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March 14, 2023 - Dennis Prager Show
01:15:12
Rising Crime
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Dennis Prager here.
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Hi everybody, welcome to the Dennis Prager Show.
Oh, how was that?
That was a crack.
Hi all!
Back from a day away, it was the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur.
Fasted my 24 hours, which I find very easy as it happens.
First of all, I fast every day at least 15. And there's no...
Non-Jews are always amazed that it also includes not drinking anything.
I'm very lucky.
It has no effect on me.
Some people get headaches, or people who are used to caffeine find it difficult not to have coffee.
But it's a good thing to do periodically.
And it was a powerful day.
You could watch these services.
They're still on Salem.
Is it Salem Live, guys?
I always forget.
Salem, what is it?
Salem Now?
Where are my services?
Is there such a thing as Salem Live, or have I made that up?
It's a thing now.
Look out.
You have a new thing to remember now.
There is a new thing?
No, maybe not that new.
It was.
So, SalemNow.com, yes.
It's worth it.
I gave a very long speech that I worked a great deal on about the afterlife.
I had a theory in my talk.
You remember hope and change?
The motto of the Obama campaign, hope and change.
Remember I said, what are you talking about hope?
What are we living in some third world country where people can barely afford a meal?
Where there's massive violence and civil wars?
What are you talking about, hope?
And then it occurred to me during the writing of this speech, people need hope because in a secular world there is nothing after this one.
You go from a few years of life to permanent extinction.
There's no hope in the secular world Anything beyond this one.
So, it's all over.
Forever.
Even if you believe that, you have to admit it is hopeless.
It's literally hopeless.
And I wonder if that has not had...
I don't wonder.
I am certain that it has had an effect on our society.
That's why I tell you secularism...
Is the root of our problems.
Name me, for example, a single secular institution that offers wisdom.
I'll give you 24 hours to get back to me.
Universities are the most secular institutions in our society, and they are the genesis of the dumbest, most society-wrenching ideas that we have.
So, just wanted to give you another example of the awful consequences of a secular society.
And I am not for religious government.
I'm for secular government and a religious society.
Just for the record, for the leftists who want to wrench any of my words out of context.
Aside from the moral and intellectual confusion men give birth being the best example, there's another thing you can add to the consequences of secularism, hopelessness.
Is it any wonder that we have record percentages of young people who are depressed?
How can you not be?
Look at what they're given.
A future of death, their own future after death of extinction, and a past that is unworthy of celebration.
That's a recipe for depression, is it not?
All right, anyway, I welcome you to the show.
I'm Dennis Prager, in case I didn't say that to begin with.
There is a story I wanted to share with you here.
Yeah, listen to this.
Los Angeles and New York City refuses from the Daily Mail today.
October 5th, correct?
Yeah.
What is today?
October 6th?
So it's yesterday.
Los Angeles and New York City refuse to hand over crime rates to FBI for national figures.
Did you see this headline?
No.
It's mind-boggling.
Okay.
As murder rises by 4.3% and rape by 3.9% across the country.
The FBI said murder rates in the United States rose by 4.3% and rapes by 3.9% last year, but the numbers don't include the crime-ridden cities of New York or Los Angeles.
How is that possible?
In its annual analysis of crime in America, the FBI said there were about 22,900 murders in 2021, up from the 22,000 in 2020, which year saw a rise of 30% over the previous year.
107,500 rape reports, nearly a 4% increase.
Crime for New York City and Los Angeles, however, were absent.
How is that possible?
How is that possible?
Ah, I have the answer.
They're governed by Democrats.
Truth is not a left-wing value.
Once you understand that, much of life becomes clear.
Did you send me the article on the DA in Philadelphia?
Saying that it was Republican cities that had the most crime?
That is as blatant a lie as saying that the sun rises in the West.
It is equivalent lie.
Truth is not a left-wing value.
It is a liberal value.
It is a conservative value.
It's just not a value.
When leftists speak, they do not ask, is what I'm saying true?
They ask, is what I'm saying effective?
It has never been different.
Again, I exclude liberals and conservatives, some of whom lie, but at least in both liberalism and conservatism, truth is a big value.
Crime for New York City and Los Angeles, crime statistics, were absent in the FBI's data.
As police in the city fail to submit their records to the Bureau's new collection system.
It comes as both cities contend with more than 300 murders so far this year, with overall violent crime running rampant.
Hmm.
That's right.
It's rampant.
Because in 2020...
The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, our universities, and the Democratic Party of the United States announced that violence is fine as long as it's done by the left.
That was the announcement.
Burn a police car.
Smash another car.
Smash in windows at your local business.
Beat some people up.
That's fine, because you're doing it after the George Floyd death.
That was the message.
And it was heard loud and clear.
Do whatever the hell you like.
Oh, that wasn't the only way the message was actually offered.
If you steal in California under $950 worth of goods, it's a misdemeanor.
That's right.
So, packs of youths.
Just enter stores and clean them out.
And because they're usually black kids, then we certainly don't want to change that rule because we don't want to increase the number of blacks in prison.
So you're not imprisoned by the left for what you do, but for how you look.
And that's fine if you're a college graduate and took what they teach in college.
Seriously.
It is truly the undermining of the moral fabric of our society.
Alright, there is a lot more, a lot more to offer you.
Good to be back from the one day away.
And it was good to be away.
Because religion keeps you sane.
We shall return.
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All right, everybody.
Dennis Prager here.
Wall Street Journal editorial board.
Illinois' shocking report card.
The land of Lincoln is failing its children and covering it up.
That people vote Democrat is stunning.
