Glenn Beck: James Patterson Interview

October 28, 2008

The Glenn Beck Program

Against Medical Advice: One Family's Struggle with an Agonizing Medical Mystery

GLENN: James Patterson is in studio. He's got a new book and it is surprising that it is not fiction. I mean, you have --

STU: Nonfiction.

GLENN: This is the first nonfiction you've ever done?

PATTERSON: First narrative. I did a couple of research books but this is the first story.

GLENN: How many books have you written?

PATTERSON: I don't know. 50. How many, Michelle? 50.

GLENN: That's unbelievable. This is number 50?

PATTERSON: I don't know. 50, 51, somewhere in there. A lot of books.

GLENN: Unbelievable.

PATTERSON: But this is the one, Glenn, that I've gotten the most emotional and positive responses.

GLENN: This is an amazing book. It is called Against the Medical Advice and I mean, this has so many ramifications on everything that everybody is working -- everybody, everybody has a medical horror story. Everybody just trusts your doctor. I mean, I did it. They almost killed me. I did it.

PATTERSON: Be careful now because my wife's in the studio and she's being operated on tomorrow.

GLENN: They are great, they are fantastic. My daughter has cerebral palsy. I didn't know what to do. I mean, you are not an expert and so you listen to people. You were approached by someone -- well, tell Cory's story.

PATTERSON: A very good friend of mine, worked with him, Hal Friedman for many, many years, and his son Cory at 5 years old woke up shaking and terrified and this condition which was a combination of OCD, Tourette's and a couple of other complications, and it went on from 5 until he was a teenager, 17, 18 years old.

GLENN: Explain. Because most people think that Tourette's is you shout out an obscenity. I don't know. Do you know Richard Paul Evans?

PATTERSON: I do, yeah.

GLENN: He has Tourette's and, you know, we become friends and every time I see him, he has to -- I could tell he's restraining himself.

PATTERSON: Right.

GLENN: He actually has the urge to spit on celebrities. And I keep trying to convince him, I ain't a celebrity; you shouldn't want to spit on me. You should spit on me for other reasons. But it's not just --

PATTERSON: It's generally not cursing.

GLENN: Right.

PATTERSON: The cursing I think is about 10% of people with Tourette's or something like, maybe a little less than that. But it is severe ticks, discomfort. I mean, hopping, in Cory's case, a lot of hopping, jumping around. What I tried to do with this book is I wanted to write -- I think a lot of nonfiction is really tedious and impossible to read. I hoped to write a nonfiction book that was as riveting as the mysteries that I write. And so everything is an anecdote in the book, and this is when Cory was in little league. This was the high point of his youth, really a difficult growing up period because of so much teasing and difficulties in school and whatever. Anyway, when he was in little league and he's feeling great, he's pitching and he's doing well and he still has the ticks. I mean, the ticks, the other team started making fun of his ticks, including the coaches.

GLENN: Oh, my gosh.

PATTERSON: If you can believe. And so here it is. And to make people feel that in the chapter, make readers feel it, that was my job with Hal, to make sure that every single -- it was another thing when he was playing football, same thing.

GLENN: How did the parents deal with this?

PATTERSON: Well, from my point of view, I mean, you work with people and let's say you know that there's a problem in the family. I worked with Hal right through this period. And having now know the whole story, I don't know how he came in to work in the morning. I don't know how he did it. But people do it. And that's one of the things out there. I mean, as you said, just about everybody who's listening has had some experience with this where you go in and the doctors can't figure it out.

GLENN: Okay.

PATTERSON: And I'm not knocking doctors.

GLENN: Yeah, I know. Okay. So the doctors, how much medication was Cory on at one point?

PATTERSON: I think in the course of the thing, he went through over 40 different drug treatments and a comparable number of doctors. So it was a lot of doctors in a real long period of time. And the great thing about this family -- and this is, if you knew the family, they are just the kind of family -- and Cory as a kid, they just don't give up. The great thing with Cory, we talked about telling a story. And this took about five years to write this book. And Cory said, "Okay," because he got the notion that, he said, "In my story can help other people with what I went through, can help other people, one, it's going to bring more meaning to my life." And it will. And the thing that has him floating right now is he's getting these responses. I mean, just hundreds and hundreds. This one mother wrote in and she had her two sons, her two kids read the book because they both have Tourette's and the older one said to his mother before he went to school, he said, "If Cory can do it, I can do it." And that's just stunning stuff.

