Ep. 643 – The People Kept Shouting: Crucify Him dissects California Senator Jackson’s Orwellian "compassion" mandates, exposing how leftist media weaponized the Covington Catholic controversy—ignoring Nathan Phillips’ AWOL past and doxxing students—to silence conservative voices. It contrasts ABC’s restraint with NBC’s aggressive framing of Nick Sandman while tying attacks on Christians to broader moral coercion, from NY’s infanticide-enabling abortion law to Alito’s warning on silencing dissent. Mailbag cases reveal faith crises rooted in betrayal, career risks tied to passion, and marital conflicts over media—all framed through a lens of biblical authority, from Ian’s porn-induced shame to Pete’s business exit, ending with praise for Brett Baer’s accident survival as a rare media integrity beacon. [Automatically generated summary]
The chairman of the California State Senate Judiciary Committee, Hannah Beth Jackson, says gendered pronouns will no longer be used during committee hearings.
I am not making this up.
Jackson said, and I swear this is a real quote, the world is a different place.
My grammar teacher's long gone, and we won't be hearing from her from them, from they, unquote.
Jackson said the new rule was intended to bring the Judiciary Committee into line with the rest of California's state government by having it run under the stupidest rules ever devised by man or woman or undifferentiated sexless it creature.
To accomplish that, Jackson said committee members would not only be forbidden to mention the existence of gender, but would be forced to deny other immutable facts of life as well.
For instance, committee members will no longer be allowed to refer to the fact that government actions cost money, but instead will be required to call them free, as in free health care or free college, or free to live on the street and crap on the sidewalk while screaming at the voices from Saturn being piped into your head through your dental fillings.
In the event that a committee member should break the rules and mention that all of these things actually come at a considerable cost, said member will be forced to pay a fine, which will be funded by the public's tax dollars and will therefore be free.
Other facts of life that will become unmentionable will be the difference between legal and illegal immigrants, especially in instances where an illegal immigrant murders an innocent American, which will now be referred to as, quote, an act of compassion for suffering refugees resulting in the violent death of a citizen, unquote.
Senator Jackson hopes these rules will become so widespread that no branch of California government will be able to acknowledge reality at all, including the reality that everyone is moving to Texas.
Trigger warning, I'm Andrew Clavin, and this is the Andrew Clavin Show.
I'm a hunky-dunky, life is tickety-boo.
Birds are winging, also singing, hunky-dunkity-dicky.
Ship-shaped dipsy-topsy, the world is ippitty-zing.
It's a wonderful day.
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You know, history is full of intolerant religious leaders, the Catholic priests who burned Protestant dissenters, Protestant dissenters who murdered Catholic priests, witch hunters, book burners, and tolerance scolds.
It was even, we should remember, the Pharisees and the chief priests of Israel who moved among the crowd at the trial of Jesus, urging the people to call for his crucifixion.
Intolerant Religious Leaders00:09:25
And guess what?
They're at it again.
Today, the Pharisees and scribes and chief priests work for the news media, and their religion is leftism.
One of the central tenets of the leftist faith is that there's no objective moral truth, only narrative.
So if you can silence those who disagree with you, if you can force or bully them into saying that right is wrong, that male is female, that abortion is health, and freedom is slavery, those things will magically become true.
Disagree, and we hear the age-old shout again, crucify him.
And now they can broadcast crucify him on Twitter and CNN.
They should have read their gospel.
They would have learned you can kill the truth, but it never dies.
And we'll talk about what that ends up resulting in in just a second.
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Speaking of Another Kingdom, by the way, Dean Kuntz, one of the masters of supernatural suspense, sent me a beautiful blurb for the book yesterday, which I really appreciate.
He said, I turned the pages faster and faster with growing delight.
Let me begin what I want to talk about, which is this assault on Christianity by the mainstream media in the person of the Covington kids and Mrs. Pence in her teaching.
I want to start with a quote from C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity.
You will be amazed at this quote, at how apt it is.
Obviously, Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis, one of the great Christian apologists, Mere Christianity, one of his central books, a book that was very important to me as I was deciding to become a Christian.
Here's what he says.
He says, suppose one reads a story of filthy atrocities in the paper.
Then suppose that something turns up suggesting that the story might not be quite true or not quite so bad as it was made out.
Is one's first feeling, thank God, even they, aren't quite so bad as that?
Or is it a feeling of disappointment and even a determination to cling to the first story for the sheer pleasure of thinking your enemies are as bad as possible?
