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Dec. 23, 2024 - Human Events Daily - Jack Posobiec
48:24
The Truth About 'It's A Wonderful Life'

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This is what happens when the fourth turning meets fifth generation warfare.
Oh, yeah.
A commentator, international social media sensation, and former Navy intelligence veteran.
This is Human Events with your host, Jack Posobiec.
What is it you want, Barry?
What do you want?
You want the moon?
Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down.
Hey, that's a pretty good idea.
I'll give you the moon, all right?
I'll take it.
I'm not a praying man, but if you're up there and you can hear me, show me the way.
I'm at the end of my rope, right?
Get me back!
I don't care what happens to me!
Get me back to my wife and kids!
Help me, Clarence, please!
Please!
I want to live again!
Please, God, let me live again.
Hey!
Merry Christmas, Mr. Potter!
Happy New Year to you!
In jail!
Go on home, they're waiting for you!
Mary! Mary! Mary!
Well, hello, Mr. Bank Examiner.
How are you?
Mr. Bailey, there's a deficit.
I know, $8,000.
George, I've got a little paper.
I'll bet it's a warrant for my arrest.
Isn't it wonderful?
I'm going to jail.
Kids, Janie!
Janie, Tommy!
Look, Daddy, teacher says every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings.
That's right.
That's right.
Attaboy, Clarence.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard to today's special episode of Human Events Daily for Christmastime.
We're going to dive into the classic tale, It's a Wonderful Life, and see how its narrative resonates with today's political landscape.
Now, I want you to imagine their town, Bedford Falls, as the heartland of America.
A place where family values, community spirit, and social prosperity thrive.
This is the world George Bailey, our protagonist, fights to maintain.
Bedford Falls, in our allegory, mirrors the ideals of MAGA. See, here, people look out for each other.
Small businesses flourish, and there's a sense of belonging, much like the vision of a united, prosperous America where the community comes first, where everyone knows your name, where the local bank run by George symbolizes trust and mutual support rather than profit motive alone.
Now, you contrast that With Pottersville, the dark dystopian alternative reality where George never existed.
Here we see the consequences of unchecked greed, rampant crime, and moral decay.
Pottersville is an image of what America could turn into and was turning into if left to the devices of those who prioritize personal gain over that community good.
Under this lens, Pottersville represents the fears that some may have about the direction that America was heading under under President Biden, where they saw an increase in crime, economic disparity, and social fragmentation.
Here, Mr. Potter, the antagonist, embodies the epitome of greed, controlling everything with an iron fist, much like how critics view the policies and economic strategies of the left.
So, It's a Wonderful Life serves as a modern-day parable for America.
It's a story about the fight between the soul of the nation and the individualistic profit-driven forces that could threaten that.
George Bailey's journey through this nightmare alternate reality, without his influence, shows us the value of every individual's contribution to community.
It's about recognizing that each person, no matter how small their role might seem, is vital to the fabric of our society.
In political terms this film warns against the loss of community values in favor of a society Where money, power, and personal gain reign supreme.
It is a reminder of what could be lost if we forget the importance of looking after one another, of the dangers of allowing the few to control the many for their benefit, and it's a call to action to restore and preserve that sense of community, that American dream, where everyone has a chance to thrive, not just the Mr. Potters of the world.
So as we approach another Christmas, let's ask ourselves, are we living in bed for falls, or are we sliding into Pottersville?
And more importantly, what can we each do to ensure we remain in or return to a place where community, values, and shared family prosperity are not just ideals, but realities in America?
This, my friends, is why It's a Wonderful Life isn't just a Christmas movie.
It's a political statement, a reminder of what America could be, should we, and in many ways still yearns to be.
And tonight on this episode, we're going to be joined by none other than Glenn Jacobs, the mayor of Knox County, Tennessee.
Hi, Daddy.
What happened to you?
I want a flower.
Wait, Mama, where do you think you're going?
I want to give my flower a drink.
All right, all right.
I'll give Daddy the flower.
I'll give it a drink.
Now, right here.
Look, Daddy.
Paste it.
Yeah, all right, all right.
Oh man, I love seeing it.
I can't wait to watch.
It's a wonderful life.
I haven't watched it again this year.
By the way, I'm not one of those guys who says we have to do the black and white or you have to do the colorized.
I think it's all good.
I think it's all good because I just love the story.
