BLOGAugust 11, 2017

Bill O’Reilly: ‘Profound Change’ Is Disrupting the Way We Watch News — for the Better

News is shifting to a model where people have more control over their own content. On radio Friday, Bill O’Reilly shared an update on his latest project and explained why it’s important for him to bring news to people without “intrusion.”

Glenn remembered starting his own TV network and how people told him to stay locked into the old school model of cable news instead of making TV available on mobile devices.

“Those days are over,” he said of the shift. “We’ve laid the groundwork and the rails.”

O’Reilly talked about a new show prototype where he was in a studio and talked with guests over Skype, giving him far more independence than he would have with a network.

“We don’t want any intrusion: corporate intrusion or Media Matters intrusion or threats,” O’Reilly said to Glenn. “We want to control the product, as you do.”

GLENN: BillO'Reilly.com. Probably one of the more brilliant businesspeople. Definitely one of the more brilliant people when it comes to how to do a show and what people are thinking. Bill O'Reilly. Now at BillO'Reilly.com. He has his own show. It's a half-hour news show every day, and you can find it at BillO'Reilly.com. He started it earlier this week. It's really good. Not a lot has changed with Bill O'Reilly. Just the background has changed. And we'll talk to him about that.

I want to start here, Bill, with something that really bothers me, and that is the firing of -- what's his name? Jeremy Lions? No, what's his name?

STU: Jeffrey Lord.

GLENN: Jeffrey Lord, that's what it is. That's how much I care about this guy.

I actually care about his firing. I think he is horrible. I think he is one of the worst commentators on CNN. I think he's just a total sellout.

However, they fired him because he got into a Twitter spat with Media Matters. And Media Matters is starting to campaign again to get people fired, get them thrown off.

And he said, "What you're doing is fascistic in nature. This is fascism." And they tweeted something back. And he wrote, "Sieg Heil."

CNN fires him almost immediately because they say, "Nazi salutes are absolutely -- we will not tolerate this --

STU: Indefensible.

GLENN: Are you kidding me? So now he's out. Bill.

BILL: Yeah, I mean, look, anybody -- and I mean anybody knows that this firing was political. It wasn't for cause. It wasn't because he did anything outrageous. I mean, you can debate all day long whether Nazi analogies should be used in any kind of discourse. But this clearly falls under freedom of speech. And he was making a contextual point, which is accurate, by the way, that Media Matters is a fascist organization. It is.

And then when the president of Media Matters struck back at him, he, in a wise guy fashion, went, "Sieg Heil." Who does that offend? Media Matters. So, what? So they were looking to dump him. And this gave them the opportunity to do it. That's the only thing I can figure out.

GLENN: Okay. So, Bill, that's maybe a little bit better than what I thought, but not by much.

Are you saying that they only use Media Matters as a cover? Because, I mean, why not cover him because we don't want him around. We don't like him.

BILL: Yeah, if he were a valued employee, they certainly wouldn't have done that. Look, if Jeffrey Lord -- I don't know what his contractual situation is. But he is an actionable violation of contract, sued against CNN.

You can't do that. He didn't do anything out of the ordinary, in the sense of exercising his freedom of speech to slap back at an organization that he feels is fascistic. So it's got to be something else. I don't know whether -- if he even had a contract.

But it looks to me -- and I've been in this business almost since as long as you have, since the War of 1812, Beck, as you mentioned last week on your program. All right? It looks to me like they just want to get rid of the guy, and this was a convenient way to do it.

GLENN: So, Bill, doesn't this not empower Media Matters like crazy?

BILL: Of course, it does. But Media Matters is in bed with all these people. I mean, Media Matters doesn't attack CNN, ever. Media Matters -- well, let me amend that. If CNN put on a conservative like you or me, maybe Media Matters would attack. But they don't attack their editorial posture. They don't attack NBC. They don't very rarely attack the networks. They only attack people with whom they disagree with politically, which is anybody. Moderate or right.

You've got to be a far-left lune to be in there cogering (phonetic).

GLENN: So we found a Media Matters plan of attack. And we're going to be going over it in the next couple of weeks, with our audience. It is their plan.

BILL: Good.

GLENN: We found it on the dark web.

BILL: The dark web.

GLENN: Yeah. I mean, who -- who even puts their stuff on the dark web? Seriously, who does that criminals. Evil people. Why are you putting stuff on the dark web?

So in it, it talks about how they're now consulting with Google. They're now consulting with Facebook. They're trying to tell YouTube and Google and Facebook exactly what is offensive, what isn't. They're coming in as these moderate arbiters of --

BILL: Oh, they -- this organization, these are the people that orchestrated the sponsored attacks against me and you.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: They organized the demonstrations in front of Fox. They've got money. They pay people. They're awful. They're anti-democracy. And I hope you guys -- you know, I listen when I can. But when you get stuff, send it to me. Because certainly looking at these people hard, these Media Matters people.

GLENN: I'll send you the stuff that we just pulled up.

BILL: And you know what the worst part about this is? The worst part about it is these people were so closely allied with Hillary Clinton. David Brock, who was the founder of this, was Clinton's consigliere. If Clinton had ever been elected president, these people would be in the White House, these Media Matters. And I can't tell your audience how strongly enough how vicious and vile and anti-democratic they are.

GLENN: Actually I want to correct you on one thing.

BILL: Win after win after win because the media will never take them on because the media sympathizes with their far-left posture.

GLENN: Okay. I want to correct you on one thing: They're absolutely pro-democratic, which in the meaning of, all we want is a popular vote and majority wins. I mean, that is -- you know -- remember, Chavez was also very democratic.

BILL: They don't believe in freedom of speech.

GLENN: Yes, you're right. Correct.