If it is the second, then it is, I am afraid, the first step in a process which, if followed to the end, will make us into devils.
You see, one is beginning to wish that black was a little blacker.
If we give that wish its head, later on we shall wish to see gray as black and then to see white itself as black.
Finally, we shall insist on seeing everything, God and our friends and ourselves included, as bad and not be able to stop doing it.
We shall be fixed forever in a universe of pure hatred.
Who can deny that that is what is happening right as I'm speaking in the case of these Covington Catholic kids who were jeered by these black activists, kind of crazy, I hardly, just this is a nutcase movement, the black activists who were screaming at them, and then confronted in a very, very aggressive way by this Native American, Nathan Phillips, who apparently has been doing this a lot to people.
But who can deny that the press now feels not only a feeling of disappointment that it turned out that their first story, that these kids, these white Catholic pro-life kids, were not the villains, but they not only feel a feeling of sheer disappointment, but a determination to cling to the first story for the sheer pleasure of thinking their enemies are as bad as possible.
That is exactly what C.S. Lewis described, exactly what they were doing.
I've talked about this story before as a media event and the fact that it was an organic outgrowth of their bias, their hatred of Donald Trump, but not just Trump, of the people that he represents and the conservatism and republicanism.
Remember, it didn't start with Trump.
That is nonsense.
It was going on with Bush.
It went on with Reagan way back in the 80s.
It's not about Donald Trump.
It is about their particular religion, and it is a religion.
New information is coming out that this guy, Nathan Phillips, he indicated, he said, I was a Vietnam Times veteran.
He was in the Marine Reserves during the last couple of years of Vietnam.
He never left America.
He was a refrigerator repairman.
He referred to himself as a recon ranger, but he was a refrigerator repairman.
I am not dissing the guy's service, by the way.
He did serve, and I think we have to give him credit to that, although he was busted to private.
He had three AWOL charges.
And the other thing about him is he has done this a lot.
He is this guy.
He burst into a church service and disrupted the church service.
Years ago, in 2015, he went to the, I think it was Michigan University, Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, I think it is.
And he did this again.
He told the news media that he had confronted some students who had been dressed up in Indian garb.
Here's a little clip of this, because it sounds just like the clip he had of the Covington kids.
I came up upon this powwow with the party, you know, with some better individuals in there.
They wave from the over so we want to get some gold.
They paint it up in the red face, kind of try to laugh it off.
It's just funny.
So short story I want to say.
I called him on this season and threw a beer bottle at me, a beer can at me.
He says they threw a beer bottle at me.
Remember, he said the Covington kids wanted to tear him apart.
The police showed up and apparently there was no sign that there had even been a party there, so we don't even know if he's telling the truth.
This is what this guy does.
And as I said before, I can't get this out of my mind, this line he had about this here indigenous lands.
We can't build a wall here while he's standing in Washington, D.C., the capital of the greatest industrialized nation on earth, as if we were still riding around on Palominos in the prairie hunting buffalo.
I mean, it's just absurd, and only a leftist media would have bought into this.
I just want to play what the Covington chaperone, a lady named Jill Hamlin, told Fox and friends actually happened.
And the reason is, is she, of all the people who's been describing this, has what sounded to me like the truth.
It just had the ring of truth to it.
Here's that interview.
Jill, you say that your boys, the boys there, were targeted.
Was it because they were wearing MAGA caps?
I think that was one of the reasons they were targeted.
And I think they were also targeted for what they stood for.
Which is?
Which is Christianity, the right for life.
And they were singled out.
And I believe partially because of the color of their skin, they were targeted.
Jill, why was Nick Sandman, why did Nathan Phillips, the Native American, why did he choose him?
Why did he get in his face?
What happened before that?
We were all just gathered on the steps.
You know, we had obviously heard the horrific insults that were thrown at our children by the black Hebrew Israelites.
And the boys were gathered on the steps.
And they, I don't know why Nathan Phillips chose Nick Sandman.
I think he would have targeted anyone, but maybe it was because Nick Sandman had the courage to look this man in the face.
You know, I want to, this is really true, what she is saying, that they were targeted, but they were not just targeted by these people for their hats and for their beliefs.
The media too, which is still saying, still saying these MAGA hats, they shouldn't have been wearing those.
What were they doing wearing those MAGA hats?
The answer to which is not something I can say on the air.
Media Abuses and Truth Masks00:14:41
It's just two words, but it's very simple.
You know, they can wear any damn hat they please.
But for our mainstream media, the chief priests of the leftist religion.
