Who Invented the Internet? (It Wasn't Al Gore)

September 15, 2016

Writer

The internet is a product of American ingenuity. Although Al Gore infamously said he "took the initiative in creating the Internet," its creation actually predated him by decades. Vannevar Bush invented the first modern analogue computer in 1930 --- and the concept behind what would become known as the internet.

"The concept was something called memex, which I like better than the internet myself. Memex. Yeah, better name," Glenn said Thursday on his radio program.

Memex was a way to store all of the world's information, like a giant brain or memory bank.

WATCH: Freedom Fighter Ted Cruz Leads Charge to Keep the Internet Away From Liberal Censors

"At first, the idea was to tie it all together on microfilm. Most people refer to the article that he wrote in the Atlantic in 1945 called "As We May Think". This was the first public unveiling of a broader collective memory machine. Because, really, it's not a machine, but that is what the internet is. It's just collective memories. And you have access to that brain of memories and ideas," Glenn said.

Xerox, credited for inventing the Ethernet, also played a key role.

"Xerox, with Robert Taylor, who was influential in the creation of the internet, both at DARPA and then as an employee of Xerox, maintains that The origins of the internet include both work sponsored by the government and Xerox PARC. So you can't say that the internet was developed by Xerox or the government. It was both. But if anyone should get the credit for the creation of the internet, it's the guy named Vannevar . . . and a guy named Robert Taylor," Glenn said.

Should Al Gore want to take credit for creating the internet, it doesn't quite reconcile with his green energy and global warming positions. According to the New York Times, worldwide server farms for the internet use 30 billion watts of electricity. Data centers on average use only six to 12 percent of the electricity powering their servers to perform any kind of computations. The rest of the electricity is used just in case there's a surge of activity.

"In other words, about 90 percent of it, 88 percent of it is completely wasted energy. So, Al, I want everyone to know that Al Gore wants to take credit for the creation of something that wastes 90 percent of 30 billion watts of electricity. It sounds pretty green," Glenn said.

Listen to this segment from The Glenn Beck Program:

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

GLENN: So let me tell you a little bit about the truth about the internet because Pat just played the truth.

PAT: The truth.

GLENN: The truth. Here, it is, the inventor of the internet.

AL: During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the internet.

GLENN: He created the internet. How can he say that?

PAT: How do you say that?

GLENN: I'll show you how he says that.

PAT: All right.

GLENN: Let me go back to the very beginning, to the very beginning. The internet starts with a concept in 1930. And the concept was something which was called memex, which I like better than the internet myself. Memex. Yeah, better name.

Memex was a concept developed by a guy named Vannevar. Now, that's his first name. I'll give you his last name in a minute.

But Vannevar --

PAT: Well, his last name is Internet.

GLENN: No.

PAT: Vannevar Internet. No?

GLENN: No. Vannevar invented the first modern analogue computer in 1930.

PAT: Wow.

GLENN: And his idea of memex was a way to store all of the world's information using computers tied together.

At first, the idea was to tie it all together on microfilm. And most people refer to the article that he wrote in the Atlantic -- in 1945, it was called As We May Think. And this was the first public unveiling of a broader collective memory machine. Because, really, it's not a machine, but that is what the internet is. It's just -- it's collective memories. And you have access to that brain of memories and ideas.

Now, at the time when he wrote this in 1945, he was working as the chairman of the national defense research committee. So he was working for the government at the time he wrote that. But not at the time he had this original idea.

Yes, Pat.

PAT: Well, isn't that why DARPA hired him in the first place? They were impressed with his work.

GLENN: Do you know, Stu?

STU: Yeah. I mean, it's a part of the reason why --

PAT: Yeah, I think that's why they were attracted to him in the first place.

STU: I mean, think about it. That's the exact reverse of what you're told though. This is a man who came up, as a private citizen, with an amazing idea, and the government hired him because of that idea.

GLENN: Right.

STU: It's not the government creating it.

GLENN: And this is the government seeing what -- what the Nazis and the Japanese had done with the enigma machine. How did we -- the enigma machine changed everything. We've got to have computers because digitization is going to change everything. It's change the game. And so the Defense Department knew in 1945, "Holy cow, we are way behind." Especially the Germans, "We are way behind. We better come up with something." And so they start looking, and they find this guy named Vannevar. And they hire him after he writes As We May Think.