BILL: They don't believe in freedom of speech. They operate in shadows on the dark web. They try to hurt people. They try to destroy people.

GLENN: Yes. Yes.

BILL: This is not what our democracy is supposed to be about.

GLENN: It's a republic.

BILL: This is the most vicious, vile political organization in existence.

GLENN: Yes.

BILL: And they have power. And money.

GLENN: So tell me how you feel about what happened with Google this week, with that firing.

BILL: You know, I didn't follow it that much because I'm not really into that world of -- and I know they're super powerful and all of that. But I'm more interested in the political component of this, rather than -- once you get into Google and Facebook and all of these organizations, you get into corporations. They're corporations. I mean, they may not wear ties. And they may give you kale for lunch. But it's a corporation. Okay?

GLENN: That's kind of what I want to talk to you about. As I said earlier this week, look, if Firestone or Goodyear was doing this, I wouldn't care. But this is the gateway to information.

We had this week a report was released that Apple has $58 billion in US Treasury bonds. That's more than most foreign countries will hold.

That gives that corporation real leverage on Capitol Hill. You know what, maybe we should just liquidate our government bonds because that's why we don't -- that's why we worry about foreign countries holding our bonds.

Does -- are these corporations that the left loves, are they becoming worrisome at all to you, Bill?

BILL: That's an interesting question. They are -- they are very, very powerful agents, and they control now most of the information flow. And with the destruction of cable news, and that's coming very, very fast.

GLENN: Very fast.

BILL: Talk radio is pretty much the only counter to the internet information flow, which is not an honest situation.

So, yes, it's dangerous. I'm not so concerned about them holding bonds. Although, yeah, I mean, I guess down the line, they could do a blackmail thing. You better do what we want. Or we'll liquidate or something. I see what you're saying.

GLENN: It's not like it's the top of my concerns. But it is -- it is a part of it.

It's like, wait a minute. These -- these guys are getting really powerful.

BILL: They are very powerful. But there's nothing you can do about that in a capitalistic society. The more successful corporations become, the more powerful they become.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: You can expose it. You can tell folks what's going on. And the information flow they're getting is not honest. That's certainly noble. But you can't stop them from accumulating assets.

GLENN: No. But you can start to say to our representatives, "I don't want you in bed with these people. There are no special favors for these people."

BILL: No, absolutely. Right. Right.

GLENN: So, Bill, I want to take a break. We have a ton to talk about, the news of the week. But I would like to pick your brain, honestly, because I have tremendous respect for you, as you know, on multiple fronts. But one of them is you are a very shrewd businessman. You are very smart.

You took every show. You know, I run on passion and gut and feelings. And you are much more of a scientific kind of guy. And you've made a brilliant move this week in not going -- running to somebody else and saying, "Okay. I'll fall under your umbrella." You're doing it yourself.

I want to talk to you about the future of cable news. I want to talk to you about the future of information.

BILL: Sure. It's fascinating what's happening.

GLENN: It really is. It really is.

BILL: And nobody is talking about it. So your audience is going to get a lot of information fast. After these announcements of interest.

STU: Wow.

GLENN: Wow, thank you.

STU: Wow.

GLENN: Back in just a second with Bill O'Reilly from BillO'Reilly.com.

GLENN: So let me go to Bill O'Reilly from BillO'Reilly.com, who just started his news program, the No Spin News. Every day you can see it and you can watch it at BillO'Reilly.com.

Bill, let's switch gears. I'd kind of like some advice from you and to pick your brain. What we did six years ago, when I left Fox and I built TheBlaze and the first OTT model around this, everyone said, "Glenn, no one will watch this on the Internet. They're not going to watch it on the phone. They want it on this."

It's why, honestly, we spent as much money as we did to make my network look -- quite honestly, the model was MSNBC. If it -- if it can't look as good as NBC in visuals, then people won't accept it.

Those days are over. We've laid the groundwork and the rails. And now you are the first one to come out as a really big guy and say, "Okay. I'm going to go and do this model, and I'm going to do it by myself. I don't need to join a network or whatever. I'm going to do it by myself." How long before, Bill, this becomes the absolute norm?

BILL: You know, it's hard to say. Our blueprint is that we want to deliver on a daily basis 30 to 40 minutes of honest news analysis, honest in the sense that it's fact-based.

And we're going to do that. And so we did a prototype this week on BillO'Reilly.com, where I was in a studio in a spiffy jacket and tie. And we had guests via Skype. And it went very well. I mean, it looked good. People liked it.

We have it up now, BillO'Reilly.com. Anybody can see the prototype. And it -- and it was tough. It was tough analysis. Talk about North Korea and stuff like that.

Now, we haven't decided exactly when we're going to launch this on a daily basis because we're doing our podcasts from my home office now. And it's working very, very well. But it's going to happen. And even if I decide to come back to cable TV, we'll still do this 30 to 40 minutes per day, because we don't want any -- I'm sorry about that. That's enthusiasm.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh.

BILL: Enthusiasm from the --

GLENN: That's Bill's head writer.

BILL: From the community.

Anyway, we don't want any intrusion.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

BILL: Corporate intrusion or Media Matters intrusion or threats or any of that. We want to control the product, as you do.

GLENN: Right. So you can control --

BILL: And I think this prototype that we put out is going to take root. And I think it's going to be very successful.

GLENN: Right.

BILL: The reason this is necessary, this is the key to it all, is there's been a profound change in cable news. And as we discussed in previous episodes of the Beck program, network news is largely irrelevant now. Remember Scott Pelley, the anchor of CBS News?

GLENN: No. Neither does anybody else.