It's just stunning.
Everything the left touches, it ruins.
Schools are a perfect example.
and parents will then vote Democrat.
I don't know what to say with regard to that.
Thank you.
Is it that they don't think?
About what is happening?
Is it that they believe that voting Republican is an act of evil?
I think it's that more than anything else.
It has been so drummed into them.
Republicans are for the big guy.
Of course, the big guys overwhelmingly support Democrats.
Name me a big corporation that supports conservatism.
I'm serious.
Can you think of one?
Let's see.
Just think.
American Express, Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, Google, Nike, Disney.
The answer they'll always give are oil companies.
The answer they'll always give is oil companies.
Okay, fine.
So let's say it's true.
Okay.
Oil companies.
There's a war on oil companies.
But okay.
I asked the question.
Not rhetorically.
So other than that, that's it.
And even they, they don't support conservatism.
They make the case for continuing to dig for oil because this country should be energy independent.
But because of the sick world of the environmentalist religion, and it is a religion, it is a pagan religion, the worship of the earth.
It is okay to crush our economy.
Last night when I filled up my car, I thought, what's going to happen within 15 years?
What is it, 2035, right?
So it's 13 years.
When no gas-powered car can be sold in California, what will happen?
So gas stations will gradually close.
I'll be able to go X hundreds of miles and then spend a great deal of time, if I can find a place to electrically charge, presuming that the electrical grid of my city is strong enough to actually support tens of millions of cars when it can't support the air conditioning in my house.
The ease, the quality of life that this affords one, five minutes to fill up any hour of the day, anywhere, they abound gas stations.
They will die.
Will they have electric stations instead?
And how long will it take?
Will it take five minutes?
Where are they going to find all the lithium for the batteries?
Are they going to dig up more gigantic craters and use young slaves to get it out?
Illinois.
No one thought Illinois schools were a shining beacon in the education landscape, but we didn't know how truly awful...
This is the generally understated Wall Street Journal editorial page.
We didn't know how truly awful so many of them are.
All thanks to Democrats and teachers' unions.
Teachers' unions have more contempt for American students than any group in America.
If there were a group titled, we crap on students, it would be called teachers' unions.
That would be, if they had an honest motto, we don't give a damn about students, that's even better.
Yeah.
We don't give a damn about students.
That would be teachers' unions.
Everyone knows it's true, except for the parents who keep their kids in the schools that the teachers' unions control.
It is one of those great naked emperor issues.
Everyone knows teachers' unions are toxic.
They were the ones who demanded that your child not go to school for two years.
Because of the hypochondriac teachers who teach them.
We'll die if we teach in school.
A new report by Wirepoints, using the state's data, shows that an epidemic of indifferent instruction...
Ah, it's a perfect term, indifferent.
Ah, that's perfect.
That's the motto of teachers' unions.
We are indifferent to students.
Good one, Wall Street Journal.
An epidemic of indifferent instruction and social promotion has left children unable to perform at even the most basic educational level.
But they all know preferred pronouns.
I added that.
Statewide in 2019, 36% of all third grade students could read at grade level.
36, a third.
One out of three students in 2019, and there's no question fewer today, It gets worse.
I know.
It does get worse.
I will report that.
Why do you send your child to an Illinois school, or at least a big city Illinois school?
Why?
I know why.
Because it's damn convenient to do so.
I understand that.
You've got to weigh your priorities, my friends.
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Welcome back everybody.
Dennis Prager here.
Delighted to welcome Congressman Van Crenshaw onto the show.
He's one of the good guys in this country fighting for the preservation of America.
As a beacon of light and liberty, he's a congressman from Houston District.
And this coming weekend will be the Crenshaw Youth Summit, where thousands of young people will attend, and I have the honor of being one of those who's speaking there.
So, congressman, tell us about this youth summit, and God bless you for arranging it.
Well, thanks, Dennis, and thank you for coming out this weekend.
We're super excited to have you.
Thank you.
I think your insight, the way you articulate the conservative philosophy and framework is indispensable to our movement.
I think communicating our ideas, and you talk about winning, you talk about winning the fight.
You can't win the fight unless you persuade others to agree with you.
And PragerU has been instrumental in that.
And so that's kind of related to why I do this summit, because I think there's two parts to this.
One, the conservatives, the young conservatives especially, need to be guided in the right direction.
And I also realize that young people like to have a lot of fun, and they like to be entertained.
So this summit has a very high production value.
It is very entertaining.
We have a concert.
As well as intellectual speakers like yourself.
It's got everything you would want from a big fun summit, big screens, cool videos, effects, the whole thing.
You see a lot of really fun people.
It's a very high energy.
But I also want to teach you something.
I don't want this to be just another rally, another kind of red meat, right?
There's plenty of those already.
We don't need to make another one.
This is meant to teach you something.
And I'll tell you something else.
If you're a liberal, I bet you can come to this summit and not think we're crazy.
I bet you can come to this summit and maybe learn what conservatives are really about, that we're not what the media vilifies us as.
We are very thoughtful, we have ideas, very good ideas, and we care about Americans just like everybody else does.
And I want young liberals to know that, and I want young conservatives to know how to fight for it.
You're terrific, because this is not known.
They don't know us.
We know them, and they don't know us.
I have to say, and it's not meant as a dig against anyone, but a lot of Republicans in Congress, and I support them, I just want to make that clear.
But I don't think they have the big picture clear.
For example, I think you understand the existential threat of the left.
I'm not talking about liberals, I'm talking about the left.
And I don't think that a lot of Republican colleagues of yours do.
Is that an unfair characterization?
