BLOGFebruary 27, 2018

Ben Shapiro on School Safety: ‘We Should Be Guarding Our Kids’ the Way We Guard Banks

In the wake of the latest school shooting, liberals only seem interested in gun control. Why is discussing school security and other bipartisan solutions controversial?

Ben Shapiro on Socialism: 'The Suggestion That I Owe You Something Because You Are Here Is Theft'

On today’s show, Ben Shapiro listed some ways to help keep students safe, discourage shooters and potentially prevent the next tragedy – all without eroding our Second Amendment rights. Liberals have turned the gun debate into a “moral push” even though we should be able to find bipartisan, commonsense solutions like these:

The media should stop publicizing the shooters’ names and faces and giving them infamous celebrity, something that encourages future school shooters.

Lawmakers should consider measures that let family and close friends petition to have someone’s gun rights suspended if there is enough evidence that they are dangerous.

Schools should increase their security, whether it’s through fences or more armed personnel.

“We should be guarding our kids the same way we’re guarding our banks,” Shapiro said.

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

STU: Editor-in-chief of the daily wire, Ben Shapiro.

Hello, Ben, how are you?

BEN: Hanging in there. How are you?

GLENN: Good.

Has anybody followed your lead on not giving the name of the shooter?

BEN: Not so far as I'm aware. So we over at The Daily Wire have taken up the policy in the last week and a half after Parkland of not turning the name or face of the shooter on our website.

I'm not aware that anybody else in the mainstream media have done that. We're not the first to the ballgame, of course. There are other outlets that have done that before.

But I am surprised that the same media that proclaims that every law-abiding gun owner in the country has to give up their rifle, is -- is happy to show continually on a loop the name and face of the shooter, when there are many studies suggesting that mass shooters actually thrive on the sort of publicity. It drives actually more common mass shootings.

GLENN: So, Ben, we are totally unhinged now from facts.

The CNN town hall debate last week was grotesque. And they still don't get it.

I mean, I think it would do a great service to CNN and a Jake Tapper, if they would just come out and say, you know what, having that crowd there was a horrible idea. Horrible idea.

Would you agree?

BEN: Totally agree. I mean, I thought it was Orwell's HEP -- I thought it was just a show trial for gun owners. I thought it was a show trial for the NRA.

And, you know, I know Jake. I like Jake. I think Jake does a good job, when he tries.

GLENN: Me too.

BEN: But I think that that -- I told him this, I thought that was a great injustice. I thought it was just a great injustice.

I thought the entire event was a setup from the start. Jake was not a moderator. Jake allowed the students to go up there and browbeat people like Senator Rubio, one of the students suggesting that when he looked at Rubio, it was like looking at the barrel of the gun of the shooter, which is just an insane statement to make publicly. And the crowd cheered that because it was more of a bang mob than it was an actual crowd of people considering possible arguments.

I understand passions are high. But that's the whole point of being in the news business. I mean, passions are high a lot of places. But there's a selective decision that's being made by news outlets as to which sorts of town halls are set up like this.

I mean, as I said at the time, I don't remember CNN doing a town hall in Texas on the border about illegal immigration after some high-profile killing of somebody by an illegal immigrant.

GLENN: No.

BEN: With all the members of the community. Of course they wouldn't do that. Because they would say, this isn't newsworthy. It's not newsworthy that people are passionate and upset after a shooting.

What's newsworthy is the argument that actually happens on the basis of reason and decency. And both of those things have completely fallen away are. And instead, CNN has decided to put on a particular set of students.

And there are a bunch of students who go to that school. I mean, there are thousands of students who go to that school. I know at least one of them who is a Second Amendment advocate who is not being booked every single day on CNN. The ones who are booked every day on CNN are, of course, these small group of students that you've seen their faces plastered all over the media, Emma Gonzalez and Cameron Cassty and HEP David Hog, and you know their names. You don't know the names of any of the people who were killed. But you know the names of these kids who are on TV the last two weeks, spouting gun control and suggesting folks like Dana Loesch, who we both know and like and are friends with, that people like Dana are actually uncaring about the death of children, which is just the sickest form of demogoguary. I mean, I've been calling that out since Piers Morgan. I hate that so much, this routine where we disagree on policy and therefore we don't get care if kids get killed. It's disgusting.