BILL: Well, Scott packed it in, and nobody even knew.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: I mean, nobody even said a word. It was like, poor Scott. He was there six years on every night. He was taking Walter Cronkite's seat, and he's out of there, and nobody even cares. That's how irrelevant the Nightly News is.

The morning is entertainment. So when cable news starts then to change -- fundamentally change, not into a news service anymore. They're not a news service. They're basically a party apparatus. So MSNBC, CNN, they're a Democrat Party apparatus. And Fox News, to some extent, not to the extent of the others, it reflects a Republican point of view. Well, where do Americans go for the truth? People seeking the truth and not having a vested interest in one political party or one political philosophy. There's nowhere to go.

So that this, in a capitalistic society, this Blaze, the Beck Blaze, O'Reilly, BillO'Reilly.com, this now presents a very, very attractive alternative to millions of Americans who love their country and want to know about it in a truthful way.

GLENN: Bill.

BILL: You're stunned at that analysis?

GLENN: No, no, no. I was actually --

BILL: You're absolutely stunned. It's so right on. Nobody has ever talked that way to you.

GLENN: I was actually hoping for a deeper insight. Why don't you put the dog on the phone?

(laughter)

All right. When we come back --

BILL: Corgi.

GLENN: When we come back, we're going to have to go over the strategy of North Korea, how Bill thinks that is going, where that ends up, and all the rest of the news of the week with Bill O'Reilly. You can hear him every day at BillO'Reilly.com. That's BillO'Reilly.com. BillO'Reilly.com.

GLENN: So let's bring Bill O'Reilly from Bill O'Reilly back. BillO'Reilly.com. And talk to him a little bit about North Korea.

First of all, Bill, are we going to war with North Korea?

BILL: No.

GLENN: Okay. If -- if it is just between us, we're having a private council, you're the president of the United States, and you've got your council split in half. And half says, "Mr. President, we've got to go. They've crossed too many red lines. It's only going to be a problem down the road. We got to go, and I'd like to recommend a first strike." The other half says, "No first strike and, no, don't go to war because millions will die." Which do you lean towards?

BILL: Okay. You can't do a preemptive strike with nukes on anybody. That's not acceptable in the world we live in. You could do, you know, some bombing like -- like you did in Syria, take out a strategic military target. I mean, that's certainly possible. But I don't see that happening.

What I see happening is this is -- Trump is basically telling the world, "Look, I'm capable of this," which is true. I'm capable of it.

Which Obama was and everybody knew, no matter what you did, Obama wasn't going to do anything drastic. And it was like Merkel today, the German chancellor comes in and says, "Well, there really isn't any military solution to North Korea."

Now, just step back and analyze how stupid that statement is from Angela Merkel. What if North Korea launches a missile at Guam or Japan or South Korea? What if they do that? I mean, that's what this idiot is threatening to do.

And Merkel says there's no military solution to that. So, what, you let them do that? That's exactly the wrong message.

And Trump's message is basically symbolic. It's a symbolic message. I'm capable of this. But will he do it? No. Only if they attack, they being North Korea, one of our allies or any interest that the United States has. Then he will. But I don't see any new component in this. Because that's Armageddon. Once you start with the nukes, then, you know, the stuff kills south Koreans. It kills Chinese. You really can't do that.

GLENN: So here's where I've come down on this, on my understanding of what Donald Trump is doing. And it may be more wishful thinking. But I don't think it is.

As I've watched this game play out and I know, you know, how horrible war with North Korea would be and now especially with China saying, "You do a first strike, we're on their side. You fight back, we're going to leave them to their own business. And you guys can have at them." There's no way we're going for a first strike.

If we do, we turn the whole world against us, I think.

BILL: Yeah. And the generals -- look, Kelly is the guy calling the shots, a lot of the shots now. He's never going to do it.

GLENN: Yep, I agree.

BILL: People got to calm down. And the reason that this has taken on hysteria is because it's August. There's no other news. Cable news is all -- I mean, they're just going crazy. And they're whipping everybody up. And the left wants everybody to think that Trump is Dr. Strangelove. And so that's why it's whipping up.

But if you look at it, it's probably not going to lead to anything. It's going to fizzle out like most of the North Korean missile tests do.

GLENN: So here is the second part of that: If this indeed is strategy and Donald Trump is playing the strong hand because nobody has the United States for a long time and wants to put everybody on notice and does have a little bit of a twitchy eye, he may in the end, if this works, be remembered as Ronald Reagan, when it came to the Cold War. This is exactly the argument we had from the left on Ronald Reagan.

BILL: Yeah. But it's a different situation because you have irrationality in North Korea. I mean, this guy is pretty irrational.

But, you know, I want to personalize it a little. And I can do that by a plug. You know, Killing the Rising Sun is about -- primarily about the atom bomb drop on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And the power of those bombs was so horrific -- now, they're 10,000 times as powerful. And if you really want to know what happened -- and kids should know it too. We have a kid's book: The Day the World Went Nuclear, off Killing the Rising Sun. We take you right down, we put you right down at Hiroshima when that bomb dropped, and you can feel what happened. And so that's why the horror of nuclear war, it gets people crazy. I mean, it really does. It gets people crazy.

And all Americans should know what the actual horror is. That you're going to have people vaporized on the spot, that you're going to have fallout that states for 50 to 60 years. Makes Chernobyl look like Disneyland. So I think that when you take that into consideration and then you're President Trump or whatever, you're not going to do that unless you absolutely have to do it. But I can see a surgical, you know, conventional strike on North Korea, if they keep it up.

