Andrew Lumish is known as the “The Good Cemeterian” for meticulously cleaning and restoring the gravestones of veterans. He joined Glenn on radio Friday to share his story.

A photographer in his spare time, Lumish came across headstones dating as far back as the Civil War, and was astonished to see the beautiful old gravestones were covered with dirt, mold and other grime.

“It kind of infuriated me,” he said. “I was really upset by it.”

He decided to learn how to clean gravestones properly, and his labor of love took off. He has since been honored by the Department of Veterans Affairs and Florida Gov. Rick Scott.

John Newton Dugger was born more than 141 years ago on June 2nd 1876 when Ulysses S Grant's occupied the Oval Office as the 18th President of the United States... ▪▪▪ Interesting events that occurred during Mr. Duggers birth year included... •• On March 7th 1876... Alexander Graham Bell is granted a patent for his new invention... He calls it the "Telephone" •• On June 25th... The Battle of Little Bighorn takes place... 300 men of the United States 7th Cavalry Regiment led by Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer are wiped out by 5000 Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes lead by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse... •• On August 1st 1876 Colorado is admitted as the 38th state in the Union... John and his Mother Martha lived with Martha's Brother Newton Dugger in Hillsborough County, Florida…John’s uncle served with the Confederate States Army in Company 57 Georgia Infantry during the Civil War… On August 1st 1883, Uncle Newton was granted 159 acres of land in return for his military service which he utilized for general farming as a source of income… John Newton Dugger passed away on August 23rd 1895... He was just 19 years old... John Newton Dugger... Before & After... #veteran #army #military #tampa #tampabay #bayarea #florida #history #historic #picture:#confederatestatesarmy #civilwar #soldier #military #cemetery #monument #tombstone #gravestone #graveyard_life #photography #picture #before&after

A post shared by The Good Cemeterian (@thegoodcemeterian) on Jul 17, 2017 at 3:33pm PDT

With each restoration, Lumish has uncovered the story behind headstone --- which is the reason Glenn wanted to talk to him.

"You said one phrase that just sounded like it was twice as loud as anything else. You said, 'I'm uncovering history.'" Glenn said

Initially cautious about telling these personal stories, Lumish ultimately decided it was the right thing to do.

“Nothing's a flat road. Nothing goes in a straight line. So early on I decided we're going to tell their story, but tell it in their entirety, ” Lumish said.

For now, Lumish's work can be seen on social media, but Glenn had a gut feeling that might change soon.

"I just have this feeling that what you're doing is way beyond anything that you might even understand at this point. You've started something really, really amazing," Glenn said.

There is nothing quite like opening day in Major League Baseball.

The smell of the the fresh cut grass on the field, the sun on your face and knowing the cold of winter was now in the review mirror. Baseball means summer is near and freedom is in sight!

Certain memories are so vivid you can remeber the smells, the sounds and the feelings of days gone by. And then there are those that are just a little too good to be true.

Take a listen to Glenn share the bonding moment he and his father experienced as they willed the Red Sox to victory in the 1975 World Series and see which category this one falls into.

Is America a Christian nation? The numbers don’t look good.

Glenn and Stu were stunned on today’s show to hear about American Christians by the numbers from Jonathan Bock, co-author of “The Way Back: How Christians Blew Our Credibility and How We Get It Back.”

Bock and co-author Phil Cooke looked at statistics from Gallup, the Pew Research Center and LifeWay to get the data on how many so-called Christians are living out their faith. Did you know that 40 percent of Christians who go to church “rarely or never” open their Bible?

“We were absolutely shocked,” Bock said. “All of the things that non-Christians are saying about us, that we’re hypocritical … it’s true.”

Here are some of the numbers he cited on today’s show:

• While 70 to 80 percent of Americans call themselves Christians, just 20 percent go to church.
• That 20 percent counts people as “regular” church attendees if they go just 19 times a year.
• 37 percent of Christians who go to church don’t think prayer is essential.
• Of the 20 percent who attend church, only 10 percent tithe a tenth of their income.

