Imagine a Priceline.com or Upside.com for Everything (Even Health Insurance)

May 18, 2017

WRITER

Could an ingenious, buyer-driven consumer experience like Priceline.com or Upside.com solve our health care problem? Serial entrepreneur, historian and dreamer Jay Walker joined Glenn on radio Wednesday to discuss why health care is broken and how his patented business model could go a long way in providing solutions --- but it isn't the entire answer.

"Up to now, Americans have had a lot of choices. But unless they're super shoppers, they never see what their choices are worth. In complicated worlds like buying business travel or buying health insurance or buying medical care, there are millions of choices. You can't figure them all out. Software makes it possible for the first time to find choices that makes sense for you," Walker explained.

However, in the case of applying free market principles to health care, there's a Catch-22.

"We're not in charge of our health care," Glenn said.

Therein lies one of the big problems.

"Glenn, one of the reasons why health care is so broken --- one of the many reasons, but one of the big reasons --- is that the person paying for it isn't the person using it," Walker said.

Glenn agreed.

While most people make a co-payment, it's the government, insurance provider or employer paying the bulk of their medical expenses.

"And what happens when somebody else is paying for something else and I get to use it? I overconsume: give me the gold-plated everything. After all, I want every test, I want every treatment," Walker explained.

The unfortunate reality is that no one knows how much anything ultimately costs.

"You go in and ask the x-ray technician, how much is this x-ray? They have no idea. They don't know. So the seller doesn't know. The buyer doesn't know. Is it any doubt the system has completely run amuck on costs?" Walker said.

In keeping with his systematic worldview, Walker explained how a free market health care system can't solve every problem.

"Again, health and wellness is a system, all right? It's not a binary A or B thing. If you treat your body like a garbage can . . . you're going to get sick, no matter who pays for it. So at the end of the day, this isn't a question of just making sure you're paying the right amount of money. You bet, we've got to make sure rational free market economics, which work for everything well, work for health care. But there are plenty of people who can't afford health care. There are plenty of children whose parents make decisions for them. This isn't going to fix that problem. We have challenges in childhood obesity. It isn't going to fix that problem. We have an opioid epidemic. It isn't going to fix that. So market solutions are critically important --- but they're important as part of the whole," Walker said.

Listen to this segment from The Glenn Beck Program:

GLENN: Jay Walker, the founder of Priceline.com. 900 patents to his name. Wired magazine calls his library on imagination -- he's an expert on imagination. The most amazing library in the world. He is a techno optimist. He is also the guy who started the new travel website upside.com. Full disclosure, that is a sponsor --

JAY: That's how we met.

GLENN: Yeah, that's how we met. However, the reason why he's here is not for that, it's for a conversation we had -- I said, what's the catch? How is this working? How is everybody making money here? Because you're reducing the time that the person spends from 80 minutes to about -- what are you down to?

JAY: Five.

GLENN: Five minutes to make the decision. You're booking the hotel. You're booking the flight. And you're --

JAY: Saving money.

GLENN: Saving money for the company. And then you're giving an Amazon gift card. And we've done things where it works out to where we've spent $200, with something that should have cost us 1,000 or would have cost us 1,000. It's like -- in the end, it's like a 200-dollar ticket and stay. That's insane.

And I said to you, okay. What -- when it's too good to be true, it's too good to be true.

JAY: Ask extra questions.

GLENN: Correct.

And you said, no, here's how it works. And imagine this with -- with everything.

Explain what that means.

JAY: Up to now, Americans have had a lot of choices. But unless they're super shoppers, they never see what their choices are worth. In complicated worlds like buying business travel or buying health insurance or buying medical care, there are millions of choices. You can't figure them all out.

Software makes it possible for the first time to find choices that makes sense for you.

GLENN: So, but we're not in charge of our health care. So I've been saying, everyone should be -- I want to give $5,000 a year. I'll cover the first -- I'll buy catastrophic for everything else. Give me $5,000 a year. You go spend it.

