John Marini with The Claremont Institute wrote a brilliant article titled Donald Trump and the American Crisis. The piece explains exactly what is happening in America and to her citizens.
"I think this writer is actually a fan of Donald Trump --- I'm not sure --- but he explains Donald Trump and what's happening," Glenn said Tuesday on his radio program. "This explains so much of what I have felt in my gut, but I haven't been able to articulate."
RELATED: Donald Trump and the American Crisis
Glenn read portions of the article, highlighting key points:
• The government is no longer legitimized by the consent of the governed.
• People must understand themselves to be citizens or things will never change.
• Political parties no longer establish a meaningful link between the people and the government.
• Political campaigns have made a science of dividing the electorate into groups and voting blocs.
• Behavior based on traditional virtues has become indefensible based on what our schools teach.
• Post-modern intellectuals have pronounced their historical and moral judgment on America's past.
• Our culture has been transformed --- and we had nothing to do with it.
Understanding and naming the problem is the first step in fixing it. If generations of Americans no longer see the value in traditional virtues or the noble history of America, then we must reintroduce them to these concepts in new and unique ways.
"We've got to stop talking about guys in powdered wigs. We've got to find a new way to present history," Glenn said. "Again, this guy likes Donald Trump . . . but he's explaining why [Trump] is doing so well and why we're not, if you believe in the Constitution."
Listen to these segments from The Glenn Beck Program:
Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors:
GLENN: One of the greatest articles I have read in I don't know how long, explaining what exactly is happening to us. And I think this writer is actually a fan of Donald Trump. I'm not sure.
But he explains Donald Trump and what's happening. I think personally he's giving him far too much credit for his intellectual prowess. But I want you to hear this. Because this explains so much of what I have felt in my gut, but I haven't been able to articulate why. I didn't know why. I didn't know exactly why. This guy does. And I'm going to give you the highlights of this.
This is called Donald Trump and the American Crisis by John Marini. This is not a hatchet piece. In fact, in some ways, it's a love letter to Donald Trump. But I want you to listen to this.
Every conservative should read this article. Because this is absolutely true and what we're facing.
Let's see. Bureaucratic rule has become so pervasive that it is no longer clear that the government is legitimized by the consent of the governed. Do you agree with that?
PAT: Definitely.
GLENN: Yeah. That's what we're feeling. We don't have anything to do with it. And our vote doesn't matter because bureaucrats are doing everything. The Congress has given their power away to the EPA and everybody else and you have nothing to do with it. Rather, it is the consent of the various national, often international, social, economic, political, and culture interest groups that determine the outcome of the elections. Absolutely true.
You see that it is these -- these groups -- how many times have we said, "I just wish -- is there some sort of group that can represent us, just the American people, not the dogs and cats of America and whatever it is." Everybody who has a political agenda, these groups, they're controlling things.
It is possible only when people understand themselves as citizens and when the regime recognizes them as citizens that things will change. But this requires distinguishing American citizens from all others and identifying them as one people.
So you can't make any difference if you don't recognize that we're a unique place, and so is Germany and so is Mexico and everything else. And you as a citizen are the one that is supposed to make the decisions that then lead the government.
But until we can even say that you're a citizen, you'll never be able to do that.
Consequently, political campaigns have made a science of dividing the electorate into groups and reassembling them as voting blocs committed to specific policies and issues dominated by the demographic categories themselves. This strategy requires a systematic mobilization of animosity to ensure participation by identifying and magnifying about what it is that needs to be opposed.
Now, we are doing that on both sides. And this is why I've been saying, "It's not enough to be against her. What are you for?"
Because this is playing into the new system. You're against something, and the system makes you against something. And so we continually go down this path.
Understood this way: What is central to politics and the election is the elevation of the status of personal and group identity to something approaching a new kind of civil religion.
Tell me that's not true. Black Lives Matter. Global warming. Constitutionalism. It is like our religion.
And if you defy our religion, you're the devil himself. You're Satan. You have to be destroyed. You're evil.
Individual social behavior. Listen to this. Individual social behavior, once dependent on traditional morality and understood in terms of traditional virtues and vices has become almost indefensible when judged in the light of the authority established by what they're now teaching in our schools.
And he goes on to talk about this a little bit. He says, "What's happened to us is, we have this critical post-modern theory that is being -- that historians have -- and the experts in our universities, have gone back and they have looked at our history. And everything is judged as bad in our history. Everything is against one of these groups."
And so as our groups are becoming more and more important, at the same time our history is being presented as only things that oppress groups. There's no individual aspiration. There's no individual that says, "I'm going to change the world, and look what they did." No, forget about the individual. What that guy did, no matter what his aspiration was, ended up hurting this group or that group. It ended up in slavery, oppression, global warming, smog, globalism -- whatever it is.