I love where it is.
But I want to bring on our special guest, Ladies and gentlemen, you know him from the WWE, but you also know him because of the role he played in 2024, not just in the presidential election, but his role in really helping so many people that were hit in Tennessee, not just Knox County, but all across Tennessee and over into North Carolina.
It is Glenn Jacobs, the mayor of Knox County, Tennessee, joins us now.
How are you, Glenn?
Hey, Jack.
Thanks for having me on.
Well, no, this is great.
So, I happened to see you had tweeted something the other day, and you had said, you were talking about, and yeah, sort of everybody does it on Twitter this time of year, and X. They'll say, what are your favorite Christmas movies?
And I had said, two of mine are It's a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Story.
And then I also saw that you had thrown down the exact same thing.
So, let's go into It's...
It's a wonderful life a little bit.
What is it about this film for you that just puts it so high up there?
Well, it's just a great story.
And obviously, You have George Bailey, who's done so many wonderful things in his life and has sacrificed, in many cases, his own personal ambitions for whether it's family or community or whatever.
He stays at home to run the savings loan after his father passes away, which is the bedrock of the community.
Everybody else runs off and they're chasing their dreams and his brother's a war hero and, oh gosh, what's his name?
The E-Haw guy's out, you know, with plastics making a fortune.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
It was like his classmate or something.
He said, oh, do you want to go in?
He didn't go into the company.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, so George passes up all these opportunities to, you know, serve his family and his community.
And you think, oh, you know, what a great guy.
But then obviously, for those that don't know the story, what happens is there's kind of some embezzlement.
Not his fault, actually.
It's criminal crime.
On the other side, Mr. Potter, who is the antagonist, George's uncle, tends to hit the bottle a little bit, and he goes to make a deposit at Mr. Potter's bank, and when he does, he forgets to actually make the deposit and just hands Mr. Potter like five grand, which is a heck of a lot of money back, you know, back, this is before Bidenflation, okay?
This is a heck of a lot of money back in the 1930s when this is set.
And then Mr. Potter just, you know, just keeps it, hoping he's going to run George out of business.
And, you know, George basically freaks out and becomes depressed and is feeling sorry for himself, wants to jump off the bridge.
And he does where he's going to.
And little beknownst to him, there's a dude named Clarence who's actually an angel that jumps into the water first.
George being George, jumps in to save him.
And basically then the story is about what the world would look like and what Bedford Falls would look like.
If it hadn't been for George Bailey.
And, you know, I think that'd be actually a great gift for a lot of people to see what the world would look like if we didn't exist or had never lived.
And in George's case, yeah, it has monumental impacts on the community that he lives in and his family.
By the way, I just wanted to fact check something that you mentioned that it was a lot more money back then than it is now.
And I was like, I thought about it.
I said, I wonder what that would be today.
So, and this is incredible.
Yeah.
$5,000 in 1940. And so when you're watching these old movies and- Was it five, Jack?
I forget the exact.
Let's just say five.
Let's say five.
So $5,000 in 1940. In purchasing power equivalents, it is equivalent to $112,000 in 2024 money.
So in, give or take, the 80-some years since that movie has come out, five grand is now equivalent to over $100,000.
Grand.
Boy, that sounds like something that would happen in Pottersville, wouldn't it?
Sure does, doesn't it?
Well, and you're exactly right.
You know, Pottersville is a place...
Yeah, it's literally centrally controlled.
And the whole idea is that folks...
Pay rent and they're kind of stuck there.
They're trapped.
And that's how Mr. Potter makes his money is basically by keeping people in his shanty town and they never get an opportunity to improve their own lives.
So, as you said, you know, it's a great illustration of, you know, of really centralized control and When the elites take over and decide what's good for you as opposed to how you want to live your life.
And to me, that's also a pretty big part of the story, actually.
And it's big too, because my, and you know, I didn't even mean to mention this here, but here we are.
When you're watching some of these films, and there's so many great movies from this era, Holiday Affair, Bells of St. Mary's, just so many great Christmas, the movie White Christmas itself with Bing Crosby, you know, so many great films from this era, but people say, you know, in Holiday Affair,
there's a whole plot about, you know, the boy wants to take the train back because he wants to get the money, and it was an $80 train, and You know, $80 is a little bit of money today, but it's not something that's this huge outpouring of money so much that it becomes this major plot point.