GLENN: Well, you could make the case that we care about kids getting killed in larger numbers than what is happening now. The greatest mass shootings in all of history come from out-of-control governments. And that's why we have the Second Amendment. To sit here and say we don't care about kids being shot, we absolutely do care about that. But we also care about protecting the freedoms of children and the children that haven't even been born yet.

BEN: That's exactly right. It's also true that even if you were to put aside the arguments on the founding level for the Second Amendment, you're telling me that in this particular case, the FBI failed twice. They were told specifically twice about the shooter by name, and they did nothing. The local law enforcement had at least 45 calls according to CNN from the shooter's house, including the shooter himself calling the police on himself, a few months ago. And they did nothing. And then we had an armed deputy on -- was present with a handgun. And we're now being told by the media, of course, that a handgun could never go up against a rifle. Which is just an insane contention that is completely meritless, as anyone who has ever fired a gun knows. And then they're telling us that all these law enforcement bodies failed, but we have to give up our guns.

So just to get this straight. My self-defense now rests on me giving up my guns to a bunch of people who will do nothing if somebody threatens me with a gun. So even on the most basic self-defense level, why in the world would I possibly give up my rights to keep and bear firearms, when the authorities aren't even keeping me safe? I mean, according to the Lockian HEP bargain, this is like their only job. Their only job is to protect life, liberty, and property. And they didn't do any of those things. They're not protecting life obviously. They didn't in Parkland. They're not protecting liberty because they want to seize my liberty and not protect my life. And they're not protecting the property of the school.

GLENN: Ben, where do you think this goes?

Because we all know that another shooting is going to happen. Because we're not taking care of the real issues. We're not even willing to -- you know, I was talking yesterday about, you know, they'll take and send the police for, you know, a third grader, who is brandishing a second degree lookalike firearm, otherwise known as a finger gun, and yet we cannot have a conversation -- they'll say, that's leading to violence. And we can't have a conversation about our culture, about the violent nature of our culture. The violent nature of our movies. The video games that our kids are deeply entrenched in. I'm not saying I want to ban any of that or anything else. But we can't even have a conversation about it.

It's all about control over you and any way of you defending yourself. So where do we go from here?

Because half of the country is dead set on that, it seems.

BEN: Yeah. I think it's going to be hard to go anywhere. Again, the entire premise of this conversation has become, you hate children. And you can't have a conversation with someone when they're screaming you hate children. How are we supposed to any sort of agreement about that?

I think there are things that could be done. I mean, I've suggested a bunch of things I think would be effective. Not only HEP faces, but I think that David French has proposed gun violence restraining orders, which is a bunch of basically your family members and close friends can go to a court and petition to have your gun rights temporarily suspended if the court finds you mentally incompetent or a danger to yourself or others. That seems like a decent idea to me.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

BEN: There's been talk about -- strong advocate of better security in schools. I went to a private school. And actually, my private school was nearly targeted by a mass shooter. Drove past our private school, targeting -- it was a Jewish school. Targeting the Jewish school. He saw there were armed guards. Or at least, he thought they were armed. He kept driving. He drove over to the West Valley HEP JTC, and shot that place up instead. That's because our school had hard security barriers, it had a certain number of security guards per number of students. There's bomb threats in our school every so often. Nobody at that school has ever been shot or killed on premises at least.

And it seems to me that we should be guarding our kids the same way that we guard our banks. All of this stuff I would assume should get wide agreement across the spectrum because it's relatively uncontroversial, that we should be protecting our schools in a better way. But the left doesn't want to discuss any of those things. Which demonstrates that there really is an agenda here, and the agenda has a lot less to defending schools and defending kids, and it has to do with a generalized gun control push that the left likes to engage in. And more importantly, the moral push that you are a bad human being if you disagree with them. Because again, this is what the Obama administration, in the early years, they had 60 votes in the Senate. They had the House. And they did nothing on gun control. Nothing. Because they knew the American people didn't want it.

And then as soon as the Republicans took back the house, suddenly it turned into, well, let's talk about gun control every single day and why Republicans are obstructionists, which says to me that this is a lot more about politicking than protection.