So when the doctor says, go get this x-ray. I can go get that x-ray here. But if I have a system that says, you know what, if you go tomorrow morning at this location, you're going to pay a fraction of that.

JAY: Glenn, one of the reasons why health care is so broken -- one of the many reasons, but one of the big reasons is that the person paying for it isn't the person using it.

GLENN: Yes.

JAY: And what happens when somebody else is paying for something else and I get to use it? I overconsume. Give me the gold-plated everything. After all, I want every test. I want every treatment.

GLENN: We don't care. Correct.

JAY: So we right at the start -- either the government is paying for it or my health insurer is paying for it or my boss is paying for it.

When you have a system where a single decision by me could be costing $10,000 to somebody else -- and, by the way, not only am I not paying for it, the person selling it to me, the doctor or the hospital, they can't even tell me what the price is. You go in and ask the x-ray technician, how much is this x-ray? They have no idea. They don't know.

So the seller doesn't know. The buyer doesn't know. Is it any doubt the system has completely run amuck on costs?

GLENN: So what we have going on in Washington, you sound like this is the solution that I've been looking for. How are you going to get that when we're headed towards --

JAY: Well, it's not a solution. So, again, health and wellness is a system, all right? It's not a binary A or B thing. If you treat your body like a garbage can, all right? You're going to get sick, no matter who pays for it.

GLENN: Right.

JAY: So at the end of the day, this isn't a question of just making sure you're paying the right amount of money. You bet, we've got to make sure rational free market economics, which work for everything well, work for health care. But there are plenty of people who can't afford health care. There are plenty of children whose parents make decisions for them. This isn't going to fix that problem. We have challenges in childhood obesity. It isn't going to fix that problem. We have an opioid epidemic. It isn't going to fix that. So market solutions are critically important. But they're important as part of the whole.

GLENN: So how do you -- let's stick to market here for a second.

How do you -- how do you correct a system and sell the free market system, when the free market system hasn't really been practiced in this country for a very long time, not in --

JAY: Not in health care.

GLENN: Yeah, not in health care. But in many ways, in many industries it hasn't been practiced in a very long time.

JAY: Many industries.

GLENN: And people are taught that this is the free market system. And they see that it doesn't work. That it just -- it's awful and cumbersome. And they're being taught that, hey, this Marxism idea is a better idea.

How do we tell the truth about the free market system to a -- to a group of people that really don't know and don't really care about what the free market system really is?

JAY: So the answer is telling people who don't want to hear is probably not going to be our winning strategy. Okay?

GLENN: Yes, right.

JAY: It's just not going to be our winning strategy. So we're going to have to offer alternatives that exist against the dysfunctional system. And those alternatives will have to compete to attract people based on cost, efficacy, easiness, and those kinds of things. It churns out -- this system is probably going to do that. The mobile phone, when you add sensors and your ability to actually, within a few years see what's going on inside your body, probably means we're going to have two systems, a public system that is going to be broken for a long time and we should try to improve and a new technology that's going to emerge along the side, where people -- a significant amount of people say, look, I just want better health for my children. And if this helps my kid, then I'm using this system. I don't care who's paying for it. People want their kids to be healthy. People want their parents to be healthy. A little less themselves, unfortunately.

GLENN: You're a historian. You know that we've been around fake news forever. I mean, I have documents of fake news from the Revolutionary War.

JAY: About to say, it was perfectly normal for Thomas Jefferson to create fake news.

GLENN: It happened.

JAY: Hardball those days.

GLENN: Yeah. Your heads -- if you elect John Adams, your children's heads will be on a pike.

JAY: There you go.

GLENN: Hello. So we've had it forever. However, we are now in a system -- you came up with the friend button at Facebook.

Facebook is so freeing and gives people the power to connect with people like you and me and people -- and give people the power to have a voice just as powerful as anybody else's. But it also is -- just because of the algorithms, making everyone's world smaller. And we're hearing the voices that we agree with, and not necessarily the full spectrum. Then you add on top of that, fake news. How are we going to imagine this?

