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March 14, 2023 - Dennis Prager Show
01:15:12
Thanksgiving Value
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Dennis Prager here.
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Thank you, and again, happy Thanksgiving week.
My dear friends, this is Dennis Prager, and this is Thanksgiving.
And this is live radio.
On Thanksgiving, because I believe, as much as I rather have slept in personally, I still believe, not still, I believe more than ever, that it is my duty as one...
Simple American to try to make the holidays of our country as meaningful as possible for those of you listening to radio on these holiday days.
And so, I'm broadcasting, and I welcome you to my program.
If you are new to my show, today is a bit different because it is about, in the largest and broadest sense, Thanksgiving.
My favorite, in many ways, my favorite American holiday.
Everybody...
Or let's put it this way.
There is no good reason for anybody not to celebrate it.
You have to defend yourself if you don't.
That's how I would look at it.
I don't mean defend yourself against any, God forbid, physical attack.
But defend yourself ethically, morally, Americanly.
Why would you not celebrate Thanksgiving?
Welcome to the program.
We talk about everything in life on the show, and I guess in a certain sense, even today, that might be true, because the ramifications of giving thanks are so awesome in your personal life, your family life, your friendship life, and as Americans.
Nevertheless, today is about this terrific and awesome day, Thanksgiving.
A day set aside, and thank God Congress didn't mess it up by making it A Monday so that we have a long weekend.
Now it's got to be this Thursday every year because it is set, and it was set from the origins of our country, that you take a day to thank God for all of the bounty that we have as Americans.
It's a quintessentially American holiday.
A dear friend of mine who was French said, no, we don't have a Thanksgiving in France.
Although he was very self-deprecating, humorous, and said, we have a Your Welcome Giving Day where everybody can thank us.
I thought that was a terrific line.
No, we don't have a Your Welcome Day.
We have a Thanks Day.
I love that fact.
By the way, it would be interesting later on in the program...
To hear from people who do not celebrate it and what reason you can give.
I mean, there are reasons not to celebrate.
Well, I don't know.
I can't think of reasons not to celebrate some of the other holidays.
But this one in particular.
I mean, even if you're an atheist, you certainly want to give thanks for being an American.
You may not have a God to thank, but it doesn't mean you can't give thanks.
Although I have covered that over the course of years.
Whom do you thank if you don't believe in God?
And I guess what you do is, and this is not meant as an accusation, I guess the answer is that you feel thankful.
Even if there is no object of your gratitude, you can still feel thankful.
You can still say, I am lucky to have been born in this country.
I want to talk to you about luck being born in this country, or not being born, since so many of you have not been, but being an American, the luck about it.
I think part of the reason I know how lucky is because I know other countries pretty well, aside from the fact that I've been to about 80 countries.
I have a keen awareness of how evil is the norm, how cruelty is the norm on so much of our planet.
And it is not the norm in this particular country of the United States of America.
You can talk to me at any time by dialing 1-8 Prager 776. Needless to say, it should be easier on a holiday to get into my show, but you can never tell, so let me give you that number.
1-8-P-R-A-G-E-R 776 or 1-877-243-776.
I want to read to you the proclamation of President George Washington in 1789 on October 3rd.
This is how he proclaimed a national holiday.
By the President of the United States of America, a proclamation.
Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God.
Now, do you notice the beginning here?
Do you realize how saturated our origins are with religion?
By religion, I don't only mean, of course, Christianity, the specific expression, or as we correctly note today, in terms of values, Judeo-Christian, in terms of religion, Christian, values, Judeo-Christian, religion, Christianity, God, the God of Israel.
That is the God that this society was founded worshipping.
If you remove God from the origins, if you remove, no, not from the origins, you can't, except if you actually distort history, which has been known to happen in your college classroom.
But without distorting history, if you would want to remove God from the essence of America, you are, in fact, changing.
You are, in fact, changing the country.
It would be as if you were to remove democracy.
Does anybody argue that we should not have the vote in this country?