STU: Is their motivation to essentially get their base fired up. You're coming up to an election. They want all this new money coming in. And they don't necessarily want this money solved. (?) they don't have the argument anymore to take to their base.

BEN: Yeah, I think there's definitely some truth about that. I'm not going to say that their motive is awful and they don't care about kids. Or anything like that. (?) in the same way when they had the power to do so, because it was a valuable political tool for them, I think (?) if they do, number one, it's not going to stop the mass shootings. It's not going to. Not a single element they've proposed is going to minimize (?) which they proclaim they don't want. And so they would rather engine engine up the base for the elections. (?)

GLENN: So we are either going to revive the enlightenment, or we are going to tie in darkness. Which one wins?

BEN: You know, I'm -- I'm with you on this. I think the enlightenment -- there -- it's become a controversial proposition to say things like, use your reason instead of your emotion. And stem cell the truth instead of (?) and if those controversial propositions, we're in serious trouble. There are some of us who are obviously trying to fight back against us. There are some of us (?) I think one of the great debates that's happening right now, inside even the group of us that are pro-enlightenment is what roots have to be restored. Can you just (?) without restoring respect for Judeo-Christian values and thought. Can you just take the cherry on top of the Sunday. And then leave aside the religion and leave aside the (?) relearn all those things. That's right now happening among people on the right and the left. It's a debate that I think is happening between people like Jordan Peterson and Steven pinker, for example. But there must be (?) broad agreement that (?) I don't think there's even broad agreement that we're trying to get enlightenment mentality.

GLENN: Yeah, I'm reading Steven pinker's book right now. He is really -- you know, he makes a lot of good points. But the guy just does not like religion at all, to put it mildly.

And I -- you know, I think we dismiss rel because of its ills. And we -- we fail to recognize that it's set up for the very first time a real civil society, where we -- where we're able to search for truth.

BEN: 100 percent. I mean, this is one of my great critiques of pinker's book. (?) in a very substantial way. Not because I disagree with him about the value of reason. But that I think he has -- the materialist atheist movement has fundamentally undercut a lot of the contentions that they're seeking to support. You have an entire book by Pinker (?) enlightenment thinking. And that neglects 3,000 years of history. (?) can you actually rip away the (?) on the one hand and Greek thought on the other, just take those away. And suddenly the superstructure is supposed to stand. He'll talk about reason. He'll talk about the value of reason. He'll talk about the value of enlightenment. And not once in the entire book does he mention the revolution.

Well, you can't do that. If you're not going to mention the (?) French revolution. If you're not going to mention the progressives of the early 20th century. If you're not going to mention the risks that came along with the enlightenment, an alignment on traditional values and Greek (?) the notion that the universe has a purpose, that we can discover as individual human beings. If you remove all of that, then people (?) they think is based on reason pretty quickly. And that I think is what Pinker neglects. And and I think it's a problem for him. (?) we are balls of floating meat with no free will.

GLENN: That is exactly the case, as I understand it, that Nietzsche was making, when he said in a God was dead. Well, then who becomes God? What man -- and that was the beginning of this whole collective idea that led to mass murder.

BEN: Totally agree. And I think that, again, Pinker (?) what he fails to recognize is that Nietzsche was making a diagnosis, Nietzsche wasn't making a recommendation. And Nietzsche was looking at the enlightenment mentality, which said, we are smarter (?) and we've come up with our own reason, and that reason is going to die with us. The cult of reason was actually a cult in the French Revolution. The first official state rev (?) was the cult of reason. The goddess of reason. And, of course, that immediately devolves into people chopping their heads off.

GLENN: Yeah. Yeah.

BEN: I'm all for reason. I love reason. The reason has to be undergirds. (?) that can either be found through nature and nature's God. Or it can be found in the revelatory dictates of violence by a religion.

GLENN: Thank you, Ben.

Ben Shapiro, the editor-in-chief of the daily wire.

RADIO

The ONE “forever war” Glenn Beck supports

This Fourth of July, Glenn Beck reveals the only “forever war” he supports. It’s the war Americans have been fighting since our nation’s founding, and we must continue the fight…

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Two hundred forty-nine years ago, I think it is tomorrow. Right? Is tomorrow the second, or is it the first?