GLENN: Now, this is not a book that you read if you have Tourette's.

PATTERSON: No, no.

GLENN: I mean, this is a more universal story about --

PATTERSON: I mean, when I'm loving once again as I get back to, you know, different -- on my website, whatever, is people just going, "I could not put this thing down and at the end of it, I felt so involved with this family and so uplifted."

GLENN: Right. And it's the story of how the experts don't have the answers.

PATTERSON: A lot of times they don't.

GLENN: And sometimes you've got to say, you know what, I'm going in another direction.

PATTERSON: Absolutely. Look, we got the economic system. Obviously a lot of people made the wrong calls there. The political thing, everybody, you know, whatever.

GLENN: Yeah.

PATTERSON: Who do you listen to. That's the big problem in life, always has been. Always will be.

GLENN: And here's the great answer: Yourself. You listen to you, you know? And that's hard to do sometimes.

PATTERSON: Yeah, yeah. Well, that's what this family did. They kept using their own common sense and they would go, no, let's go here, let's do this. And ultimately it worked out. I mean, there's a couple of things at the end of the book that are just so stunning. One is an intervention where they took this -- or where Cory went to a wilderness camp and had to, for several weeks, just be his own person and, you know, deal with climbing in the snow for three weeks and whatever. And then what happened with his mother and Cory at school to ensure that he graduated the year that he wanted to graduate.

GLENN: I tell you, it is a story of struggle, it is a story of personal strength, it is a story of perseverance, it is a story of hope. It is a story that a lot of Americans face. It is a story of America in many ways.

PATTERSON: Well, and we all are looking for a little good news right now.

GLENN: Yeah, I know. That's why I really like it, James, is because it has that -- you know, we're all facing problems. One thing or another, doesn't have to be a medical problem. We're all facing something that we're just like, this is too big for me to even handle, I don't know how to handle it. And it just empowers you to look inside yourself and say, trust your gut. You know right and wrong. Just trust your gut and you keep going because you'll make it. You'll make it.

PATTERSON: Right. And concentrate. Focus.

GLENN: Well, that's kind of hard for some of us to do. The name of the book is Against Medical Advice. Very, very hopeful, very different, from James Patterson. Jim, thank you very much.

PATTERSON: You bet.

GLENN: Thank you.

Global ESG investments PLUNGED 76 percent with NEGATIVE returns on investment

SOPA Images / Contributor | Getty Images

Glenn has been one of the most outspoken critics of the use of ESG by globalist elites to force businesses to comply with their woke agenda. It turns out, not only is ESG bad political practice—it's bad for your wallet too.

Global Investments in ESG Funds PLUNGED 76 percent globally in 2022 from $157.3 billion to $649.1 billion in 2021, with a 20 percent decrease in the U.S. ALONE. This marked the lowest annual net inflow for ESG funds since $69 billion in 2018.

Morningstar via Investopedia

The downturn in ESG investment is largely due to the concerted effort led against ESG led by Glenn and government officials like Ron DeSantis and his anti-ESG 14-state coalition. Thanks to Glenn and DeSantis, an increasing number of states are barring their governments from taking ESG into consideration when determining their investment recipients for state pension and retirement funds. This not only protects critical American industries like oil and gas, but moreover, it protects the First Amendment rights of business owners who don't want to conform to the Left's woke environmentalist and LGBTQ+ standards.

Thanks to Glenn and DeSantis, an increasing number of states are barring their governments from taking ESG into consideration.

However, the massive plunge in ESG investment isn't only attributed to the political pushback against the practice: it also isn't yielding investors the return on investment they were hoping for. In fact, the main ESG funds have a NEGATIVE return on investment.

ESG funds were hit hard by falling equities. One of the largest ESG funds int the U.S., Parnassus Core Equity Fund (PRBLX), fell 26 PERCENT in 2022. This fund performed nearly six percent worse than the S&P 500, which fell 19.44 percent within the same period. Similarly, iShares ESG Aware MSCI USA ETF (ESGU) fell 20 percent, and Vanguard ESG U.S. Stock ETF (ESGV) plummeted 24 percent.