There is no individual that is being taught anymore. The moral standing established by group identity is now how everything is judged. Character is almost unrecognizable and no longer serves as the means by which people can determine the qualifications for public office, of those they don't know personally. As a result, it's difficult to establish the kind of public trust that once made it possible to connect public and private behavior or civil society and government.
When coupled with the politicization of civil society and the institutions, the distinction between the public and the private or the personal and the political has almost disappeared.
So because -- because we no longer have anything that revolves around individual character, we can no longer judge because we don't understand principles. We don't understand virtue and vice.
You can no longer judge. And because we can no longer judge, because we're now all about groups, the idea -- the idea of having your thought philosophy have anything to do with the presidency, it doesn't work.
In short, public and private character of American policies and politics has been placed in the hands of academic intellectuals.
Post modernist and intellectuals have pronounced their historical judgment on America's past, finding it to be morally indefensible. Every great human achievement of the past, whether in philosophy, religion, literature, or the humanities, came to be understood as a kind of exploitation of the powerless. Rather than allowing the past to be viewed in terms of its aspirations or its accomplishments, it has been judged by its failure. The living part of the past is understood in terms of slavery, racism, and identity politics.
No public defense of the past greatness can be allowed to live in the present.
That's absolutely true.
PAT: It sure is.
GLENN: In such a time, an appeal to American citizenship is almost a revolutionary act because it requires making the distinction between citizens and all others.
Since local politics and administration came to be centralized within the administrative state, elections have provided the people the only possibility of participation in public life.
It wasn't long before the brightest and most ambitious college faculty and graduates became graduating to Washington, DC, the new center of economic, social, and political decision-making.
In turn, the federal government and bureaucratic apparatus become dependent upon the intellectual elites to provide the expertise of what everything means.
But do these people who participate in politics -- but what do you do with the people who only participate in politics only as citizens?
In terms of elections, the old partisans of both parties, the party pro who have devoted their lives to trying to understand politics in terms of mobilizing the people, were no longer needed once partisan appeals could be marketed just like any other commodity. Both political parties have benefited from the kind of predictability made possible by the incorporation of scientific professionalism in the organizing and shaping of campaigns and elections.
In addition, both parties have enforced political correctness as the ground of understanding civil society, public policy, law, and bureaucracy itself. Before the end of the 20th century, a new kind of iron law of politics happened. There are red states, and there are blue states, and then there are handful of purple or battleground states.
Political conflict can be contained by focusing on the battleground states. Elections were understood in terms of division rather than unification. And it became almost impossible for any candidate to appeal to the electorate on behalf of a common good.
That's not surprising. Because positivism was rejected and -- as was any other understanding of meaning of the common good.
The political parties no longer establish a meaningful link between the people and the government. Party patronage has been replaced with bureaucratic patronage, and a professional elite has established itself as a vital center between the people and the government.
It's all true, right? It's about to get really important.
PAT: And it's already incredibly insightful.
GLENN: Yes, it is. I mean, this guy is brilliant.
PAT: It's deep, but it's --
GLENN: John Marini, he is brilliant.
PAT: It's really insightful.
GLENN: I do not need think tanks, because we need some do tanks.
PAT: Yeah.
GLENN: And I avoid think tanks like the plague because I just don't -- I see them churning out papers that are meaningless.
PAT: Besides think tanks avoid us as well.
GLENN: Yes. This is -- this is -- this is from Claremont.
And this is -- this has to be understood if we're going to take our country back.
PAT: Yes.
GLENN: Okay. So listen to this. You know, let me take a quick break because the next section -- the next section talks about why constitutionalists, conservatives, those -- basically it says, basically, Glenn, everything you've done in the last ten years, worthless.
PAT: Oh, good.
GLENN: And it explains why my gut has been saying for how long, would he give you to stop using the word "conservative." We've got to stop talking about guys in powdered wigs. We got to find a new way to present history. Would he give you to stop talking about, "Hey, we need another Reagan." And why Donald Trump's slogan, "Make America great again," appeals to the older generation, but there are zero people who are millennials who are voting for him.
PAT: Very few.
GLENN: Very few. So we'll get into that here in a second.
And, again, this guy likes Donald Trump. I think likes Donald Trump. But he's explaining why he's doing so well and why we're not, if you believe in the Constitution.
[break]
GLENN: John Marini, who I think is a Donald Trump fan, in an article from Claremont.org -- Donald Trump and the American Crisis, this is a must-read for everybody who believes in the Constitution because it is why our argument is failing.