Now, he had been writing about the memex concept since the early 1930s. And he didn't start working for the government until 1938.

So he didn't invent the government -- he didn't invent the internet for the government. His invention, the internet, was one of the reasons why he was hired by the government.

So it isn't to say that the government -- more specifically, the military wasn't highly involved in the development of the internet from concept to reality, but I think it's really important to not give the government the credit, but the military credit. If there's one thing this government does effectively, it is the military.

STU: And this is the only time in history that the left gives the military credit for anything.

GLENN: Yes.

STU: All of a sudden, they're, we love the -- they're the government. See what we're saying. The government is inventing things.

All of a sudden they love the work the military has done.

GLENN: Yeah, except they'll never say that. They just call the military the government.

STU: The government.

GLENN: So by the time Al Gore was 21 -- 21 -- the backbone of the internet, Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, ARPANET, had already been commissioned. So here's the backbone, ARPANET: Al Gore is 21.

And what did he just say?

AL: During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the internet.

(chuckling)

GLENN: Wow. Wow. So when he was in Congress --

STU: Wow.

GLENN: But ARPANET was already being built when he was 21. And they laid the groundwork starting as a network to connect research computers one to another.

Now, in 1982, ARPANET linked together a grand total of 88 computers.

PAT: Which at that time was probably pretty good.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh, that was huge. That was huge.

PAT: That was amazing.

GLENN: Eighty-two computers. Now, what the government did for the internet was foundational, but rather worthless to your everyday life. The unique thing the government brings to the table for projects like this is unlimited access to your money.

Now, they took this idea. They gobbled it up with unlimited access to your money. This is what they came up with, linking them to 88 computers.

Can you imagine if -- if the people at the very beginning, the private sector, had unlimited access. If Vannevar would have had unlimited access to your money, do you think maybe there may have been more than 88 computers put together, especially if there was the profit incentive at the other end? Wait a minute. I have to eventually get this to pay for itself. How does this work? How can this benefit a lot of people?

Al Gore couldn't even fathom the internet being created without the government funds -- your money -- as he detailed in his 1991 article for Scientific America: Infrastructure For the Global Village. A high-capacity network will not be built without government investment. Congress must formulate the policies that are crucial to realizing the potential of the Information Age. Just as the Interstate Highway System was built with federal funds, so too will high-speed networks require federal seed capital.

So here's what Al Gore did, and you're going to love this. Al Gore was very successful at using your money. He sponsored the High-Performance Computing and Communications Act of 1991.

This is what it did: He took $600 million and poured it into high-performance computing. And with that $600 million, here's what he made.

Have you ever -- have you ever heard of the web browser Mosaic?

PAT: Uh-huh.

GLENN: Yeah. That's what the government did. That's what Al Gore gave you. Al Gore gave you a really crappy web browser that nobody uses. That's what he did.

Yes, the government advanced the internet, but what turned the internet from a boring network of 88 computers to the things you post a picture of, you know, of your oatmeal in the morning or, you know, Anthony Weiner's wiener, was the private sector. And more specifically, it was Xerox.

Xerox is credited for inventing the Ethernet, the graphical user interface. You know, I have on the set of The Vault, which premieres next week, is an Apple IIc. Have you guys turned that on? Have you guys seen that? Have you been in The Vault?

PAT: I've seen that, but I haven't turned it on.

GLENN: Oh, my --

STU: Wow.

GLENN: This is what I used to write scripts with. I mean, when it came out in, what, 1982, '83. And so I turned it on. And I'm like, "Oh, my gosh. I haven't sat behind this computer since the 1980s."

And it does nothing.

(chuckling)

GLENN: It does nothing. My son looked at it. He's like, "Dad, this is great." And I said, "You want to play a game on it?" And he said, "Yeah." And I said, "You can't."

(laughter)

So Xerox -- Xerox, with Robert Taylor, who was influential in the creation of the internet, both at DARPA and then as an employee of Xerox, maintains that, quote, the origins of the Internet include both work sponsored by the government and Xerox PARC. So you can't say that the internet was developed by Xerox or the government. It was both.

But if anyone should get the credit for the creation of the internet, it's the guy named Vannevar. Not last name. First name, Vannevar. And a guy named Robert Taylor.

So I just want to -- I want to wrap it up with a couple things. First of all, Al Gore, he wants credit for inventing the internet. We know that's not true. But he also wants to be known as the guy who conserves energy and is a guy who is saying we can't use all this energy. We have to be green.