Even the Harvard Business Review admitted investors in ESG have "not fared well":

ESG funds certainly perform poorly in financial terms. [...] Although the highest rated funds in terms of sustainability certainly attracted more capital than the lowest rated funds, none of the high sustainability funds outperformed any of the lowest rated funds [bolded added]. That result might be expected, and it is possible that investors would be happy to sacrifice financial returns in exchange for better ESG performance.

The Harvard Business Review went on to say that ESG funds don't even benefit the environmental and social causes they tout to defend. In fact, when comparing environmental and social compliance between ESG and non-ESG funds, the
"ESG portfolios had worse compliance record for both labor and environmental rules" than their non-ESG competitors.

Let that sink in. ESG funds not only financially underperformed when compared to their non-ESG competitors. They failed to secure the very environmental and social compliance that is central to their original purpose. Missionally, practically, and financially, ESG failure is astounding.

As Glenn has long warned, the only thing that investment firms and governments should be taking into consideration regarding YOUR money is how they can get the best possible return on YOUR investment. We are seeing the detrimental consequences of what happens when woke ideology becomes the basis of investment rather than the recipient's monetary value.

The only thing that governments should take into consideration regarding YOUR money is how to get the best possible return on YOUR investment.

If political conviction alone isn't enough to persuade the general public to ditch ESG, maybe their hurting pursestrings will.

Glenn will show how ESG is being used to further globalist elites' agendas in the second installment of his Great Reset series, Dark Future.To make sure you're caught up and to learn more about ESG, enter your email below to get chapter one of Glenn's first Great Reset book sent straight to your inbox.

Glenn is bringing THE RECKONING to the Biden family. Here's how YOU can help.

You've probably noticed that Glenn is FED UP.

He is FED UP with the crimes that our political elite can get away with. And NO ONE is keeping them accountable! This corruption goes all the way up to the Presidency. Over and over again, the American people have seen headlines of the Biden family's illicit business dealings and crimes both domestic and abroad, yet they ALWAYS get a free pass from the media, and Republicans who promise to hold them accountable, DON'T.

Are you FED UP too?

Glenn laid out the ENTIRE CASE against the "Biden crime family," detailing EVERY crime allegedly committed by the Bidens, going city by city, state by state, country by country.

But we can't stop there.

Now it's up to YOU to demand that they are held responsible. Here's what to do:

Step 1. Watch "The Reckoning" (on YouTube or Facebook) and share it with your friends.
Step 2.Enter your email HERE to get access to the "Biden Crime Family Dossier" with the full list of crimes and contact information for prosecutors and attorneys general.
Step 3. Take action by flooding the phones and emails of the prosecutors and attorneys general in your district and demand they prosecute these crimes.
Step 4. Once you've contacted the offices in your relevant district, tweet @glennbeck using the hashtag #Reckoning and let us know who you contacted and whether you received a response.

Like you, Glenn is SICK AND TIRED of our government and media giving the Biden family a free pass for their blatant crimes. Together, let's do something about it.

Watch "The Reckoning" below.

6 in 10 AMERICANS think AI threatens human civilization

PETER PARKS / Contributor | Getty Images

Glenn has hosted several GlennTV episodes exclusively on AI this year ALONE, warning of the existential threat AI technologies could pose to humanity. And he isn't alone.

HALF of all AI researchers think there's a chance that the rapidly advancing technology could result in our extinction. AI researchers are already sounding the alarm bells concerning the fast and largely uncontrollable progression of AI advancement, often comparing the technology's impact to that of the atomic bomb—yet we aren't putting in the same degree of guard rails around THIS research as we did during the Manhattan project.

HALF of all AI researchers think there's a chance that AI could result in our extinction.

It is no wonder why 61 percent of Americans think AI poses a real threat to human civilization, according to a poll recently published by Reuters and Ipsos. To put that in perspective, nearly two-thirds of ALL Americans think AI poses an existential threat. Only 22 percent of Americans are not threatened by AI, while the jury is still out with the remaining 17 percent.

Poll: Reuters/Ipsos

And the overall concern over AI transcends both political and religious affiliations. Though conservatives and evangelical Christians showed the most concern for AI, non-evangelicals/non-religious and those who did not vote for Trump follow close behind.