But back then, it would have been.
So I almost feel like we might have to get the Glenn Jacobs inflation calculator for classic movies so that people can add it to their film.
So every year, when someone mentions $5,000, you can see what that is in $20, $24.
Yeah, it's a ton more.
It's a lot more.
That's exactly right.
So yeah, $80 in 1948. Yeah, that's almost $1,800 today.
I mean, it's an incredible amount.
It's almost $2,000 for a toy train obviously would become something that becomes a plot point because I can't accept this gift.
It's way too much money for a child.
Anyway, totally separate movie.
But man, we really have to explain this to people, don't we?
Yeah, man.
Your point is well taken in the fact that inflation has accomplished what Pottersville did.
You know, for so many people, they're working so hard just to keep their heads above water because everything's gotten so expensive now.
You know, so it's hard to put away.
It's hard to plan for the future.
It's hard to save when things have become this expensive.
So, unfortunately, I know this is Christmas season and we're being a bit of grinches here, but nevertheless, yeah, those are really important issues.
Well, and I think that that gets into the heart of the movie as well.
And of course, the film is, it's a savings and loan.
And so, because he's been trying so hard to make good on these loans and put the loans out and say, throw some money here, throw some money there.
It's actually a good financial tale as well, which is funny because, you know, you don't expect to get your financial literacy from Christmas films, but it does have a great scene at the very end.
You know, where's our money?
Towards the end, I should say.
Where's our money?
Your money's not here in the savings and loans.
It's not just back in the safe.
It's in your house, and it's in your house, and it's your garage because that money goes out.
By the way, though, that's the way those systems are supposed to work, isn't it?
Thank you.
Yeah, sure.
Absolutely.
You know, and it's funny just getting on banking for a second.
Yeah.
One of the issues that has happened now is, you know, it used to be that you had time deposits, which would be like CDs, and that's actually what banks would loan out.
Then you would have your savings account when those that did not bear interest.
In fact, sometimes you actually had to pay because that was kept at the bank.
Okay.
That's just where you kept your money.
They were two different things.
Now we've conflated that and now Basically, at a bank, everything is loanable, so you get into the whole thing about fractional reserve banking, and that's part of what causes inflation when the Fed creates money and it goes out to the banks, and then they only keep a little bit of it, but most of it actually goes out into circulation through loans.
Yeah, that's a great example.
Of how things have gone awry.
You know, back then, people understood you were not going to go to the bank and get your money out that day because it was being used, loaned to someone else, which is how you got interest for that.
Nowadays, you know, everything goes out, banks make a lot of money, and then you get a little bit through interest, but that's about it.
But, yeah, if you go to your bank and say, hey, I've got, I don't know, $10,000 or let's say $50,000 in a savings account, good luck trying to get that out because they still ain't got it at the bank.
Yeah, that's right.
That's exactly right.
If you walk out there and say, I want to pull this all out, it is very good.
That's why they put the limits on.
That's why they put it out there.
But to your point as well about how the Fed's been working, this is where you get that inflation that has the inflation calculator that comes in because suddenly it's like, wait a minute, why doesn't my dollar go as much as it used to?
Why is it that, you know, it's a wonderful life.
It's a long time ago, but it's not that long ago.
So why is it that $5,000 in that film could almost, you know, would be the equivalent of, I mean, I guess you couldn't buy a house now, but you could buy a car.
You'd buy a pretty decent car for that amount of money now.
But suddenly, you know, that's just a couple grand back then.
And that gets to what you're speaking of because it reduces the value of our money because they're printing more of it.
And one of the most important things for young people is debt and how, you know, debt can be used appropriately, obviously, you know, buying a house or these long-term things that you can't buy up front.
However, you can also end up being a slave to debt.
And that's what we see in a wonderful life.
With Mr. Potter, you're never going to get out of debt.
With George, you're eventually going to pay that loan off and own your house.
Mr. Potter's whole deal is to keep you there so he can keep on making money off.
This is such a good point.
We're coming up on our break, but I want to get into that in the next segment because this gets into how this movie is, by the way, a Christmas movie because it has the very core of the Christian spirit at its heart.
Stay tuned.
We'll be right back.
Jack Posobiec, Glenn Jacobs, The Truth About It's a Wonderful Life.
Dear Father in Heaven, I'm not a praying man, but if you're up there and you can hear me, show me the way.