Nobody argues that.
To remove God from the equation of what is American is not a matter of...
I was going to say in my opinion, and I often say those words, but in reality it is a structurally...
As dangerous, as structurally dishonest to the structure of America, as if you would remove the vote.
Imagine somebody saying, you know, it's true, we did have the vote, but in fact, we don't need it any longer.
We can get along in this country without having the American people vote.
It would be considered absurd, but to me it is as logically absurd to remove God from America as it would be to remove the vote.
This is how we're founded.
This is what makes us what we are.
That doesn't mean that atheists are excluded any more than somebody who doesn't vote is not excluded from the American family, if you want to use that term.
It's not a way of excluding.
That is the way it is often referred to by people who wish to remove God from the American equation.
It's not a matter of excluding atheists.
The idea is absurd.
An atheist is as much an American as anybody else.
Nobody ever denied that.
Nor did anybody ever claim that everyone who believes in God is a terrific person or a terrific American.
But the atheist is as capable as anyone of acknowledging the centrality of God to the American identity.
This is what it means to be American.
This is what America is about.
President George Washington begins the proclamation, whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God.
The duty of all nations.
Not just this nation.
Because those who believe in this God believe in a God who judges all peoples, including those who don't believe in Him, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.
That is what it is the duty of all nations to do.
That is why this country has been different for 213 years.
Or 200, how many?
No, no, 224, 227.
Whereas both houses of Congress have by their joint committee, this is President Washington, 1789, requested me to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging requested me to recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an
Now notice that it was both houses of Congress who initiated the idea.
You can't even say, well, maybe Washington was exceptional in his God-centeredness.
No, it was the two houses of Congress who asked him to make such a holiday.
Now, therefore, do I recommend and assign Thursday.
The 26th of November next, to be devoted by the people of these states to the service of that great and glorious being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.
I will continue with the proclamation and I will take your calls at 1-8 Prager 776 and talk to you about gratitude and much more on the Dennis Prager Show.
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Everybody, this is Dennis Prager.
Thanksgiving, and the lines are open because I broadcast on the holidays.
They are very important days.
By the way, later on, not even that much later, I am going to explain why holidays are so important and how, in our lack of wisdom, we have forgotten that fact.
Holidays are meant to be observed.
They are not meant to be days off.
It is a very important distinction.
They're not just rest days.
That's a byproduct.
When George Washington declared this holiday, It was to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor, in order not to work one day.
And I will ask you to start calling.
This is extremely urgent as well.
About how your children are taught it in their schools.
I mentioned earlier this week about a school that banned Indian costumes and pilgrim costumes because one parent had complained.
What is wrong?
Indians did not have a specific form of dress?
What, did Indians wear suits?
Did pilgrims wear jeans?
I tell you, we are in the hands of fools very often, transmitting this most delicate, precious gem.
The heritage of our nation.
And the people in charge of doing so don't do it.
That is the purpose of holidays, is to remember what your nation is about.
Let me repeat that.
That is the purpose of a holiday.
To remember what the purpose of your nation is about.
You take a day off and you enjoy it, of course.
But you remember what it is about.
A Thanksgiving without giving thanks, especially for being an American, which is what it is about, is not Thanksgiving.
It's a Thursday off.
I get angry about it, I do.
You know why I get angry about it?
Because I have the understanding of the rarity of the United States.
I have the understanding about how thin...
The line separating civilization and barbarity is.
That's why.
I don't take the country for granted.
That's the point.
I know that if you rip out from under God in the pledge, if you rip out the Ten Commandments enough, you will be left with nothing.
You will be left with Belgium on American soil.
Pointless.
Futureless.
Driftless.
Meaningless.
A place for bureaucrats to meet.
That's what will happen when you rip out God, as the ACLU and many others would like to do, from our culture.
You see, the problem with these people is not that they're bad.
It's that they're not bright.
They don't understand that they are destroying that which made them possible.
They truly don't understand.