Let me just give you this: According to the New York Times, that bastion of conservatism, they found that server farms for the internet, server farms worldwide use 30 billion watts of electricity. But, wait, Al, it gets better.

Data centers on average use only six to 12 percent of the electricity powering their servers to perform any kind of computations. The rest of the electricity is used just in case there's a surge of activity.

So, in other words, about 90 percent of it, 88 percent of it is completely wasted energy.

So, Al, I want everyone to know that Al Gore wants to take credit for the creation of something that wastes 90 percent of 30 billion watts of electricity. It sounds pretty green.

Oh, and one more thing: Just -- there's no relation, but just to make everybody feel better, if you have my point of view and everybody who really loves Al Gore, it will make them feel really, really bad, and I don't want to be one that rubs salt in the wound at all, but Al Gore didn't invent it: Vannevar did.

And his last name is not Gore. His last name happens to be Bush. Just thought I'd leave you at that.

Featured Image: Vannevar Bush seated at a desk. This portrait is credited to "OEM Defense", the Office for Emergency Management (part of the United States Federal Government) during World War II; it was probably taken some time between 1940 and 1944.

Breaking point: Will America stand up to the mob?

Jeff J Mitchell / Staff | Getty Images

The mob rises where men of courage fall silent. The lesson from Portland, Chicago, and other blue cities is simple: Appeasing radicals doesn’t buy peace — it only rents humiliation.

Parts of America, like Portland and Chicago, now resemble occupied territory. Progressive city governments have surrendered control to street militias, leaving citizens, journalists, and even federal officers to face violent anarchists without protection.

Take Portland, where Antifa has terrorized the city for more than 100 consecutive nights. Federal officers trying to keep order face nightly assaults while local officials do nothing. Independent journalists, such as Nick Sortor, have even been arrested for documenting the chaos. Sortor and Blaze News reporter Julio Rosas later testified at the White House about Antifa’s violence — testimony that corporate media outlets buried.

Antifa is organized, funded, and emboldened.

Chicago offers the same grim picture. Federal agents have been stalked, ambushed, and denied backup from local police while under siege from mobs. Calls for help went unanswered, putting lives in danger. This is more than disorder; it is open defiance of federal authority and a violation of the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause.

A history of violence

For years, the legacy media and left-wing think tanks have portrayed Antifa as “decentralized” and “leaderless.” The opposite is true. Antifa is organized, disciplined, and well-funded. Groups like Rose City Antifa in Oregon, the Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club in Texas, and Jane’s Revenge operate as coordinated street militias. Legal fronts such as the National Lawyers Guild provide protection, while crowdfunding networks and international supporters funnel money directly to the movement.

The claim that Antifa lacks structure is a convenient myth — one that’s cost Americans dearly.

History reminds us what happens when mobs go unchecked. The French Revolution, Weimar Germany, Mao’s Red Guards — every one began with chaos on the streets. But it wasn’t random. Today’s radicals follow the same playbook: Exploit disorder, intimidate opponents, and seize moral power while the state looks away.

Dismember the dragon

The Trump administration’s decision to designate Antifa a domestic terrorist organization was long overdue. The label finally acknowledged what citizens already knew: Antifa functions as a militant enterprise, recruiting and radicalizing youth for coordinated violence nationwide.

But naming the threat isn’t enough. The movement’s financiers, organizers, and enablers must also face justice. Every dollar that funds Antifa’s destruction should be traced, seized, and exposed.

AFP Contributor / Contributor | Getty Images

This fight transcends party lines. It’s not about left versus right; it’s about civilization versus anarchy. When politicians and judges excuse or ignore mob violence, they imperil the republic itself. Americans must reject silence and cowardice while street militias operate with impunity.

Antifa is organized, funded, and emboldened. The violence in Portland and Chicago is deliberate, not spontaneous. If America fails to confront it decisively, the price won’t just be broken cities — it will be the erosion of the republic itself.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

URGENT: Supreme Court case could redefine religious liberty

Drew Angerer / Staff | Getty Images

The state is effectively silencing professionals who dare speak truths about gender and sexuality, redefining faith-guided speech as illegal.

This week, free speech is once again on the line before the U.S. Supreme Court. At stake is whether Americans still have the right to talk about faith, morality, and truth in their private practice without the government’s permission.