What day is it today?

So it was 200 -- 249 years ago, tomorrow, that somebody sat alone, in a -- in a one-room hotel room.

And scratched out the words, when in the course of human events. Those are the first six words of a document that is so dangerous!

Still today, so revolutionary.

It was whispered in those candle lit rooms by men who knew. Knew. That if I signed this document, that's a death warrant.

I'm dead!

I'm dead.

But in the course of human events, shh.

Jefferson wrote them!

33 years old. Adams would later say, you do well to revere Jefferson. But he didn't write alone. Basically, I was there too.

And so was Ben Franklin. The ideas were forged in the minds of men like Franklin, who is old enough to know better. And Adams, who was stubborn enough, not to care. And they weren't perfect men. But I love this about the left. They try to make you think.

That you think are perfect. I don't think they were perfect! I mean, Ben Franklin used to walk around naked in his house a lot. That shows, I mean, for as smart as that guy was. It shows, maybe he had a lack of mirrors. But they weren't perfect!

They owned slaves. They argued. They compromised.

How does that make them different than us?
I mean, we should be able to relate to them!

What is it that we tolerate right now?
What is it that we compromise on?

What is it -- what are our failures that future generations are going to go, these people just didn't get it? Perhaps what we should notice is that they, unlike most of us. They were willing to gamble their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

For something that had never, ever been done before. Something entirely new!

The idea that rights don't come from a government, or from a king, or from a parliament.

They don't come from the majority voting. Everyone has certain rights.

You know, for all these people who are, you know -- going in Macy's, and burning down towns. And then stealing clothing. And they're like, because I've been oppressed!

And you can't -- I've got rights, you know.
Yeah. Yeah.

You know who the first people were, to articulate those rights?

You know the only country that actually has stood for those rights?

And we're imperfect!

That idea came from the Founders, that you say you hate.

But the actual rights come from God, which you dismiss!

Think of this. Just ponder this for a second.

That all men are created equal! That their rights are given to them, by a creator.

It's not a political assertion. It's a genius. That's eternal truth!

That's theological dynamite, lobbed straight in to the thrones of Europe.

All over the world, it's still dynamite.

They knew what they were doing.

And I don't mean like, they knew what they were doing.

They had it. No. They knew that the British crown had the largest military force in the world. And these guys, they were farmers. They were printers. They were lawyers. They were a ragtag collection of intellectual and idealists, facing down an empire, where they said, the sun never set on the British empire. Meaning, the colonialism was everywhere!

You could not escape England. And yet, they declared it. We're leaving, without apology!

And they said that when a government becomes destructive of the ends of liberty, life, and the pursuit of happiness, it's not only the right of the people, it's their duty to throw it off!

Wow. And you know what is amazing? That's not rebellion.

That's -- that's not revolution. That's -- that's responsibility.

That -- that kind of language today, that would have you flagged, shadow banned. Labeled an extremist. In most countries, disappeared!

But that is the foundation of what we call America. The American experiment. And it's that. The American experiment.

And it's just that, an experiment. We didn't know if we could get it right. And we haven't gotten it right. But isn't it worth experimenting?

Isn't it worth trying to get that concept right?

When you fail on that concept, you're like, eh. That's a stupid idea.

That's not a stupid idea. That's the greatest idea of all time.

Why are so many people willing to just quit?

The experiment is self-rule. It's not perfect.

Never has been. Slavery. Jim Crow. Internment camps. Assassinations.

My God! Forgive us, for what we have done.

But at the same time, what nation has done more to correct its own errors?

What people have shed more blood, not for conquest, but for freedom.

Twice in the last century, we crossed oceans. Not to claim territory. But to liberate that territory!

Our sons and daughters fought and bled on foreign soil to push the darkness back, to fight against Naziism and fascism and Communism. And here we are. Here we are today.

After 249 years tomorrow of that experiment, standing at the lip of the very abyss, those men feared.

A godless chaos, rising in the east and a cold atheistic utopia, clawing at the foundations of the Western world. Islamism and Communism, two ideologies that have killed tens of millions of people. Now dressed all in new robes, selling old lies.