Just standing there with a MAGA hat is an act of heresy deserving of punishment.
It's an enticement to riot because of their religion.
It's just like somebody did something absurd, like put out a so-called work of art by putting a crucifix in a vat of urine.
That would be essentially what they do by wearing a MAGA hat.
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I do want to say that our friends at Newsbusters compiled a list of how each media outlet covered this story, the Covington story.
And there were good people.
CBS and ABC did well.
They held off.
They did not come out and attack these kids until the new information was coming in and immediately spotted the fact that this story was going haywire, that it was not what it was supposed to be.
But NBC, CNN, the New York Times, The Washington Post, they were all trash.
They all covered themselves in shame, which is hard because it's the other layers of shame were already there.
So they were just recoding themselves with more shame.
I have to mention National Review and other right-wing outlets that jumped on this story too.
And you know, I love National Review.
I like a lot of the people there.
I know a lot of them are bright.
But they jumped on this thing.
They said they ran a story that said these Covington kids might just as well have spit on the cross.
They took it down.
They apologized.
But I want to tell you that I feel that these right-wingers who jump on these stories are like battered children.
They are in such a race to prove to the media that they, oh, they're not racist.
They're the good Republicans.
They're the good conservatives.
And they ought to just stop.
The media is abusive.
It is abusing you, and they're acting like people who have been abused.
They're acting like children who have been abused.
When you're abused by your parents, you keep your head down, you don't want to say anything, you walk on eggshells because anything might set them off because they're unreliable, they're undependable, and they might go off at any time.
That's the way the right-wing acts.
They did it to Steve King, too.
And again, I'm not defending Steve King because he said things in the past that I find suspect.
But I did tell you, and I say it right now, I have no idea what Steve King said to the New York Times because the New York Times lies.
They lie.
And so I'm not going to just prove my bona fide by coming out and saying, oh, Steve King should resign the minute the New York Times runs a story that makes him look like a racist.
They make all of us look like racists.
It is what they do.
And the National Review should really do a full soul check on this and ask themselves how their hatred of Donald Trump, their fear of the media, has made them jump on this bandwagon too soon.
It is time for them to take stock because that was a big, big mistake.
And it's not just any mistake.
It's a mistake that grows out of the state of their mind, which is created by the abuse of the media.
So this is what's happening now at Covington, okay?
Here are some of the kids at Covington telling you what's going on.
They've had to close the school and they will tell you what's happening.
Several media platforms blatantly lied about the events regarding the controversy in D.C. and it affected us as a community and individuals greatly.
There have been many threats against our lives, against our parents.
Some of these threats include that we should all be locked in the school and should be burnt to the ground, the school being bombed, school shooting threats.
It's really scary.
I know that a lot of people are scared to go to school tomorrow and won't be attending because of what could happen.
There have been cops there ever since the incident and I think there'll be a lot more tomorrow.
A lot of the negativity and the hate surrounding this event comes from people on social media doxing people that were at the event.
I myself wasn't even present, but I'm very vocal about defending my school and my peers, and I have been doxed on three separate occasions.
This has led to a tsunami of hateful messages and threats and everything above.
So these are kids being doxed.
These are 15, 16 year old kids being doxed, their information put out online and death threats.
I mean, this is what the media has wrought.
And I just want to show you the media's attitude.
Not all of them, again, again, ABC and CBS handled this well, but I want to show you this.
NBC was one of the chief offenders.
Savannah Guthrie on NBC has Nick Sandman, who was the boy who was kind of targeted by this guy and who was called.
People were saying, you know, he should be punched in the face.
One woman tweeted that she would give oral sex to anybody who would punch him.
And this is Savannah Guthrie on NBC, one of the chief offenders.
This is how she interviews him.
Do you feel that you owe anybody an apology?
Do you see your own fault in any way?
As far as standing there, they had every right to do so.
My position is that I was not disrespectful to Mr. Phillips.
I respect him.
I'd like to talk to him.
I mean, in hindsight, I wish we could have walked away and avoided the whole thing.
As far as I'm concerned, Savannah Guthrie should be groveling on the floor begging this kid for forgiveness, not asking if he wants to apologize.
She should be sorry she works for a network that slandered children.
She should be sorry that they haven't stood down from that slander.
She should be sorry for everything they did.
And she, as a representative of that network, not personally, but as a representative of that network, ought to be groveling and asking for forgiveness instead of asking him, the kid, whether he wants to apologize.
You know, there was just a wonderfully revelatory moment, although not completely revelatory, on the view with Whoopee and Joy.
