This Singer Told People to ‘Love and Value Our Planet’ at a Hurricane Relief Benefit

September 14, 2017

WRITER

People are wonderful and should love each other … just as long as they all believe in climate change.

That’s the takeaway from Stevie Wonder’s comments during a performance at a star-studded hurricane relief benefit. The “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” singer urged people to set aside all “political persuasions” and care for each other.

People should value one another “as we should begin to love and value our planet,” Wonder said. “And anyone who believes that there is no such thing as global warming must be blind or unintelligent.”

Glenn pointed out two key lessons to be learned here:

1 --- We know from the hurricane aftermath that good causes don’t need celebrity names anymore since only a small amount of funding came from Hollywood.

2 --- We should expect kindness to be accompanied with politics from progressives.

Instead, “let’s actually love people. Let’s actually serve people,” Glenn said. If you’re going to reach out to people, you need to be kind without bringing in political qualifications like the need to believe in climate change.

“Let’s stop hating each other,” Glenn said. “Let’s start seeing that we are alike and start seeing humanity in each other.”

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

GLENN: So while we're here, let's talk about all of the wonderful things that Hollywood is doing to help out the victims of the hurricane.

They've just had a big gala, where they raised $44 million. Wow. They had a TV network. They had every star known to man. And they raised $44 million.

There's a football player who just raised by himself $32 million.

STU: J.J. Watt.

GLENN: Thirty-two by himself. He did that, you know, with Twitter. "I don't know, I'm thinking about raising some money. You want to help?"

Thirty-two million dollars later. You spend all of this money, all of this production. You bring in every star -- and I'm sure they all -- they were all driving the Leaf. None of them were driving anything that was -- seriously, they were all driving a Leaf. And you brought them all together. And, you know, you had the catering trucks and the catering tents. And everything else, congratulations, $44 million. What happened here? Why only $44 million.

Because Hollywood is irrelevant and they don't even know it. Hollywood -- everybody is sick -- I mean everybody on both sides. They don't need you anymore. To raise money, you don't need people like me anymore. You don't need anybody. You don't need celebrity. You don't need anything.

If you have a good cause and you have a direct way to help, you're going to -- it's great. This is technology.

We don't need the celebrities. And could the celebrities help? Yes. Yes.

J.J. Watt, he's helping. He is helping.

The problem is, they fail to look at what he did, and that is, "Wow. People need help. Let's help them."

And then, I'm not trying to make a political point, I'm not trying to make any point whatsoever, let's just help them.

Is anybody else -- is anybody else bothered, when you go to church -- and every church is like this, when you go to church, and they start talking about how you need to love people so you can bring them in to get baptized. That drives me out of my mind.

STU: Yeah, that whole loving people to join the faith sounds terrible. Hmm.

GLENN: No. No. It does to me. And maybe because -- and maybe because I've just -- I've had shields up on that for so long. And now that I'm sitting in a congregation and I hear people say these things, what it translates to me as, "How can we get people baptized? I know, let's love them."

STU: Again, this does not sound bad. You're saying it's translating to you in a way that it sounds good. If you believe in the faith, you want people to be baptized. You want people to see the light, right? And a good way to do that -- is it hate? If you don't want love, what do you want?

GLENN: I know.

No, this is the intent. Because -- and I don't think is in the intent of the churches. I think this is the -- this is how it's interpreted by some. And that is, we want to change people's minds, so let's go in and become their friends.

Well, that's good.

STU: Isn't this the entire --

GLENN: Would you listen to me for a second? Would you let me finish? Would you let me finish?

STU: Every day on the show --

GLENN: No. Let's love people. Let's actually love people. Let's actually serve people.

Now, I said, it's not the intention, it's how it sounds, especially when it's -- when it's in churches. It sounds this way.

And it's why -- it's why I think we fail. I think we fail as churches sometimes. We fail with people. Because we have another intent. Our intent is to get you to believe what we believe.

No, that's not my intent. My intent is to get you to see that I'm just like you. I just -- I'm just like you. I don't need you to believe what I believe. We just have to stop hating each other. That's my goal. Let's stop hating each other. Let's start seeing that we are alike and start seeing humanity in each other. Let's just see that, you know what, you could hate me, but why don't you hate me for real, authentic reasons. Okay?

STU: Right.

GLENN: Why don't you hate me for that?

Until that time, how about we just love each other and cut each other some slack and help one another?

And it's my belief that if you are a happy and genuine person, somebody in your life is going to say, "You know what, I can't figure this out. You seem to have this mastered. What is it that you have?" Well, I'll tell you. I'll tell you.