I'm at the end of my rope, right?
Show me the way.
Oh, God.
*Pewds* Thank you.
All right, Jack Posobiec, we're back.
Human Events Daily, the truth about It's a Wonderful Life, and we're on with Glenn Jacobs, the mayor of Moxley County, Tennessee.
And by the way, that scene just there with Jimmy Stewart, that when this film was made, it was actually after the war, but only a few years after, Jimmy Stewart himself, World War II veteran, Who actually had, now at the time they would have called it shell shock,
but actually had PTSD. And this is something that people have referred to as basically his actual emotions and his actual experiences in the war and then coming back to the United States and trying to re-ingratiate himself with normalcy and that's a huge issue with our veteran community even today.
by the way incredibly progressive for its time like true progressive not the false like political progressive but the fact they talk about it that at the fact that suicides do go up at christmas eve and you're talking about a film like this that comes out in the 1940s not really the type it's a heavy film it's definitely a heavy film and the fact that you you it's it gets into the individual out of the spirit being stripped away from the individual
uh through taxation the Christian sentiment of the film getting taken away by the state with Mr. Potter.
There's so much here.
And then Frank Capra himself, the director, was a World War II veteran.
So I think with a lot of these films, too, when you go back and look at them, you have to put them in the context Of what not only the audience was going through and what their intent was, but what the people who made it were going through.
Isn't that right, Glenn?
Yeah, absolutely.
And I did not know that, actually, that Capra was...
A veteran, and I actually didn't know that about Jimmy Stewart either.
You know, but you see people, you know, some of these celebrities back then, Jimmy Stewart, Ted Williams, the great baseball player, you know, who lost a couple years because he served in World War II as an aviator.
And we'll never know how great a baseball player Ted Williams really would have been because he lost two years of his prime doing that.
But it was just...
Different world, you know, and that's one of the things that you can see in the movie, too.
You know, just the importance of family, of community, of all of those things.
And I wonder, Jack, I wonder, too, if that's why the movie maybe doesn't resonate with some folks nowadays, like it once did, is because some of these values, frankly, have been lost or we don't talk about them that much anymore.
I couldn't agree more.
This is the type of stuff.
And by the way, you know, when we talk about community, we're not doing so in sort of the false communist collectivist ideal of, oh, yes, the government must come in and be the...
The arbiter of the state will form the community of the workers.
No, that's statism, okay?
That's actual statism.
When I talk about community, I mean, no, I mean just an actual town that has pride in its character, a town that cares about its heritage, that wants to protect itself, and oh, by the way, wants to provide for basic Public services and basic public goods so things like crime on the street or things like fentanyl homeless zombies stomping around like you'll see where I'm from in Philadelphia in a place where in the 1980s and 1990s Kensington
Avenue used to be a place where you could go shopping and take your kids nowadays that's all it is is druggies and homeless and gang members shooting up at each other and so We sit there and say, oh, well, life is better for them this way, and they've got more choices.
It's ridiculous.
It's completely ridiculous.
The quality of life has gone so far down in our cities and so far down in so many places in America.
And we sit back and say, oh, don't worry about it.
Here's some new crypto.
Don't worry about it.
Here's a new government program that'll take care of you.
Take out another PPP loan.
And so these values, and we keep getting told again and again, and by the way, from some people on the right as well, I should say, and I'm not going to leave them out, they say, oh, that stuff just doesn't matter.
You know, just go do something else.
And if that town, this is what J.D. Vance, and this is what our good friend Kenny Cody writes about all the time.
This is about the people of Appalachia saying, we don't want to leave our towns.
So much of the 2024 election was about these very issues.
I really believe that.
Yeah, I do as well.
And I think you're exactly right.
You know, when we talk about community, we're just talking about taking care of one another and looking out for each other.
And it's not, no, the government coming in again.
That's what Mr. Potter basically does is, you know, he's going to take care of everything up to a certain point.
And that point is just survival.
And That's kind of how I see, you know, with our government now, so many things are really...
Well, and that's a shantytown that you were just talking about.
Yeah, it is.
It is.
I mean, so many things now are just encouraging people, not encouraging people, I'm sorry, discouraging people from thriving by ensuring that they can survive, if that makes sense.
It's so true.
That's what welfare programs...
Well, because you're talking about dependence.
Welfare programs.
It's making you dependent on his program.