The case comes out of Colorado, where lawmakers in 2019 passed a ban on what they call “conversion therapy.” The law prohibits licensed counselors from trying to change a minor’s gender identity or sexual orientation, including their behaviors or gender expression. The law specifically targets Christian counselors who serve clients attempting to overcome gender dysphoria and not fall prey to the transgender ideology.

The root of this case isn’t about therapy. It’s about erasing a worldview.

The law does include one convenient exception. Counselors are free to “assist” a person who wants to transition genders but not someone who wants to affirm their biological sex. In other words, you can help a child move in one direction — one that is in line with the state’s progressive ideology — but not the other.

Think about that for a moment. The state is saying that a counselor can’t even discuss changing behavior with a client. Isn’t that the whole point of counseling?

One‑sided freedom

Kaley Chiles, a licensed professional counselor in Colorado Springs, has been one of the victims of this blatant attack on the First Amendment. Chiles has dedicated her practice to helping clients dealing with addiction, trauma, sexuality struggles, and gender dysphoria. She’s also a Christian who serves patients seeking guidance rooted in biblical teaching.

Before 2019, she could counsel minors according to her faith. She could talk about biblical morality, identity, and the path to wholeness. When the state outlawed that speech, she stopped. She followed the law — and then she sued.

Her case, Chiles v. Salazar, is now before the Supreme Court. Justices heard oral arguments on Tuesday. The question: Is counseling a form of speech or merely a government‑regulated service?

If the court rules the wrong way, it won’t just silence therapists. It could muzzle pastors, teachers, parents — anyone who believes in truth grounded in something higher than the state.

Censored belief

I believe marriage between a man and a woman is ordained by God. I believe that family — mother, father, child — is central to His design for humanity.

I believe that men and women are created in God’s image, with divine purpose and eternal worth. Gender isn’t an accessory; it’s part of who we are.

I believe the command to “be fruitful and multiply” still stands, that the power to create life is sacred, and that it belongs within marriage between a man and a woman.

And I believe that when we abandon these principles — when we treat sex as recreation, when we dissolve families, when we forget our vows — society fractures.

Are those statements controversial now? Maybe. But if this case goes against Chiles, those statements and others could soon be illegal to say aloud in public.

Faith on trial

In Colorado today, a counselor cannot sit down with a 15‑year‑old who’s struggling with gender identity and say, “You were made in God’s image, and He does not make mistakes.” That is now considered hate speech.

That’s the “freedom” the modern left is offering — freedom to affirm, but never to question. Freedom to comply, but never to dissent. The same movement that claims to champion tolerance now demands silence from anyone who disagrees. The root of this case isn’t about therapy. It’s about erasing a worldview.

The real test

No matter what happens at the Supreme Court, we cannot stop speaking the truth. These beliefs aren’t political slogans. For me, they are the product of years of wrestling, searching, and learning through pain and grace what actually leads to peace. For us, they are the fundamental principles that lead to a flourishing life. We cannot balk at standing for truth.

Maybe that’s why God allows these moments — moments when believers are pushed to the wall. They force us to ask hard questions: What is true? What is worth standing for? What is worth dying for — and living for?

If we answer those questions honestly, we’ll find not just truth, but freedom.

The state doesn’t grant real freedom — and it certainly isn’t defined by Colorado legislators. Real freedom comes from God. And the day we forget that, the First Amendment will mean nothing at all.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Glenn Beck joins Megyn Kelly LIVE — One night ONLY in Fort Worth!

Get ready for sparks to fly. For the first time in years, Glenn will come face-to-face with Megyn Kelly — and this time, he’s the one in the hot seat. On October 25, 2025, at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas, Glenn joins Megyn on her “Megyn Kelly Live Tour” for a no-holds-barred conversation that promises laughs, surprises, and maybe even a few uncomfortable questions.

What will happen when two of America’s sharpest voices collide under the spotlight? Will Glenn finally reveal the major announcement he’s been teasing on the radio for weeks? You’ll have to be there to find out.

This promises to be more than just an interview — it’s a live showdown packed with wit, honesty, and the kind of energy you can only feel if you are in the room. Tickets are selling fast, so don’t miss your chance to see Glenn like you’ve never seen him before.

Get your tickets NOW at www.MegynKelly.com before they’re gone!

What our response to Israel reveals about us

JOSEPH PREZIOSO / Contributor | Getty Images

I have been honored to receive the Defender of Israel Award from Prime Minister Netanyahu.