What do you think? Are we still a Christian nation? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below.

What’s happening?

Chinese President Xi Jinping has proposed changing China’s constitution to end the two-term presidential limit. If the constitution changes, he could remain president for the rest of his life.

China instated the term limit to protect the country from revolutionaries like Chairman Mao Zedong, who ruled from 1949 until he died in 1976.

Yikes …

In more bad news for the Chinese people, the government recently went on a censorship spree that’s believed to be part of Xi’s tightening grip on power.

The internet and social media were analyzed for content seen as subversive. Winnie the Pooh was scrubbed along with search terms “my emperor” and “lifelong.” The beloved cartoon bear has been used as a meme by Xi’s dissenters.

Even the English letter “n” was temporarily censored so people couldn’t express this rebellious sentiment: “N > 2” (“n” standing for the number of Xi’s terms in office).

Orwell warned us.

The Beijing National People’s Conference has reportedly also proposed censoring the Orwell classics “1984” and “Animal Farm,” both of which warn people about the dangers of unlimited government power.

Glenn’s take:

“This isn’t new to the Chinese people. President Xi has been periodically censoring specific things for years,” Glenn said. “He controls almost every aspect of Chinese citizens’ lives, but it’s about to get much worse.”

The gun debate has heated rhetoric on both sides. How can we be better? National Review’s David French wanted to reach out to people who don’t understand why anyone needs to be a concealed carry permit holder, so he wrote a piece for The Atlantic explaining American gun culture to anyone who finds it foreign.

“[M]any millions of Americans don’t truly understand how ‘gun culture’ is built, how the process of first becoming a gun owner, then a concealed-carrier, changes your life,” French wrote. “It starts with the consciousness of a threat.”

For French and his family, the road to becoming part of “gun culture” started with disturbing threats and the realization that they were completely vulnerable until the police arrived. He joined Glenn on today’s show to talk about why many Americans want to own guns and how we can work together to find focused solutions to keep guns away from dangerous people.

“I just wanted to connect people with the real story of people’s lives,” French said.

What’s going on?

Longtime TV personality Ryan Seacrest is set to host the E! News coverage of the 2018 Academy Awards this Sunday. Why is that controversial? Because old allegations about sexual harassment have resurfaced even though Seacrest was already cleared in an E! News investigation.

Glenn, Pat and Stu talked about this story on today’s show. What happens in a world where people are cleared after allegations, but we’re all still expected to believe the accusers?

Catch me up:

NBC Universal, which owns E! News, said that an independent counsel “interviewed more than two dozen people” following the harassment allegations by former stylist Suzie Hardy. She worked for Seacrest between 2007 and 2013 and accused him of touching her inappropriately, asking sexual questions and otherwise harassing her.

What are people saying?

“E!’s Ryan Seacrest Situation Is Getting Complicated,” Vanity Fair said in a headline, while a Daily Beast opinion piece demanded that “It’s Time for E! to Pull Ryan Seacrest From the Oscars Red Carpet.”

Hardy’s claims resurfaced this week after an anonymous source told NBC News that the stylist’s claims were accurate; however, a video clip of Seacrest and Hardy from the time contradicted that story.

“Over the course of a two-month process, our outside counsel interviewed more than two dozen people regarding the allegations, including multiple separate meetings with the claimant and all firsthand witnesses that she provided,” NBC Universal said in a statement. “Any claims that question the legitimacy of this investigation are completely baseless.”

“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers?”

Glenn revisited the famous “God is dead” quote from German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche on today’s show, analyzing how our society has disintegrated since people decided they no longer believed in God and asking if that loss has encouraged mass shootings. When we’re told that God doesn’t exist, there are no heroes to look up to and even science can be ignored, what else can we expect but chaos?