As I always say, without whoopee, there's no joy.
Without joy, there's no whoopee.
And here's Whoopee and Joy talking about how this could have happened.
Many people admitted they made snap judgments before these other facts came in.
But is it that we just instantly say that's what it is based on what we see in that moment and then have to walk stuff back when it turns out we're wrong?
Why is that?
Why do we keep making the same mistake?
Because we're desperate to get Trump out of office.
That's why.
So she at least was honest about that.
But again, this happened with Reagan in the 80s.
It happened to George W. Bush.
It happens to every Republican.
It happened to Mitt Romney during the races when they accused him of murder, essentially, or allowed him to be accused of murder.
This is what they do.
And it's more than this.
In fact, Donald Trump Jr. got, I think, came closer to the truth in his accusation on Fox.
Here's what he said to Laura Ingram.
You had some Catholic schoolboys that were at a right to life march.
Okay?
They were wearing a MAGA hat.
They had to pounce because the media wants that to be true.
They want a bunch of nice Catholic kids that happen to be white.
They want them to be the enemy.
This is what they've created.
The media has done this to themselves.
They have shot themselves in the foot time and time again because they so desperately want this to be the truth.
He's absolutely right about this.
It is, in fact, what these kids represent, chief among it, the Christian religion, their Catholicism, which was being went on full display in their defending the right to life, the right for babies to live and grow in the womb without being destroyed, without having themselves wiped off the face of the earth.
We know this because of the way they treated Karen Pence when it came out that she was teaching part-time at a small private Christian school that, among other things, upheld the classic traditional Christian teaching against homosexuality.
This was, I mean, the things that people were saying about this.
William McGurn wrote a great column about it yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, quoting Politico, saying, how could this happen in America, that Christians would continue to be Christians and have this traditional belief?
On CNN, I mean, this is, I gotta play, this is an amazing piece of sound.
John King suggested that Karen Pence should not be allowed to have secret service protection because it's paid for by all people.
And she's insulting gays.
Here's this clip.
When you use your core beliefs in this kind of public way, obviously it does open yourself up to criticism.
And I think the Pence's might be a little naive to think that that wouldn't happen if she is going to make this decision.
It's interesting to me that they made no attempt to get ahead of it.
They made this announcement that she was going to be working at this school and then saw the backlash come a couple times.
Does it matter that all taxpayers pay for her housing?
All taxpayers pay for secret service protection?
You know, it's not her fault that she needs protection.
This is the world we live in.
But all taxpayers pay for it, subsidize her life.
Does it matter?
So you mean, does her First Amendment, do her First Amendment freedoms get somehow curtailed because taxpayers pay for her accommodations and her security?
I don't know that a lot of people would sign on to that.
That's Olivier Knox bringing King back to reality.
But I love the woman, too, saying, you know, how could they not get out in front of this and realize what a problem this was to be supporting traditional Christian teaching?
How can CNN be so locked in its own world that they don't understand that this is not a problem for a lot of people?
And I'm going to get back to that in a minute because this is really the important point.
This is the central point.
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Let's talk about for a minute what Christians believe about homosexuality.
The traditional belief.
The traditional belief is that things are made for a reason.
God gave us a purpose.
We have a purpose in our lives.
We have a purpose in what we do.
That our actions have moral ramifications.
That we can tell this is true because we understand when we hear parables about reality, we know that there are actual moral stories because reality has a moral level to it.
Sex was made for the creation of children.
Children require care and feeding.
They require a mom and a dad.
And therefore, only a mom and a dad in a state of marriage should have sex.
That's why that is what Christians believe.
The Catholics believe that you shouldn't even use birth control because that's getting in the way of the purpose of sex.
But most Christians believe that sex should be had in the context of marriage so the children can be taken care of.
And that's why they don't accept homosexuality.
Homosexuality is not having sex for that purpose.
It is anytime you're not having sex with that purpose in mind, many Christians believe you are simply using your partner for your personal pleasure.
As you know, I have a different point of view on this, but it accepts many of the premises.
It accepts the premises that things have a purpose, that there is a moral level to life.
I accept all those premises.
That's the premise that they have a problem with.
You know, William McGurn in that column I mentioned, he quotes Samuel Alito, the Supreme Court justice, his dissent on Obergfeld, one of these terrible decisions that said basically states cannot pass laws against gay marriage.
It may not forbid gay marriage.
