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Glenn's Show Prep

Now is the time for the 'least likely' to step up to the plate

October 08, 2015
Ted Tuttle

Editor

Oskar Schindler was an alcoholic womanizer. MLK cheated on his wife. Moses stuttered. What was it about these unlikely individuals that allowed them to change the world in such powerful ways for good?

Glenn brought historian and theologian Dr. Jim Garlow and his wife - a direct relative of Oskar Schindler - onto his radio program to talk about what set these people apart.

"Do you believe there is something to the idea that it's the ones that have nothing to lose that do it?" Glenn asked.

Garlow replied, "Well, it's the ones who have an obedient responsive heart. They're faithful, they're available, they have a teachable spirit."

Listen to the segment or read the transcript below.

Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors.

GLENN: I -- I -- I'm a stutterer. Nope. I got the right guy, Moses. It's you. No, you really got the wrong guy.

And you can see that he always selects -- and I'm not convinced that it is that he is selecting as much as he'd like to select all of us. But not all of us are willing to do it. Not all of us are willing to do it. And it's usually the least likely because the most likely is the one that already has the power and the prestige and the money and the following and everything else. It's the rich man that comes into Jesus. And he says, "Hey."

And the way I read this. He comes in and says to Jesus. "You know, Jesus, I can really help you because I'm really well connected. And I can smooth things out for you." And Jesus is like, "No, you don't need to do that. I tell you what, leave all of that. Just come follow me." I see the rich man looking at the apostles going, "Would somebody tell this guy who I am? Doesn't he understand what's coming his way? I can help him. No, listen, Jesus, I can help you."

Yeah, I get it. Leave all of that and come follow me.

No, you're crazy.

That's what happens with the most likely person to do the job is they're going to do it their way because they've had everything. They've already done it. They know how it all works. They can grease the skids. It's always in the case of Oskar Schindler the alcoholic womanizer that is like, here's the call. Like, all right. All right. Okay. Well, I'll do it. They don't have anything to lose. And they're the least likely person.

So welcome to your day to recognize yourself as the least likely person and wear that as a badge of honor. Because now is the time that we are going to see ourselves either step to the plate or be dust away into the dustbin of history.

Jim Garlow is a very good friend of mine. He joined us last hour. He is the head of the Skyline Church. He has his doctorate in what kind of theology?

JIM: Church history and historical theology.

GLENN: Okay. And is fascinating to talk to. He is married to Rosemary, who is Rosemary Schindler. How distant are you in the Schindlers?

ROSEMARY: Like a second or third cousin.

GLENN: So Rosemary Garlow is joining us as well. And Rosemary brought with her something that is truly remarkable. In my hands right now on the radio desk is a Bible. And it is the Schindler family Bible. How old is this?

ROSEMARY: This Bible is this year, 333 years old.

GLENN: And he was Catholic. But this is -- this is a Martin Luther Bible.

ROSEMARY: Yes, Catholic and Lutheran, translated by Martin Luther. One of his first translations on letterpress in Germany.

GLENN: And tell me what else that you have. Because I find this fascinating. One is a passport.

ROSEMARY: Yes. That's a German passport allowing a citizen to be able to travel through and out of -- in and out of the country.

GLENN: And, again, it's a Schindler. It's his brother, right?

ROSEMARY: Yes. Yes.

GLENN: Then there is this -- this is -- a work pass?

ROSEMARY: Yes. It's a passport or a book, certifying that a person could have employment as a Nazi. It's something very valuable because it provided the citizen the chance to provide for their family.

GLENN: Okay. And then there's these two books. And I don't even know -- Aukum Pass (phonetic)?

ROSEMARY: Aryan Pass. It's a genealogy passport. Actually, Oskar Schindler died at age 66 on October 9th, 1974, 46 years ago this week. But genealogy was incredibly important to Adolf Hitler because he had a false theory of racial purity. And he was a father of racism. And in it, the foreword, he signed himself telling how significant it was in his estimation and for all German people to be free, particularly of Jewish blood, and to teach this theory to their children.

GLENN: Okay. I find this interesting in my faith. We are very into genealogy. And we're very into, you know, the hearts of the fathers turn to the sons and vice-versa. And connecting that family. You'll see that in the Scriptures too. The genealogy. I've always hated this part of the Bible where it's like so-and-so begat so-and-so. And you're like, okay, I get it. They're all related. But it's important for some reason. And as I said on yesterday's broadcast just like with the United States. We won't be destroyed by evil. We will be perverted by evil. That's the way -- there's no idea. Evil doesn't have a new idea. He takes what God has built and he perverts it.

Genealogy is very important. And it's interesting that Hitler -- I mean, if you look -- if you look at anything -- we do a genealogy in my church. And what happens is, you fill out a little slip of each person just like this. And you fill it out. You put the name, the date, the birth, the death, all of the details. And then it is signed and it is -- it's just like this. It's just like this. Except it's not for evil. And it is amazing to me how things are perverted. Always evil perverts.