JAY: Well, first of all, let me set it straight. I'm not the inventor of the friend button. Some of the inventions I created led to it. So I don't want to take credit for something I'm not the inventor.

That being said, you're asking a tough question. And here's the question: The weather today is cold and rainy, but the climate is really what matters most here in Dallas, Texas. Right? It might be cold and rainy today, but we live in -- you're in Texas here. We have to remember that when we're hacking away at the weather, we're simply just hacking at the leaves. The climate is really the bigger issue.

And let's talk about the climate. More people are getting more news from more sources than ever before. Yes, some of those sources are being constrained. But if you have confidence in people, you know what, you can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time. We live in a world where the ability to control the news like Nazi Germany or to control what any one person hears is less than ever before.

You know, white men -- old white men in New York City do not decide what's on the evening news anymore. We live in a much more information-open society. Yes, within certain realms, it appears we're being contradicted. We're having bracelets put around the news we see on Facebook, but that's not maybe what we're going to see on Twitter, or something new will emerge tomorrow.

Remember, the phone is going away, Glenn. The phone is an intermediate system. It's just an on-ramp to the network. It's almost certainly going to go to the glasses. And probably with a little thing in your ear, assuming we don't direct connect to the brain.

This is what's really going to happen. You're going to have way more opportunity here, way more people. And these younger kids, they're way more global. Yeah, it's easy to fool some of the people some of the time, but overall, the climate is more open, more information. You know, I don't care whether you're the Chinese government or whether you're a dictator in Africa, you're having -- or Korea. You're having a hard time controlling the flow of information.

GLENN: When you look at the climate, I am a -- I am a -- some would call me jingoistic. I would not. I would call myself proud of the -- the best system that has ever been created to help people explore -- the minute you come up with a better system than our Constitution and the free market connecting Moral Sentiments to Wealth of Nations, I'm in. I'm in. But this is the best that's been created.

But we're now being taught that America -- our children are being taught, America doesn't matter. It's a global community. And it is a global community. But how do we balance a global community with, these principles are global and eternal?

JAY: Well, there you've got the core of the problem. We used to have a much more of a common heritage. We used to have much more of a common heritage. We used to talk about Western values and Western civilization as an absolute good in the larger scheme of history. And we don't do that any longer.

GLENN: Is it an absolute source of good? In the overall picture?

JAY: If you study history, there is no systems, other than ours, that have lifted more people out of poverty, that have given more opportunity to more people who never had opportunity. If you're a woman, you want to be an American. If you're an African-American, you want to be an American (sic). Half the world would like to come to America. I'm not arguing that we're perfect or even better in every way, but what I'm saying is, market-based systems with real competition and checks and balances that in a government that works, has been by far and away the best. System. There isn't anybody in second place, right?

There are just fakes. So at the end of the day, when China wanted to lift hundreds of millions of people out of desperate poverty, they turned to capitalism to do it. Yeah, they put a Chinese brand on it. But, baby, they unlocked initiative. They unlocked risk-taking. They unlocked imagination at the market value. They opened their borders to global supply. They basically adopted the western system. They just called it the Chinese communist party.

GLENN: A friend of mine went over and talked to the Chinese. This was 2008. And he was very concerned about us.

And Chinese said, you guys might be kicked down. And you might have some time where you're kicked down for a while, but you have something that the world doesn't have. And that is imagination.

JAY: Permission to fail. The big difference in America is, in the rest of the world, when you're a failure, you're dead. You're done. In America, when you're a failure, you're Bill Gates. You're Steve Jobs. You're a failure? Perfect. You've dropped out of school, perfect. We love you. Okay?

America is a country that reinvents itself and has always done so. We believe in the individual. We believe in responsibility.