Alito, in his dissent, said, I assume that those who cling to old beliefs will be able to whisper their thoughts in the recesses of their homes, but if they repeat those views in public, they will risk being labeled as bigots and treated as such by governments, employers, and schools.
And who can say that Alito was wrong?
He was obviously exactly right.
The left thinks they can change moral truth by forcing you to say what they want you to say and silencing you if you will not say it.
But the truth doesn't die.
Crucify the truth.
They tried it once.
He came right on back.
And that makes you crazy.
It makes these people who want the truth to be what they say it is.
It makes them crazy.
It makes them full of hate.
And remember what C.S. Lewis said.
Tuesday's Madness00:02:04
When you find that you are beginning to wish that black was a little blacker, you will ultimately wish to see gray as black, and then you will see white itself as black.
And if you think that is not true, just take a look at what happened on Tuesday.
That's yesterday in New York State.
Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the New York State Legislature had passed the Reproductive Health Act, which allows mothers to abort their babies up until birth.
He had many buildings, including the One World Trade Center, lit pink to celebrate this decision, which, by any stretch of the imagination, is infanticide.
They have just legalized infanticide.
I mean, the moment before birth, how can that child not be a child?
How can that be?
By what logic, by what moral logic?
Only the moral logic that silences people, that hates them for going to the right to life march, that ignores the issue of the right to life in favor of nonsense controversies, does everything it can, including the Covington story, including the Ben Shapiro baby Hitler story, everything it can to distract you from the issue at hand, which is that these people are ultimately moving toward infanticide because they have taught themselves that black is white, and they think if they can make you say it and silence people who deny it,
they think ultimately black will become white.
Ain't gonna happen.
The truth remains true.
We have the mailbag coming up, and next Tuesday, January 29th, we have the next episode of Daily Wire Backstage.
This is the state of the union coverage.
If there is a state of the union, if not, we'll just all sort of stare at each other.
Daily Wire, God King, Jeremy Boring, Ben Shapiro, Michael Knowles, and myself will be talking about the speech, what it means going forward, and how the left will respond in some insane way.
And as always, the lovely Alicia Krauss will be classing up the joint and taking your questions as they roll in.
Have to be a subscriber to get your questions in.
So go to dailywire.com and subscribe for a lousy 10 bucks a month or 100 bucks.
You get the whole year and the leftist tears tumbler.
We had a great conversation yesterday with Alicia.
Job Stress Bothers00:14:14
I hope you tuned into that or you can still watch it, find it wherever you find such things.
All right, we've got the mailbag coming up.
Come to dailywire.com, subscribe, and watch the whole show there.
All right, mailbag.
Yeah!
Coffee, all right, from Jacob.
Hi, Drew.
God bless you for all you do, and you helped me the other day re-examine my relationship with God for the better.
So thank you for that.
I was wondering what previous jobs you've held in Hollywood, and also, is there any chance of you bringing your book Another Kingdom to a television audience?
Thanks.
You know, I'm still pitching Another Kingdom to television.
Right now, I really believe I'm so toxic that I can't get any traction on it, but we'll see when the book comes out in March.
You can pre-order it.
When the book comes out in March, I'll have another bite of that apple.
Other jobs I held in Hollywood, well, you know, when I started out, when my wife incited me to actually get a job by speaking those two magical words, I'm pregnant, I got a job at Columbia Pictures as a reader.
And as a reader, that's what Austin Lively does in Another Kingdom.
As a reader, you just read books after book after book after book, script after script, and say, will this make a good movie?
What's in the book?
So that the bosses at the studio can pretend they've read it by reading what they call your coverage.
So that's how I started out.
And after that, I was just dragged into the movie business.
I didn't want to be in it.
Somebody basically maneuvered me into a position where I had to write something and they made it into a movie, A Shock to the System, which is still quite a good movie.
And so I've done it from time to time.
I've done it really always, paying most attention to writing novels and other work, but I've done it when I've been called on to do it, and I've had a lot of fun doing it.
I've been very fortunate with it.
I know a lot of screenwriters would cut off their arms.
A lot of wannabe screenwriters would cut off their arms to have had the career in screenwriting I have, but I never looked for it.
It just kind of fell into my lap.
And that's the stuff.
That's the only stuff I've done in Hollywood.
From Ian, he says, I became a Christian at age 13.
I have to edit this because it's very long.
He said, I lived the next 10 years with great confidence in God.
However, my faith fell apart when I was 23 because I became suddenly afraid that my salvation was lost.