Right.
Right.
You're promoting mediocrity by saying, you know, it's okay to just be at this level and you're never going to know what your life can really be.
You know, if you're literally forced to go out and just go, to go out and take life by the horns.
And that's, you know, all the things you were talking about before too.
I think so many of those things Are really a result of government getting way too involved in our lives, doing way too many things.
So, yeah, you know, you can do these destructive behaviors because guess what?
There's a government program, you know, that's food stamps or whatever.
So you're going to survive.
And in some cases, you know, someone's going to come in and clean up your mess.
And that's not how human beings are wired.
You know, we have to be responsible for our actions.
And one of the biggest things the government actually does, especially with the welfare system and those sort of things, is to take that responsibility away from you and to put it on the public at large.
And that's not what we're talking about.
You know, everybody gets down on their luck.
Everybody has issues, you know, but As you're going through these things, you also have to be held accountable.
And actually, that's what the movie does as well.
In the end, it's not like the Lord comes along and just fixes George Bailey.
He shows him what's going on.
And George makes the decisions about his life in the end himself.
And he realizes that, yeah, he's got some problems, but there's nothing that he can't overcome.
And sometimes you actually have to ask for help, too.
You see it with what happens at the end of the movie when all these folks basically open their hearts and open their wallets to rescue George in the situation.
But again, it's not like anyone comes along and fixes this stuff for George.
He has to figure it out himself first.
Oh, that's exactly right.
And, you know, God helps those who help themselves, and I really believe that.
But what you just said about how you can make everyone dependent on a central power, or you can make everyone personally independent through having that...
And it is, by the way.
It's freedom of being financially independent and having that...
Which, by the way, doesn't necessarily mean rich.
You know, Dave Ramsey talks about this kind of stuff.
And it's what you just said before about freedom from the slavery of debt.
Because when you get that far in debt, and we do live, by the way, in a debt culture, that your whole life, and it is like this, it's this, you know, it's like having Glen Jacobs on your back every day.
And...
And every decision is like, oh man, what do I do?
What do I do?
How do I get Glen Jacobs off my back?
And it is going to just cast a pallor over all your decisions.
But meanwhile, it's why we put those lights on our homes because we care about them and we realize that those homes exist through our financial success and through the success of our families.
Right.
You know, and it was interesting you brought up just about the whole debt thing.
You know, our monetary system is based on debt.
I mean, you know, if all the debt in our system were eliminated, all the dollars would go away.
You know, and it's crazy to think about that, but that's how the system works.
It encourages debt.
It encourages people to go into debt and to stay into debt.
And really discourages folks from acquiring assets.
And as you said, you know, getting to the point where even if you're not wealthy, you're at least financially secure enough that you don't have to keep on the rat race or keeping the rat race and keep on the durable wheel all the time.
And it's literally like our entire culture now.
Which is a result of what the government has done and what the Federal Reserve has done, frankly.
Our entire culture is about more and more and more and more debt and just people working harder and harder and harder and harder just to keep up.
And that's just no way for human beings to live.
And of course, it also gets, and Pottersville shows this, it leads to people, you know, you get upset about the debt, so where do you go?
You hit up the bar, and then, oh, what's right next to the bar is, it's girls, girls, girls is right there, and then you go across the street, oh, here's the casino!
Here's a way to get out of debt.
You go to the casino.
Hey, you got your last...
I guess back then it would be like your last five bucks or your bottom dollar.
So they used to call it the bottom dollar.
And try your luck.
And then guess what?
You'll lose that too.
And then guess what?
You're going to end up right on the bridge with George Bailey.
And Mr. Potter's going to say, well...
Got another floater, and he's gonna say, step right up, who's next?
Because they ultimately don't care.
You're never gonna beat the house, you're never gonna beat Mr. Potter, and the bridge is right there as your way out, and these people are punching out.
And what's great about It's a Wonderful Life, I think, is that it's trying to show people that there's another way.
One minute until the break, Glenn Jacobs.
Yeah, absolutely.
And as you said, the other way is, It's really the America I think that we're all striving for, or at least have a romantic version of what it should be in our minds, right?
As opposed to whatever this thing that we're currently living in.
And I think you made a great point during the intro about how under the Biden administration, that had really accelerated.
And hopefully with the second Trump administration, we're going to get back to the values that have made us great to begin with.
It's so simple.