You almost want to say, forgive them, Lord, they do not know what they do.
As they crucify the country, to use that metaphor that I just used it from, took it from, they don't know what they're doing.
They think they're doing good.
That somehow an America in the image of Belgium and France and Holland is a good place.
1-8 Prager 776 I will read to you, as the day goes on, some more of the George Washington Proclamation and much else.
But I do like to talk to you on these holidays, and I will take some calls.
And let us go to Terry in Glendale, California.
Terry, Dennis Prager, a happy Thanksgiving to you.
Happy Thanksgiving, and God bless you, Dennis.
Yes, I knew who you were.
You are one of my oldest callers.
I agree with all you've been saying.
I was blessed to grow up in a family where Thanksgiving is a big celebration, and my grandfather, born in Italy, but he always reminded us of what the story was, and we grew up with that.
That would be like kind of my macro comment about the importance of it with respect to our big history.
But my micro comment is to the degree that one is able to develop or cultivate an attitude of gratitude, one increases one's ability to be happy and experience happiness.
You didn't happen to hear that from me.
You and I are on the same page on a lot of things.
Not everything, but a lot of things.
I know.
That's why I said you're one of the longest-standing callers in my life, and it is great to open Thanksgiving with you, my dear Terry.
But I'm certainly not the one to first come up with the idea.
It's just that it's so central to my thinking.
You can't be happy, and I wrote a book on happiness, and you can't be happy if you're not grateful.
Gratitude is the source, and I'm going to talk about that later.
And happy people...
As you know my belief, because we have an hour on happiness on this program every week on Friday, and happy people just make the world better.
They are far more likely to do so than the unhappy.
I walk around, I am delirious about having had the luck to be born and raised and live in this country.
Now, can every single one of 200, whatever, 70 million Americans say that?
Is everybody, no, not every single one, but a proportion of people, larger than anywhere on earth, I believe, and a number larger, can say, I can't believe how lucky I am that this is the place that I have been raised in and allow myself to be.
Or have been allowed to be, not allow myself.
Richard, also in Los Angeles, California.
The phone number, 1-8-Prager-776.
Richard Dennis Prager, hi.
Hello, Dennis.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Thank you.
You too.
I'm calling about a couple of things.
Actually, I was talking to my rabbi yesterday, and I remember I had asked him about this before.
I had asked him whether he celebrates Thanksgiving.
Right.
He's an Orthodox Jew.
Right.
And he specifically does not.
Do any of the American holidays at all.
He does only Jewish holidays.
I never really got as far as exactly why, except I believe that his Jewish and Judaism, even though he's an American, is what is preeminent in his life, and the American holidays to him are...
Not something that an Orthodox Jew celebrates.
Do you know anything about this yourself?
There are members of...
I know Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, have a policy of not celebrating any national holidays of any nation.
They feel that for some reason it is anti-biblical.
And there may be others who have religious scruples about it.
But you're, of course, he's not on the lines and, you know, I can't come in without hearing his side.
But if you're accurately portraying what he says, he's a fool.
He's an ingrate and a fool.
And I, you know, I began by saying not everybody who believes in God is wise, any more than every atheist is a fool.
But here's an example of a religious fool.
It's, you know, don't start me.
Just, don't start me.
All I can tell you is I was raised an Orthodox Jew, and Thanksgiving was a holy day in our home.
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All righty, everybody.
Dennis Prager here.
Both dialoguing with you on this Thanksgiving Day with live radio and also reading to you the President Washington Proclamation.
And if any of you know anybody else who isn't celebrating or you don't celebrate Thanksgiving, I'd love to hear from you.
As it happens, even today it's tough to get in.
But still, you should give a try at 1-8-Prager-776.
I'll try to clear up lines.
I would love to know what objection anybody could have to celebrating Thanksgiving.
What, religious or national or personal?
You know, there is one.
I will, there is one.
And I admit to an ambivalence about that, and that is an American Indian.
