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Rachel Dolezal: Cultural Appropriation Gone Wrong

February 27, 2017
Staff

WRITER

Evidently lying to your friends and co-workers comes with a price. Rachel Dolezal, former president of the NAACP Spokane chapter who resigned amid allegations that she lied about her racial identity, has come upon hard times.

"She's jobless, on food stamps and expects soon to be homeless," Co-host Stu Burguiere said Monday on The Glenn Beck Program. "Its unclear why she just does not identify to have a home or identify to have a job."

Co-host Jeffy Fisher had an even better recommendation.

"She should just identify as a CEO. She would be making big money," Jeffy said.

Despite all the controversy and her white parents confirming their biological daughter's racial identity, Dolezal remains steadfast that she identifies as black.

Listen to this segment from The Glenn Beck Program:

PAT: Is there some sad news for Rachel Dolezal? This is -- seems unfortunate.

JEFFY: Oh, no.

PAT: She is the -- you might remember, I think the Spokane NAACP chapter. She was the head of that. She was the head of it for some time. And then it was discovered, somehow, I guess somebody finally looked at her and said, "Wait a minute. You're not black." She's like, "Sure, yeah, I am. Oh, yeah, I'm way black."

And it turns out no. She has white parents. She herself is white. But she identified more as a black person, right?

STU: Yes.

PAT: And now I guess she's having a hard time getting a job.

STU: Yeah. She's jobless, on food stamps, and expects soon to be homeless. Is unclear why she just does not identify to have a home or identify to have a job.

JEFFY: Oh, no. Oh, no. She should just identify as a CEO. She would be making big money.

PAT: Big, big money.

STU: I don't know why she hasn't thought of that. But she still says she's not white. I thought that was interesting. She says, I do think I'm more complex label. Would be helpful. But we don't really have that vocabulary. Yeah, we don't have a word for what you have.

PAT: No.

STU: There's not a -- that's true. Again, this is on us. We have not developed the vocabulary to describe the thing she is. Which, by the way, we have developed that vocabulary. It was white. We nailed it.

(laughter)

STU: But she says --

PAT: She's more comfortable in a different -- in a different light. Right?

STU: Exactly. She says, I feel -- I love that word. I feel like the idea of being trans black, would be much more accurate than I'm white. Because you know I'm not white. Calling myself black feels more accurate than saying I'm white.

So -- so it feels --

JEFFY: I'm sorry. Go ahead. She's just hawking her book. That's why this is such a big deal.

STU: What do you mean?

JEFFY: Her experiences in her memoir, In Full Color. So she just wants us to buy her book.

PAT: I have absolutely no interest in her book.

JEFFY: I have zero interest in that. But it talks about her views on racial identity and her experiences in her memoir, In Full Color. I was listening to her with the food stamps and being back in the news again. And she's back in the news again because she wants us to buy her book.

STU: Well, she apparently needs it. Right?

JEFFY: Right. If she's on food stamps. She's unable to get a job. This is it.

STU: I love this. If Dolezal was exposed in 2015 -- exposed as what? She's white.

She was exposed in 2015 when a local television crew asked her a simple question: Are you African-American?

(laughter)

That must have been an interesting moment to go up and have to ask that question. But, of course, all pictures of her being white and blond from her youth came out. And that kind of blew up her little gig at the NAACP apparently.

PAT: It sure did.

STU: Which is kind of interesting. It's weird in that that is a natural extension of what we just talked about with Chris Cuomo.

JEFFY: It sure is.

STU: Why would this be wrong? Because you can do -- you can take medications -- I mean, we've talked about the old thing with Michael Jackson, which wasn't true. But that he wanted to bleach his skin white because he wanted to be white so bad, right? You can do things to change your outer appearance. But you don't even need to, really. She, I guess, took on some of the attributes as what she thought she was. But it was a lot different than her blond-haired youth. But you can say that Chris Cuomo was on TV. If you missed it last hour, on TV, on national television, saying that a girl with girl parts who wanted -- who identified as a boy -- calling her a girl is mythology. Mythology.

Now, here's a situation -- like, I can understand, we all want to accommodate people and do the best we can to be nice. I get that.