I was all but convinced of this by a pastor whom I trusted when he made a case from the Bible that my sudden relapse into porn use had offended God too greatly to apply the grace of Christ to me.
My life was ruined.
I've read the Bible obsessively for years since.
I've read theology and commentaries.
I could easily explain why that stupid lesson from the pastor was wrong.
I could have done so within a few months, no problem.
But the trauma broke something in me.
I can't feel trust in God, I once felt.
In many ways, my life has gotten better.
I'm free from porn use for a long time.
I'm happily married.
We're going to be parents soon.
I've got a job that I like.
In my heart, I fear that Jesus hates my guts, and I'll never be able to feel joy or love for him again, no matter how much I try.
I don't mean to lay too great a burden on you to answer such a large outpouring of doubt, but I respect your wisdom.
I've read your memoir, and I'm inspired by your experience of joy in Christ.
Okay, here's the thing.
We got to work this through, all right?
What's obvious about this is it has nothing to do with God.
It has nothing to do with this state, your state of grace, with God.
Christ died for your sins.
Your sins are forgiven, and he loves you, and he understands your life.
He is as close to you as your own breath.
He knows this, and you know he knows this.
You say so in your letter.
This is the important thing.
It's not just that this is not about God.
You know you're forgiven.
You know God forgives you.
So what is going on here?
Why are you so bothered by a stupid thing that a stupid pastor stupidly said?
And you know it's stupid.
So why is it bothering you?
That's the question you have to answer.
The question you have to answer is not what God's doing and not whether you're forgiven.
You know that.
You know the answer to that already, all right?
The answer you have to come up with is why did it get you that much?
And I don't, I try not to indulge in any kind of amateur psychoanalysis here, but it seems to me this was a trusted guy who essentially abandoned you.
He betrayed you and told you that God was doing the same thing.
And I think there must be something in here about your dad.
I really do.
I think somewhere along the line, this must reflect something that you feel about your father, and that is why it is pounding at you and you're not facing it.
You don't mention that in here, but this is the thing that's bothering you, not what God is doing.
God is not doing anything like this.
As you know, what bothers you is what the pastor did and what he said God did, which were both father figures rejecting you.
I would find out what that is.
I mean, probably it's the reason that you got involved in the porn in the first place was to solve that wound and to, you know, masturbating to porn is a comfort thing that people do, a very primitive comfort thing that people do to heal some pain inside them.
There is some pain, psychological, it's not spiritual, there's some psychological pain inside you that has to do with your upbringing that is bothering you.
You should deal with it.
Get a counselor to deal with it.
Whatever you have to do, face it yourself and deal with it because your life is good.
You want to be there for your wife.
You want to be there for your kids.
And God is with you all the way on this.
He wants you to fix this.
He does not want you to live in shame for, you know, obviously it's a dumb thing to do to get hooked on porn and you're good on you for getting away from it.
But this is not something he wants you to torment yourself about for the rest of your life.
So find out what's bothering you because it's not this.
It's not God.
It's something I think probably about your dad or the way you were raised or something that wounded you to begin with.
From Veronica, dearest Andrew, I have a decision to make pretty soon.
I need help.
First option, I can get the heck out of California.
Always a good thing to do.
Move to Texas for a PhD and become a professor.
I don't like the school system, public or university, but it'll be a while before it dies out.
My age, I need some job security and financial stability.
Also, I can be a positive conservative Christian influence in academia.
I'm a good teacher, but I don't love the job.
Sometimes a job is just a job.
Second option, I can stay here and pursue being an opera singer.
It's been a dream for years that I always thought was unattainable, but I have an excellent teacher now with connections, and she is opening doors for me.
I'm the perfect age to start opera at 29.
I'm also single with no kids.
I don't want to chase a pipe dream, and I usually don't take chances in favor of being realistic and practical.
But I also don't want to miss an opportunity if it presents itself.
Maybe I could stumble into something unique and wonderful.
Is it silly to even think that at my age?
Thank you so much.
You're my favorite.
Well, thank you for that.
I love opera, and I have heard from other singers that you start opera late.
I mean, 29 is probably too late, for instance, to start being an actor.
Not necessarily, but probably.
So perhaps you're not too old at 29.
I can only tell, I don't know whether you can sing.
I don't know you.
I don't know whether you have that great a gift.
I know it's a tough life, you know, and a competitive market.
So I don't know what you should do.
I can only tell you what I would do in your situation.
If it were I, I would find people that I trusted who know about this, not just friends, but people like your teacher who you trust, to tell you whether you have this talent, whether you have that ability.
