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Glenn's Show Prep

Meet the young man connecting the conservatives of Silicon Valley

May 13, 2015
Wilson

Writer

It's hard to find a state more liberal than California, but the entrepreneurs of Silicon Valley have shown a libertarian streak that drew Glenn's interest. On his TV show Tuesday night, he brought Aaron Ginn, founder of Lincoln Labs, to Dallas to discuss what it's like to be a young conservative in Silicon Valley and what libertarians in one of the most liberal parts of the country expect from the government.

Below is a transcript of the interview:

Glenn: So, I have to introduce you to somebody. Aaron Ginn, he is the cofounder of Lincoln Labs, a Silicon Valley tech organization that wears conservative libertarian views on its sleeve. We were just talking about that I’m surprised and I think most people in the audience would be surprised that there are conservative—I mean, just show what’s on your neck.

Aaron: Oh yeah, my cross my mom gave me.

Glenn: You’re from Silicon Valley, California, Silicon Valley. Most people would say that they don’t think those people exist.

Aaron: Yeah. And we do. That’s why we started Lincoln Labs was that there are. Like most of these people are hiding behind their job titles or their careers, and they don’t want to talk about their beliefs.

Glenn: This is kind of like Friends of Abe in Hollywood.

Aaron: Yeah, exactly. When we started Lincoln Labs, we didn’t know anything about Friends of Abe, which is ironic because we started Lincoln Labs, Friends of Abe, and the main reason why we chose Lincoln Labs was we researched, and we’re like okay, so what president best shows the Silicon Valley attitude? We saw Abraham Lincoln. He was the first one to do tallies on door knocking, like who says yes to me or like maybe. He was the only president to hold a patent. He tried out all the weapons. He went there during the Civil War, he put the telegraph in the White House. He was very innovative. He also was a uniting force for the country. He thought that my goal is to protect liberty. So, when we started Lincoln Labs, the goal was to find more people like us. Over the course of, I guess now we’re going on two years, we found lots of people like us all around the nation.

Glenn: You know what’s really amazing is I spent some time out in Silicon Valley and I thought I would be a pariah out there. To some, I am. To some, I am, but to those who are really—there’s a lot more libertarian out there. The problem is they will see a Republican that will say something stupid like, for instance, the only thing that comes to mind is Ben Carson when he said you can go to prison, and all of a sudden you’re gay, and you’re like come on, man, really? That’s what’s stopping them from—they’ll tend to go to the left because, correct me if I’m wrong, because they’ll see somebody who looks like that doesn’t make any sense to me.

Aaron: Yeah, and our goal is simple, liberty, like we want more liberty, whether you’re blue, purple, or red. And a lot of the engineers, designers, technical people in Silicon Valley, they see stupidity on both sides, and they know.

Glenn: I’m glad to hear that because I didn’t think a lot of them did see the stupidity.

Aaron: It’s my opinion that I think a lot of them begrudgingly vote for people who they know are fundamentally against their values, and it’s because they think that both of them are just so bad. And that’s why we’re simply there to be like hey, the fundamental basis of what technology does is enables people to make their own decisions. That’s why a lot of the Web 1.0 guys are very liberty oriented, like Marc Andreessen or Peter Thiel.

And even if you look at the innovations that are transforming our entire world, like Uber or Airbnb, right, those are very liberty-minded companies. They’re like hey, this random middle-class person in Las Colinas can now become a cab driver for people and just like logs onto the app and becomes a cab driver, right—revolutionary things that before we would need massive amounts of bureaucracy, people doing verifications and checks. Now we can do that all automated, and I think that fundamentally the technology community is very liberty oriented because the goal is to empower consumers to make their own decisions and to effectively—to decrease costs and increase productivity.

Glenn: So, in Silicon Valley, is it as tough to be conservative or religious as it is in Hollywood? Because in Hollywood, they fear for their jobs.

Aaron: I would say it’s similar and a little bit different in a sense that I’ve never been afraid of my own beliefs, both politically and my Christian faith. People also saw like when they met me and started talking to me, they were like, “That guy’s Christian.” So, they sort of like accepted it, and they just moved on with their life; however, my background and my training is a little bit different than the average Christian. I’ve been trained in theology and apologetics, so I can effectively communicate. I read Alvin Plantinga for fun. Not many people do that. And so whenever I get a question, I can articulate my views, but I know several people, whether my church or in Lincoln Labs, that are very scared about expressing their political beliefs or religious beliefs because there is a sense of hostility against these positions.