I can't force upon an American Indian whose culture was decimated because of the arrival of the European on this continent to just have with no ambivalence a feeling about the United States.
I understand that.
I do.
I would not say that about the African American.
I think that even though the origins of blacks in America are, of course, filled with so much cruelty, the cruelty of slavery, a black person can be profoundly, in fact, ought to be profoundly grateful for living in this country.
What would be better, to live in Africa?
That would be the choice.
I always recommend Out of America, that extraordinary book by a black journalist at the Washington Post, Keith Richburg.
Every American should read that book on how lucky he feels that his ancestors came here even though they came on slave ships.
That without one iota diminishing their suffering, he is so lucky to be in America and an American.
But an American Indian whose culture has been decimated by and large, I understand their ambivalence.
But if you're not American Indian, and even many American Indians feel themselves very lucky to be nevertheless in this country, look, let's be honest, folks.
Let us say the European didn't come to North America.
Think it would have remained just Buffalo and a few Indians forever?
I mean, please, let's be realistic.
Somebody would have come just as the Indians came.
They didn't arise out of the ground in North America themselves.
Every place has been populated by people who have replaced the indigenous culture.
Every place on earth.
That's just the way life is.
But beyond that, I would be curious to know if anybody does, in fact, celebrate it.
Does not celebrate it.
Alrighty, let's go to some more of your calls here.
Actually, you know what?
I am going to go to some more of the proclamation.
Then I'm going to take some more of your calls.
Because I am going to have to clear up some lines.
Folks, if the line is cleared up, because it's only because I'm looking for some other calls, and I don't want you to feel insulted in any way, shape, or form, okay?
So we'll just have to...
Because I don't want to...
I don't politicize the program too much either, although politics can enter it.
Joe in Los Angeles as well.
Joe, Dennis Prager, hi.
Hi, Dennis.
Good morning.
How are you?
Fine.
Thank you.
I'm calling regarding your previous caller who mentioned that his rabbi doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving.
Yes.
I'm an Orthodox Jew, and I do celebrate Thanksgiving.
Yeah, almost every Orthodox Jew I ever knew did.
Yeah, that's probably right.
I celebrate Thanksgiving, 4th of July, but I don't celebrate Yom HaTzimut, which is Israel's Independence Day.
Uh-huh.
And the reason I don't celebrate that is because I feel that was a, that Zionists at that time, it was specifically an anti-religious.
Wow, you're quite on the right theologically.
No, no, no, you really are.
So do you feel that Israel shouldn't exist?
Oh, no, no, absolutely.
I'm 100% supportive of Israel.
Oh, you just don't celebrate it as a religious holiday.
Oh, exactly.
That's a separate issue.
Anyway, that's an intra-Jewish issue, which is not critical.
Right.
But can you even explain why that man's rabbi would not?
Yes.
I think there's a lot of thought, especially from a lot of the immigrants from Europe.
That anything that a Christian country would establish as a holiday, we're not going to have any part of.
That's exactly right.
And it's called, let's not be polite, it's called bigotry.
Probably, probably.
It is, it is.
I know where it comes from.
I know as well as you do.
But as you know, I know.
But they're not living in Europe.
You're right, exactly.
Let them wake up and smell the roses.
They're living in a country that has treated Jews the best in the history of Jewry.
You're absolutely right.
One more comment.
We actually have two Thanksgiving dinners.
We used to have a smaller dinner Thursday night and our big turkey dinner Friday night.
And the reason is because I feel bad eating turkey leftovers for the Sabbath.
Okay, fine.
That's fascinating.
We'll be back in a moment.
I'm Dennis Prager.
You are listening to the best of The Dennis Prager Show.
As you enjoy Thanksgiving weekend with your family and friends, please remember my annual campaign for Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree.
For just $25, you can bless a child who has a mom or dad in prison with a personalized Christmas gift and a Bible.
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generous as you can.
Thank you, and again, Happy Thanksgiving Weekend.
Hi, everybody.