Look, we're the most charitable nation by far in the world. Just look at the nature of charity in America. Only people of generosity and wealth can be charitable. Most of the world doesn't -- that makes no sense in China, to donate money to a hospital. There are no hospitals in China, paid for by wealthy Chinese. That doesn't work that way.

America does that. And it's because we have permission to try, to fail, to try again. We literally, from the very start in our patent system said, if you can invent something, you don't have to practice it, and you don't have to be rich to get a patent.

GLENN: I think one of the worst things we've done are the bailouts and everything else. And a lot of people will say, because it's not our position as government. But my core on that is I have a right to fail. As much as I have a right to succeed -- my failures are more important to me than my successes. I am who I am today because of massive failures in my life.

JAY: All great hitters strike out a lot. Okay? They swing at the ball, and they strike out. The poor hitters watch the ball go by. Right? The great hitters put it in play, and they're out. But that's no difference than all of us. The fact of the matter is America allows for that.

Now, sure we have bailouts. Why? Because we have a political democracy. And you put enough people out of work, that's a lot of votes going out of work. So there's enormous pressure to not let those enterprises fail.

But we've learned over and over again, even when the largest enterprises in our country have failed over their history or have become irrelevant in their arc of history, the country bounces back. It finds new ways to deploy resources. It motivates people to learn.

In America, everybody wants to be wealthy. They don't want to drag the wealthy down. They want to join the wealthy. That's why America lives the way it lives.

GLENN: Jay Walker is our guest. An inventor. Described as a serial entrepreneur. Founder of Priceline. Founder of upside.com. An imagination expert. Has the library of the history of human imagination. A techno optimist. And we only have about two minutes left. On the other side, I want to come back. I want to ask you, if you're an entrepreneur and you're out there swinging for the fences today, what is the one thing -- one piece of advice that you would give them, to say, "Just focus here, or have you asked yourself this?"

We'll do that when we come back. First, our sponsor this half-hour is Casper. Are you having sleepless nights? Research shows sleepless nights may be because of warmer weather. And if you have a foam mattress, holy cow do you know that. You'll wake up in the middle of December with your windows open, and the top of you will be ice cold, and the bottom of you that's next to the mattress will be boiling hot.

This is one of the first things that Casper tried to do. They wanted the perfect mattress, so they went back to the laboratory, and they came up with a new foam -- two actual high-tech foams that will guarantee that you will sleep cool and comfortable. Then they wanted to see, how can we keep the price down to where normal people can afford a great mattress?

What they did is they cut out the middle man. And they ship right directly to you. So instead of going to some place where they're paying somebody to say, hey, why don't you lay down on this mattress? What you do is you just go to Casper.com, and you buy the mattress.

In 100 nights, you can send it back. They'll refund every single penny. They'll come and pick it up from you if you don't love it. But you're going to love it.

One hundred nights in your home. Try it. See if it doesn't just change the way you sleep and doesn't make you think about, I can't wait to go home and go to bed. Casper mattress. Casper.com. Use the promo code Beck. Get $50 off the purchase of your mattress right now. Terms and conditions do apply. It's Casper.com. Promo code Beck.

(OUT AT 10:52AM)

GLENN: Jay -- Jay Walker, the founder of Priceline and upside.com. Tell me if you're an entrepreneur and you're out there struggling, give me a piece of advice.

JAY: There's only one person that matters, assuming you've got the oxygen you need. Right? The oxygen is the capital you need to do anything. But if you've got the oxygen, it's all about the customer.

People are continuously reinventing how to serve customers. If you serve the customer, you win the game. There are endless ways to serve customers that have never been possible before. And that's what this new technology revolution is doing. It's putting things up in the air that have never been up in the air, that you can actually find customers and serve them. That's the key. Serve the customer.

GLENN: Upside.com. Jay Walker. Great to have you. We'll be on Facebook later today. Don't miss it.

JAY: Thank you.

Critical theory destroys truth and justice

Editor's note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.