However, to insult every piece of knowledge we've ever had in human history. Part A equals gender A. To say that those things are true, even -- you know, we're talking before the surgery or anything else has happened. That's mythology now. Why wouldn't Rachel Dolezal's story connect? I don't think there's any reason why she isn't treated as respectfully as every single transgendered person that Chris Cuomo is backing here.

Why doesn't she get that same treatment? Why is she without a job? Why is she without a -- without a home, potentially?

PAT: Because she's white. I guess. Just because she's white. Right?

If she were -- but it's only a matter of time, right? It's only because she's the first one. And, again, in our -- in our sphere of awareness, right? She's the first story of a person saying, "I'm actually black, but I'm white."

Now, the guy who works at The Daily News says the same thing. What is his name? Shaun King says the same thing. There's a few of them. But she's one of the first ones that entered into our awareness. And because of that, people are saying, "Come on. Look. I want to accommodate people, but she's obviously white. She's obviously white. And she was trying to say she's black when she's not." That's okay to say today. Guess what, soon it won't be. Soon it won't be.

Soon, the same way you will have people on national television, like Chris Cuomo saying it's mythology to call her white.

That will happen. The only issue -- the only questionable aspect of that is whether Chris Cuomo will remain on television. That's the only questionable aspect of that. He very well may not have that gig at some point. But other than that, that discussion will occur. I mean, it has occurred with certain personalities already. And it will continue to happen. And it will become the thing you're not allowed to say, that Rachel Dolezal is white.

Look, I -- we're not at a point, any of us, that are like, "Oh, well -- I don't want to -- to understand, to accommodate, to do whatever you can." But it's like, we have to at some point have a truth that we can center on. Some foundation of just accuracy. She says -- it feels more accurate to say she's black. But she's not.

(laughter)

STU: I -- do these things need to be said?

PAT: I mean, it might feel more accurate to say that I'm 18 years old because that's how I feel in my head.

STU: Right. I'm young at heart.

PAT: But it's just not the case. Because I'm now in my mid-50s. So, yeah. Yeah.

As if. I mean, the mid-50s are so far in your rearview mirror.

JEFFY: I remember when I broke that mid-50 mark.

PAT: Yeah.

STU: How can you? It was such a long time ago.

PAT: Such a long time ago.

STU: And that will happen. We are there. This stuff is already occurring. To the point that -- you know, this is an interesting discussion. Like, if you had this point -- you're like, this is an interesting discussion. She identifies with many of the cultural things of being black or -- you know, he -- she identifies as many of the -- she feels like she wants to do boy -- things that are typically associated with boys. You know, she called herself a tomboy. She -- and, you know, this is an interesting thing that we're talking about. How does society deal with it? It's not that.

It's, you're a hatemonger, and you're dealing with mythology if you think that the gender she is born in is the gender that she has.

PAT: That's nuts.

STU: That's so far beyond -- it's not a discussion. It's a shutdown of a discussion. Incredible.

PAT: It's nuts. Yeah. And nobody, going back to the way I feel in my head -- because I tell my kids that all the time: I feel like I'm 18 still. In my head, that's kind of where I stopped, I think, was 18. So I identify as such.

But -- so if I -- if I acted as if I were 18 all the time, nobody would accept that. Well, I'm just 18. I identify as 18. What do you mean, why should I be more responsible than that? What are you talking about?

You can't hold me to the standards of a 55-year-old man with six grandkids. You can't do that. I identify as an 18-year-old.

Nobody --

STU: Nobody.

PAT: -- nobody would back me on that. None of these Democrats who are bending over backward for every other minority on this planet would say that's okay.

JEFFY: Well, there was the CEO, the guy that said he was a millennial, right? That was in his 50s. Not very long ago.

PAT: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

JEFFY: That they were all up in arms about.

PAT: And he kept saying he was 34 or something, and he was 55.

JEFFY: And they were all up in arms about him. How dare he.

PAT: Right. Right.

STU: And that's different from me who is actually a millennial. I do not identify --

PAT: According to one source who said a 41-year-old person --

STU: Yes, 1976 was the cutoff date. And I was born in February 1976, which makes me one of the first millennials. So I know better than everybody else.

PAT: Because don't most people say 80 -- 80 is the cutoff date for most?