It’s not like hostility of like, you know, I think that when people on the right see someone they disagree with, they’re like I just disagree with you, but when people in the left see someone they disagree with, it’s almost like you like killed a kitten in front of them. It’s like a moral hatred, right? I don’t want to be called a bad person. So, I think it’s out of that. They don’t want to hear that they’re like this awful, terrible human being for just thinking that I don’t want to pay as much to the government.

Glenn: Yeah, this is crazy.

Aaron: Yeah, it’s crazy, because I think that’s what I’m seeing now in what’s going on in Silicon Valley is that I think that a lot of the engineers and technical people who used to associate themselves with the left now have seen this rising intolerance that they don’t agree with. They’re like I’m liberal because I’m classically liberal.

Glenn: I’m classic liberal.

Aaron: As I am too, right?

Glenn: I saw today that in my old high school in Bellingham, which is a very, very lefty area of Washington state, that the juniors in both of the high schools now are planning a walkout against Common Core, and I thought to myself my oh my gosh, our viewpoint is starting to be cool. The man is coming down so hard that it’s our side that is starting to be the cool side, and they just don’t realize that’s coming.

Aaron: One of our advisors has called us a countercultural movement in that it’s kind of interesting and cool to be liberty oriented and having these different beliefs, there’s this large swath of I don’t know what to call them, maybe social norm of like in Silicon Valley, it’s cool to be different, right? And Elon Musk is cool because he’s trying to build rockets to the moon and do things that are very different. In that sense, I think a portion of people are seeing us as like a valid alternative now versus when we originally started.

I was going to host an event at one of my previous companies, and I received an email from the CEO being like hey, we can’t host your event. It was basically like we were going to have Rand Paul come speak. Because he received an email from one of the engineering leads, being like one-third of the company has threatened to quit if we host this event, right? And the ironic thing is that the slogan of our company was basically to discover things that we did not know and to be open to new ideas was basically the premise of what our product did.

And so I had to scramble. It was two weeks before the event, and I had to scramble to find another location. That was like the original days. Now, we get invites from a lot of the big tech players to host events with them and to partner with them on issues.

Glenn: So, I have two minutes. I just want you to talk a little bit about the difference that the left, how the left views this fight and how the right views this fight.

Aaron: Like in the sense of—?

Glenn: The right usually says okay, well, the election is coming, so I’ll go out and vote.

Aaron: Yeah. I think what people need to understand, especially the liberty-oriented side within the United States and really all across the world is the left is very motivated to starve for their cause.

Glenn: Literally.

Aaron: Yeah, literally because to them it’s like a religious commitment, versus the people on the right generally have another higher calling to which they want to go after, which is one reason why that they’re right-leaning. The battle is constant.

Glenn: I think that’s what we’re missing, and that’s what kind of was talking about the monologue here. The first was we don’t even know. We’re supposed to serve. It’s not about going to church. It’s about serving. So, that’s making the world a better place, helping people, helping people in need. That’s what the left thinks they’re doing, but they’re crippling people. If we’re actually seen making a difference, some of these people will go, “Oh crap, I’ve got it wrong,” and they’ll come over here because some of them are sincere in their help. Some of them are just doing it for power. You know what I mean? Same on the other side, but those who really want to make a difference, this works, this doesn’t.

Aaron: Yeah, we need to constantly be telling people about the cause. We need to be constantly showing people investing in community, basically caring about people. I think the right has been, and liberty has been so far associated with big corporations and rich people taking home as much money as possible rather than the fact of why we believe in liberty is because we care about people who do not have access to those things. We care about empowering individuals to reach that possibility, and the left is, I think, very sincere. Like you said, they think that they’re doing good work. In reality, they never look at—I like Dennis Prager. He always says as soon as you ask whether or not something works, you start becoming a conservative.

Glenn: That’s right.

Aaron: Because the left is about creating this vision for the world that may or may not come to be, but they don’t care because this is what they’re going after, versus the right’s sort of like let’s be a little bit more rational about it. Let’s think about this a little bit more.

Glenn: I’d like to have you on the radio show and talk a little bit more about how we can help you and how we can get involved with Silicon Valley and the movement there, because I think you’re doing great stuff.

Aaron: Thank you.

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.

A break in trust: A NEW Watergate is brewing in plain sight

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.

The melting pot fails when we stop agreeing to melt

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.