Well, it's incomplete, I think.
I think they understand it, but I think it's shallow.
I think the understanding is shallow.
And not enough people take the next step, which is how do we actually fight it?
And so what a lot of people do to quote-unquote fight that far left is really just, you know, at worst, pick the scabs of conservative grievances constantly.
And that's a good way to fundraise.
It's a good way to gain attention.
But you're only gaining attention from your base.
And so, you know, it might be fun to rally and throw up that red meat, and it's always necessary to amp up your activists because they're the ones who get out there and work.
I'm not saying you shouldn't do a lot of this stuff, but if you're not doing the second part, which is to figure out how your message sounds to people who disagree with you and then how to persuade them, then we're not actually doing our base any favors.
You know, fighting for our base should mean persuading others.
To see it our way.
That's true fighting when it comes to politics.
That's winning.
You know, it's not enough to fight.
You've got to win.
And so that's usually my criticism.
Because I think we all agree on what the dangers are of the left.
But there's severe division on the Republican side about how exactly to fight that and how to strategize.
And a lot of that division seems very manufactured to me.
And we need to get past it.
We need to get past it.
You know, the left has discredited themselves.
I think they're very easy to beat.
I think Democrats are easy to beat for the next 50 years if we put forth a happy warrior mindset and a positive view of what conservatism can accomplish for the American people, just like Reagan did.
We do that, we'll win for 50 years.
That's why they don't want us on campuses.
We can do that.
So can you stay on with me?
Yeah.
Okay, terrific.
I'm yours.
All right, I'll be back.
I'm yours.
Congressman Dan Crenshaw, and this weekend in Houston is the Crenshaw Youth Summit.
It's up at DennisPrager.com.
And I will be there, and I'm delighted to be there, to say the least.
Be there on Sunday.
I am speaking to Dan Crenshaw.
A congressman who understands what's going on in the country well, and is a fighter, and to his great credit is having the Crenshaw Youth, is it Youth Festival, is that correct?
Youth Summit, right.
Oh yeah, Crenshaw Youth Summit, yes sir.
This weekend.
How did you get so many students to enroll?
This is our third year doing it, Dennis, and we've built it up since then.
Frankly, because, you know, they look forward to really good speakers like yourself.
You know, last year we had Ben Shapiro come out, even Tony Robbins come out.
It's not all political either.
You know, I want this to be a summit where you learn about all sorts of subjects.
You know, we had Tony Robbins out.
It was all about self-empowerment, right?
It was a motivational speech in many ways.
This year we've got, you know, financial advice from Jordan Belfort, of all people, in Wolf of Wall Street.
We're going to hear from Yongmi Park as well about her experiences escaping from North Korea and what kind of lessons we should learn from that and what kind of lessons we can apply to all of the challenges we face in America.
It's an interesting summit, unlike other conservative summits, especially the ones focused on young people.
It's a lot of fun, but you learn a lot, and I think that appeals to a lot of young people.
Are people coming from all over, or mostly Houston?
Traditionally, we've got about 30% from outside of Houston, traditionally.
So I don't know what the makeup's going to be this year.
But yeah, people have traveled for it.
So it's an exciting thing.
We're always kind of re-tailoring it to the audience and do what the audience wants.
So it's a little different than last year.
And hopefully people enjoy it.
I think they will.
I think they will, too.
I'm very delighted to be coming and speaking.
I have a question that I ask when I have a Republican congressman on, which is generally rare.
I don't normally have politicians, and I don't say that in any disrespectful way.
It's a human question.
And I'm curious on a human level how you deal with this.
The Democratic Party is not the Democratic Party, as they say, of my father or even of my childhood.
And it supports many of its...
Leaders supported defunding police.
They all seem to support open borders, which is almost literally the end of a society, as the society has been known.
And the crime, wherever Democrats are in charge, is frightening.
Explain to me your colleagues who are Democrats.
Do they really believe in these terrible things?
Do they go along with it because they need to be re-elected?
And how do you get along with them?
Yeah, it's a great question.
How much time do we have?
Go ahead.
Take your time.
I'm very curious because you're a thoughtful man.
Go ahead.
Yeah, because there's a lot to say here.
One, they're not all the same.
So that's, of course, one aspect of it.
There are some decent ones that you can probably work with.
But work with on what?
That's another question.
It depends on the issue.
On certain issues, it does seem that they're aligned in this very, very radical position.
You brought up open borders.
And what they'll do is they'll be clever about it.
They'll talk out of both sides of their mouth and say, of course we're not for open borders.
Well, you're just not for enforcing any of the laws that would...
Actually fix this problem?
Well, yeah, exactly, because that would be incompassionate.
And you know very well how they sort of mealy-mouthed their way out of that problem.
Now, another thing is like a social dynamic that I'll say about the Democrat Party, and this is why I can try to convince people that even your well-intentioned liberalism is still a path to this progressivism, because well-intentioned liberalism isn't really anchored in very succinct and defined We care about equality.
We care about justice.
This is the kind of thing that a good-natured liberal will say, right?
But what do they mean by that?
First of all, they redefine those words pretty drastically.
They don't mean those words in the classical sense.
They mean equity.
They don't necessarily mean equality.
They mean doing favors for a certain group.
They don't necessarily mean justice.
They mean social justice, environmental justice.
So they definitely redefine things.
But even if they don't, they don't have limiting principles.
And this is a really big difference between conservatives and liberals, and it's something that conservatives should really amplify is what distinguishes us, because those limiting principles dictate how we will solve problems.
It's like a roadmap for how we look at a policy.