GLENN: Bill, you were probably, oh, around retirement age back in '82 and '83, when -- when The Day After came out. And that was -- '82 was the year I graduated from high school. So I had a very different look at it then. I just looked it up this week. I was just kind of zipping through it on YouTube. And I remember how scary that was. But because of my age back then, I really didn't see it as really what it was. Nothing's changed. That is Hollywood and the press and the networks trying to make you more afraid of Ronald Reagan's rhetoric than really the Soviet Union. And trying to thwart Ronald Reagan. Would you agree with that?

Did you see that that way?

BILL: Yeah, the left historically never wants to fight for anything. And anybody who counters that is a war-mongering fascist. So even before World War II, there was a big strain of Americans that didn't want to confront Hitler or Tokyo. They didn't want to get involved.

GLENN: Yeah.

BILL: And some of those were conservative people.

GLENN: Yeah. The America First -- the America First campaign.

BILL: Yeah, just stay away. We got two oceans protecting us. Well, now we don't have any oceans. Okay? So it is an emotional issue, but people should know, this isn't like Iraq or Afghanistan. You know, sending in the Special Forces to track down ISIS. It's nothing like that.

This guy is playing with something that could obliterate millions of people. And so I -- I have, you know, confidence in the American system that we're not going to do anything irresponsible. That's the key word. The rhetoric is the rhetoric, all right? Trump is definitely sending a message to the world that he's capable, like Reagan. Okay? But I don't think anything more will come of this, at this point.

GLENN: Okay. Let me give you just some quick hits here and just get your comments on. Chelsea Manning being described as an American beauty in a woman's swimsuit on the beach in Vanity Fair. Comments?

BILL: What do you want me to say about it?

GLENN: Just any comment on --

BILL: I mean, look, if she wants to be in a bathing suit and on a beach, she has the perfect right to do that. If Vanity Fair wants to make a deal about it, I don't care.

GLENN: It's not that. It's that she's an American traitor. How many people lost their lives because of her?

BILL: Oh, I see. Okay. Yeah.

GLENN: And now we're being spoon-fed, that, no, she's just a beautiful woman.

BILL: And if I could just remind everybody, President Obama commuted her sentence. Okay. So that's why she's in the bikini. Now, maybe that was part of the deal. I'll let you out, if you go into a bikini in Vanity Fair. That's the deal.

PAT: That's a weird deal.

GLENN: That's a weird deal.

PAT: But okay.

BILL: It could have happened.

PAT: It could have.

GLENN: Paul Manafort, the raid of his residence by the FBI.

BILL: You know, not since Eliot Ness and the Untouchables has there been a crime drama at this level.

You know, Manafort, I've always said this from the very beginning: If there's one Trump person that's got a deficit in this whole thing, it's him. Because he made some big money representing pro-Russian interests in the Ukraine situation. He had the contacts. He knew the guys.

GLENN: Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

BILL: He knew Boris and Natasha. And so, you know, they went in. They try to find out what he has, and I'm glad I'm not Paul Manafort.

GLENN: Mitch McConnell said the reason why the G.O.P. is getting a bad brand or bad name is because Donald Trump and others had excessive expectations.

BILL: I just think this guy is such a dweeb. I hate to be -- you know, I just think McConnell is such a dweeb. D-W-E-E-B. Word of the day.

GLENN: Yeah. Word of the day.

BILL: I mean, this guy, when I was very close to getting Kate's Law on the floor of the Senate, it was him who sabotaged it. Because he wanted to attach all kinds of stuff that he knew wasn't going to pass it.

I just think this guy is just -- I don't know him. I don't -- he never came on my program. He was always afraid to do that.

I just don't have any use for him at all. So I wish -- I wish there was more dynamic leadership on both sides. On the Democratic side, you have Chucky Schumer threatening all of his people.

If you don't do what I say, we're going to run somebody against you in the primary and cut off your money. That's why he's got all these Democrats, you know, voting against their country's best interests.

And on the other side, you've got Mitch McConnell playing whatever game he's playing. So it's just really -- and I think Americans have got it. It's disgusting. It really is.

GLENN: Bill O'Reilly, writing some great history books and books now for your kids as well. You can hear his commentary every day at BillO'Reilly.com.

You can get his podcast and his members also are chiming in now on, how do we make this internet newscast work for you? And he's taking your comments on it. And you can watch it now at BillO'Reilly.com. Thanks, Bill, appreciate it.

BILL: Now, Beck, one more thing before you dump me here, if I send you an advanced copy of Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence, will you read it, Beck? Will you read the book if I send it to you in advance? It's out September 19th.

GLENN: Are there some things in the pages that maybe might fall out?

BILL: You're going to find out what Franklin, Washington, and Jefferson were really like.

GLENN: I only care about Benjamin. If Benjamin happens to be in those papers and it slips out of the book, I might read it.

BILL: All right!

GLENN: But I'm interested in the Benjamins. Thank you very much, Bill. Appreciate it. God bless. BillO'Reilly.com. BillO'Reilly.com.

Dr. Oz EXPOSES the $15 Billion Medicare SCAM Behind the Gov't Shutdown

Glenn Beck sits down with Dr. Mehmet Oz to reveal the shocking truth behind the government shutdown and how billions of taxpayer dollars are being STOLEN through Medicare and Medicaid fraud. From California’s healthcare funding for illegals, to foreign governments like Russia, China, and Cuba exploiting America’s medical system, this discussion exposes the corruption draining our nation’s resources. Was this the real reason for the government shutdown?

RADIO

The DISTURBING truth about the END of the government shutdown

Enough Democrats have finally decided to end the government shutdown. But as we await a final vote, Glenn warns that the battle is far from over. The shutdown had a MAJOR effect on our nation: it softened people up even more to socialism.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

STU: Thank God, we are out of this shutdown potentially.

That's the thing today.

GLENN: Yeah. Are we? Are we though?

Are we?