Critical theory once stood out as the absurd progressive notion that it is. Now, its maxims are becoming an integral part of ordinary political discourse. The more you repeat a lie, the more you will believe it, and this is the very dangerous place in which we find ourselves today.

Take this critical theory maxim as an example: If we desire justice, we must sometimes champion what may appear superficially as injustice. It's a necessary evil, if you will, the necessity of “controlled injustice.”

By using truth through fabrication and controlled injustice for justice, we’ll save the republic. We’ll be acting in a noble way.

This definition of justice is defined by the “oppressed,” not the “oppressor.” It is the greatest happiness for the greatest number. To achieve this justice, however, we need to endorse acts on occasion that, while seemingly unjust, serve a higher purpose. It will ensure the stability and the unity of our republic, and this may manifest in ways that seem contradictory to our values. But these are the necessary shadows to cast light on “true justice.”

And isn’t that what we are all after, anyway?

Here’s another critical theory maxim: Sometimes we find the truth through fabrication. Our pursuit of truth sometimes requires a strategic use of falsehoods. The truth is a construct that has been shaped and tailored to promote the well-being of the collective.

We sometimes need to accept and propagate lies designed by "the system” — not the old system, but the system that we’re now using to replace the old to get more justice through injustice and more truth through fabrication.

We’re engaging in a higher form of honesty. When we fabricate, it’s for the right reason. We are reaching up to the heavens fighting for a higher sort of honesty. To fortify the truth, we occasionally must weave a tapestry of lies. Each thread, essential for the greater picture, will ultimately define our understanding and ensure our unity under this infallible wisdom.

The election is coming up. Does this maxim sound familiar? Many think it is imperative that we secure our republic through election control to maintain our republic. Sometimes, we might need to take actions that by traditional standards might be questionable.

The act of securing elections requires cheating. It's not mere deception. It is a noble act of safeguarding our way of life. We're on the verge of losing this democracy, and without deception, we will lose it.

To ensure it doesn't fall into the hands of those we know will destroy it, we may have to make a few fabrications. We're fabricating stories to be able to control or secure the republic through our elections. By using truth through fabrication and controlled injustice for justice, we'll save the republic. Therefore, we'll be acting in a noble way. Stealing an election from those who wish to harm our society is truly an act of valor and an essential measure to protect our values and ensure the continuation of our just society.

If we desire justice, we must sometimes champion what may appear superficially as injustice.

I know it's a paradox of honor through dishonor. But in this context, by embracing the dishonor, we achieve the highest form of honor, ensuring the stability and the continuation of our great republic.

Let this be heard, far and wide, as a great call to patriotic action. As we advance, let each of us, citizens of this great and honorable republic, consider these principles. Not as abstract or paradoxical but as practical guides to daily life. Embrace the necessity of controlled injustice, the utility of lies, the duty to secure our electoral process, and the honor and apparent dishonor. These are not merely strategies for survival. They are prerequisites for our prosperity.

We all have to remember that justice is what our leaders define, that truth is what our party tells us. Our republic stands strong on the values of injustice for justice, honor through dishonor, and the fabrication of truths. To deviate from this path is to jeopardize the very fabric of our society. Strength through unity; unity through strength.

We've heard this nonsense for so long. But now, this nonsense is becoming an instituted reality, and we are entering perilous times. Don't be fooled by the narratives you will hear during the march to November. Never let someone convince you that the ends justify the means, that a little bit of injustice is needed to achieve a broader, collective vision of justice, that truth sometimes requires fabricated lies and narratives. If we do, justice will cease to be justice, truth will cease to be truth, and our republic will be lost.

Top 5 MOST EVIL taxes the government extorts from you

David McNew / Staff | Getty Images

"In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." -Ben Franklin

The injustice of taxation has been a core issue for Americans since the very beginning of our country, and it's a problem we have yet to resolve. This belief was recently reignited in many Americans earlier this month on tax day when the numbers were crunched and it was discovered that the government was somehow owed even more hard-earned money. As Glenn recently discussed on his show, it's getting to be impossible for most Americans to afford to live comfortably, inflation is rising, and our politicians keep getting richer.