I would not let the chance go by to at least take the shot, to take your shot.
You know, Part of taking your shot is knowing when to quit.
That is part of taking your shot.
And it's one of the things I hear from artists all the time.
Do I give up?
When do I give up?
There's always some little trail that keeps you going.
You don't want to go too long, but I would take the shot.
If people around you who are expert and who know you think you've got that skill, think you've got the requisite talent to do it, and you really want to do it, I would take the shot.
Why?
You only live once if it's what you were meant to do.
I tell people all the time, don't do what you want.
Do what God wants.
Do what God made you to do.
If you think he made you to do this, take your shot and find out.
You could be wrong, but it's worth it.
And you don't do it forever.
You don't do it for 10 years.
You can go back and do teaching later.
But that's what I would do.
So I can't advise you personally because I don't know your level of talent, but that is what I would do.
From William, dear wise one, my wife and I go to church together and actively participate in a community group associated with the church.
We're in bed by eight every night.
We rarely drink.
Recently, my wife has decided that certain activities we did and shows that we watched were evil and or immoral.
Chiefly among the shows is Game of Thrones, although there are some others that I thought were just light-hearted sitcoms that she has put under scrutiny.
I understand why she may object to Game of Thrones because of sex and murder, but what really bothers me is that she says that my faith is not genuine if I continue to watch these shows.
She conflates Game of Thrones with pornography, while I feel that it mirrors the human experience.
I think the key is not being absorbed into lust.
What is your opinion on this situation and how some non-Christian works of art fit into a Christian life?
I'm worried that my wife will keep damning everything we have in common until there's very little between us.
Soon the only thing that will be acceptable will be bland Christian rock.
Please give me your advice.
I don't know what to do.
Well, I have two responses to this.
One is, I've said this repeatedly, that Christian art, conservative art does not look like Christian life or conservative life.
The greatest Christian art is filled with sex and violence.
The work that really changed my life, that put me on a path toward Christianity, is Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment, which is about an axe murderer who falls in love with a prostitute.
Okay, so that's what it's about.
You couldn't sell that at Crossways or any of the other Christian bookstores, and yet it is the greatest Christian novel ever.
I think Game of Thrones, I have theological problems with Game of Thrones, but I think it is a brilliant work.
Parts of it, especially early on in the middle, were just brilliant, although there was exploitative sex in it.
So that just depends on who you are and how you react to that.
So that's the first thing.
So I don't agree with your wife.
The second thing is, you've got to get control of your house here.
You are the leader in this house, and your wife is nagging you, and she is being censorious, and she is behaving extremely badly.
You are supposed to be the leader in this house.
And if I were in this situation, I would sit down with my wife, and in the kindest possible terms, I would say to her, my darling, I am the head of this household.
I'm not asking you what shows I should watch.
You don't have to watch Game of Thrones.
You are free to watch whatever you want, but I don't want to be nagged.
I will not accept being nagged.
I will not accept being told what to watch.
And I don't care whether you think I'm a Christian or not because I know what my faith is.
I would not want to see any frowny faces.
I don't want to see any cold shoulders.
I don't want to see any rolled eyes.
Get your act together and be a wife.
If you want to show me your Christian faith, learn what it says about being a wife in the Bible because she is really riding you, pal, and you should not accept that in your own home.
All right.
I have been, question, I have been, this is from Pete.
I have been working for my parents for the past few years as a manager, and I've gained responsibilities and ownership over time.
I recently have received a job offer for a higher-paying career option in the same industry.
How can I start a conversation with my parents about my future and what I believe is better for my life in the long run?
Appreciate all that you do.
I mean, this is kind of an easy question.
You sit down by yourself or with your wife if you have one, and you decide what you want to do.
What is the best thing for you in your life?
You're not living your parents' life, you're living your life.
What is the best thing for you in your life?
It sounds like in this case, it would be taking the higher-paying job.
And then you sit down with your parents, and in the kindest, most loving possible way, you explain to them that you are taking another job.
It's not their decision.
It's your decision.
You may come back.
At some point, the training that you get at this job may bring you back to the family business.
But right now, what you have deemed is best for your life is to move on.
So tell them you love them.
This is not a personal rejection.
You know, you've had a great time.
They've been great to you.
But now you want to take this job.
And if they give you, you know, if they unleash hell on you, you just have to stand firm.
That's what becoming a man is about, and that's what becoming a grown-up is about.
And you have to go and do it.
But hopefully there'll be understanding of this.
One more.
There's one in here about.