STU: Yeah. The Democrats stepped up. Or folded, depending on who you are talking to. And solved this for us.

GLENN: Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you for that. I appreciate that.

It is -- it's so clear now that all they did was they held this for the election, to try to win the election. And now they're ready to -- to fold. And we are seeing people with real, real problems all around the country.

Socialism is becoming popular because the -- quite honestly, the -- the right is not -- is not answering the question, what do we do from here?

We are in what's called a K shaped economy right now.

And that's what happens after a crisis. When the different groups, head to different opposite directions and locations.

If you think about a K, you think the upper line goes up. And the lower line, that's the -- the up are the people with assets and homes and stable jobs.

And they'll do well.

But the lower -- the lower line goes down.

And that's the people living paycheck to paycheck.

The renters. The small businesses. The wage earners. That all fall behind.

And right now, you're seeing on television, you're seeing, oh, my gosh. Look at, the stock market is up. All of these things are up. Well, that's great. Some rise. Some sink. But the gap is widening here. The K at the very beginning where the two lines meet is very, very close to each other.

But as they keep going, those lines becomes further and further apart. And there is a moment in -- you know -- there's a moment -- how can I explain this?

Remember the old country fairs? You probably never went to one. But maybe you saw it on TV. Where there's a strong man contest. And there's that thing where, you know, you hit the -- you hit the thing with the hammer, and the bell goes up. And it goes bing!

That's what's happening right now. There's a strong man contest going on right now, and everybody leans in to see, oh, will this guy be able to ring the bell? And he takes the big hammer, and he swings it, and the puck goes up, and it rings the bell. Some swing just as hard, and the puck barely budges, okay? Same hammer, same pole, different outcomes. That's a K-shaped economy.

And we live in a moment where the puck is going up for those who already own a house and have investments or run businesses that survived the storm. And, you know, they -- they swing the hammer.
And the bell goes up and rings the bell. But the family down the street, the young couple that is trying to buy their first house. The small shop owner that never reopened. They're swinging just as hard. Just, the puck is barely going up as hard. And the system says, "Try again, step right up. Try again."

And then hands a smaller hammer. A K-shaped economy is not philosophy.

It's not a political slogan. It's what happens when a government prints money like confetti. And then watches inflation climb a ladder that is missing rungs. And then tells you, don't worry. The economy is booming. I'm sorry. The economy is not booming for a lot of Americans.

And there are big changes being made right now of the global level. And I like the changes that are being made at the global level. But we are -- we are forgetting there are too many people that are really hurting right now.

You know, we are going to continue to work and continue to spin our wheels on socialism. Until there is a new idea on how we're going to get out of this problem.

And Donald Trump is working on a long-term solution. But I -- I fear that's not going to be enough.

I heard a crazy idea today about a 50-year mortgage. Oh!

Wow!

So the average person is in their house for 12 years.

And I've got a 30-year mortgage. Which means, I'm not really putting very much into it. Because the bank is taking all of the interest rates for the first, you know, ten years, at least. They're taking all the interest first. And then I don't really start paying my house off until the last 15 years of that mortgage. But now, instead of a 30-year, you want me to do it for 50 years!

Oh! Okay. Okay.

Well, what -- what is that going to do. Well, first of all, it's going to raise the price of the house.

You know, if everybody starts -- I get a 50-year mortgage, so I can afford the house. We have a shortage of houses.

So the house payments. Sorry, the house prices are going to go up because we have a lack of housing. And then on top of it, you're going to double the payment anyway.

Because you're paying all that extra interest. I mean, you're just charging more and stretching it out. It's like, solving hunger by not giving food. But just giving longer straws to people.

Okay. Wait. What?

You'll pay double to the same house. It means double the interest rates. And while your roof has to be repaired, the -- the brand-new wiring that you had when you bought the house, all needs to be redone. The appliances have to be replaced. Everything. The bathroom is completely out of date.

All has to be replaced again. You're still paying on that house.

It's like buying, not one house, but two houses. And it's not freedom.

It is trapping you. And, you know, what really bothers me is, it is home ownership. No. I'm sorry.

It's renting, disguised as home ownership.

That's what that is. You're not going to build equity into a house like that. You won't own your home until you're in your '80s. And if you bought it later in your life, your children will inherit the payments that you have. It masks the problem that we really have. Is home prices. Because we don't have enough homes.

We also have these giant corporations that are buying up homes, en masse!

And then renting them to us!

And we also have prices for the home that is broken from the wage -- a 50-year mortgage is like giving someone a longer plank on a sinking ship.

I'm going to end up in the water anyway.

I guess that's helpful in a strange sort of way.

What we don't understand is these are the conditions in which socialism thrives.

If we keep just trying to say, socialism is wrong! We're not going to help anyone.

There's two things that have to happen.

We, A, have to come up with new solutions for these very old problems.

And the new solutions cannot involve printing more money. Bailing the banks out.

Giving the banks more interest. Or anything like that.

Because socialism is coming with a vengeance. And, boy, I've got to tell you, it is going to have all kinds of answers, because it always does. In January, I will start something new, called the Torch, and it exists really, for one reason. We're running out of time to relearn what our grandparents knew by heart. Okay? The lies that we face today are not new.

They're old ghosts wearing just modern clothes. And starting January, I'm dedicating the next part of my life.

The last part of my career, to education on history and -- and usable things going deep. You know, the thing about broadcast is, you go very wide and very shallow. I need to go narrow and deep at times.

We will still be doing what I do here. Which is bringing you all the news and trying to make sense of it.

But I need to go deep on things. And socialism is one of them.