You know, we ask questions like, does this infringe on individual rights?
Should it be solved at the local level or state level or federal level?
What are the costs?
Is that sustainable?
What are the second, third order consequences?
These are all limiting, principled, conservative things to ask.
The liberals ask none of these questions.
They just ask, does this make us feel good?
And so, I'm coming to a point here.
It is very easy for very extreme progressives to therefore persuade and control good-natured liberals.
And so that's what you see in the Democrat Party.
There are still plenty of good-natured liberals, honestly.
They are very easily controlled by the radical progressives.
There's a few reasons for that.
One is that sort of philosophy.
They have a vacuum in their philosophy, and it's easily filled by the progressive left.
And then, of course, there's just partisan politics, which happens on the right and the left, where I think activists have largely taken control of the parties because your kind of regular base of voters, they've got other things to do.
They're trying to get their kids to soccer practice on time.
So they get less and less involved.
Social media has made people more hyper-partisan.
So there's a lot of reasons for I think you're seeing what you're seeing.
But I don't think what I just mentioned about the liberal-progressive dynamic is talked about enough.
I think it's an interesting perspective.
Well, my bottom line is liberals don't understand that their enemy is the left, not the right.
In one sentence, that's the problem.
All right, I look forward to seeing you.
Thank you for all your work, Congressman Dan Crenshaw.
I will be in Houston at his summit for young people, thousands.
It is up at DennisPrager.com.
Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Dennis Prager Show.
I repented of my sins yesterday while fasting all day.
No liquids, by the way.
The holiest day of the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur.
And now I can resume sinning.
Now, by the reactions of everybody here, it is clear that was not an expected next sentence.
For those of you who are unaware of my dark humor, please know that that was...
Dark humor.
It was about the human condition, hopefully, more than it was about me.
Anyway, I'm back after that intense day yesterday.
You can watch the service, by the way, and I have no doubt if you find me interesting and helpful in your life on this radio show, you will doubly sell.
By watching it.
It's up at SalemNow.com.
I want to make sure.
Is it Salem Now, guys?
Yeah, it is Salem Now.
Okay, good.
The videos of both the New Year Rosh Hashanah and the Yom Kippur services will be up until the end of the year.
There's a fee.
But it's an extremely elaborate and very expensive operation.
And the video is magnificent in 4K. I'm so touched, frankly, that there is now a record of this.
Because what I spoke about, I speak constantly, as well as the fantastic music, is not dated.
These ideas should be relevant 100 years from now.
If they have 4K now and they're going to 8K, what will they have in 100 years?
1000K? The truth is, beyond 4K, you're getting into such clarity that you actually see people more clearly than you do in life.
So, I... I guess every generation thinks, gee, how can you get better?
How can you get better than radio?
They probably thought when they started radio.
How could you get better than TV? Oh, color TV, that's right.
So what will they do?
I really do wonder about this.
In terms of video, beyond 8K, you can see the pores in a person's face.
From long distance, but who wants to see the pores of people's faces, unless you're a dermatologist?
Well, will they have 3D? You think that that's in the offing?
3D without special glasses?
You think so?
Is that what the future holds for video?
I would imagine that's where the advances might come.
That's eerie.
Anyway, it's up at the Senate now, and it's worth getting.
I've been reading to you about Illinois and its schools, so I have a real question.
If you're a Democrat and you hear about this, what keeps you voting Democrat?
God, I would so love to hear from Democrats.
Here is my theory.
My extended family is mostly Democrats.
My theory is that they don't know the damage being done in the country.
That's what I believe it amounts to.
In my extended family, the Democrats are very fine people.
But I'll give you an interesting example of what I mean.
It's not about a problem, it's about a person.
So I was speaking to an extremely successful person in my extended family a few months ago, mentioned that I was going to Miami to spend eight days with Jordan Peterson and five others in bringing the book of Exodus home.
To people through the auspices of the Daily Wire.
And you know what the person's reaction was?
Who's Jordan Peterson?
There is no symmetry here.
There is no liberal or leftist of equal stature.
If they even exist.
That the average conservative has not heard of.
We know them.
They don't know us.
I mean, I know Ibram X. Kendi.
I don't mean personally.
I know of him, right?
Ibram X. Kendi is one of the leading theoreticians of anti-racism.
The, right, the leading, correct.
I think it's an interesting thing you should do as a non-confrontational but clarifying distinction between liberals and conservatives, let alone leftists and conservatives.
Tell me your leading...
Intellectual heroes.
And I'll tell you mine, and let's see who heard of more.
We know all of theirs.
I know, I mean, I personally know of more left-wing intellectual heroes than the average leftist does.
I don't know how many of them know, let's say, Paul Krugman even.
New York Times, Economics.
And Republican basher-in-chief.
Well, all right, I'm just debating on what to say about him.
I won't say anything.
Just that I'm not even sure as many leftists know about him as rightists.
So I'm reading to you about the destruction of Illinois' public schools.
And I don't know that this is known to almost any Democrat.
This is a Wall Street Journal editorial.
The number of non-conservatives reading the Wall Street Journal editorial page is minimal.
And where else is it reported?
Just to remind you, in 2019, a third of all third grade students could read at grade level.
2019, that's before the lockdowns, goes down to 22% for black students.
One out of five black students in third grade reads at grade level.
So I continue.
A child who can't read in third grade can't do word problems in fourth or science experiments in fifth.
Promoting Decatur children to the fourth grade, Decatur is central Illinois, when 99% are below grade level in math, condemns them to future failure.
That's right.
By 11th grade, 5% of Decatur students are reading at grade level.