It's a big idea, but it's a simple idea because there's a lot of stuff that gets in the way.
And that's why I keep saying you got to watch It's a Wonderful Life at least once a year.
Have it on while you're wrapping presents, right?
To remind us of what it is that we're actually fighting for.
Stay tuned.
We'll be right back on this special Christmas edition of Human Events Daily.
Bert, do you know me?
Know you?
Huh, you kidding?
I've been looking all over town trying to find you.
I saw your car piled into that tree down there and I thought maybe you...
Hey, your mouth's bleeding.
Are you sure you're all right?
What you...
My mouth's bleeding, Bert!
My mouth's bleeding!
Bert!
What do you know about that?
Alright, Jack Posobiec, we're back live.
Christmas edition of Human Events Daily, the truth about It's a Wonderful Life.
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Mayor Glenn Jacobs, I wanted to ask you about that sense of things towards the end there, because it's ultimately, and it's a wonderful life, you know, it plays on a lot of the same themes as A Christmas Carol and Charles Dickens, which came out, you know, a century prior there, where in that case, it's Ebenezer Scrooge.
And, you know, Scrooge is a different character from Bailey, but, you know, there's a lot of similar themes in the sense, you know, he's visited by the...
The Christmas ghosts versus an angel, but he's given these visions of what life was like and what life is like for others and remembering that spirit of the season.
But also, it teaches us something, I think, because, look, we can all, you know, we all have our dreams and then we have reality.
And I think it's when they always say that when expectations don't meet reality, that's when people turn to despair.
And it's like George, he has this, I can't get over it, he lives in this massive house, he's got a gorgeous wife, he's got four incredible children, and yet the whole time he's thinking about those dreams.
And it's like, I just want Clarence to go up to him and start smacking him around.
Actually, the hardest part for me to watch in that film is when I forget his daughter's name, but she's playing on the piano and he starts screaming at her.
He just starts laying into her.
I'm like, this is pretty dark stuff.
This is like child abuse, basically, what he's doing to her.
She's playing a beautiful Christmas song for them.
And yet...
This is real.
This is a real thing that affects people.
And of course, you know, we understand debt is a huge driver of this, but there's other things out there that can be those issues for us, especially at Christmas time.
And it's almost like Christmas In a sense, it's a giant magnifier of whatever we're feeling.
If we're feeling life is good, then Christmas is great.
If we're feeling life is terrible, Christmas can be really, really bad.
It really is, I think, a message of the movie that you've got to reframe.
You've got to reframe and realize that, in fact, quite possibly, your life is pretty good.
Yeah, 100% agree.
I think George's issue is...
He's looking at everyone else, right?
And he's comparing himself to them.
And I guarantee you that what's happening is if we were to make another It's a Wonderful Life and say with George's brother or whoever, they would look at George and go, man, I wish I was George.
Because he's, like you said, he's got it made.
He's got a beautiful family.
He's super well-respected in the community.
All these things.
I'd Absolutely agree.
I think so many times in our lives, you know, what we do, and I'm guilty of this, you know, we look at other people and go, oh man, they got it made, and this is, you know, I wish I was them.
Well, you probably don't actually, because you don't know what kind of issues they have going on in their life.
But that's just what human beings do.
Unfortunately, we all don't have a clearance that can come down In a time of crisis, and it's kind of what Clarence does, even though he doesn't slap him around.
In the end, you know, the whole story is about, I guess, a psychological or a mental slapping around and saying, George, dude, get your head on straight.
You know, this is what everything would look like if it weren't for you.
And you need to quit feeling sorry for yourself, because in the end, that's what it is, you know?
And there are times you feel, you know, you feel really sympathetic towards George.
There are other times you're just like, dude, Just quit feeling sorry for yourself, you know, and move on.
But I guess you wouldn't have a movie if that were the case, right?
No, no, of course not.
It's like sometimes when my wife, Tanya, she's not big into horror movies.
And I always say, but the horror movie would never work if they don't open the door.
So why don't they just leave the house?
Well, then you wouldn't have a movie.
Come on, you got to throw some of that stuff in there.
Exactly.
Suspend logic for a minute.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Why don't you just leave?
No, no, no, no, no.
Suspension of disbelief.
A little bit of suspension of disbelief.
