online courses, inspired by the fact that Charlie had done the same. He had quietly completed around 30 courses before I even knew, mastering the classics, civics, and the foundations of liberty. Watching his relentless pursuit of knowledge reminded me that growth never stops, no matter your age.

The path forward must be reclaiming education, agency, and the power to shape our minds and futures.

This lesson is particularly urgent for two groups: young adults stepping into the world and those who may have settled into complacency. Learning is life. Stop learning, and you start dying. To young adults, especially, the college promise has become a trap. Twelve years of K-12 education now leave graduates unprepared for life. Only 35% of seniors are proficient in reading, and just 22% in math. They are asked to bet $100,000 or more for four years of college that will often leave them underemployed and deeply indebted.

Degrees in many “new” fields now carry negative returns. Parents who have already sacrificed for public education find themselves on the hook again, paying for a system that often fails to deliver.

This is one of the reasons why Charlie often described college as a “scam.” Debt accumulates, wages are not what students were promised, doors remain closed, and many are tempted to throw more time and money after a system that won’t yield results. Graduate school, in many cases, compounds the problem. The education system has become a factory of despair, teaching cynicism rather than knowledge and virtue.

Reclaiming educational agency

Yet the solution is not radical revolt against education — it is empowerment to reclaim agency over one’s education. Independent learning, self-guided study, and disciplined curiosity are the modern “Napster moment.” Just as Napster broke the old record industry by digitizing music, the internet has placed knowledge directly in the hands of the individual. Artists like Taylor Swift now thrive outside traditional gatekeepers. Likewise, students and lifelong learners can reclaim intellectual freedom outside of the ivory towers.

Each individual possesses the ability to think, create, and act. This is the power God grants to every human being. Knowledge, faith, and personal responsibility are inseparable. Learning is not a commodity to buy with tuition; it is a birthright to claim with effort.

David Butow / Contributor | Getty Images

Charlie Kirk’s life reminds us that self-education is an act of defiance and empowerment. In his pursuit of knowledge, in his engagement with civics and philosophy, he exemplified the principle that liberty depends on informed, capable citizens. We honor him best by taking up that mantle — by learning relentlessly, thinking critically, and refusing to surrender our minds to a system that profits from ignorance.

The path forward must be reclaiming education, agency, and the power to shape our minds and futures. Every day, seek to grow, create, and act. Charlie showed the way. It is now our responsibility to follow.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Glenn Beck joins TPUSA tour to honor Charlie Kirk

Joe Raedle / Staff | Getty Images

If they thought the murder of Charlie Kirk would scare us into silence, they were wrong!

If anything, Turning Point will hit the road louder than ever. On Monday, September 22, less than two weeks after the assassination, Charlie's friends united under the Turning Point USA banner to carry his torch and honor his legacy by doing what he did best: bringing honest and truthful debate to Universities across the nation.

Naturally, Glenn has rallied to the cause and has accepted an invitation to join the TPUSA tour at the University of North Dakota on October 9th.

Want to join Glenn at the University of North Dakota to honor Charlie Kirk and keep his mission alive? Click HERE to sign up or find more information.