The taxpayer's burden is heavier than ever.

The government is not above some real low blows either. While taxes are a necessary evil, some taxes stretch the definition of "necessary" and emphasize the "evil." Here are the top five most despicable taxes that are designed to line the IRS coffers at your expense:

Income Tax

Joe Raedle / Staff | Getty Images

"It would be a hard government that should tax its people one-tenth part of their income." -Ben Franklin

On February 24th, 2024 we hit a very unfortunate milestone, the 101st anniversary of the 16th Amendment, which authorized federal income tax. Where does the government get the right to steal directly out of your paycheck?

Death Taxes

Dan Mullan / Staff | Getty Images

"Now my advice for those who die, Declare the pennies on your eyes" -George Harrison

Not even in death can you escape the cold pursuit of the tax collector. It's not good enough that you have to pay taxes on everything you buy and every penny you make your entire life. Now the feds want a nice slice, based on the entire value of your estate, that can be as much as 40 percent. Then the state government gets to stick their slimy fingers all over whatever remains before your family is left with the crumbs. It's practically grave-robbery.

Payroll

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

"The power to tax is the power to destroy." -John Marshall

What's that? The nice chunk of your paycheck the government nabs before you can even get it to the bank wasn't enough? What if the government taxed your employer just for paying you? In essence, you make less than what your agreed pay rate is and it costs your employer more! Absolutely abominable.

Social Security

VALERIE MACON / Contributor | Getty Images

"We don't have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven't taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much." -Ronald Reagan

Everyone knows the collapse of Social Security is imminent. It has limped along for years, only sustained by a torrent of tax dollars and the desperate actions of politicians. For decades, people have unwillingly forked over money into the system they will never see again.

FICA

Kevin Dietsch / Staff | Getty Images

"What at first was plunder assumed the softer name of revenue." -Thomas Paine

FICA is the payroll equivalent of Social Security. Your employer has to match however much you pay. It means it costs your employer even more to pay you—again, you'll NEVER see that money. At this point, are you even working for yourself, or are you just here to generate money for the government to frivolously throw away?

5 DISTURBING ways World War III will be different from previous wars

Oleg Nikishin / Stringer | Getty Images

Has World War III begun?

Over the weekend, Iran launched an unprecedented attack against Israel involving over 300 missiles and drones. This marked the first direct attack on Israel originating from Iranian territory. Fortunately, according to an Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, 99 percent of missiles and drones were successfully neutralized by Israeli defense systems. Iran claimed that the operation against Israel had concluded and that no further offensive was planned, although the possibility of another attack is still present.

This has left many people, including Glenn, wondering the same thing: did we just witness the start of World War III?

Glenn recently had a World War II Air Force Veteran as a guest on his TV special, who told stories of the horrors he and his brothers-in-arms faced in the skies over war-torn Europe. This was a timely reminder of the terrors of war and a warning that our future, if it leads to another world war, is a dark one.

But, if Glenn's coverage of the Iranian attack revealed one thing, it's that World War III will look nothing like the world wars of the twentieth century. Long gone are the days of John "Lucky" Luckadoo and his "Bloody Hundredth" bravely flying their B-17s into battle. Over the weekend, we saw hundreds of autonomous drones and missiles clashing with extreme speed and precision over several different fronts (including space) simultaneously. This ain't your grandfather's war.

From EMP strikes to cyber attacks, here are FIVE ways the face of war has changed:

EMP attacks

New York Daily News Archive / Contributor | Getty Images

The entire modern world, on every level, is completely dependent on electricity. From your home refrigerator to international trade, the world would come to a grinding halt without power. And as Glenn has pointed out, it wouldn't even be that hard to pull off. All it would take is 3 strategically placed, high-altitude nuclear detonations and the entire continental U.S. would be without power for months if not years. This would cause mass panic across the country, which would be devastating enough on its own, but the chaos could be a perfect opportunity for a U.S. land invasion.