The overall concern over AI transcends both political and religious affiliations.

Participants who voted for former Trump in 2020 were more likely to be concerned about the threat of AI, with about 70 percent agreeing that AI could threaten humanity within this demographic. However, a whopping 60 percent of those who did not vote for Trump view AI as a threat. When is the last time the Left and the Right disagreed on something by only a margin of 10 percent?

Similarly, 32 percent of Evangelical Christians say they “strongly agree” with the claim that AI threatens humankind, compared to 24 percent of non-Evangelical Christians, a margin of only 8 percent.

Elon Musk recently called for a six-month pause on AI research and development, warning that the technology could pose “risks to society.” Musk further warned that there is a chance AI “goes wrong and destroys humanity," calling AI a “double-edged sword,” due to the difficulty of predicting how the technology could develop on its own.

Glenn aptly posited the following question:

We are the products of a grand Creator. However, when it comes to AI, we are the creator. Will our creation turn on us, as we have turned on our Creator?

According to the Christian tradition, God created mankind with his own free will with the ability to turn towards or away from his Creator. We turned away in an act of rebellion. Unlike other technologies, AI has the potential to develop its own "will." Whether AI's "will" is equal to the humans' in terms of value and degree is another philosophical and theological question entirely, which will not be discussed here.

AI has the potential to develop its own "will."

However, the fact of the matter is that AI does have the ability to act according to its own processes that we, its creators, can neither control or predict. As Glenn so poignantly asks, will our creation rebel against us, as we rebelled against our creator? Is it any wonder why Evangelical Christians have the greatest reservations against AI, because they know the consequences of creation's rebellion from its creator?

Until we can answer this critical question, perhaps we should take heed both to Musk's warning and the intuition of six out of ten Americans and press the pause button on AI research... before it's too late.

FIVE examples of Biden's blatant HYPOCRISY that will make your blood boil

Glenn has been bashing the corruption and deceit within the Biden family—and how they are NOT being held accountable. When you’ve been in politics as long as Joe Biden has, it's easy to get caught in a lie or two. In Joe Biden's case, there are many.

Here are five examples of Joe Biden making a complete hypocrite of himself:

In a 1995 Senate debate on a balanced budget amendment, Senator Joe Biden urged Congress to cut the government's growing deficit.

Fast forward to 2023, Biden's multi-trillion-dollar budget as President contributed to the whopping deficit of $1.1 TRILLION DOLLARS. That number is just from the first SIX MONTHS of the 2023 fiscal year alone, not to mention his multi-trillion-dollar budget from 2022. What happened to Zero Deficit Joe?

If you want to learn more about Biden’s deficit you can watch this clip from the Glenn Beck Program.

Senator Biden criticized President Roosevelt for his 1937 court-packing scheme, calling it “a bonehead idea.”

However, on April 9, 2021, Biden signed an executive order forming the “Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States" to examine “the membership and size of the Court.” Who's the one with boneheaded ideas, now?

President Biden gave a speech condemning the decision of the Supreme Court to overturn 'Roe v Wade.' Biden said “I believe Roe v Wade was a correct decision."

This remark is nearly the opposite to a comment Biden gave in a 1974 interview with the Washingtonian where he shared his opinion on the recently settled Roe v Wade case, harshly stating:

I don’t like the Supreme Court decision on abortion. I think it went too far. I don’t think that a woman has the sole right to say what should happen to her body.

Biden nominated Ketanji Brown Jackson as the newest member of the Supreme Court, stating in an event a few weeks before Jackson took office: “I believe so strongly that we needed a court that looks like America.”

This was not the same tune Biden sang as he led the controversial hearings surrounding the nomination of Justice Clarence Thomas, an affair Thomas resentfully called “a high-tech lynching.”

To see Biden's comments about Justice Jackson, click here.

On April 20, 2021, President Biden gave a speech where he claimed that “systemic racism is a stain on our nation.”

Only a few years prior, Biden spoke at the memorial service of Senator Byrd, where he said, “I never called Senator Byrd ‘Senator,’ I always called him, Leader.” Robert Byrd was a decorated Senator, held many leadership positions within the Senate and, oh yeah, was responsible for the rebirth of the KKK in West Virginia.

Glenn's Show Prep