So we are working right now on new programs and new podcasts, and new -- a new daily rhythm of learning that I've never done before. And some of these shows are just going to be you and me, every single day, just walking through history with a flash light in one hand and the truth in the other, trying to figure out what's going on. But one of the lessons that I think we need in this is a series on socialism, on why it never works, how it happens.
And how the lies always begin exactly the same. This is the kind of work that the Torch is being built for. So let me give you -- let me give you a highlight of one lesson.

On how -- whenever a society gets into this situation, history will show us, a poisoned promise begins. And I'll give that to you, here in just a second.

GLENN: Okay. So let me give you -- with a K-shaped -- a K-shaped economy, the socialists always arrive making all kinds of poison promises, and there is a pattern. And it is so ancient, it can be Scripture. Also, modern enough to sit on the news crawl, as you're watching whatever news you're watching.

Every socialist experiment starts with the same smooth tongue promise: We are going to make life fair.

Unfortunately, for socialists, you know, history keeps impeccable books. The receipts are really, really damning. Fortunately for socialists, nobody ever reads history.

So let's take a quick stop at history for a second. Hugo Chavez is probably the latest. When Chavez took power in Venezuela, it was 19.95. He told the nation, which was boom. It was lake America 2000, okay?

He said -- he's building a new -- a new revolution that would create a classless society. Where oil wealth would lift the poorest into dignity.

Okay?

He had the richest country, besides I think the United States of America, in the western hemisphere.

He said, it wasn't enough!

We need no more hunger.

No more shantytowns. And the state will guarantee your rights. And we're going to distribute the wealth of the rich to the people.

And everybody cheered. And everybody was so very excited. And for a short moment, the fantasy glowed. Because it always the blows for just a fraction of the second.

He nationalized the oil industry. Then he said, poverty he would end by decree.

Well, he ended something by decree.

By 2014, the shelves were completely empty in the stores. By 2016, the average Venezuelan was losing over 20 pounds a year, due to food shortages.

Let me just remind you, that by 2016, they were eating the dogs and the cats in the streets.
Not making that up. Look it up yourself. And the zoo animals in the cages of the zoo were also being cooked up for people on the streets to eat!

Hospitals lost their power. Children died from treatable diseases.

Millions fled the country. And today, Venezuela sits on the largest proven oil reserves in the world!

And yet, people are standing in line for bread while the daughters of the socialists post photos of European vacations. What's happening to the revolution there?

It ended with a ruling class gorging on privilege and the nation digging through dumpsters for meals. That's the way it always happens. It's not an outlier. It's a rule.

Look at Cuba, 1959, Fidel Castro. I'm quoting, the revolution will bring justice, equality, education, and health care for all!

Freedom from American exploitation. Che declared that Cuba would become an example of a new humanity!

Well, what followed?

Well, first thing they did, was they shut down the independent newspapers. They were shut down by 1960. Then they imprisoned people in labor camps for being counterrevolutionary, including priests, teachers, and homosexuals.

Yeah, that Che. Then food rationing began in 1962. By the way, food rationing in Cuba has never ended!

Today, the average salary in Cuba is $15 a month!

Now, the same communist party that claimed to abolish class, created the most immovable ruling class in the Caribbean, and yet the billboard still shows smiling peasants and slogans about equality, while the sons of party officials are driving imported cars through Havana's rotting streets. And everybody else has to fix a car from the 1950s. Remember, the promise was fairness, but result was an island-sized cage.

All right. It was just those two! Now, let's look at Germany. The Nazis were -- national socialists. Hitler didn't sell Naziism as tyranny. He sold it as social justice for the German worker. The Nazi platform, 1920, promised abolition of unearned incomes. Profit-sharing in large industries. Nationalization of trust. Land reform because there just wasn't enough space for people to own their own houses. All in the interest of the common good. It was marketed as a worker's movement. A worker's -- a socialist worker's movement, and it was going to correct all the inequality, punish the greedy capitalists, and restore fairness. So what happened? Well, first the disabled had to go, and the sick children. Because we can't afford to keep them going. And the political dissenters, they were just stopping us from all this progress. Oh, and the Jews, of course and the Slavs.

And the Pols. I mean, anyone who didn't fit the utopian math, they were gone. The promise of fairness became the most industrialized murder machine the world has ever seen. But don't worry. We can also go to the Soviet Union. The grand cathedral of socialist dreams.

Here's what Lenin promised: We'll bring about the complete equality of all citizens, end quote!

The state, quoting, will whither away! Oh, yeah.

The workers will own the factories. The peasants will own the land. Okay. So they got power. And what happened?

Well, none of that. Under Stalin, over 100,000 priests were executed or sent to camps. Why?

Why do they keep going after the religious people? Because the religious people are the only ones that will stand against monsters, that's why.

Millions of Ukrainian peasants were starved under the Holodomor for refusing the collectivization. Read that story. It's horrific. The workers paradise required one of the largest secret police stories in human history. Why?

Soviet Union became a nation where you waited hours to buy bread. Party members, however, if you were in the party, and you were high up.

Oh, you could get anything you wanted. You had luxury stores that were built just for you.

By the 1980s, the system was so hollow, that the most basic consumer goods. Soap. Shoes. Toilet paper, they were rationed or unavailable. And, by the way, the state never withered away. It metastasized into every corner of life. It became everything.

This story of socialism is written in blood, in ledger books, all over the world.

And it always starts with the promise of equity or equality. And it always leads to the rise of an elite who decides what equality means. And every time it fails, they say, well, that was just put in the hands of the wrong people.

No, the key word here is not wrong. It's people. People.

The workers never get the factories. The peasants never receive the land. The poor never get any of the wealth.

And it's this story over and over and over and over again.

Socialism begins with a promise. But always ends with a ruling class, armed with absolute power!