That's your opportunity. But we set out, sometimes, we set out with, I'm going to get them in the boat. I'm going to get them in the boat. I'm going to get them baptized. I'm going to do X, Y, or Z. You know what, do your part. And that is, love people. We're missing the love people part.

Actually do that. No other agenda. Love people.

When you love people, they will see, "Wow, I like that guy. I like those people. I may not agree with those people. But I like them." Then you have all kinds of opportunities ahead of you. Then that's the time to talk about those opportunities.

Hollywood is not -- they did not do this because they genuinely love the people in -- in Houston. Maybe some of them did. But far too many of them started doing things like Stevie Wonder. Listen to Stevie Wonder.

(music)

STEVIE: We've come together today to love on the people that have been devastated by the hurricanes.

GLENN: Great. Great. Great.

STEVIE: When love goes into action, it preferences no color of skin.

GLENN: Oh, boy. Here we go.

STEVIE: No ethnicity.

GLENN: Agenda.

STU: But, I mean, that's true.

STEVIE: Beliefs.

GLENN: Agenda. Agenda. Agenda.

STEVIE: No sexual preferences and no political persuasions. It just loves.

GLENN: Uh-huh. Okay. Good.

STEVIE: As we should begin to love and value our planet --

GLENN: Agenda.

STEVIE: -- and anyone who believes that there's no such thing as global warming must be blind or unintelligent.

GLENN: Agenda. Okay. That sounds like --

STU: Wait. A blind guy is telling us that.

GLENN: Yeah. And that's love. That's a prayer. That's a prayer.

STU: Yeah.

GLENN: That's a prayer. You must be blind or unintelligent.

STU: Amazing. I mean, of course, as it relates to hurricanes, that is not what -- even the global warming thesis says, that there's going to be more hurricanes. They actually say there's been a decrease since 1880 in the number of hurricanes hitting the United States of America. You know, that's an amazing thing.

And I think you kind of look at that and you say, why apply that there? Why insert that into the middle of this? Because you're right, like the other stuff you're talking about, agenda, agenda. You're looking at it -- I mean, I hate to point this out, but you're looking at this in a cynical sort of way, right?

GLENN: It's Hollywood, yes. They deserve that. Yes.

STU: A correct cynical way. But, you know, there's nothing wrong with saying, "We embrace all races." Of course. Those are things we actually believe.

GLENN: There's not. There's not. I do.

STU: You just don't believe it from these people because people in Hollywood are constantly coming with an agenda. And then he proves the point seconds later.

GLENN: Correct. Yes. Look, if he said -- if he said everything that he said, "Look, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you have the Confederate flag, you don't want to -- or, you don't want to stand for the American flag. It doesn't matter. We have to love you and serve you. Period." That would have been great.

STU: It doesn't matter if you believe Harvey and Irma were caused by global warming or you feel like we've seen these storms a million times before and it's no big difference.

GLENN: Exactly right. We have to love you.

STU: We're there for you. And, again, it's not that way. You're an idiot. You're blind. You're unintelligent. They can't help themselves.

GLENN: No, they can't. Because -- because their agenda is more important. And, look, I want to make this really clear. Do I want people to find the joy that I have found in my faith? You bet I do. You bet I do.

STU: You should, right?

GLENN: I have found great joy -- I am alive today because of that. I would not have made it without that.

So I -- I do want to share that. But that's not my agenda. That's not what I get up for in the morning. That doesn't -- I'm sorry. But that is -- to me, I don't even think that was Christ's agenda. That was the result. He knew that would be the result of the way he lived his life and loving everyone, truly loving everyone. Where are your accusers now?

He's -- he won't stone somebody who broke one of his laws. He won't stone them.

Where are your accusers?

Does that mean he -- does that mean he was endorsing her? No.

His agenda is love. Love. And did she go back and -- and get right back into bed with somebody else? Probably not.

How many people -- we don't know this. But how many people did she change because he just showed love? He didn't stop and say, hey, by the way, and the only way is through me. He didn't do that. He said, "Where are your accusers? Well, I'm not going to condemn you either. Go and sin no more." That's it.

That's it. Oh, by the way, I did save you, so now I have to do this. Now you have to believe these things.

No, he loved. All of our love, it seems to have an agenda. All of the love in the world seems to have an agenda. An agenda-driven love will not change anything.

$44 million. That's nice. It's nice. When Hollywood stops with the agenda, maybe they'll be able to make a big impact again.

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VIDEO: Both Bernie Sanders and Barack Obama are radicals, but there's one HUGE difference

Biden backs yet another criminal justice policy with disastrous consequences

The number of people serving life sentences now exceeds the entire prison population in 1970, according to newly-released data from the Sentencing Project. The continued growth of life sentences is largely the result of "tough on crime" policies pushed by legislators in the 1990s, including presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Biden has since apologized for backing those types of policies, but it seems he has yet to learn his lesson. Indeed, Biden is backing yet another criminal justice policy with disastrous consequences—mandatory drug treatment for all drug offenders.