The Jerusalem Post recently named me one of the strongest Christian voices in support of Israel.

And yet, my support is not blind loyalty. It’s not a rubber stamp for any government or policy. I support Israel because I believe it is my duty — first as a Christian, but even if I weren’t a believer, I would still support her as a man of reason, morality, and common sense.

Because faith isn’t required to understand this: Israel’s existence is not just about one nation’s survival — it is about the survival of Western civilization itself.

It is a lone beacon of shared values in the Middle East. It is a bulwark standing against radical Islam — the same evil that seeks to dismantle our own nation from within.

And my support is not rooted in politics. It is rooted in something simpler and older than politics: a people’s moral and historical right to their homeland, and their right to live in peace.

Israel has that right — and the right to defend herself against those who openly, repeatedly vow her destruction.

Let’s make it personal: if someone told me again and again that they wanted to kill me and my entire family — and then acted on that threat — would I not defend myself? Wouldn’t you? If Hamas were Canada, and we were Israel, and they did to us what Hamas has done to them, there wouldn’t be a single building left standing north of our border. That’s not a question of morality.

That’s just the truth. All people — every people — have a God-given right to protect themselves. And Israel is doing exactly that.

My support for Israel’s right to finish the fight against Hamas comes after eighty years of rejected peace offers and failed two-state solutions. Hamas has never hidden its mission — the eradication of Israel. That’s not a political disagreement.

That’s not a land dispute. That is an annihilationist ideology. And while I do not believe this is America’s war to fight, I do believe — with every fiber of my being — that it is Israel’s right, and moral duty, to defend her people.

Criticism of military tactics is fair. That’s not antisemitism. But denying Israel’s right to exist, or excusing — even celebrating — the barbarity of Hamas? That’s something far darker.

We saw it on October 7th — the face of evil itself. Women and children slaughtered. Babies burned alive. Innocent people raped and dragged through the streets. And now, to see our own fellow citizens march in defense of that evil… that is nothing short of a moral collapse.

If the chants in our streets were, “Hamas, return the hostages — Israel, stop the bombing,” we could have a conversation.

But that’s not what we hear.

What we hear is open sympathy for genocidal hatred. And that is a chasm — not just from decency, but from humanity itself. And here lies the danger: that same hatred is taking root here — in Dearborn, in London, in Paris — not as horror, but as heroism. If we are not vigilant, the enemy Israel faces today will be the enemy the free world faces tomorrow.

This isn’t about politics. It’s about truth. It’s about the courage to call evil by its name and to say “Never again” — and mean it.

And you don’t have to open a Bible to understand this. But if you do — if you are a believer — then this issue cuts even deeper. Because the question becomes: what did God promise, and does He keep His word?

He told Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you, and curse those who curse you.” He promised to make Abraham the father of many nations and to give him “the whole land of Canaan.” And though Abraham had other sons, God reaffirmed that promise through Isaac. And then again through Isaac’s son, Jacob — Israel — saying: “The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I give to you and to your descendants after you.”

That’s an everlasting promise.

And from those descendants came a child — born in Bethlehem — who claimed to be the Savior of the world. Jesus never rejected His title as “son of David,” the great King of Israel.

He said plainly that He came “for the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” And when He returns, Scripture says He will return as “the Lion of the tribe of Judah.” And where do you think He will go? Back to His homeland — Israel.

Tamir Kalifa / Stringer | Getty Images

And what will He find when He gets there? His brothers — or his brothers’ enemies? Will the roads where He once walked be preserved? Or will they lie in rubble, as Gaza does today? If what He finds looks like the aftermath of October 7th, then tell me — what will be my defense as a Christian?

Some Christians argue that God’s promises to Israel have been transferred exclusively to the Church. I don’t believe that. But even if you do, then ask yourself this: if we’ve inherited the promises, do we not also inherit the land? Can we claim the birthright and then, like Esau, treat it as worthless when the world tries to steal it?

So, when terrorists come to slaughter Israelis simply for living in the land promised to Abraham, will we stand by? Or will we step forward — into the line of fire — and say,

“Take me instead”?

Because this is not just about Israel’s right to exist.

It’s about whether we still know the difference between good and evil.

It’s about whether we still have the courage to stand where God stands.

And if we cannot — if we will not — then maybe the question isn’t whether Israel will survive. Maybe the question is whether we will.

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