Only the names change.

Did you know that -- did you know in Jamestown, in 1619, you know, that boat that the New York Times said arrived. Didn't arrive with slaves.

It arrived with socialism. It ended in cannibalism. Did you know that the pilgrims tried the same thing?

They decided, you know what, we should put everybody's money into a big pile. You take whatever you be need.

That's the Christian thing to do!

You know what that ended with?

Starvation and death.

By the way, the big reunion tower, the big ball you see in the sky.

That's to mark reunion.

That's the first sociologist town in 1855 in Dallas. Guess how that ended! Starvation!

RADIO

Can AI destroy lives? Starbuck’s case raises terrifying questions

Did Google's AI defame filmmaker ‪@RobbyStarbuck‬ by making up that he had been accused of sexual assault?! Robby joins Glenn to discuss how he has filed a defamation lawsuit against Google, who's AI bot 'Gemini' claimed Robby had been accused of sexual assault out of thin air. Robby also revealed to Glenn that Gemini claimed Glenn actually reported on the story, which never happened. If Google's AI can do this to somebody like Robby, it can and it will be used to shape narratives, influence opinions, and even SWING elections.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Robby Starbuck is an interesting guy. He once directed Oscar-winning actors, some of the biggest music stars in the world. He started seeing the threat of Marxism to America. His family fled to Cuba. So he -- he has seen this movie before. So he started standing up in 2015. He endorsed Trump. Hollywood didn't like that. He's gone on to -- he is a major force in getting transgender surgery and hormones for children in Tennessee banned. He helped pass the law to put the death penalty on the table for child rapists in Tennessee. He also did a documentary, the War on Children, which I think had 60 million views after Elon Musk said, "You really needed to watch this."

And then he had a problem with Google AI. Google AI started coming after him, and saying all kinds of really horrible and specific things that he had been, you know, charged with sexual assault. And child rape. And abuse. And fraud. And stalking. And all kinds of stuff.

From Google AI.

He finds out about it. And he engages with Google AI. And it just keeps doubling down.

He is now in a lawsuit.
And we wanted to have him on. Because I saw something last week, that shows that Google AI apparently is still using me as a source, on some of these allegations.

Nope!

That wouldn't be me!

Robbie, welcome to the program.

ROBBY: Thanks for having me, Glenn. Yeah, you were one of the sources cited. And so this is one of the crazy parts of what happened. Google AI has been inventing these lies about me that have no basis in reality. I've literally never been accused of or charged with any crime, ever, let alone, this crazy stuff.

But during this time period there, AI transitions from Bard to Gemini and Gemma, right? Gemini and Gemma started doing something very different than ever Bard did. And it was -- it started inventing actual articles and references to videos. Links, fake links to real media personalities and media outlets. And it would even make headlines or give summaries of what these people said.

So in your case, it said that you reported on sexual assault allegations against me by women. And these are not just saying sexual assault accusations. It has names of victims. It has fake police records it invents. Fake court records it invents.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh.

ROBBY: Articles from media. So it goes so detailed into this, it will list out evidence that doesn't exist, investigations by police departments that don't exist, and it just doubles down when you press on it.

Some people might be saying, what are you saying to the AI to get this out?

We've posted examples where people posted. And asked questions as simple as, tell me about Robby Starbuck, and it immediately dives into saying that I'm accused of sexual assault. And so you go and you say, "Hey, where is the citation of this? Give me sources. Give me only facts." It will double and triple down. And if you say, "Hey, those links you gave me do not work." It has even gone so far as to invent and fake an entire media article under a real journalist name, to pretend that it was printed, and somehow for some reason, it was taken down by the media outlet's website.

GLENN: That is crazy. Crazy.

Can we -- Stu. We just asked Gemini, tell me about the sexual assault allegations of Robby Starbuck. And here's what he just said.

STU: And I asked specifically, what did Glenn Beck say about those sexual abuse allegations?

And it said, it was unable to find any specific statements by Glenn Beck addressing these allegations.

And I asked, what the abuse allegations were?

Gemini now says, it was fabricated. And was disseminated by Google AI's platforms.

And I said, well, wait a minute. Google AI platforms were the problem. Isn't that you?

And they said, "That's an excellent and relevant question. You were correct to notice the connection."

So apparently, it's been corrected at this part.

ROBBY: You're a smart guy. No, so here's where Google ends up in a really, really precarious position in this lawsuit.

So they've created their phone app, right? And the main website for Gemini. However, they've got a major problem.

So their AI Gemma has been downloaded 150 million times. And they're not all connected to the internet. Google cannot force updates to those AI downloads. So Gemma will essentially, seemingly defame me for life as a by-product of that.

GLENN: Wow.

ROBBY: And then Gemini as well, same issue. They released wild models of Gemini into the public sphere. So if you go on one of those AI websites, like there's LOM Arena (phonetic), where you test different AIs against each other. And you ask those versions, that are wild downloads of it, you're going to get a bunch of this crazy stuff.

You go, you know, on any application that was built with these into the bedrock that allows you to ask questions about somebody, you will get the same stuff.

So I want you to think, you know, sort of down the line here.

If somebody builds an app with reputations for insurance risk. And they build it, using let's say Gemma. And it's feeding information about specific people.

You know, you very quickly start to understand, there's very many different situations, where this affects people's lives in many different ways. The real problem here is, we don't have a standard, at the first principle with AI, that it can't harm humans. And that's really the thing that they have to fix.

Because if it can do this to me. It can do this to anybody. To your sons. To your daughters.

And it can ruin their lives. Because AI is dominating in many different industries.

GLENN: Oh, yeah.