“How much … has the foundation for our society been laid to grow these killers?” Glenn asked. “How much of just the removal of basic principles and then not replacing them with anything other than gobbledygook?”

How did we get here? Why do so many people just not care about the facts anymore?

On today’s show, Glenn talked about why the gun debate and so many other issues show that our country is divided into those who are willing to listen to logic and reason and those who are not.

“This is the problem,” Glenn said. “There are two Americas, and it is not left and right. It is those who are willing to engage in logical conversation and actual thinking and those who want to do Common Core, ‘2 plus 2 equals 5 if you can show me how you got there.’”

What’s going on?

After the Florida school shooting, teenage survivors turned student activists began fighting for gun control on national media. David Hogg, 17, is one of the activists, and he recently slammed NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch for supposedly controlling Congress and not doing anything – as he defended local law enforcement officers who were warned about the shooter beforehand.

What did he say?

“I don’t want to say anything until after the investigation’s done because I don’t know what happened,” Hogg said of Sheriff Scott Israel. The Broward County Sheriff’s Office is under fire for not flagging a tip about the eventual gunman and missing some serious red flags about his determination to shoot up a school.

While Hogg didn’t presume to know about Israel’s actions, he was certain about Loesch and the power he thinks she has. “She owns these congressmen,” he said.

Glenn’s take:

Glenn, Pat and Stu had a lot of questions about this clip on today’s show – including wondering why Loesch didn’t wield this incredible power over the government on behalf of TheBlaze when she worked here.

“She should have passed things for us,” Stu joked.

Glenn pointed out that while the students should be respected and treated with sympathy, they also can’t expect people not to analyze their arguments.

“They have a right to be listened to,” Glenn said. “They don’t have a right to be listened to unchecked.”

What’s going on?

Humans haven’t been replaced by machines yet in at least one area: spotting news hoaxes. BuzzFeed senior writer Charlie Warzel joined Glenn and Stu today to talk about the tech world’s fake news problem and urge lawmakers to sit up and take notice of developing technology before it gets completely out of hand.

Give me the quick version:

After the tragic shooting in Florida last week, journalists and researchers noticed dozens of hoaxes that were going viral; impersonations of journalists; and posts and videos that claimed the victims were actors. All of those things violate the rules for platforms like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.

Parkland marked the third time in four months that these tech companies had slipped up by allowing total misinformation about tragedies to be shared freely on their platforms, BuzzFeed reported. Why can’t they seem to do better?

Politicians need to wake up.

As technology advances, it’s getting more and more difficult to know what’s real and what’s fake. Warzel urged lawmakers to put in “safeguards” now before obscure Reddit threads become mainstream misinformation. How will we trust our eyes and ears when video and audio can be easily faked?

How do we stop mass shooters?

Would requiring background checks for private gun sales reduce gun violence?

Should new laws stop people flagged for unstable behavior from buying guns?

How does due process factor in?

Why don’t we just “do something”?

Earlier this week, CNN’s Chris Cuomo and National Review’s Charles C.W. Cooke debated some of the most common questions and issues as the nation looks at gun control laws.

On today’s show, Glenn was pretty certain about who came out on top of the debate.

“[Cooke is] clear with logic. He’s doing math. Cuomo is doing Common Core math,” Glenn joked on today’s show while introducing the clip. Listen to the full segment (above) to hear the discussion (skip to 6:36 in the clip for Cooke and Cuomo’s debate).

Shooting survivors challenge NRA at CNN Town Hall https://t.co/RM0UZ9hgWw

— Christopher C. Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) February 22, 2018

Liberals like to point to countries like Australia to “prove” that sweeping gun reform will prevent future mass shootings.

On today’s show, Glenn and Stu talked about why Australia didn’t affect its homicide rate with a mandatory buyback program. (You can learn more about Australia’s mandatory gun buyback program and why it won’t work in the U.S. with Stu’s analysis here.)

Glenn and Stu also took a look at a now-expired federal ban in the U.S. that also didn’t help prevent crime.