But, you know, with the film, too, it's also something where This is where, you know, if you do have religion in your life, and look, I'm the kind of guy where I always promote this for people, is that if you have religion in your life, that's when, you know, and I'm Catholic, but, you know, any Christian or just anyone who's got religion, you can put it in your life and say, you give it up to God.
You know, you don't have to have Glenn Jacobs on your back carrying it by yourself.
You can say, you know what, maybe God's going to help me with this burden.
Maybe God gave me this because he wants me to see it through.
The story of Christ itself, which is of course the center of Christmas, is a story of sacrifice.
When you're younger, you look at the nativity scene and you see, okay, it's beautiful, Jesus married baby Joseph.
But keep in mind, that's a manger.
That's a farm, you know, a barn, basically.
And you're surrounded by animals.
It's the worst possible place that any baby could be born, really, that's, you know, like within reason.
And then knowing what you know happens to Christ along his life and everything that his mother has to see him go through, has to watch him be Tortured and crucified and killed in public, right?
It's the utter, utmost humiliation that he has to go through.
And then realizing that that's, if you are a Christian, I'm speaking to Christians on this, or maybe anyone who's Christian curious, that to understand that if he's willing to go through that, he's willing to do so only because he would do so for you.
And that, by the way, is my answer to why It's a Wonderful Life is a Christmas movie.
I saw an argument that was a non-believer, atheist, I guess, and they were like, well, if Jesus Christ were so powerful, why did he allow himself to be tortured, publicly humiliated, and crucified?
You know, he could have just said no, right?
And actually, in the Bible, he does.
He asks God, the Father, he's like, you know, let this cup pass over me.
And that just wasn't his fate.
But the response is amazing.
It's like, yeah, he's the most powerful being imaginable.
He could have said, no, I'm not going to do that.
But he didn't.
He chose himself to sacrifice for us.
And therein actually lies the ultimate power, right?
You're exactly right.
And it is the same with The Wonderful Life.
At the end of it, I would hope anyway that George realizes that he does have a wonderful life because of all the people that he's helped, the tremendous impact that he has made on his local community, all the things that he's done.
And yeah, the world would be a different place if it hadn't been for him.
You know, certainly not the power of Jesus Christ, but nevertheless, that same decision-making along the way.
And in the end, it did take an angel to show him that that's really what the whole thing is about.
And that's really what our lives are about.
You know, I mean, man, you're going to die.
No one's going to care how much money you had or any of those things.
What they will care is the impact he had on other people and that he had on them.
There's a quote from G.K. Chesterton right before we go to break here that I'll say, and it always stuck with me.
He said, the most extraordinary thing in the world is an ordinary man and an ordinary woman and their ordinary children.
And in fact, it actually is the most extraordinary thing in the world.
And you might even call it a wonderful life.
Be right back.
Glenn Jacobs Parents Parents!
Help me, Clarence!
Get me back!
Get me back!
I don't care what happens to me!
Get me back to my wife and kids!
Help me, Clarence, please!
Please!
I want to live again!
I want to live again!
Jack Posobiec back live, Human Events Daily, the truth about It's a Wonderful Life.
We were talking earlier about how Jimmy Stewart was going through his own PTSD as he was making the film after having served in World War II. You just hear it in that clip.
You just hear it there where it's a man who's lost everything But he's saying the only thing he wants back is his wife, his children, his family.
He's totally understood the importance of that.
And of course, Jimmy Stewart had all of those things as well.
But Glenn, I gotta ask you.
Look, man, you and I, you know, a lot of us disagree with us on this.
There's some other Christmas movies out there, but there's also a movie that many people claim is a Christmas movie that you and I are in agreement on is not a Christmas movie.
And in fact, Bruce Willis agrees with us on this.
It's Die Hard.
They say Die Hard's a Christmas movie, and I just got to say, it really is not.
It's really not.
No, it's not.
I mean, it's set at Christmas.
And as I said the other day on X or Twitter, whatever you want to call it, you know, there's two tests.
OK, you have the setting test.
Yes, it's set at Christmas, but the plot has nothing to do with Christmas, either on a religious level or a secular level either.
I mean, there's no there's just no it's not like a Christmas story.
You know, where Ralphie's trying to get his Christmas present, right?
And along the way, he discovers that his dad's actually a really good guy despite the rough exterior and all that sort of stuff, you know?
So, and here's the thing.