By 11th grade, 1 out of 20 high school students is reading at grade level in Central Illinois.
Wow.
I blame parents and I blame the schools, teachers and parents.
I blame the parents because they're probably not reading to their kids.
Some of this comes from home, but I'm blaming them for a bigger reason.
They don't seem troubled by it.
They're okay with their kids learning nothing at school except how to hate America and that there aren't...
Males and females who divide the human race, since it's a spectrum.
That's what they're learning.
The Wall Street Journal editorial asks, Why shouldn't every single adult presiding over the Decatur schools be fired?
Good one!
It's fighting words from the Wall Street Journal.
All right.
There's more to come.
Back in a moment.
This is a staggering horror, what is happening in the Illinois schools.
Arlington, Texas, and Ray, hello.
Hello.
Are we connected on our phone lines?
Now I hear you.
All right, perfect.
I was just addressing the question that you had about why people vote Democrat, even though Democrats aren't necessarily doing much, right?
Oh, they're doing plenty, but it's all injurious.
Exactly.
But I would tell you, as an African-American, I'll tell you, Republicans just aren't there.
When it comes to a lot of the issues that we care about, They're not there.
There's no talking points.
There's no policy.
And I'll give you a prime example.
Most black males should vote Republican.
If you're heterosexual and you're not part of the subculture, Republicans should get at least 70% of black males.
However, most of black males, one of the biggest issues that we have against the Republican Party is not...
Having some type of policy towards police brutality and police misconduct, not defund the police, not any of that crap or whatever, or Black Lives Matter stuff, none of that stuff, but just actually police accountability.
Because most of us have had some type of brutal or disrespectful interaction with police officers, and we're used to that, and nobody speaks to it.
So, I mean, Republicans don't speak to it at all.
Zero.
Nothing.
No message, no policy or anything.
You know, and so, as an example, that's why most black males vote Democrat.
We don't love Democrats.
I vote Republican mostly half the time.
We don't love Democrat.
It's just that Republicans aren't there for some of the stuff that we care about.
Is there another issue that you care about that prevents blacks from voting Republican?
Yes, basically a fair share of the contracts that come from municipalities and states.
And how we're 30% or 40% of the population of a city and only awarded 5% of government contracts when there are legitimate black organizations that can do the work.
So those are things that...
Well, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
So this is an interesting one.
I'll get back to the police in a moment.
But this one is very interesting to me.
Who runs the cities, Republicans or Democrats, who give the contracts out?
No, the Democrats run the city, and they run the counties.
So wait, so aren't they the ones not giving black companies contracts?
That's right.
But however, that's a talking point that Republicans can speak to that they don't.
Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
Wait, you changed the issue, which is fine.
I'm not trying to get you.
I just, you did change the issue.
First it was...
Blacks care about not getting their fair share of contracts in big municipalities where they're a large percentage of the population, and then I tell you, well, it's Democrats who are not giving them the contracts, and then you're saying, well, Republicans aren't talking about that.
So, in other words, the problem is caused by Democrats, but because Republicans don't talk about it, blacks vote Democrat.
So in other words, it doesn't make sense.
That is correct.
I agree with you.
So if Republicans talk about it, only then will the average black voter think, oh, that's a good point.
Democrats are denying me contracts.
Right, because the thing about it is there's no representation, there's no Republican voice out there actually speaking to the issue.
We know that Democrats are creating theills, the poverty, the...
You name it.
It's like we should not vote Democrat.
But it's hard to sell Republicanism and conservatism when there's no dominant voice that's actually driving home the points for some of the things that, to be honest with you, That black people are emotional about it.
So when unemployment rates were the lowest in history with regard to blacks under Trump, did it change black voting?
It changed black male voting.
It did.
Yeah, somewhat.
You're right, somewhat.
But it's still overwhelmingly Democrat.
So as regards to police, so again, this is purely...
To understand where you're coming from, do you know the number of unarmed blacks killed by police in any given year?
The number is?
No, no, no.
Listen, if you don't know, don't feel bad.
Most people don't know.
But if you feel you do know or want to guess, throw me out a number.
I would say maybe a hundred, if that.
Okay.
So the number is about 23. Okay.
So this is a real battle of getting the info out.
I agree, it's a very important call, so I kept you on so long.
Thank you for calling.
It's very frustrating that Republicans do not emphasize this more, but who's going to report it if a Republican says it?
See, that's the problem.
A Republican can stand in the middle of Chicago and self-immolate like Buddhist monks did in Vietnam.
He can burn himself alive.
And if his message is, you know, only 23 armed blacks a year get killed by police.
They won't report it.
They'll just say that the guy burned himself to death.
That's the biggest problem.
Black messaging is, excuse me, Republican messaging is a problem.
But getting through the deaf wall of the...
Left-wing media?
That's the bigger problem.
We shall return.
1-8 Prager, 7-7-6.
Dennis Prager Show.
All right, everybody.
Do we have Kristen Wagner on?
I guess not.
All right.
We'll have her on later.
A remarkable case that the Alliance Defending Freedom is handling.
I'll take some more calls.
Gary in New Jersey, hello.
A good year to you, thank you.
So I wanted to say, first of all, I enjoyed your Yom Kippur service yesterday.
Thank you.
And there was one particular...
A moment that brought back a memory for me.
You were talking about your adventures in Azerbaijan and connecting with Soviet Jews.
And I grew up in my 60s.
I grew up in Westchester, Pennsylvania.
At that time, I did not like going to Sunday school.
However, except it was one Sunday school with these two, I remember, kind of hippie-like guys showed up.
I remember a beard and sandals.