Proponents of this policy argue that forced drug treatment will reduce drug usage and recidivism and save lives. But the evidence simply isn't on their side. Mandatory treatment isn't just patently unethical, it's also ineffective—and dangerous.

Many well-meaning people view mandatory treatment as a positive alternative to incarceration. But there's a reason that mandatory treatment is also known as "compulsory confinement." As author Maya Schenwar asks in The Guardian, "If shepherding live human bodies off to prison to isolate and manipulate them without their permission isn't ethical, why is shipping those bodies off to compulsory rehab an acceptable alternative?" Compulsory treatment isn't an alternative to incarceration. It is incarceration.

Compulsory treatment is also arguably a breach of international human rights agreements and ethical standards. The World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) have made it clear that the standards of ethical treatment also apply to the treatment of drug dependence—standards that include the right to autonomy and self-determination. Indeed, according to UNODC, "people who use or are dependent on drugs do not automatically lack the capacity to consent to treatment...consent of the patient should be obtained before any treatment intervention." Forced treatment violates a person's right to be free from non-consensual medical treatment.

It's a useless endeavor, anyway, because studies have shown that it doesn't improve outcomes in reducing drug use and criminal recidivism. A review of nine studies, published in the International Journal of Drug Policy, failed to find sufficient evidence that compulsory drug treatment approaches are effective. The results didn't suggest improved outcomes in reducing drug use among drug-dependent individuals enrolled in compulsory treatment. However, some studies did suggest potential harm.

According to one study, 33% of compulsorily-treated participants were reincarcerated, compared to a mere 5% of the non-treatment sample population. Moreover, rates of post-release illicit drug use were higher among those who received compulsory treatment. Even worse, a 2016 report from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health found that people who received involuntary treatment were more than twice as likely to die of an opioid-related overdose than those with a history of only voluntary treatment.

These findings echo studies published in medical journals like Addiction and BMJ. A study in Addiction found that involuntary drug treatment was a risk factor for a non-fatal drug overdose. Similarly, a study in BMJ found that patients who successfully completed inpatient detoxification were more likely than other patients to die within a year. The high rate of overdose deaths by people previously involuntarily treated is likely because most people who are taken involuntarily aren't ready to stop using drugs, authors of the Addiction study reported. That makes sense. People who aren't ready to get clean will likely use again when they are released. For them, the only post-treatment difference will be lower tolerance, thanks to forced detoxification and abstinence. Indeed, a loss of tolerance, combined with the lack of a desire to stop using drugs, likely puts compulsorily-treated patients at a higher risk of overdose.

The UNODC agrees. In their words, compulsory treatment is "expensive, not cost-effective, and neither benefits the individual nor the community." So, then, why would we even try?

Biden is right to look for ways to combat addiction and drug crime outside of the criminal justice system. But forced drug treatment for all drug offenders is a flawed, unethical policy, with deadly consequences. If the goal is to help people and reduce harm, then there are plenty of ways to get there. Mandatory treatment isn't one of them.

Lindsay Marie is a policy analyst for the Lone Star Policy Institute, an independent think tank that promotes freedom and prosperity for all Texans. You can follow her on Twitter @LindsayMarieLP.

BOMBSHELL: 'It wasn't just Hunter,' Rudy Giuliani says Joe Biden was target of Ukraine corruption investigation — and he has the evidence to prove it

President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani joined Glenn Beck on Tuesday's radio program discuss the Senate's ongoing investigation into former vice president Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, and reveal new bombshell documents he's currently releasing.

Giuliani told Glenn he has evidence of "very, very serious crime at the highest levels of government," that the "corrupt media" is doing everything in their power to discredit.

He also dropped some major, previously unreported news: not only was Hunter Biden under investigation in 2016, when then-Vice President Biden "forced" the firing of Ukraine's prosecutor general Viktor Shokin, but so was the vice president himself.

"Shokin can prove he was investigating Biden and his son. And I now have the prosecutorial documents that show, all during that period of time, not only was Hunter Biden under investigation -- Joe Biden was under investigation," Giuliani explained. "It wasn't just Hunter."

Watch this clip to get a rundown of everything Giuliani has uncovered so far.

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Revealing Bernie’s dark side — one 1980s quote at a time

For most Americans, the 1980s was marked by big hair, epic lightsaber battles, and school-skipping Ferris Bueller dancing his way into the hearts of millions.