Nuclear strikes

Galerie Bilderwelt / Contributor | Getty Images

Nuclear war is nothing new. Many of us grew up during the Cold War, built fallout shelters, and learned to duck and cover. But times have changed. The Berlin Wall fell and so did the preparedness of the average American to weather a nuclear attack. As technology has advanced, more of our adversaries than ever have U.S. cities within their crosshairs, and as Glenn has pointed out, these adversaries are not exactly shy about that fact. Unfortunately, the possibility of an atomic apocalypse is as real as ever.

Immigration warfare

Nick Ut / Contributor | Getty Images

The strategy of strangling an opposing nation's economy to gain the upper hand is a wartime tactic as old as time. That's why the Border Crisis is so alarming. What better way to damage an opponent's economy than by overburdening it with millions of undocumented immigrants? As Glenn has covered, these immigrants are not making the trek unaided. There is a wide selection of organizations that facilitate this growing disaster. These organizations are receiving backing from around the globe, such as the WEF, the UN, and U.S. Democrats! Americans are already feeling the effects of the border crisis. Imagine how this tactic could be exploited in war.

Cyber shutdowns

Bill Hinton / Contributor | Getty Images

Cyber attacks will be a major tactic in future wars. We've already experienced relatively minor cyber strikes from Russia, China, and North Korea, and it is a very real possibility that one of our adversaries inflicts a larger attack with devastating consequences on the United States. In fact, the WEF has already predicted a "catastrophic" cyber attack is imminent, and Glenn suggests that it is time to start preparing ourselves. A cyber attack could be every bit as devastating as an EMP, and in a world run by computers, nothing is safe.

Biological assault

WPA Pool / Pool | Getty Images

Don't trust the "experts." That was the takeaway many of us had from the pandemic, but something less talked about is the revelation that China has manufactured viruses that are capable of spreading across the globe. We now know that the lab leak hypothesis is true and that the Wuhan lab manufactured the virus that infected the entire world. That was only ONE virus from ONE lab. Imagine what else the enemies of America might be cooking up.

The government is WAGING WAR against these 3 basic needs

NICHOLAS KAMM / Contributor | Getty Images

The government has launched a full-on assault against our basic needs, and people are starting to take notice.

As long-time followers of Glenn are probably aware, our right to food, water, and power is under siege. The government no longer cares about our general welfare. Instead, our money lines the pockets of our politicians, funds overseas wars, or goes towards some woke-ESG-climate-Great Reset bullcrap. And when they do care, it's not in a way that benefits the American people.

From cracking down on meat production to blocking affordable power, this is how the government is attacking your basic needs:

Food

Fiona Goodall / Stringer | Getty Images

Glenn had Rep. Thomas Massie on his show where he sounded the alarm about the attack on our food. The government has been waging war against our food since the thirties when Congress passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938. They started by setting strict limits on how many crops a farmer could grow in a season and punishing anyone who grew more—even if it was intended for personal use, not for sale on the market. This sort of autocratic behavior has continued into the modern day and has only gotten more draconian. Today, not only are you forced to buy meat that a USDA-approved facility has processed, but the elites want meat in general off the menu. Cow farts are too dangerous to the environment, so the WEF wants you to eat climate-friendly alternatives—like bugs.

Water

ALESSANDRO RAMPAZZO / Contributor | Getty Images

As Glenn discussed during a recent Glenn TV special, the government has been encroaching on our water for years. It all started when Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972, which gave the government the ability to regulate large bodies of water. As the name suggests, the act was primarily intended to keep large waterways clear of pollution, but over time it has allowed the feds to assume more and more control over the country's water supply. Most recently, the Biden administration attempted to expand the reach of the Clean Water Act to include even more water and was only stopped by the Supreme Court.

Electricity