And they started talking about how they had been sent over to Russia to meet with Soviet Jews.
One of them said he was in an apartment.
He snuck out from their handler and was in an apartment and was pretty certain that they were being, you know, bugs.
And then I remember them mentioning they were bringing newspaper articles from the West, which people were craving for, and they hid them in books.
And then all of a sudden, that was the most excited they ever got.
And suddenly I was like, oh, these...
Jewish hippie dudes were like spies in Russia.
So Westchester is a suburb of Philadelphia.
So I was wondering if you did a road show afterwards.
Maybe that was you.
Well, I was never hippie-like, but I did get to Westchester and I did speak about Soviet Jewry.
But that is funny.
I've been described as many things, but never as hippie-like.
But yes, that's correct.
That's what I did.
That's how I started my public life, speaking about Soviet Union and Soviet Jews.
That's correct.
Do we have Kristen on now?
Is this on video or just audio?
All right.
One of my favorite people, Kristen Wagner, President, General Counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom.
All right, Kristen.
So are we going to talk about this case?
That I just read about Lori Smith.
Is that right?
Well, I sure hope so.
I'll bet you do.
I never know for sure with you, but I'd love to talk about it.
You know, never have truer words been said by a guest on my show.
There must...
I love what you said because you have no idea what I'm going to come out with, especially in the beginning.
That's a very funny reaction.
There must be a slight bit of trepidation on the part of guests before they come on.
Oh my God, that is funny.
Well, yes, that's right.
This is an amazing case.
Although, I guess nothing is amazing anymore.
So, we'll put that...
On the back burner for a moment.
So tell everybody about the case of Lori Smith and then I'll ask some questions.
Sure.
Lori Smith is a graphic designer.
She designed customs websites as well as other items for her clients.
And she's also a Christian that believes that marriage is between a man and a woman.
She left the corporate world and started her own small business because she wanted to work on projects that are important to her.
Where is she located?
She's in Colorado, the same place that Jack Phillips is also out of, and Colorado's taken the position that if she wants to enter into designing custom wedding websites that promote her view of marriage and her faith, that she'll be breaking Colorado law.
What Colorado law will she be breaking, allegedly?
Colorado has a civil rights law that is a non-discrimination statute, and we're seeing states like Colorado misuse those laws to actually punish those who disagree with the government's view on issues that can range from abortion and being pro-life to also human sexuality, gender identity, and same-sex marriage issues.
So when was this law passed?
The law was passed many years ago, but what we see in a lot of jurisdictions is that they continue to add to the law over the years, where they might interpret sex to mean sexual orientation and gender identity, or they might add those things as protected classes.
Other cities even have these types of laws where they say your personal appearance, for example, is a protected status.
But in Colorado, they've said sexual orientation and gender identity are protected class status.
And they refuse to accept the fact that it's wrong for the government to compel speech, that Lori bases her decision.
Right, hold on there.
This is mind-blowing.
ADF is handling the case.
There's an ADF banner on my website.
Please, please help them out.
they do all this work and go to the Supreme Court.
Eric Metaxas.
He's in that rare group of fighters, and his latest book is a fighting book, and I really, really urge you to get it and read it.
It's a short and powerful letter to the American church.
We are in complete sync on this matter, because we both believe that if the churches weaken, then we have no hope for the Western world.
And I say that as a Jew.
He says that as a Christian.
You could say that as an atheist, for that matter.
I don't know if Douglas Murray is a believer or an agnostic, but Douglas Murray is as convinced that the collapse of Christianity is the doom of the West as the most religious Christian might be.
Your last point, Eric Metaxas, is one I made in a series of two columns consecutively in 2021. One was titled The Good German, and the other was The Good American.
The two most painful columns I've written and the 1,000 columns I have up on the Internet.
I understood The Good German for the first time in my life.
There really is such a thing.
Not everybody in Germany was pro-Auschwitz.
But a lot of people did nothing.
And we expect better from...
At least the religious community.
So I asked you why this was, and you had mentioned that cowardice, the human heart, etc.
I'd like you to answer another one, because I get this a lot from callers.
Well, as Christians, we're told by Christ to follow the authorities of our time.
What's your answer to that?
That's a lie from the pit of hell.
That's my short answer.
Look, first of all, Jesus didn't say it.
It's in Romans 1. Paul said it.
And when you look at the context, it is preposterous.
This is kind of the example that I keep going to Bonhoeffer.
Bonhoeffer faced the same nonsense.
People said in his day, well, the Church, we can't weigh in on this.
Romans 13 says clearly we're supposed to obey the governing authorities, you know, as though that settles the matter.
It doesn't settle the matter.
Bonhoeffer said that if you do not speak up for the Jews, you as a Christian, now, if you don't speak up against this, you have no right to sing your worship songs to God.
You are a fraud and a hypocrite.
That's the full counsel of Scripture.
And you have many people today in the church, leading figures in the evangelical church.
Making exactly the same theological errors.
And Bonhoeffer at some point, and I quote him in my book, Letters to the American Church, I quote him many times, but I say that he says he's disgusted with these so-called theologically-based objections, which, after all, are nothing but fear.
In other words, people are clinging to these tortured definitions of faith, or they have bought into the nonsense, which so many have, that The separation between church and state means we're supposed to keep our faith separate from the culture, and we're completely the opposite of what the Founders intended, precisely the opposite.
We're supposed to take our faith and the values of our faith everywhere we go, because it is meant to bless people.
If I'm bringing my Judeo-Christian values into the culture, it's going to bless everybody beyond the Judeo-Christian world.