But for Bernie Sanders — who, by the way, was at that time the oldest-looking 40-year-old in human history — the 1980s was a period of important personal milestones.

Prior to his successful 1980 campaign to become mayor of Burlington, Vermont, Sanders was mostly known around the Green Mountain State as a crazy, wildly idealistic socialist. (Think Karl Marx meets Don Quixote.) But everything started to change for Sanders when he became famous—or, in the eyes of many, notorious—for being "America's socialist mayor."

As mayor, Sanders' radical ideas were finally given the attention he had always craved but couldn't manage to capture. This makes this period of his career particularly interesting to study. Unlike today, the Bernie Sanders of the 1980s wasn't concerned with winning over an entire nation — just the wave of far-left New York City exiles that flooded Vermont in the 1960s and 1970s — and he was much more willing to openly align himself with local and national socialist and communist parties.

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Over the past few weeks, I have been reading news reports of Sanders recorded in the 1980s — because, you know, that's how guys like me spend their Saturday nights — and what I've found is pretty remarkable.

For starters, Sanders had (during the height of the Soviet Union) a very cozy relationship with people who openly advocated for Marxism and communism. He was an elector for the Socialist Workers Party and promoted the party's presidential candidates in 1980 and 1984.

To say the Socialist Workers Party was radical would be a tremendous understatement. It was widely known SWP was a communist organization mostly dedicated to the teachings of Marx and Leon Trotsky, one of the leaders of the Russian Revolution.

Among other radical things I've discovered in interviews Sanders conducted with the SWP's newspaper — appropriately named The Militant (seriously, you can't make this stuff up) — is a statement by Sanders published in June 1981 suggesting that some police departments "are dominated by fascists and Nazis," a comment that is just now being rediscovered for the first time in decades.

In 1980, Sanders lauded the Socialist Workers Party's "continued defense of the Cuban revolution." And later in the 1980s, Sanders reportedly endorsed a collection of speeches by the socialist Sandinistas in Nicaragua, even though there had been widespread media reports of the Sandinistas' many human rights violations prior to Sanders' endorsement, including "restrictions on free movement; torture; denial of due process; lack of freedom of thought, conscience and religion; denial of the right of association and of free labor unions."

Sanders also traveled to Nicaragua and met with socialist President Daniel Ortega. He later called the trip a "profoundly emotional experience."

Comrade Bernie's disturbing Marxist past, which is far more extensive than what can be covered in this short article, shouldn't be treated as a mere historical footnote. It clearly illustrates that Sanders' brand of "democratic socialism" is much more than a $15 minimum wage and calls for single-payer health care. It's full of Marxist philosophy, radical revolutionary thinking, anti-police rhetoric, and even support for authoritarian governments.

Millions of Americans have been tricked into thinking Sanders isn't the radical communist the historical record — and even Sanders' own words — clearly show that he is. But the deeper I have dug into Comrade Bernie's past, the more evident it has become that his thinking is much darker and more dangerous and twisted than many of his followers ever imagined.

Tomorrow night, don't miss Glenn Beck's special exposing the radicals who are running Bernie Sanders' campaign. From top to bottom, his campaign is staffed with hard-left extremists who are eager to burn down the system. The threat to our constitution is very real from Bernie's team, and it's unlike anything we've ever seen before in a U.S. election. Join Glenn on Wednesday, at 9 PM Eastern on BlazeTV's YouTube page, and on BlazeTV.com. And just in case you miss it live, the only way to catch all of Glenn's specials on-demand is by subscribing to Blaze TV.

Justin Haskins (Jhaskins@heartland.org) is editorial director of The Heartland Institute and editor-in-chief of StoppingSocialism.com.

Candace Owens blasts leftist cancel culture: 'Godless', 'societal atom bomb'

Candace Owens, BLEXIT founder and author of the upcoming book, "Blackout," joined Glenn Beck on Friday's GlennTV for an exclusive interview. available only to BlazeTV subscribers.

Candace dropped a few truth-bombs about the progressive movement and what's happening to the Democratic Party. She said people are practically running away from the left due to their incessant push to dig up dirt on anybody who disagrees with their radical ideology. She explained how -- like China and its "social credit score" -- the left is shaping America into its own nightmarish episode of "Black Mirror."

"This game of making sure that everyone is politically correct is a societal atom bomb. There are no survivors. There's no one that is perfect," Candace said. "The idea that humanity can be perfect is Godless. If you accept that there is something greater than us, then you accept that we a flawed. To be human is to be flawed."

Enjoy this clip from the full episode below:

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BlazeTV subscribers can watch the full interview on BlazeTV.com. Use code GLENN to save $10 off one year of your subscription.