And we can't even teach a child where their rights come from. We have replaced Jefferson and Adams with TikTok influencers and bureaucratic groupthink.

We're raising generations to not even know the truth about their own identity.

But to question their identity. And they could be, oh, you're a funny, funny colored unicorn today. What do you want to be tomorrow?

We don't teach them anything about truth, or their inheritance, most importantly. Their inheritance. What good are hot dogs and fireworks, if the soul of the nation is up for auction? What is the meaning in Fourth of July, if we have forgotten the why? If we don't even call it Independence Day anymore. Most people don't even know who we fought against for independence.

They think we fought for its independence! Most people think we fought the South!

And yet, we'll light the sparklers, or blow our fingers off, because we're just that stupid.

This Independence Day weekend, would you do me and yourself and your country a favor, and read the words out loud. Speak the words out loud.

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands, which have connected them with one another.

And to assume among the powers of earth, the separate, but equal station, to which the laws of nature.

And nature's God entitle them.

A decent respect to the opinions of mankind, requires that they should declare the causes, which impair them to the separation.

What are they saying?

Look, we want to be decent people.

We want to be decent people.

And we have to separate them.

But we believe it's only right that we tell you why we have to separate. And it's not because of all the bad things you've done. We'll get to those later. It's because we're different. And you don't understand. You have been telling us all of these things, we no longer believe in. We hold these truths to be self-evident. That all men are created equal, and they're endowed by their creator with certain inalienable. Unchangeable rights.

And just among these, are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

That to secure these rights, government are his instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

My gosh. Read those words. And let your children hear what thinking and courage sounds like.

That to secure these rights, I'm telling you, the king, who thinks that your government was given to you, by God.

And you are the ruler.

And you will tell everybody what to think, what to do. What to buy. What to sell. What to tax. What not to tax. Who gets land. Who doesn't get land.

No, no, no. Government are his instituted among men, deriving their powers, their just powers, from the people. And that government is only there, established by those men to protect the rights that God has given each of those men.

Let them feel the chill, that runs down the spine, when Jefferson writes, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the government, or from the governed. Let them hear the words, of -- of responsibility. What responsibility sounds like, with courage and freedom. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these rights, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it.

And to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to affect their a lot of and happiness.

In other words, you have the right, you have the responsibility to stop tyrants. And if the government has gone bad, to throw that government off.

But reconstitute a government, that will do a better job at protecting those rights. Not to form a communist government.

Not to do anything else. But you want a new government?

Fine! Let's find the way to make men more free. This is not a metaphor. This is a declaration of war on tyranny in all of its forms.

I mean, I said, yesterday, freedom isn't free.

It was paid for by somebody's blood. But you have to remember, they paid for their freedom, not for our freedom, necessarily.

We -- there comes a time, we have to pay for our freedom. And God forbid, that it comes down to blood.

But at least shake off the apathy. We -- we must renew this promise of this experiment of America.

We need to fight for it as well. An out-of-control government that seeks to rope us into forever wars, over and over again. We're all against forever wars. I'm against it.

I hate them.

But there is one forever war, that is required in a free society. A different kind of forever war.

A war against ourselves, a war against human nature in each of us. Because of human nature, we get fat. We get lazy.

We get tolerant of abuses. Let your children hear you speak these words. And when you speak them, ponder them yourself.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes.

And accordingly, all experience has shown, that mankind is more disposed to suffer while the evils are sufferable than to right themselves, by abolishing the forms in which they're accustomed.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a sign to reduce them under absolute despotism.

It's their right. It's their duty. To throw off such government. And provide new guards for such future security.

In one paragraph, we make the point twice. And they tell us, look, we've studied people.

We know you're going to get fat and lazy and apathetic. And you won't want to do stuff for transient causes. Because this is really not good.

But when push comes to shove. And everything is moving towards absolute despotism. Absolute tyranny. Then you must stand up.

I ask you to ponder this. This particular part, when a long train of abuses and usurpations. Prudence will indeed dictate that governments long established should not be exchanged for light and transient causes.

And accordingly, all experience has shown, that mankind is more disposed to suffer while the evils suffer, than to right themselves.

Aren't we exactly the same people, that their experience was talking about?