STU: You know what, I don't know what most people. This is not about most people. It's how I identify, Pat.

PAT: Okay. And you want to be a millennial? Because, man, I would do everything I can to not identify with the millennials.

STU: No kidding.

(laughter)

But technically --

JEFFY: Why?

STU: -- by one source, I am.

However, no sources say a 55-year-old is a millennial. No sources say a white person is a black person.

JEFFY: Right.

PAT: No.

STU: And, you know, I guess now a lot of sources do say -- you know, Chris Cuomo goes on in this interview that we played this last hour to say, "Well, the Department of Education says that if you identify as a girl, you're a girl. Or if you identify as a boy, as a boy."

PAT: Yeah, under Barack Obama, they said that. So what?

STU: And also, is the Department of Education, that's the --

PAT: Is it a scientific department now? No, it's a political department.

STU: Uh-huh.

PAT: So politically, you know, that is now accepted, I guess, in some circles. But that's not science. I love how they want to have it both ways. They're all science, until science doesn't agree with them. Then there's nothing to do with science. It's just a feeling. It's just a thought. It's just an attitude.

JEFFY: Don't pay attention to that.

PAT: It's the same thing on climate change. They have it both ways on every single issue.

JEFFY: Yep.

PAT: That would be pretty sweet, if we had it both ways on every issue.

STU: It's an exciting way to live.

PAT: Yeah.

STU: And it would be fun. Right? It would be fun to be a liberal for a while, wouldn't it? Where you could just sit back and every -- you never have to worry about past statements. You never have to worry about what you said that disagrees completely with what you're saying right now. You just need to say what benefits you at that exact moment. I mean, that is what we saw throughout the Obama administration.

Whatever benefited him at that exact moment was the thing he supported. And that is a -- it's got to be nice.

PAT: It's a good standard.

STU: I mean, to just be able to forget your history and forget what you said in the past has got to be a nice thing to live under.

PAT: You have to have the media on your side to back you up and let you get away with that standard. But it's a nice standard, if you can have it.

A nation unravels when its shared culture is the first thing to go

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.

Shocking: Chart-topping ‘singer’ has no soul at all

VCG / Contributor | Getty Images

A machine can imitate heartbreak well enough to top the charts, but it cannot carry grief, choose courage, or hear the whisper that calls human beings to something higher.

The No. 1 country song in America right now was not written in Nashville or Texas or even L.A. It came from code. “Walk My Walk,” the AI-generated single by the AI artist Breaking Rust, hit the top spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart, and if you listen to it without knowing that fact, you would swear a real singer lived the pain he is describing.

Except there is no “he.” There is no lived experience. There is no soul behind the voice dominating the country music charts.

If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

I will admit it: I enjoy some AI music. Some of it is very good. And that leaves us with a question that is no longer science fiction. If a machine can fake being human this well, what does it mean to be human?

A new world of artificial experience

This is not just about one song. We are walking straight into a technological moment that will reshape everyday life.

Elon Musk said recently that we may not even have phones in five years. Instead, we will carry a small device that listens, anticipates, and creates — a personal AI agent that knows what we want to hear before we ask. It will make the music, the news, the podcasts, the stories. We already live in digital bubbles. Soon, those bubbles might become our own private worlds.

If an algorithm can write a hit country song about hardship and perseverance without a shred of actual experience, then the deeper question becomes unavoidable: If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

What machines can never do

A machine can produce, and soon it may produce better than we can. It can calculate faster than any human mind. It can rearrange the notes and words of a thousand human songs into something that sounds real enough to fool millions.

But it cannot care. It cannot love. It cannot choose right and wrong. It cannot forgive because it cannot be hurt. It cannot stand between a child and danger. It cannot walk through sorrow.

A machine can imitate the sound of suffering. It cannot suffer.

The difference is the soul. The divine spark. The thing God breathed into man that no code will ever have. Only humans can take pain and let it grow into compassion. Only humans can take fear and turn it into courage. Only humans can rebuild their lives after losing everything. Only humans hear the whisper inside, the divine voice that says, “Live for something greater.”

We are building artificial minds. We are not building artificial life.

Questions that define us

And as these artificial minds grow sharper, as their tools become more convincing, the right response is not panic. It is to ask the oldest and most important questions.