A Happy Thanksgiving live show as every holiday on the Dennis Prager Show.
The only way a country can continue its culture is to have holidays to commemorate it.
You with me, folks?
A country will die out without holidays, holy days to commemorate what it stands for.
Thanksgiving does more perhaps than any other, even more than July 4th, because it is, first of all, it predates July 4th, but beyond that, it is the day on which we give thanks to God for America and for everything that we have. - Yeah.
Anthony, if you would please put that lovely underbed of music for me, the nice slow piece that we had talked about earlier, that we had, I don't know how else to say it.
Other than that we had talked about it.
Why don't you give it a try and I'll tell you if that's not it.
I want to read to you, my listeners, part of the article of, that's right, of Paul Greenberg, who is the editor of the major Arkansas newspaper.
Like life itself, this is his column for today, Thanksgiving 2003. Like life itself, today's holiday is assuringly familiar and never the same.
In many ways, this is the most expected of American holidays.
They say it inspires more travel plans than any other.
Yet it still seems to come unexpectedly in the middle of the week.
Thanksgiving always has the feeling of a sudden lull, an abrupt cessation, a surprise, despite its having been there on the calendar all along.
In that way, it is like grace itself.
We count on it, know it, invoke it, and yet there is something miraculous in its arrival.
So let us give thanks.
For those who serve and protect us around the world, this will inevitably be the first Thanksgiving away from home for some young soldier, sailor, airman, or marine.
For those far away, the turkey will have an extra flavor, the flavor of home.
For the flag.
In peacetime it may take the sight of old glory in a foreign land to make the heart beat faster and remind us of all we have, and who we are and the people we yet hope to be, a shining light, a city upon a hill.
When the long, cruel war burst upon us one unsuspecting September day, the flags came out like lights across a galaxy of fear as the doubt and confusion, the anger and resolve spread.
It was the one thing we could all do, raise the flag.
It was the one clean, wordless gesture we could make without reservation or explanation.
It was the one symbol that said more than we could say ourselves.
The sight of those flags, great and small, cheered.
They sprang up in front of homes and were taped to cars and flew atop the rubble of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
To honor those Americans who first had the chance to fight back against this evil, and did.
Now, as this war against that shadowy terror enters its third year, that flag still waves proud, and in locales like Kabul and Baghdad.
The war that began on these shores has been taken to the haunts of the enemy, to places he thought were beyond our reach.
Terror has been given no sanctuary, not this time.
There will be empty places at the table this Thanksgiving and there is no softening the sorrow we feel.
But painful as each loss is, Americans press ahead, learning from each setback, adapting, striking back, refusing to be daunted.
Let us be thankful for that.
I will continue later.
It's a beautiful column by Paul Greenberg.
And it is time to go to some more of your calls here on the Dennis Prager Show.
And let's go to Jerry in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Jerry Dennis Prager.
Hi.
How are you?
Okay, thank you.
I just wanted to say I was born in Korea and just totally blessed to be an American.
I wanted to send a thank you to the military.
I was driving the other day and saw a vet with a bumper sticker that said the Korean War.
The Forgotten War, and I just wanted him to know that he's not forgotten.
He did a lot for tens of millions of Koreans by helping to protect South Korea from North Korea and China, and it isn't forgotten.
And I thank him.
That's very beautiful for you to say.
There is actually a lot of pain in me over the lack of gratitude in Korea these days for the losses of Americans.
And I'm very moved, therefore, by what you say.
I tried to get his attention, but the only way to do it is to get in a car accident.
No, no.
Well, I would have gotten his attention, you're right, but it wouldn't have worked.
I met you when you were in Minneapolis this past summer.
Oh, good.
I hope you come back when I come back.
I totally want to.
Thank you, Jerry.
Thank you.
Have a great Thanksgiving.
Thank you, you too.
Bye.
So far we've heard, let's see, from people who've emigrated here from Iraq, Jamaica, now Korea.
And I love hearing from you folks.
I do indeed.
It's very powerful to hear that.