Aren't we the people that are more disposed to suffer, than to right ourselves? Because we're too comfortable. Or we're too afraid, just to stand up and simply say no to lies.

No!

There is a difference between men and women.

No! Communism is to be feared. It's killed over 100 million people, in the last 100 years.

No!

Muslims aren't bad. Islamism is!

It's evil. No!

You can peacefully protest, any time, any place. And I will fight to the death for your right to do that.

But when you start burn cities down to the ground, no!

We're just a few days away. And we have marked our 249th birthday. Maybe. Just maybe, this year, can we stop asking what America was, and start deciding what America will be?

Where it just slips quietly into history. In the dark of apathy and ignorance.

Because the only thing more dangerous than tyranny is the people who have forgotten what it took to break its chains.

THE GLENN BECK PODCAST

We need REAL jobs in America — Trump should do THIS now!

It is clear we need to create more productive, high-paying jobs for American citizens. But that doesn't mean bringing back the same exact jobs of the past in massive numbers. It means creating and supporting jobs of the present and future that will better the lives of Americans. Glenn Beck and Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts break down exactly what this entails and how President Trump can make it a reality.

Watch Glenn Beck's FULL Interview with Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts HERE

RADIO

The most INCREDIBLE World War II story you’ve NEVER HEARD

One of the biggest American World War II cemeteries in Europe is in a small town in the Netherlands, where thousands of Dutch people continue the tradition to this day of “adopting” a fallen US soldier and checking in on his family. “The Monuments Man” author Robert Edsel joins Glenn Beck to tell this incredible story, which he documents in his new book, “Remember Us.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Robert, welcome back to the program. How are you, sir?

ROBERT: Great to talk to you!

GLENN: It's great to talk to you.

Can you remind me? You were on with us, after Monuments Men. And you talked about this great service that is still going on, where people that -- they were still looking for paintings and pieces of art, that had been taken by the Nazis.

And if I remember right, didn't somebody in our -- our own audience reach out to you, and say, I think we found one of those paintings?

ROBERT: Yes, sir. Absolutely.

The Glenn Beck audience. And Glenn Beck, you yourself deserve a lot of credit.

Because I hadn't walked out of your studio last time. You know, in Dallas at Las Colinas.

Headed back to our office at Monuments Men and Women Foundation office, before someone in my office contacted me and said, we've already had a lead, as a result of your interview with Glenn. And it turned out someone whose aunt had been given two paintings during World War II.

She had worked for the government overseeing Germany, and these two paintings were missing.

We were able to identify who the rightful owner was, and get them back.

So it's a great thing that you performed. And, you know, it's a magnificent conclusion, though obviously a very difficult part of history.

GLENN: What was it like to give that back to the family?

ROBERT: It was a deeply moving experience. We -- the foundation found and returned more than 30 works of art, from paintings to documents, ancient books. Tapestries, to museums. Individual collectors, and so on.

And, you know, when we see, oftentimes, the people just stand there, and they cry.

They don't even know what to say. Because they may have worked 50 or 60 years, trying to find some work of art that's been missing. And they haven't had leads. And to -- to see us standing there, with something that belongs to them.

Not asking for anything in return. Don't charge anybody for doing it. Because we feel like everybody who went through World War II already paid enough.

Words -- words just fail. It's just pure gratitude.

GLENN: I can't wait for you to tell this new story.

Tell me the story of the care takers. The care takers of --

ROBERT: Well, it's a story that found me, just as Monuments did.

I have written about -- in the Monuments Men, I told the story of two Monuments Officers who were killed in combat, one British soldier and one American, Walter Huchthausen. And Huchthausen was killed. He once did a last casualty at war. He was killed in the last month of World War II, and is buried in the American benevolence, American cemetery, in Margraten in the Netherlands. I knew that story, and I had made mention of a young girl who was harbored in September '45, asking for the address of his mother, wanting to write her and tell her, that she walked 5 miles, several times a week, from her house to the American military cemetery. It was called then. To put flowers on his grave. Because her family knew them. And they were grief-stricken to know that they were killed.

And I knew that story too. I mentioned that. And then in 2015, the nephew of Huchthausen wrote me and included a photograph of this elderly lady with this crown of white hair. And he said, here's a photo with Frida, and I couldn't place who this was.