Let's talk a little about the parallels between now and then. Tell me what you -- because you travel all over the world. Just, you have this with you because you just got back from Hawaii?

ROSEMARY: Hmm.

GLENN: Talking about Oskar Schindler and what's happening. You've been to Israel 56 --

ROSEMARY: Three.

GLENN: Fifty-three times. And things are changing in Israel there. You are still bringing survivors of the Holocaust back to Israel.

Tell me the parallels that you are seeing between then and now.

ROSEMARY: What's alarming especially to Germans who are alive in that time is the significant similarities between what is happening in our present government with gun control, socialized medicine, and all the different government regulations to control the populace.

It starts out very innocent. It starts out being promoted that, this is for the best of society. And we're all going to be much more well off if we cooperate together and share our information. And we, the government, are going to protect you. You do not need guns. They're only for criminals. What they did in Germany is begin by having everybody register their weapons. Because they said, that way, if there's a burglary or a crime and somebody gets shot, we get the gun, we know right who it belongs to. So the very obedient German citizens went and registered all their weapons.

Then the government came back and said, "Well, we still have a lot of crime. So I think the next thing is to do, we need to confiscate your weapons, and we'll be in charge of them all." And, of course, by that time, they knew --

GLENN: It was too late.

ROSEMARY: Yeah, everybody's weapon. Nobody could hide anything.

GLENN: Yep.

ROSEMARY: So it goes that way. More and more regulation, even down to having to have a little book to enter every time you bought a stamp in the Post Office and where that letter went. Everything was regulated to its utmost ability 80 years ago.

GLENN: I'm going to do something on either tomorrow's show or Monday's show that is something new out of China that is one of the most terrifying things I've ever seen. And it is now a new social media status. And they're saying by 2020. Right now it's voluntarily. But by 2020, they say it's mandatory in China. And what it is is, you get a ranking a or a rating as a person. What is it you're doing and saying on your social media? How much of it is against the government? How much of it is politically correct? How much of it is for the good of China? How much of it is not? Not only do you get ranked, but your friends get ranked based on what you post. So if you're my friend and I say, "This is a bad policy," you get hurt because you have friended me. So it is a way to isolate entirely. And this is the new thing over in China.

When I show it to you on probably Monday, it will boggle your mind. And if you think that's not coming into the West, you're sadly mistaken. All they need is the information. And people who -- who are not going to take this much metadata and do nothing when they can control populations.

So Oskar Schindler, not a -- not a guy that you would say -- would you agree with -- pastor, let me ask you too? God's last choice, right? That's usually how it works, right?

JIM: He wouldn't have become a member of my church.

GLENN: Right? Right? I love these people -- because a lot of people are like, "Glenn Beck, you're not a Christian. You're not a very -- whatever. A lot of people.

Oskar Schindler would not be on my list either. Martin Luther King, honestly, if I were his -- if I were his bishop or his preacher or pastor, I would have probably been sitting him down a lot saying, "So tell me about how you're treating your wife again." Not the ones that we necessarily pick. But do you believe there is something to -- to the idea that it's the ones that have nothing to lose that do it?

JIM: Well, it's the ones who have an obedient responsive heart. They're faithful, they're available, they have a teachable spirit.

GLENN: Yeah.

JIM: And they're willing not to hold back those things that would cause them to feed their own ego. In other words, there's a bigger cause. I did a study a few years ago on what causes Christian universities to stop being Christian? What causes denominations to slide? What causes local congregations to lose their Christian centricity and stop what they once were? And I was to lecture after the guy who was really an expert on this from Notre Dame. I wasn't the expert. He was. And I had to lecture after him, so I was very paranoid about trying to be in this environment.

So I read the study for like six months. And I could boil everything I studied down to this, a person will lose their Christocentricity. They'll lose their convictional center, once they long for the accolades of other people more than they fear God. It's that simple.

GLENN: So what happened with Oskar Schindler? How did that happen? Who was he before, and why did he do what he did?

ROSEMARY: Well, he was a businessman. And he thought, "What a great opportunity." I'm a Nazi official. And I can take over this factory and have basically slave work for me and make millions of marcs. And he did. But in the process, he got to know his employees. And he had also known Jewish people growing up. So even though all the propaganda was going and trying to persuade the German populace that they were vermin, they didn't deserve to live, he saw for himself, and he knew better. And he kept seeing in them more and more evidence of humanity and kindness under the worst possible conditions. And in his own German people, such as atrocities and sadism, he said they're just acting like pigs. He said, "I had to do something." He said, "I had no choice." So for him, it wasn't a huge dilemma. But when he realized that Hitler's intent was to annihilate all the Jews of Europe, he said, "That's it. I'm going to do everything and give all that I can to save them." And he fought back with all that he had. And he did use all his money and all his resources to preserve the lives of almost 1200 men, women, and children in his factory.