In the popular election, arousing rhetorical defense of a political candidate is nearly impossible when those who have held political office as an attained social respectability are unable to praise the candidate. In the attempt to evaluate Donald Trump, liberals have judged him from the perspective of post modern culture, labeling him a reactionary racist, a nationalist, and a xenophobe.
Conservatives have not objected to this post modern characterization of Trump, they have simply tried to add a conservative twist by seeking to revive the old language of character, virtue, and vices, as though this language still has any public or political meaning.
Did you hear that?
As if character, virtue, vices has any public or political meaning. Unable to politicize a language that no longer resonates, even with the Libertarian or economic conservatives, their moral judgments can -- listen to this -- their moral judgments can only be interpreted by the general population in terms of self-interest.
How many times have we heard people say, "Well, you're only doing this because of, whatever our self-interest is." And we look at each other and say, "Are you kidding me? The beating we're getting for this." But that's the popular refrain. He's making the point, the reason why is because people do not connect to character, virtues, or even vices anymore.
This is not -- was not always the case in American politics. A political discourse once existed that understood itself in terms of principles of right, and the stewards of public office were once judged by nonpartisan standards that presupposed virtue such as honesty, integrity, character, and honor. Those are now a thing of the past.
It was an agreement on the need for such virtues that made it possible to entrust those offices to political partisans and to distinguish theoretical and practical reason or prudance. While it was possible to agree on an abstract principle, it was also possible to disagree on the practical way those principles were to be accommodated with respect to contemporary circumstances.
Moreover, a public language still existed that made it possible to agree on what kind of public and private behavior was praiseworthy or blameworthy.
This is what's happening, gang.
But that old language was dependent on a reasonable and objective understanding of virtue and vice. Such language eludes us now, in an age where subjective values have replaced public and private virtue.
Subjective values.
And when principles are merely subjective policy preferences that are defined and defended simply by being non-negotiable.
Let's see. Although it's easy to blame Trump for politicizing the personal by ridiculing those who seek and hold public office, this is his way of connecting with people who would become mere spectators, not citizens, when it comes to Washington politics. Perhaps he did so because there had been no honest evaluation of Washington that originated in Washington. No policy ever really fails. Private corruption never arises to the level of public corruption, let alone is punished. No officeholder of significance has been held personally responsible for their behavior since Watergate.
Ironically, it has taken a reality television star, one who knows the difference between the real and imagined --I think he's giving him too much credit there -- to make reality a political issue with respect to Washington.
Indeed in recent years, Washington has presented itself as a kind of reality show. It is difficult to distinguish what is real from the way it is spun. Benghazi is one example of the unwillingness of the Washington establishment to announce deception in a political matter. In our post Machiavellian age, which is open to every kind of novelty, we are faced with a new kind of incredulity, one that prevents men from believing in the old things which they no longer have any experience of.
So you can't -- you -- you don't believe in anything anymore because you haven't seen it for so long. And it's been destroyed by academia. It has become far easier for modern man to accept change as something normal, almost natural. What has become difficult to understood, let alone preserve are things that are unchanging or eternal.
History understood in terms of the ideal of progress and politics, economic, science, and technology, has made change or the new, seem almost inevitable. As a result, the desire for the newest has become almost irresistible.
He then goes into how Lincoln brought together, at the Cooper Union speech, where he said, "What is a conservative? What does it mean to be a conservative? Are we conservatives, or are we revolutionaries?" And he made the point that we're both, that you have to go back and reject what the fathers did, while weighing what they did as good and what parts are bad.
So, yes, we want to conserve what our Founders did. But we also are revolutionaries because we have to now go back and say, "This part of it is bad."
So he was asking, "You can't be -- he was saying, you cannot be a conservative and -- and -- and serve the future, unless you're using reason to be able to go back and look through the eyes of reason and virtue, to see, this is good. This is bad. I love this. Let's conserve or preserve this. And let's take this out."
In contemporary politics, both liberals and conservatives are necessarily now open to the new. But in many of the most important ways, they have rejected the old policies of the Fathers. True, conservatives have not yet seen fit to denounce the Fathers. But how much of the legacy of the Fathers do they still find defensible because of academia?
Lincoln was aware that the only proper defense of the tried and the true of tradition was a defense of the unchanging principles of political right understood in terms of an unchanging human nature.
This presupposed distinction between theoretical and practical reason, which made it possible to distinguish unchanging principles from policies that must change.
This understanding assumed the benevolence of nature and nature's God, as well as the capacity of human reason to comprehend and impose those rational limits on human freedom that are necessary to ensure human happiness. It is only if the old can also be defended as the good that conservatism or the tried-and-true can remain a living thing.