I had no idea who it was. And I realized, my God, this is that 19-year-old girl that is still alive. So I flew to England. She married a British soldier after the war. And I went to meet with her. She started showing me photographs of when the American -- Americans liberated her area of the Netherlands.

And all these American soldiers that they knew.

And she said, you know about the American military cemetery.

She said, have you been there?

And I said yes. And she said, so you know about the great adoption program?

And I said, what? She said, the great adoption program.

I said, I have no idea what you're talking about. So I started doing some research on this. And learned, at the end of World War II, our largest World War II cemetery in Europe, was not Normandy. It was the Netherlands American cemetery, where 17,800 boys and a few women buried at this cemetery by May 1946.

And by that time, every single grave had a Dutch person, a local person, who volunteered to be an adaptor of that brave.

Go out there on the first death date of the soldier, Veterans Day, Memorial Day.

And if they had the contact information for the next of kin, send them a photograph of the grave.
And a letter.

Because they realized, it was okay to adopt the bodies of dead boys.

But where the real need was, was to reach across the ocean, into the American homes and try to assuage the grief of the families.

And they knew some of these boys. And I found it the most heartwarming, uplifting, and certainly unique conclusion to a World War II story that I think has been written.

GLENN: So are they still some of them still doing this?

ROBERT: Not some. In fact, there were about -- in 1940, 748.

American families were given the choice to have their loved ones sent home, or to be left overseas in a military cemetery.

The Army had no idea, how many -- how many families would want their boys sent home, and as a consequence, they couldn't tell how many cemeteries they would need.

We thought almost everybody would want to have the families sent home. But it turned out not to be the case. So about 61 percent came home. About 39 percent stayed in Europe, which was about the numbers from World War I.

Although, the numbers in this area, in the Netherlands were higher.

The -- the graves that are there now.

There are 10,000 boys there. And four women.

8300 graves. 1700 names on the walls of the missing.

Every one of them has an adaptor for 80 years.

All those graves have been adopted, without interruption.

There's a waiting list of almost a thousand people in the Netherlands, to become a doctor. This is a -- not just a --

GLENN: This is --

JASON: A privilege. Because they take their kids out to the cemetery. They turn the cemetery into a classroom. And you go out there. And, yes, there's a somber element. They're instilling in their kids, you're able to think, and say what you want to. Because of the freedom that was given to you, by this American girl or boy. And we don't do that in our country anymore.

GLENN: So this is one of the most incredible stories that I've -- I've ever heard.

And I'm shocked that the world doesn't know this!

Is -- have you -- is there anything like this, anywhere else in the world?

JASON: No. We couldn't even find a comp of any nature.

There are -- that is not to say, the people in Normandy area, don't care about Normandy and other cemeteries. They do, of course. As do the Belgians in other cemeteries.

But there's no place that created an organic great adoption program, during the war, in January 1945!

These people in this area of the Netherlands were so grateful, having been neutral in World War I.

And having not lost their freedom for 100 years!

And they didn't like it!

And when the Americans liberated them in September 44. I'll never forget this woman Freda. This elderly woman I met, looked at me, the first time I interviewed her. I knew her for eight years. The last eight years of her life.

I delivered a eulogy two summers ago. She looked at me, there were the eyes of the 19-year-old. And she said, when I saw that first tank over the hill and I realized, we were saved.

I looked at my dad, and I said, Papi, these American boys come all the way across the ocean to say this. And there were tears in her eyes.

Because they didn't -- they couldn't imagine how we could have moved that equipment across -- across the ocean.

And why we would have cared so much.

So there isn't anything like it.

But January 45, these people in this little town of Margraten.

A mile from the cemetery, organized a meeting of the town leaders. The town who got 1200 people.

And they were trying to find an answer to the question: How do you thank your liberators, when they're no longer alive to thank? And they came up with this idea of this great adoption program, and it's a story that I tell, following the lives of about 12 different American combat soldiers.

Bomber recipients.

Tankers.

Because we don't know that story.

We don't what knows to an American story, when they're killed on the field of battle.

Because it's depressing.

We move on to the next scene in a movie.