In 1994, the U.S. implemented a ban on “assault weapons,” which were defined as certain semi-automatic firearms. The ban, which expired in 2004, had no discernible effect on the homicide rate.

“The Department of Justice found that there was no change in murder rates; it didn’t affect it at all,” Stu pointed out on today’s show.

Listen to the podcast above to hear more.

What happened?

S.E. Cupp and Angela Rye clashed during a discussion on CNN after host Brooke Baldwin asked if they agreed with President Donald Trump’s proposed measures for increased gun control.

Baldwin listed possible changes to gun laws, including raising the minimum age to purchase an AR-15 and banning bump stocks, devices that allow a semi-automatic gun to operate like an automatic one.

What did Cupp and Rye say?

Cupp agreed with Trump’s proposed measures, saying, “There are lots of things that law-abiding gun owners want to consider.”

“How many people have to die before we truly do something?” Rye objected. “These little piecemeal solutions won’t work. That means there are going to be gaping holes in the policy.”

Rye claimed that “tangible things” can be done to stop gun violence. When Cupp asked why Democrats didn’t pass this “tangible” solution when they held the White House, the House and the Senate, Rye pointed the finger at the NRA.

“I can tell you why,” she said. “Three letters. NRA. Far too much control.”

Glenn’s take:

On today’s show, Glenn and Stu listened to this clip and talked about what the National Rifle Association truly represents: everyday Americans who make up its membership. The NRA doesn’t get any votes and can’t directly affect legislation, but it does provide a voice for responsible gun owners.

“It’s not the NRA’s money,” Glenn said. “It is the NRA’s membership, people who own guns, who are law-abiding citizens, who take gun safety more seriously than anyone on television.”

Listen to the podcast above to hear more.

The latest Quinnipiac poll asking Americans if they support more regulations on guns found the highest level of support for gun control in the poll’s history.

The poll found that 66 percent of American voters support stricter gun laws, and a whopping 97 percent say they support universal background checks. In 2015, Quinnipiac surveyed Americans to find that just 47 percent supported stricter gun laws.

Glenn and Stu talked about the implications of this poll on today’s show and debated whether it’s an outlier or shows a “dangerous shift” in Americans’ mindsets toward our Second Amendment rights. Listen to the full clip (above) for more.

What’s going on?

Patrick Neville, a sophomore at Columbine High School during the 1999 shooting, is now a Colorado state legislator fighting to reduce restrictions on guns at schools. After surviving the shooting, Neville joined the Army, served a tour in Iraq and was later elected to the Colorado House of Representatives.

What’s his solution to prevent gun violence?

The Colorado House minority leader wants to give people the right to concealed carry in schools, which are typically gun-free zones, and he has reintroduced a bill that would give gun owners with a permit the right to carry on school property. Under current state law, concealed carry permit holders have to leave their weapon in their vehicles.

Neville has filed such a bill each year since he was first elected in 2014.

“This act would allow every law-abiding citizen who holds a concealed carry permit, issued from their chief law-enforcement officer, the right to carry concealed in order to defend themselves and most importantly our children from the worst-case scenarios,” Neville told the Washington Times.

Glenn’s take:

Neville’s voice needs to be heard as we try to find ways to stop these horrifying acts of violence. “The reality is, we are bringing nothing to a gunfight with evil every single day,” Glenn said. “We should listen to all sides so we can give ourselves and our children a chance.”

Folklore, magicians and “monstrous science”? Nazis weren’t just evil – they were also obsessed with the supernatural under Hitler’s direction.

Eric Kurlander is a history professor who published “Hitler’s Monsters: A Supernatural History of the Third Reich” last year. He joined Glenn on today’s show to talk about how a fascination with bizarre pseudo-science and the supernatural fueled the Nazi conviction that Aryans were a master race.

“You’ve never heard any of this before, and it will give you … a new look on what allowed the Nazi movement to really grow,” Glenn said.