But the significant thing is that even though he cared for them and became like their parent and he called them his children because he had none, when it turned around, they were the ones that saved him. And this is where I think it will come to. As we're being tested right now in the eyes of the Lord, especially the nations. Are you going to stand with me and my people? Are you going to turn your back, America, on little Israel? Because in the end, I believe Israel will come out safe and shining.

GLENN: Oh, yeah.

ROSEMARY: But the other nations are going to reap a judgment. So the rest of his life, the Jewish survivors cared for Oskar Schindler. They provided at least a day's wage, giving him funds for he and his wife, Emily, to have money to live on. They gave them work opportunities, but Oskar was very much persecuted by his own German people.

GLENN: What was his life like? You see the movie ends at the train tracks.

ROSEMARY: Yes.

GLENN: What was his life for the next 10 years after the war?

ROSEMARY: Well, that was kind of his shining moment. But he was called a traitor by his own German people. When he would go back to Germany, they would spit on him and say, "You Jew kisser. You traitor." And he was never made a hero until Steven Spielberg's movie came out. And then it was recognized what he did.

GLENN: But he was recognized by the Jewish people.

ROSEMARY: Always when he went to Israel. He would go every year a few times. He was welcomed as a great hero. And the Jews he saved would just cry. They loved him so much. And I know many of the survivors. And they just said, "He was their messiah. He was their savior. He was their deliverer. He was the closest person they had ever seen to being a real Christian." As flawed as he was morally, they considered him a true Christian.

A Sharia enclave is quietly taking root in America. It's time to wake up.

NOVA SAFO / Staff | Getty Images

Sharia-based projects like the Meadow in Texas show how political Islam grows quietly, counting on Americans to stay silent while an incompatible legal system takes root.

Apolitical system completely incompatible with the Constitution is gaining ground in the United States, and we are pretending it is not happening.

Sharia — the legal and political framework of Islam — is being woven into developments, institutions, and neighborhoods, including a massive project in Texas. And the consequences will be enormous if we continue to look the other way.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

Before we can have an honest debate, we’d better understand what Sharia represents. Sharia is not simply a set of religious rules about prayer or diet. It is a comprehensive legal and political structure that governs marriage, finance, criminal penalties, and civic life. It is a parallel system that claims supremacy wherever it takes hold.

This is where the distinction matters. Many Muslims in America want nothing to do with Sharia governance. They came here precisely because they lived under it. But political Islam — the movement that seeks to implement Sharia as law — is not the same as personal religious belief.

It is a political ideology with global ambitions, much like communism. Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently warned that Islamist movements do not seek peaceful coexistence with the West. They seek dominance. History backs him up.

How Sharia arrives

Political Islam does not begin with dramatic declarations. It starts quietly, through enclaves that operate by their own rules. That is why the development once called EPIC City — now rebranded as the Meadow — is so concerning. Early plans framed it as a Muslim-only community built around a mega-mosque and governed by Sharia-compliant financing. After state investigations were conducted, the branding changed, but the underlying intent remained the same.

Developers have openly described practices designed to keep non-Muslims out, using fees and ownership structures to create de facto religious exclusivity. This is not assimilation. It is the construction of a parallel society within a constitutional republic.

The warning from those who have lived under it

Years ago, local imams in Texas told me, without hesitation, that certain Sharia punishments “just work.” They spoke about cutting off hands for theft, stoning adulterers, and maintaining separate standards of testimony for men and women. They insisted it was logical and effective while insisting they would never attempt to implement it in Texas.

But when pressed, they could not explain why a system they consider divinely mandated would suddenly stop applying once someone crossed a border.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

AASHISH KIPHAYET / Contributor | Getty Images

America is vulnerable

Europe is already showing us where this road leads. No-go zones, parallel courts, political intimidation, and clerics preaching supremacy have taken root across major cities.

America’s strength has always come from its melting pot, but assimilation requires boundaries. It requires insisting that the Constitution, not religious law, is the supreme authority on this soil.

Yet we are becoming complacent, even fearful, about saying so. We mistake silence for tolerance. We mistake avoidance for fairness. Meanwhile, political Islam views this hesitation as weakness.

Religious freedom is one of America’s greatest gifts. Muslims may worship freely here, as they should. But political Islam must not be permitted to plant a flag on American soil. The Constitution cannot coexist with a system that denies equal rights, restricts speech, subordinates women, and places clerical authority above civil law.

Wake up before it is too late

Projects like the Meadow are not isolated. They are test runs, footholds, proofs of concept. Political Islam operates with patience. It advances through demographic growth, legal ambiguity, and cultural hesitation — and it counts on Americans being too polite, too distracted, or too afraid to confront it.

We cannot afford that luxury. If we fail to defend the principles that make this country free, we will one day find ourselves asking how a parallel system gained power right in front of us. The answer will be simple: We looked away.

The time to draw boundaries and to speak honestly is now. The time to defend the Constitution as the supreme law of the land is now. Act while there is still time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Why do Americans feel so empty?

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.