The historous understanding of freedom purports to reveal that nature itself is tyrannical and has attempted the self-destruction of philosophic reason by liberating the creative individual from the chains imposed by nature, nature's God, nature's law, and nature's reason.
Identity is something that must be freely chosen and self-created by the individual alone. And it must be defended by a government and a law in civil society. Social institutions dependent on the old morality have become intellectually indefensible. In terms of contrary, social, and political thought, it is good -- it is the good understood as the old that is no longer defensible. And its political defense has therefore become unattainable.
The most controversial aspect of Trump's campaign is his slogan, "Make America great again," because it goes to the heart of the problem. Trump's view presupposes that the old America was good and establishes the conditions for greatness. But is it true, or is America something to be ashamed of as the protesters against Trump have insisted, having accepted all of the teachings of the post modern cultural intellectuals?
Trump's defense of the old America goes unrecognized by conservatives, either because they have succumbed to the post modern narrative, or because Trump is unable to make an intellectual case for the old America.
It is possible that the Trump phenomena cannot be understood merely by trying to make sense of Trump himself, but rather, it is the seriousness of the need for Trump that must be understood in order to make sense of his candidacy. Those most likely to be receptive of Trump are those who believe America is in the midst of a great crisis in terms of its economy, it's chaotic civil society, its political corruption, and the ability to defend any kind of tradition or way of life derived from that tradition, because of the transformation of its culture by the intellectual elites.
This sweeping cultural transformation occurred almost completely outside of the political process of mobilizing public opinion and political majority.
Understand what he's saying? Our culture was transformed, and you had nothing to do with it. And that's what people are feeling.
I have nothing -- I don't agree with that. America is good. But you can't defend it anymore.
We haven't even learned how to defend it with new language. The American people themselves did not participate or consent to the wholesale undermining of their way of life which the government and bureaucracy helped to facilitate by undermining those institutions of civil society that were dependent upon a public defense of the old morality.
To be clear, the seriousness of the need does not mean that the need can be satisfied perhaps even by Lincoln, let alone a Trump.
That's frightening. That is frightening.
Trump has established his candidacy on the basis of an implicit understanding that America is in the midst of a crisis. Those who oppose him deny the seriousness of the crisis and see Trump himself as the greatest danger.
Well, I know there's five -- there's four in this room right now that understand this. And I think there's a great number of people in our audience that understand this.
Here again, this is why -- the Trump people have to understand. This is what -- we are with you on a lot of it.
We are concerned because I don't think Donald Trump has the intellectual firepower to even understand what this is saying.
PAT: Yeah. Those two things are not mutually exclusive.
GLENN: They're not.
PAT: You can believe we're in crisis and just believe he's not the guy to fix it.
GLENN: Yes. Right.
Here, again, Trump's success will depend on his ability to articulate the ground of the common good that is still rooted in the past, a common good established by a government that protects the rights of its citizens in a constitutional matter.
I don't think he's going to be able to do that.
Trump may or may not succeed in becoming president of the United States. And all those who have a stake in preserving Washington as it now exists are his enemies, and the public that is drawn to him is fickle. Much will depend upon the ability of the established order, which has authority and respectability on its side to erode the trust that Trump has built with the constituency that he has created.
In any case, the need that brought Trump to the fore will not disappear with a possible Trump demise.
He has addressed this issue when no one else would. And it is the need for political rule to be reanimated in a way that allows public opinion, understood to arise in the creation of constitutional majorities to establish the legitimacy of politics, policy, and laws, in a matter compatible with the rule of law and the common good. That requires revitalizing the meaning of citizenship and reaffirming the sovereignty of the people and the nation.
It also requires the restoration of the link between the people and the political branches of the government so both can become defenders of the Constitution and the country.
That's from the Claremont Institute. There is a lot to digest. Anybody who is serious about fixing the country and helping the country needs to read that.
STU: It's a hearty meal right there.
JEFFY: Darn right it is.
GLENN: There's days of stuff to feast on in that. John Marini is the name.
STU: Yeah. I was looking back at his archives at the Claremont. And he wrote an article in 2012: America has a problem, not because of our Constitution, but because constitutionalism as a theoretical doctrine is no longer meaningful in our politics.
That's in 2012.
GLENN: How did I not know this guy? Can you reach out to him and find out if he listens or hates us or likes us? I would like to talk to him.
STU: I start at the hate.
JEFFY: Start at the hate. I know. That's a good place to start.
STU: And then be pleasantly surprised.
GLENN: So reach out to him. I'd like to talk to him.
STU: Sure.
Featured Image: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump looks on during a campaign rally at the Prescott Valley Event Center, October 4, 2016 in Prescott Valley, Arizona. (Photo Credit: ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images)