“Black Panther” made history with record-breaking box office numbers over the weekend. Glenn shared his perspective on the superhero flick and its cultural significance on today’s show, praising it as a “very healthy movie” thanks to its nuanced plot and worldview.

In the movie, hero and future king T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) returns to Wakanda, a mythical African kingdom that boasts unparalleled technological advancement and power. He is challenged for the kingship by a mysterious interloper who claims the same bloodline and wants the throne.

The two men approach oppression and racial issues worldwide in two very different ways, to say the least. Glenn’s read on the movie was that it illustrated the struggle between peaceful resistance and radicalized violence that Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X lived out in real life.

Mercury One held their annual gala in November and it was a smashing success. Enough money was raised to keep the ship running and ensure that the nonprofit can continue to be a service to victims of natural disasters, persecuted Christians in the Middle East, survivors of global human trafficking and other causes.

There were several ways to donate, including the now infamous armadillo race, as well as a raffle for a GMC Canyon. Cynthia and David Bray of Battle Ground, Washington turned their one raffle ticket into the trip of a lifetime to visit the studios and drive their prize home.

Jeffy may have cheated his way to a win in the armadillo race, but despite his best efforts, he couldn't find a way to rig the raffle to come away with a new truck.

Take a listen to their interview above and hear Jeffy try to bribe them with cash in his last ditch effort to snag the prize.

What’s going on?

McDonald’s is trimming some of the fat (literally) from its kids’ menu in an effort to appeal to health-conscious parents.

How will the menu change?

Cheeseburgers and chocolate milk will be technically taken off the Happy Meal menu, but parents can still request them as part of a kid’s meal.

The company says that not listing a cheeseburger as an option will mean that kids order it less.

McDonald’s is planning to bring back chocolate milk eventually after tweaking the recipe to have less sugar. Ironically enough, fat-free chocolate milk was introduced as a healthier option when McDonald’s previously revamped its Happy Meals.

But kids can still eat cheeseburgers, right?

Yes. On today’s show, Pat and Stu chatted about this story, with Stu pointing out that the company isn’t really removing cheeseburgers from the menu the way most headlines are claiming. Isn’t it common sense that any restaurant can usually add cheese to your hamburger if that’s what you want?

What will be the difference in the new Happy Meal?

The restaurant chain has announced these goals for every Happy Meal option:

• 600 calories at most
• Less than 650 milligrams of sodium
• Less than 10 percent of its calories coming from saturated fat
• Less than 10 percent of its calories to come from added sugar

Will taking it off the menu keep you from ordering it anyway? Let us know what you'll do in the comment section below.

What happened?

A teenager was arrested in Washington state on suspicion of attempted murder after his grandmother called 911 and alerted authorities about his alleged plan to shoot up a school.

Pat and Stu talked about this disturbing story on today’s show and wondered if encouraging “see something, say something” is an option to help prevent more shootings.

Yikes. How did Grandma find out?

Joshua Alexander O’Connor, 18, was arrested Tuesday when his grandmother showed police a journal allegedly detailing his scheme to shoot as many people as possible at a nearby school and to use DIY explosives to increase the death count.

What else do we know?

After serving a search warrant, detectives took the high school student’s journal, a rifle hidden inside a guitar case and inert grenades as evidence.

“I need to make this count,” O’Connor reportedly wrote in the journal, which detailed ways to make homemade explosives and an armed robbery that O’Connor is accused of participating in so he could fund his plot.

O’Connor allegedly wrote that he had decided which local school to target through a coin toss. He settled on ACES High School, where he was a student.

What’s going on?

Led by Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), Congress is investigating why the White House employed former aide Rob Porter even though he had been accused of domestic abuse.

On today’s show, Pat and Stu talked about this story while sitting in for Glenn.

Remind me:

Porter, who served as White House staff secretary for the Trump administration for about a year, resigned last week when allegations from two of his ex-wives surfaced. One of them produced a photo of her blackened eye from the alleged abuse as evidence.