ROBBY: So what we've asked ourselves is, are we protecting our kids and grandchildren from the downstream effects of AI that believes it's okay to harm humans? Whether that's by defamation or physical harm?

And it's very easy to imagine a future after seeing what happened to me, where a nice guy with the wrong politics, is lied about by the dominant AI and makes him unemployable. Because whenever somebody researches him, the AI is feeding out a background check that says he's an accused rapist and supported the KKK. So on and so forth. That's another one of the lies that were told about me. Which would be strange, as a Latino, I kind of felt like Dave Chappelle in that skit. Like, the black kid, gay member. I was like, well, that would be strange for me, as a Latino. But it sticks to this in a genuine belief system, and that's what's really scary.

Is it's creating this base of knowledge that I refer to as the roots of the tree. Right?

And this tree is growing right now. And it's going to be a big part of this world. And we're either going to allow that tree to have poisonous roots that makes everything it bears poisonous. Or we're going to say, hey, no, we've got to build this very carefully so that it does not do this to humanity.

GLENN: So my -- my -- I think the most important question I could ask you is, how are you not my richest friend at this point? How do you not own go Google at this point? What they've done to you. How is this not just really simple?

ROBBY: So you're friends with Elon Musk, too. Right?

GLENN: Well...

ROBBY: You know, aside for that, you know, I will say this, you know, our lawsuit, even people who don't like me, they read it, and they're like, damn, you guys got them. It's very clear what they did is wrong.

GLENN: Oh, yeah.

ROBBY: There's no getting out of this. That's even with the public figure, sort of threshold. For how public figures are treated, in defamation cases, versus somebody else. You have to prove actual malice or gross negligence. In our case, we notified Google for two years, that this was happening and asked them to stop it. They did not stop it until at least with the app and the website, very, very recently over this last week. Everything else --

GLENN: Over the last -- wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Over the last week?

ROBBY: Yeah. I -- even after we filed the lawsuit, it was still happening on their main platforms. So this is something that like we had to go out there, and I had to make this go viral, for them to pay any attention to fixing it finally.

But for two years, they were not engaged by just me notifying their executive and Google employees, talking directly to me.

Even built in a lawsuit. One of the Google employees that was working with us two years ago, trying to get this fixed. She resigned. Okay?

And, you know, apologized for not being able to -- but then, you know, I ran into the law firm. They had multiple cease and desist letters to Google. And Google essentially just couldn't be troubled to fix the problem. Which makes you wonder, what was the real intention of this? Was this a dry run? A dry reputation, so you can use it in elections? Because Glenn, you know as well as I do, the seats in our country determine power in our country. Which party controls it?

So I want you to imagine, a generation now. Where so many people, more than ever. Are just relying on an AI and the internet. To say, hey, what's the difference between these candidates? Or who should I vote for?

And imagine it spits out that the Republican candidate in every swing seat is an alleged criminal. And every Democrat has a fluffed up resume, where the horrible things they've done, if you ask about it. They'll say, oh, no. That's a lie. That's a lie. That's not true. Those are Republican talking points. It's a grand Republican conspiracy.

Very easy to see, where AI flips elections and decides control of our country.

GLENN: I can't -- I mean, I -- honestly, I thought this had been solved.

You know, months ago. Months ago.

I didn't know that up until last week this was still going. I mean, they don't have -- they don't have a leg is to stand on. I mean, your attorneys must be like, I'm never going to work again.

ROBBY: That's right. Well, the wild downloads will seemingly do this forever. And in our estimation in the AI and first we talked to, there's no way that we found for Google to be able to force an update to these things. I mean, I'm open to hearing differently. But we've talked to some of the biggest experts in the country.

And they're like, no, there's no way. A bunch of these models aren't even connected to the internet, and they're used to build a lot of the bedrocks of things people use including medical devices, law enforcement, all types of things.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh.

ROBBY: So in terms of damages, like, if we go all the way to trial, a jury seemingly doesn't have a limit as to what they can assign as punitive damages.

Because you have to remember, Google is the fourth largest company in the world. So if you want a company like that to learn a lesson, the only way to do it is to slap them with damages that they never want to happen again. Right?

So that's -- our hope is that they're going to be held accountable, and that we're going to change the rules and set the precedent here so that there is a first principle with AI, that it can do no harm against humans.

And if there is some massive damage at the end of this, that is assigned to me and I'm paid out by, I plan to use that, you know, in good stewardship, right? To help humanity, to be able to navigate these waters and ensure that we have AI that's fair and unbiased.

GLENN: And remember, your good friend that never said anything bad about you on the air, ever. Not once. Not ever.

ROBBY: That's right.
(laughter)

GLENN: Wow. Where is this going to be -- where is the trial going to be? Please, don't say California.

ROBBY: No. Not California. Delaware.

We just got our judge assigned. I really feel like it's one of these cases, where no matter where you are.

There's the appeals process, and things like that.

And at the end of the day, highest courts. When you look at this case, I mean, I don't see how any judge, even one that really dislikes me, really looks at it, and finds a way to get rid of it.

And that's -- what they did is so egregious, it has to be answered for in some way.

GLENN: No. And especially since, it will never, ever go away. They've got to find a way to purge that stuff.

They have to. I mean, maybe they made that mistake this time. But that can't be made a second time. That destroys people forever. Forever. And ever and ever.

ROBBY: That's the important part of this is making sure it doesn't happen to anyone else.

GLENN: Robby, well, I'm glad it's finally stopped, and -- to some extent. And we'll be following. Thanks so much, Robby. We'll be following. Appreciate it.

ROBBY: Thank you, Glenn. Appreciate it.

GLENN: You bet. Buh-bye.

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Transcript

Can AI destroy lives? Starbuck’s case raises terrifying questions

Transcript

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