Who am I? Why am I here? What is the meaning of freedom? What is worth defending? What is worth sacrificing for?

That answer is not found in a lab or a server rack. It is found in that mysterious place inside each of us where reason meets faith, where suffering becomes wisdom, where God reminds us we are more than flesh and more than thought. We are not accidents. We are not circuits. We are not replaceable.

Europa Press News / Contributor | Getty Images

The miracle machines can never copy

Being human is not about what we can produce. Machines will outproduce us. That is not the question. Being human is about what we can choose. We can choose to love even when it costs us something. We can choose to sacrifice when it is not easy. We can choose to tell the truth when the world rewards lies. We can choose to stand when everyone else bows. We can create because something inside us will not rest until we do.

An AI content generator can borrow our melodies, echo our stories, and dress itself up like a human soul, but it cannot carry grief across a lifetime. It cannot forgive an enemy. It cannot experience wonder. It cannot look at a broken world and say, “I am going to build again.”

The age of machines is rising. And if we do not know who we are, we will shrink. But if we use this moment to remember what makes us human, it will help us to become better, because the one thing no algorithm will ever recreate is the miracle that we exist at all — the miracle of the human soul.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Is Socialism seducing a lost generation?

Jeremy Weine / Stringer | Getty Images

A generation that’s lost faith in capitalism is turning to the oldest lie on earth: equality through control.

Something is breaking in America’s young people. You can feel it in every headline, every grocery bill, every young voice quietly asking if the American dream still means anything at all.

For many, the promise of America — work hard, build something that lasts, and give the next generation a better start — feels like it no longer exists. Home ownership and stability have become luxuries for a fortunate few.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them.

In that vacuum of hope, a new promise has begun to rise — one that sounds compassionate, equal, and fair. The promise of socialism.

The appeal of a broken dream

When the American dream becomes a checklist of things few can afford — a home, a car, two children, even a little peace — disappointment quickly turns to resentment. The average first-time homebuyer is now 40 years old. Debt lasts longer than marriages. The cost of living rises faster than opportunity.

For a generation that has never seen the system truly work, capitalism feels like a rigged game built to protect those already at the top.

That is where socialism finds its audience. It presents itself as fairness for the forgotten and justice for the disillusioned. It speaks softly at first, offering equality, compassion, and control disguised as care.

We are seeing that illusion play out now in New York City, where Zohran Mamdani — an open socialist — has won a major political victory. The same ideology that once hid behind euphemisms now campaigns openly throughout America’s once-great cities. And for many who feel left behind, it sounds like salvation.

But what socialism calls fairness is submission dressed as virtue. What it calls order is obedience. Once the system begins to replace personal responsibility with collective dependence, the erosion of liberty is only a matter of time.

The bridge that never ends

Socialism is not a destination; it is a bridge. Karl Marx described it as the necessary transition to communism — the scaffolding that builds the total state. Under socialism, people are taught to obey. Under communism, they forget that any other options exist.

History tells the story clearly. Russia, China, Cambodia, Cuba — each promised equality and delivered misery. One hundred million lives were lost, not because socialism failed, but because it succeeded at what it was designed to do: make the state supreme and the individual expendable.

Today’s advocates insist their version will be different — democratic, modern, and kind. They often cite Sweden as an example, but Sweden’s prosperity was never born of socialism. It grew out of capitalism, self-reliance, and a shared moral culture. Now that system is cracking under the weight of bureaucracy and division.

ANGELA WEISS / Contributor | Getty Images

The real issue is not economic but moral. Socialism begins with a lie about human nature — that people exist for the collective and that the collective knows better than the individual.

This lie is contrary to the truths on which America was founded — that rights come not from government’s authority, but from God’s. Once government replaces that authority, compassion becomes control, and freedom becomes permission.

What young America deserves

Young Americans have many reasons to be frustrated. They were told to study, work hard, and follow the rules — and many did, only to find the goalposts moved again and again. But tearing down the entire house does not make it fairer; it only leaves everyone standing in the rubble.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them. The answer is not revolution but renewal — moral, cultural, and spiritual.

It means restoring honesty to markets, integrity to government, and faith to the heart of our nation. A people who forsake God will always turn to government for salvation, and that road always ends in dependency and decay.