“These outrageous allegations are simply false,” Porter said in a statement, calling the claims a “coordinated smear campaign.”

What are Republicans saying?

Gowdy said his House Oversight Committee launched the investigation on Tuesday night. In an interview, he sounded determined to get to the bottom of things.

“You can call it official, you can call it unofficial — those words don’t mean anything to me,” Gowdy said in an interview with CNN. “What means something to me is I’m going to direct questions to the FBI that I expect them to answer.”

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan told reporters that he had been informed about the probe and that Porter’s employment by the White House indicated a “breakdown” in the screening process.

“If a person who commits domestic violence gets in government, then there’s a breakdown in the system,” Ryan said. “There’s a breakdown in the vetting system, and that breakdown needs to be addressed.”

Kind, humble, courageous, loving: These are some of the words that women used to describe a true “gentleman” after Glenn did a survey at TheBlaze.

“I asked the women to tell me what a ‘real man’ was,” Glenn explained. “Do you notice that every single one of them talked about humility?”

Do you agree with these definitions of a good man? Listen to the full clip (above) for more.

“The most important quality of being a man is integrity,” one respondent wrote.

“Someone who protects the helpless,” another added.

“A gentleman puts his family first and himself second,” a third described.

What’s going on?

Congress has pushed through a major budget deal that increases government spending caps by a whopping $300 billion over the next two years. Conservative lawmakers like Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) aren’t happy.

This week, Lee used the analogy of a trip to the grocery store to illustrate why out-of-control government spending is insane. If you go to the store for bread and milk, why should you have to buy one of every item in the store to purchase those two things? Why is government funding an all-or-nothing decision?

Did the government shut down?

Very briefly, yes. Congress approved a budget deal that President Donald Trump signed into law early this morning, ending the overnight shutdown.

Who else fought the deal?

In the House, 76 Republicans voted against the continuing resolution, while Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi urged Democrats to vote no because the bill doesn’t include a provision for DACA.

Paul delayed the bill on the Senate floor until 1 a.m. this morning, forcing a brief government shutdown until the deal went to a vote.

Jon Huntsman Sr. died last week at age 80, a generous and dedicated philanthropist and a hero to many.

“The world got a little bit dimmer because we lost truly, truly a great man,” Glenn said. “I’ve never met a greater man. I’ve never met a more giving man and a more forgiving man.”

Glenn took the opportunity to read a moving letter from a listener seeking help, encouraging the audience to follow Huntsman’s example by learning to forgive and by being honest with ourselves and others.

“Dedicate yourself to asking the hardest, most honest questions that you can,” Glenn said. “Be the opposite of what the world is.”

What happened?

A Saudi immigrant who had been living in the U.S. since 2011 has been charged with visa fraud by the FBI. Naif Abdulaziz M. Alfallaj was discovered when the FBI matched his fingerprints to ones found on an application to the Al Qaeda camp where four of the 9/11 hijackers were trained.

How was he flagged as a threat?

Alfallaj used a fraudulent visa as ID so he could take private flying lessons and get his pilot’s license. The FBI used those fingerprints to track down the match on the Al Qaeda camp document.

Glenn’s take:

“The Saudi man in Oklahoma was a good catch by the FBI, but this episode highlights the fact that there is still a mountain of work to be done in counterterrorism,” Glenn said on today’s show.

The government is planning to borrow $1 trillion this year, but how much of that will go toward fixing gaps in the immigration system and protecting us from terrorism?

What’s going on?

Scientists are fascinated and horrified by a species of crayfish that doesn’t need a mother and a father for eggs to be fertilized. Marbled crayfish can clone themselves: The mother crayfish’s eggs grow into copies of her through parthenogenesis.

“Every single one has the ability to reproduce. Every single one could start a new population,” crustacean researcher Zen Faulkes told The Atlantic.