There it is.
I recently found out that my dad is my biological father.
This is from Anonymous.
He and my mom weren't able to conceive, and so they decided to have an anonymous sperm donor.
I have no issue with this whatsoever.
Dad is my dad, period.
End of story.
He raised me along with mom.
I would never think of many differently simply because I have this new information.
The issue is that my dad is taking this very hard.
I'm in my 30s, and he was terrified to let me know any of this.
I found that I have a half-sister, one whom I obviously didn't know, and my parents were forced to discuss this topic.
I also feel awful that I essentially forced this information out into the open.
I'm fine with never discussing this and going on like everything is normal.
Is that the right thing to do?
But I'm concerned my dad won't be able to.
He also does not want to talk about this at all.
Any advice as to what I can do for my parents?
If anything, thank you so much, Drew.
Yeah, this is not your problem.
This is your father's problem.
It's not normal and it's not particularly wise for him to be unable to discuss this truth with you.
It may be a difficult truth.
It may be difficult for him, but it's not a bad truth.
It's not an evil thing.
It's a perfectly reasonable good thing.
But he has a problem with it.
You can't solve his problem.
You can only solve your problems.
You can't solve his problem.
So it is not wrong to not discuss it with him, but only understand that you're not discussing it with him because he has a problem.
It's not your problem.
You can discuss it with anyone else you want.
You don't want to torment him.
At some point, it might be nice to tell him that you love him.
It has made no difference to you.
But if you want to discuss it with other people, go ahead.
Just leave him alone because he's got a problem with it and you can't solve that problem.
Again, this is not your problem.
You sound like you have a perfectly sane and rational reaction to it.
You know, you didn't do a bad thing by bringing the information to light.
You're not doing a bad thing now.
But don't torment him if he can't deal with it.
It's him.
It's he who can't deal with it.
And so if you have to leave him alone, leave him alone.
But feel free to explore it in any other way that you want to, you know, because it's your life.
It's something you might want to know about.
All right, I got to stop there.
I love doing the mailbag, and there were some great, more great questions, but we'll hold them over until next week and maybe select a few out of there.
Or you can always write back.
I got to close by talking about Brett Baer.
Brett Baer's Rescue00:02:50
Brett Baer, obviously the host of special report on Fox News.
He was in a car accident on a skiing vacation with his wife and two kids.
His car overturned.
Thankfully, people came and helped him.
And while his family suffered some minor injuries, they came out.
He made a very impassioned Comment about how we should count our blessings and all this.
But I just have to say, I don't know Brett Baer.
I've never met the guy.
I just admire him.
He is one of the very, very few people in the journalism business whom I admire, especially in TV journalism.
That show special report, I know it's on Fox News.
I know Fox News is a right-wing station with right-wing commentary, but that show is the fairest, best journalism on television.
And he, as its leader, bears a lot of responsibility for that.
He is, you know, Chris Wallace is good on Fox.
I hate the fact he interrupts everybody, but he interrupts everybody.
He's fair.
But Brett Baer does a show that is really difficult to do.
And my first, I know it's awful.
I mean, my second reaction was to pray for him and his family and to wish them well and to be grateful for their life.
But my first reaction when I heard the news was utterly selfish, was, oh no, now there'll be no journalism on television.
The guy just deserves every kudo, every award.
Other journalists, even left-wingers, have praised him, have said that it is the best show on TV in all the effort to demonize Fox.
There is nothing else on television, nothing else that compares to Brett Baer's special report.
It is a great, great work of journalism.
And, you know, I'm thrilled that the guy is well, not just for himself, obviously, but for the rest of us.
Because if we lost that show, we would lose 90% of the truth in television journalism.
It is great stuff, and I pay tribute to him because I just think he's terrific.
That's it.
Tomorrow, the last day, you want to be there to suck in all the clavy goodness you can before the clavenless weekend descends upon you.
I'll be there.
I hope you'll be there too.
I'm Andrew Clavin.
This is The Andrew Klavan Show.
The Andrew Clavin Show is produced by Robert Sterling.
Executive producer, Jeremy Boring, senior producer, Jonathan Hay.
Our supervising producer is Mathis Glover, and our technical producer is Austin Stevens.
Edited by Adam Sajovitz.
Audio is mixed by Mike Cormina.
Hair and makeup is by Jessua Alvera.
And our animations are by Cynthia Angulo.
Production assistant, Nick Sheehan.
The Andrew Clavin Show is a Daily Wire production, Copyright Daily Wire 2019.
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