These are things, the abolition of slavery, all of these things, That people of faith spoke up against because the Bible commanded them to speak against these injustices.
At the time, just like today, there were voices that said, oh, no, no, no, no, no, that's political.
Just stick to your little theological lane.
Hitler actually said to Niemöller, I talk about it in my Bonhoeffer book, but at the famous moment, Niemöller was a German Christian.
He was one of the good guys.
There's no question about it.
He was a good guy.
But like many good guys today in the evangelical church, he was deceived.
He believed we can work with Hitler.
It's not going to be as bad as some think.
Bonhoeffer's a bit of a hothead.
And he had a meeting, a famous meeting, with Hitler, finally.
And Hitler said to him, in an almost demonic voice, it's so vicious, he said, you, stick to your sermons.
And I'll worry about the Third Reich.
In other words, you stay in your little religious lane, little Mr. Pastor, you preach your little gospel in your little church, and when you come out, you bow to the secular authority of the state, which is me, Adolf Hitler.
In other words, here was a good man, fooled for a time.
When he finally woke up to the evil on the other side, it was too late.
And that's the message of my book, Letter to the American Church, is that some in the German church...
Good people bought these lies, these theologically-based objections.
Oh, Romans 13, we're not supposed to get involved in stuff.
Those are all lies.
But many people, for reasons of different kinds, bought into that just long enough for the Church to be neutralized, and then the wicked powers had nothing to stop them.
The German Church had the power to do something.
things, it did not do anything, and by the time it realized it, the power was taken away from it.
That is where we are in America, and silent voices, some good, some evil, some indifferent, some mixed up, are all drifting along with the culture, going along with things that are undeniably anti-American, anti-Bible, and if we in the church don't going along with things that are undeniably anti-American, anti-Bible, and if we God considers us primarily guilty.
It was silent in Germany that these things were allowed to happen.
Listening to you, I'm thinking, the Christians who say you obey the authorities, apparently no matter what, how do they take pride in the abolitionist movement of Wilberforce in England?
He was violating the law by opposing slavery.
It's called sophistry.
It's diabolical sophistry, where they give lip service to this idea that, oh, we're supposed to obey the governing authorities.
When the governing authorities are doing God's work, yes, they're put in place, you know.
By the way, it's no longer the first century in the Roman Empire.
We, the people, have been given this inestimable blessing, which we don't deserve, of freedom and self-government.
We have a responsibility.
We are effectively the governing authorities, and we are supposed to hold our leaders, who are really only our representatives, accountable.
That's right.
And so, again, this is sophistry.
People get confused about it.
All right.
And I have to say, it is leading us into a place as darker, darker.
It's hard to imagine that.
Letter to the American Church, Eric Metaxas.
We continue.
Hi everybody, I'm Dennis Prager.
Eric Metaxas is a fighter.
He's a kindred spirit to my own.
We even both have lacerating senses of humor.
Though his is a bit more lacerating and mine is a bit kinder.
Nevertheless, it is always a joy to talk to him.
But this is such a serious topic, we're not making our usual jokes.
The book is Letter to the American Church.
It's a cri de coeur.
It's a cry from the heart.
And it's one that I share.
I could have written Letter to the American Synagogue.
It would have been very similar.
So, let's be precise here.
What would you have liked the churches to have done in the last two years?
One thing that's pretty simple.
I mean, I think, first of all, we have to understand why people do what they do.
Some of it is for good reasons, right?
Americans are nice.
You can be nice to a fault.
We've met people, parents that are really nice, and then you think, well, they need to be a little tougher on their kids.
I think a lot of people in America could not dream that we're having a cultural Marxist takeover of everything, and that this...
The pandemic is going to be used by tyrannous bureaucrats around the country.
You know, most people couldn't see this coming.
So in the beginning, you go, oh, okay, okay.
You know, you have no precedent to compare this to anything.
But I think, pretty quickly, a number of pastors, when they were told, shut down your church, they said, excuse me, no, we're not going to shut down our church.
But most churches did.
Most churches kind of meekly went along with this tremendously overreaching government-bullying-pushing mandate, like, okay, we'll close our churches.
It was really an extraordinary moment because the spiritual and emotional health of every single American is at stake.
It wasn't just, oh, you're going to catch this bad...
It's blue, and you're going to be sick, and whatever it was.
But somehow, in our lifetimes, we've never seen anything like this.
And so people went along.
Some heroes, like my friends where you are in California, I was just by you, but I mean, pastors Rob McCoy and Jack Hibbs and Che On and John MacArthur and a number of others around the country said, hold on, we're not going to shut our churches, parentheses, How dare you?
What planet do you live on that you think you would have the right to tell us to do that?
We're not living in China.
So some did, but many did not.
They kind of went along with this and went along with this.
And you see, just as you saw it in Germany, people are kind of, you know, to use the term, they're being groomed, right?
They're being taken along a path.
Give in now.
Do this now.
Get this vaccine now.
Do this now.
If you don't get it, you lose your job.
You can't go to a concert.
Whatever your view is of the vaccine or whatever, you just have to start thinking, wait a second.
What do you mean in America that you're going to tell me what I can't talk about?
You're going to tell me I need to do this or you won't let me do this?
In other words, we're not used to that in this country.
And we saw the same thing happen in Germany where people sort of went along with it because It takes a lot to suddenly say, hang on, no, I won't do it.
So I think we've had this kind of rolling awakening among people, that people are waking up and thinking, why was I silent back then?
The question, Dennis, of course, is, will enough people wake up?
The reason I wrote this book, Letter to the American Church, is that I am begging people.