Well, I want people to know, you started your program with freedom is not free.

It's ugly.

Let's talk about that. Let's talk about what the cost is.

Let's talk about the stripping line that the body goes through, and the removal of dog tags, one being put in the mouth, if there's still a head. And the other being nailed to the cross, because they don't have time to stencil the names on yet.

Let's talk about that, and let people know, it's not just a Marvel movie. Or a gang war.

This is real. This is painful. And, of course, at the end of the war, when we Americans declare victory, and move on with our lives, there's millions of family members in the United States, whose lives will never be the same.

So it is -- it's still happening today. It's still happening today.

GLENN: The name -- the name of the book is Remember Us.

And take us -- I mean, because that's really kind of the -- the -- the beauty of it.

Take us through the rest of the book, just briefly.

It starts with what?

ROBERT: Well, I follow -- I began what a nice life was in the Netherlands. Until May 10, 1940.

And the Netherlands does not get much attention from World War II, and yet everybody has heard of Battle of the Bulge. And Battle -- those are all within 50 miles of what we're talking about.

They happened around there. Of course, World War II, in western Europe, begins right here in this area. Because the German tanks roll across the border.

So I cover the life of these 12 different Americans. I interviewed all their family members. Some make it through the war. Some don't.

You read the book, you realize who makes it, who doesn't. But their lives converge around this area of the Netherlands. And when post-world War II stories end, with the war being over, remember us kicks into a transcendent moment when the Dutch come up with this idea of this great adoption program. The Americans refuse to provide the names and addresses of the next of kin.

So they're foiled with trying to achieve their ultimate objective. Which is to try to contact all the American families.

And frustrated, there was -- one of the key figures of the book.

A woman who is the mother of 12 children.

Who takes it upon herself. She's a woman of action.

She writes president Truman. And pleads for him to get involved.

When that doesn't work. She gets on the first airplane, she's ever flown on. She leaves her kids behind.

She flies to New York. Lands in LaGuardia Field.

She goes to Washington, and meets the members of Congress. Including a young guy from Texas, named Lyndon Johnson.

Who says, young lady, you need to go to Texas. Because there are so many military bases there.

She flies to our hometown. And lands in Lovefield.

In June of 1946. And is met by two family members. And for five weeks, she lives with American families, that lost somebody during a war.

And to each of them she says, leave your boys with us. When the election comes.

We will watch over them, like our own forever.

And they have done that. Now, today, these 10,000 Dutch doctors only have contact information for 20 percent of the American families.

They couldn't ever get the others.

GLENN: You're kidding me. Where is the list? Do you have a list?

ROBERT: Yeah. The Monuments Men and Women Foundation entered into a joint venture with the Dutch Foundation for Adopting Graves.

Not charging anybody for this. And we have created a website called foreverpromise.org.

And on that website is a list of all 10,000 men and women, more women that are buried at the cemetery, or whose names are on the walls missing.

And it's a searchable database. We're asking people to go and see. Do you have someone you know, or a relative, who is buried there.

And if so, we have a short questionnaire. What's your relationship? Are you aware of this great adoption program? Are you in contact with your adopter? Would you like to be? Would you allow us to share your contact information?

I connected a lady from Richmond, Texas. Saturday night. To her -- to this young Tammy, that's the adopter of her brother.

She's 93 years old.

She was in tears. At the thought when she leaves this world, there will be someone there to watch over her brother.

And that's what we're all about is this connecting.

GLENN: Rob, I have to tell you.

You've really done something with your life. I mean, I know you don't need me to say it.
But what a great job you have. And what a great service you have done for so many years.

Thank you so much.

Please, look this up.

The forever promise project.

You can find it at foreverpromise.org. Foreverpromise.org. Robert Edsel is the author's name. The book is Remember Us. It's a perfect read for this week.

Glenn's Show Prep

Ben Shapiro on School Safety: ‘We Should Be Guarding Our Kids’ the Way We Guard Banks

Ben Shapiro on Socialism: 'The Suggestion That I Owe You Something Because You Are Here Is Theft'

The ONE “forever war” Glenn Beck supports

Transcript

Transcript

Ron Paul EXPOSES How the Federal Reserve Keeps Up its Scam!