By the way, Christmas Story, I can watch that every year because it is so darn funny that I could quote the entire thing verbatim.
It's just one of the funniest movies I've ever seen.
Yeah.
Me too, yes.
And yeah, that makes it a Christmas movie, the fact that you have all the components.
Die Hard could have been, they could have done it the 4th of July.
They could have done it just because the building is having maintenance.
The reason it's set at Christmas is because the security is lax at the tower.
Now, here's the deal.
If Hans Gruber had been trying to steal some advanced weaponry from the tower, say some service-to-air missiles to shoot down Santa's sleigh, and Bruce Willis stops him and says, It's a Christmas movie, but that's not the case.
No, it's not.
It's not.
If you want to remake the movie and make it a Christmas movie, that's what you need to do.
By the way, for folks who don't know, and I will say this, by the way, even though I disagree with Gryhardt being a Christmas movie, and honestly, I think it's kind of a dead meme.
Like, the joke was not funny like five years ago, and for some reason, people just want to keep bringing it along.
It's a great movie, okay?
There's nothing wrong with that movie.
I love that movie.
Yeah.
But it's an action movie.
It's like the original action movie.
One thing though, I will, since you mentioned Hans Gruber, a lot of people don't know this, that that organization, that terrorist organization he's part of was a real life terrorist organization, communist terrorist organization Of
course you had to...
Of course you had to have been a liberal.
I'm just saying.
That is the factual basis that Hans Gruber is based on.
I did a whole communism book this year and I'm not pitching it, but it's true.
It's all true.
Little known fact that Hans Gruber is actually a CNN anchor.
No!
Oh man, now we're getting in big trouble.
But it's true.
The story goes that she was writing a story on, so the group existed.
She didn't found the group.
The Red Army Faction.
And then she was doing a story on them, and she was sort of getting closer and closer in with the group, and then suddenly she just went native.
She just went native and was like, I'm in here, and there was like a, I think it was a bank robbery, because they were doing bank robberies to kind of finance themselves.
As you do when you're a communist, by the way.
Kind of gets into the It's a Wonderful Life stuff there a little bit.
But she then decides, I'm going to get in the car and go with them.
Leaves her kids, by the way.
She had two little girls.
Leaves them.
And the one girl is now grown up and actually is an anti-communist writer and speaker in Germany.
So there you go.
You guys didn't know that, did you?
About Die Hard.
Full circle.
Full circle.
Yeah, full circle.
So no, I wrote that about that in my Antifa book, actually.
And then we touched on it a little bit, because they were sort of one of the original Antifas.
But no, I think Die Hard's a great movie.
Look, A Christmas Story.
Christmas Story is a great movie.
There's nothing wrong with that.
And by the way, it's a...
Even then, the town that A Christmas Story takes place in, it's got an actual community.
It's got kids who know each other.
The fact that the mom can call up the other mom when...
I guess it's Flick's mom or something like that when he says the bad word.
We've totally lost that in society today.
We've totally lost that.
And that's something, when it comes to all these films, That's what MAGA and, you know, it's not about Donald Trump and, you know, they say, oh, you guys love Trump.
No, no, no, no.
Like, he's great.
But it's about we're fighting for the world that, guess what?
It did exist in the 1940s.
And Norman Rockwell's America did exist.
By the way, Norman Rockwell's America was after It's a Wonderful Life came out.
The 50s were after the 40s, for folks who understand, you know, how mathematics work.
So...
You know, all of these things can be had if we just fight for them.
Last minute to you, Glenn Jacobs.
We're talking about the breakdown of the family unit here.
That's what it is.
I was talking with someone the other day.
Literally, what the left and what the communists want to do is they want to destroy the family.
They want to take God out of the public square because they want government to control everything.
And they want people to worship government.
They want government to be your family.
That's Pottersville.
That's just a wonderful example, as you pointed out.
In order for our country to survive, in order for society to survive, you know, we need strong civic institutions.
It starts with the family.
I also believe that the church is a big part of that.
And the further we get away from those, the more problems that we're going to continue to have as a country.
It's as simple as that, folks.
You didn't know that you might actually get, you know, it's not just politics, but it's a vision of America.
And the question that I have whenever I watch, and I hope when you watch It's a Wonderful Life this year, sit down.
You can watch it black and white or the colored.
I don't judge.
I watch them both.
They're all good.
It's a story of which America do you want to live in?
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