To take this seriously.
The parallels to Germany are astonishing.
I wish they weren't, but they are astonishing.
In Germany, I want to say it again, some good people were quiet.
They weren't all pro-Hitler.
In fact, there's a chapter in the book called 12,000 Pastors.
I say that there were 18,000 Protestant pastors in Germany.
This is just Protestants.
18,000.
In 1935, by 1935, the churches had been so bullied by the government that only 3,000 of the 18,000 were standing firmly against the National Socialists.
Only 3,000.
But here's the key.
On the other end of the spectrum, there were 3,000 of these 18,000 standing firmly with the Nazis, which brings us to the 12,000 in the middle.
Very good.
All right, hold on there, Eric.
I want to promote it as if I wrote it.
Letter?
To the American Church by Eric Metaxas.
It's up at DennisPrager.com.
The Dennis Prager Show.
Hi, everybody.
This is what we call very serious talk.
Letter to the American Church.
Very important.
Truly important work by Eric Metaxas.
The failure of the churches and synagogues, and I might add, a group that I have particular respect and admiration and affection for, Mormons.
They failed as much as everybody else in bowing down to the bullies, the irrational dictators, who had the audacity to tell places of worship to shut down.
And the Mormons and the Jews and the Protestants and the Catholics all said, fine, not all.
Nearly all.
Isn't that amazing?
Shut down.
We have zero science behind this request.
We have zero morality behind it.
Just shut down because we said so.
And virtually every pastor, priest, and rabbi said, sure, what else should I do?
Oh, well shut your schools too.
Okay, we'll shut our religious schools too.
Even for two years, if you guys say so, they'd have done it for three years if these guys said so.
That's the fact, my friends.
Some of us were saying it the whole time.
Eric and I are two of them.
When they use the Romans, Oh, I think it's both.
In other words, I think mostly it's a desired excuse, but there are certainly people who have a religious conviction.
The point is that if you're looking for excuses, the most vile excuses are religious excuses.
The idea that in Germany you had Pastors who are just afraid of losing their congregation.
So somebody comes along and says, no, no, no, no, no.
Stay in your theological lane.
Just be there to preach the gospel.
Don't speak up for the Jews.
Don't speak up against it.
That's not your thing.
Don't do that.
Well, first of all, this is a fundamental misunderstanding of what it is to be a person of faith.
A person of faith speaks up against evil fearlessly because we believe God is with us and he commands us to do that.
So Bonhoeffer saw this, and he saw them kind of playing this game, and he knew that in most cases it was nothing but fear.
And I mentioned earlier that there were 3,000 who stood up heroically.
There were 3,000 that were with the Nazis on the other end of the spectrum, but it was the 12,000 in the middle who said, you know what, we're going to take the safe path.
We're just going to see which way the wind blows.
I don't want to lose any friends.
I don't want to lose my job.
I don't want to lose people in my congregation.
They may be offended.
I'm just going to sit on this Romans 13 thing.
This is my fig leaf.
I think I'll fool somebody with this fig leaf.
And those are the ones, and they are the same ones today, who are enabling evil to triumph.
And so I wrote the book letter to the American Church, hoping that some in the middle who are currently being silent...
Some of whom are even advocating silence.
They're not just being silent, but they're saying, oh, we must be silent.
We must not talk on these issues.
Let's just stick to our little theological corner here.
That is not what you're supposed to do.
You're supposed to take the truth of God into all the world with regard to slavery, with regard to what the Nazis did, with regard to the transgender madness.
If you love people, you're supposed to speak out against these things.
And I say to my fellow Christians, If you actually believe Jesus defeated death on the cross, which you claim to, then you should have no fear.
You should speak fearlessly, knowing that he has freed you to do that.
You can live free, and you can speak the truth about all of these issues.
But there are many people who prove that they don't really have the faith they claim to have, because their actions betray them.
There is a prominent Reform rabbi in L.A. Major synagogue who signs his emails with his preferred pronouns.
I just thought you'd find that of interest.
I'm sure that there are liberal Protestants who do the same thing.
I'm just more familiar with the Jewish community intimately.
So talking about the future, you hinted at this, but I'm curious.
I rarely ask people what they foresee.
Because I don't make predictions and I'm not terribly interested in others, but this is different from that somewhat.
So there are two possible lessons learned from the horror of the draconian responses, which were completely irresponsible.
By the way, they're getting worse, Eric.
In California, the nominal dictator of this state where I live has signed a law.
That if a doctor suggests something that the CDC doesn't agree with, he can lose, she can lose their medical license.
So, for example, just giving a COVID patient hydroxychloroquine, one of the most benign medications available to humanity, and announcing that you think it might work, You are engaged in misinformation and can lose your license.
So they're getting more draconian because they knew they could get away with it.
So here's my question.
What do you think the lesson learned by those middle 12 million, as it were, let's say Christian pastors in this instance, what do you think they learned from the last two years?
To do it again or not to do it again?
I think that is the question, Dennis.
There are some that have learned the lesson not to do it again.
I mean, I wrote this book specifically for them, for the people that are kind of not clear on this.
I want to make it crystal clear that if you do not fight against these evils, if you're foolish enough to think that you're supposed to stay in some little theological lane...
You are now officially part of the problem, because human beings' lives are being destroyed, and God will hold you accountable for your silence.
The famous phrase, silence in the face of evil is itself evil.
Not to speak is to speak.
Not to act is to act.
God will not hold us guiltless.
That's right.
All right.
The book, Letter to the American Church, up at DennisPrager.com.
The Dennis Prager Show.
Dennis Prager here.
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