Stu and Glenn talked about this bizarre science story on today’s show.

Should we be prepared for an invasion?

Maybe not yet, but it doesn’t hurt to be on the lookout! A German aquarium owner first alerted scientists to the existence of the marbled crayfish when he noticed that some “Texas crayfish” he’d purchased were mysteriously filling up the tank.

The marbled crayfish has spread across Europe in recent years and is threatening native crayfish in Madagascar. Just one can produce hundreds of eggs at a time.

Yikes … do we know why this happened?

It’s still a mystery. For the first time, scientists have learned more through sequencing the DNA of the marbled crayfish – of 11 marbled crayfish, to be exact. They were all clones, the progeny of one single crayfish that inexplicably reproduced by self-replicating. Scientists also discovered that the marbled crayfish is triploid, which means that it has three sets of chromosomes.

There’s more to explore in the Great Pyramid at Giza, but scientists may need some help from robots to do it.

Researchers have used muon detectors and thermal imaging to discover two previously unknown voids in the Great Pyramid. The larger void is around 98 feet long, while the smaller one is a corridor of uncertain length. Experts are conflicted on whether the spaces were purposely designed to hold anything or not.

Because scientists can’t just take apart the pyramid, they’re working on tiny robots that can enter the smaller void and see what’s there. Glenn and Stu talked about this unique story on today’s show.

“First, we want to send a ‘scout robot,’ which is basically a pan-tilt camera with a lot of lights fitted in a tube-like robot,” researcher Jean-Baptiste Mouret told Live Science. “The goal is to survey what is on the other side of the wall and get high-resolution pictures.”

Why can’t the Democratic Party let go of the past?

Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-Mass.) was chosen to give the Democrats’ response to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, a puzzling decision that shows a toxic attachment to political dynasties.

“If you’re going after white, wealthy and privilege, you don’t pick a Kennedy to deliver the message,” Glenn said on today’s show. “Democrats continue to claim that they are the party of diversity and the poor, but last night, the grandson of Robert Kennedy was hand-picked of course by Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi.”

National Review senior editor Jonah Goldberg joined Glenn on today’s show to talk about President Donald Trump’s first year, both good and bad, and why it’s dangerous for moral leaders to make excuses for his deficiencies.

Glenn wanted to know: Why is there no middle ground on Trump? People can’t seem to be able to support him on good things while criticizing him on bad things.

“It’s all or nothing on both sides,” he lamented.

Voters have every right to decide which political leader will benefit their lives more. But Goldberg pointed to comments from Family Research Council President Tony Perkins as an example of extreme and misguided support for Trump. If evangelical leaders want to make excuses for Trump’s reported affair with a porn star, where do they draw the line?

“Going way out there to offer, as [Tony] Perkins called it, a ‘mulligan’ to Trump and basically minimize or dismiss his personal character … I think that’s really problematic for people who pretend to be or claim to be a leading moral authority,” Goldberg said.

In a world where school shootings are horrifyingly normal, parents worry that their kids will be next. A mother and newspaper editor faced a different nightmare last week in Benton, Kentucky when she rushed to the scene of a shooting at the county high school to discover that her 15-year-old son was the suspect.

Mary Garrison Minyard has declined to comment on the incident or her son, Gabe Parker, the Louisville Courier-Journal reported. He has been accused of using a handgun to shoot and kill two classmates and wound 14 other people right before class. The teenage boy now faces two counts of murder and at least 12 counts of first-degree assault, according to Reuters.

The two victims, Preston Cope and Bailey Holt, were also 15 years old.

On today’s show, Glenn pointed out that we’ve become numb to school shooting stories; they barely register as we follow the news. He wondered what we can pass on to our kids when we don’t really have a baseline for what “normal” means anymore.

“I hate to judge what ‘normal’ is anymore because I don’t know what ‘normal’ is anymore,” Glenn said. “Give my kids a ‘normal’ childhood? How? What is a ‘normal’ childhood?”