Freedom demands something of us. It requires faith, discipline, and courage. It expects citizens to govern themselves before others govern them. That is the truth this generation deserves to hear again — that liberty is not a gift from the state but a calling from God.

Socialism always begins with promises and ends with permission. It tells you what to drive, what to say, what to believe, all in the name of fairness. But real fairness is not everyone sharing the same chains — it is everyone having the same chance.

The American dream was never about guarantees. It was about the right to try, to fail, and try again. That freedom built the most prosperous nation in history, and it can do so again if we remember that liberty is not a handout but a duty.

Socialism does not offer salvation. It requires subservience.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Rage isn’t conservatism — THIS is what true patriots stand for

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

Conservatism is not about rage or nostalgia. It’s about moral clarity, national renewal, and guarding the principles that built America’s freedom.

Our movement is at a crossroads, and the question before us is simple: What does it mean to be a conservative in America today?

For years, we have been told what we are against — against the left, against wokeism, against decline. But opposition alone does not define a movement, and it certainly does not define a moral vision.

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

The media, as usual, are eager to supply their own answer. The New York Times recently suggested that Nick Fuentes represents the “future” of conservatism. That’s nonsense — a distortion of both truth and tradition. Fuentes and those like him do not represent American conservatism. They represent its counterfeit.

Real conservatism is not rage. It is reverence. It does not treat the past as a museum, but as a teacher. America’s founders asked us to preserve their principles and improve upon their practice. That means understanding what we are conserving — a living covenant, not a relic.

Conservatism as stewardship

In 2025, conservatism means stewardship — of a nation, a culture, and a moral inheritance too precious to abandon. To conserve is not to freeze history. It is to stand guard over what is essential. We are custodians of an experiment in liberty that rests on the belief that rights come not from kings or Congress, but from the Creator.

That belief built this country. It will be what saves it. The Constitution is a covenant between generations. Conservatism is the duty to keep that covenant alive — to preserve what works, correct what fails, and pass on both wisdom and freedom to those who come next.

Economics, culture, and morality are inseparable. Debt is not only fiscal; it is moral. Spending what belongs to the unborn is theft. Dependence is not compassion; it is weakness parading as virtue. A society that trades responsibility for comfort teaches citizens how to live as slaves.

Freedom without virtue is not freedom; it is chaos. A culture that mocks faith cannot defend liberty, and a nation that rejects truth cannot sustain justice. Conservatism must again become the moral compass of a disoriented people, reminding America that liberty survives only when anchored to virtue.

Rebuilding what is broken

We cannot define ourselves by what we oppose. We must build families, communities, and institutions that endure. Government is broken because education is broken, and education is broken because we abandoned the formation of the mind and the soul. The work ahead is competence, not cynicism.

Conservatives should embrace innovation and technology while rejecting the chaos of Silicon Valley. Progress must not come at the expense of principle. Technology must strengthen people, not replace them. Artificial intelligence should remain a servant, never a master. The true strength of a nation is not measured by data or bureaucracy, but by the quiet webs of family, faith, and service that hold communities together. When Washington falters — and it will — those neighborhoods must stand.

Eric Lee / Stringer | Getty Images

This is the real work of conservatism: to conserve what is good and true and to reform what has decayed. It is not about slogans; it is about stewardship — the patient labor of building a civilization that remembers what it stands for.

A creed for the rising generation

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

For the rising generation, conservatism cannot be nostalgia. It must be more than a memory of 9/11 or admiration for a Reagan era they never lived through. Many young Americans did not experience those moments — and they should not have to in order to grasp the lessons they taught and the truths they embodied. The next chapter is not about preserving relics but renewing purpose. It must speak to conviction, not cynicism; to moral clarity, not despair.

Young people are searching for meaning in a culture that mocks truth and empties life of purpose. Conservatism should be the moral compass that reminds them freedom is responsibility and that faith, family, and moral courage remain the surest rebellions against hopelessness.

To be a conservative in 2025 is to defend the enduring principles of American liberty while stewarding the culture, the economy, and the spirit of a free people. It is to stand for truth when truth is unfashionable and to guard moral order when the world celebrates chaos.

We are not merely holding the torch. We are relighting it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.