And I'm going to let some lines loose here to open it up for more calls at 1-8-Prager-776.
Also in Minneapolis is Darren.
Darren Dennis Prager, hi.
Happy Thanksgiving, Dennis.
Thank you.
Took a moment to call, and I'm driving to my family, and as many things that I think all Americans have to be thankful for, one of the things I am truly thankful for every day is that I can turn on the radio for three hours, or whatever part of it I can get, and hear your voice on the radio, and that you did not go into political office and stay on the airwaves, because it is actually a very profound part of my day, and I just want to say thank you for all that you do.
Oh, you made my day.
That's so sweet of you, Darren.
Thank you so much.
Thank you, and happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.
Thank you so much.
To you, of course, as well.
That's very kind.
Well, look, I know every day I'm not only grateful to be an American, I am grateful for so much, obviously, excuse me, my family and friends, of course, my religion, for God, but also for the ability to have this unique, well, not unique, there are others who do it, but close to unique, gift of a microphone.
There is not a day that goes by that I do not realize how fortunate I am to have this ability to come into the lives of so many people and try to do some good.
That's why I regard it as a sacred trust.
And I try, therefore, to ennoble this profession.
It's part of the reason you may notice or not notice.
I wonder how many do notice.
I don't tend to talk about a Michael Jackson.
And I'm not criticizing those who do, but it's just not the thing that fits into what I want to do with my hours on radio.
I'm not saying I would never discuss it.
It's not in any way central to what I can do with this work.
All righty, let's go to some more of your calls.
John in Phoenix, Arizona on KKNT. Hello, John.
Dennis Prager, Happy Thanksgiving.
Happy Thanksgiving to you, Dennis.
First, let me thank you for doing this live and giving up at least part of your holiday to enrich us.
Well, it enriches me, too.
But thank you for thanking me.
Go ahead.
I was trying to put my thoughts together, and I think what I've come to is the phenomenon that we have today of the lack of gratitude toward America.
And I'm wondering if, in part, that that isn't due to the lack of religiosity in the country that people are coming from, as well as here, engendered by that me-ism culture of the 1960s and onward.
It seems to me that thankfulness is something...
It's not a natural human trait.
In other words...
word no it is not yeah it is not a natural human trait and once as as always I go back to my favorite text the Bible and most specifically the first five books and and you have you have you have book after book of God being angry at the Jews after leaving Egypt for complaining.
The big sin is not really idol worship, it's ingratitude.
Yes, okay.
And when I teach it, and I teach it to a class of people of all religious backgrounds, I show them, look at how angry God gets at ingratitude.
You're allowed to fight with God.
Abraham does.
Moses does.
That's not an issue.
But to be ungrateful, this ticks God off.
Well, that makes Thanksgiving even more powerful a holiday that a secular nation would set aside a holiday for that purpose.
That's correct, but we're not.
We're a secular government.
We're a religious nation.
Thank you, yes.
That is key.
No, I know it is, but I needed those words specifically.
God bless you, John.
Thank you.
Thank you.
You too.
Thank you.
That's the thing.
And if we stop being a religious nation, we stop being America.
It's as simple as that.
This is not complex.
And there are those who wish to destroy that religious America, specifically Judeo-Christian.
We shall return in a moment on Thanksgiving.
This is Dennis Prager.
You are listening to the best of The Dennis Prager Show.
Hey, Happy Thanksgiving to you all on The Dennis Prager Show, where, though it is work, it is work that I have embraced to be on every national holiday.
I can't emphasize too strongly that if we don't make the holidays meaningful, we will lose touch with what our civilization is about.
They can't just be days off.
They can't.
So I ask you today to take a half a minute even.
Obviously, if you take more, that's great.
But even a half minute, 30 seconds, at your Thanksgiving dinner, or at some point today, Just to say, thank you for America.
Thank you, God, if you believe in God, or just, I am thankful for.
But something like that.
I mean, and I know that there is a serious, serious percentage of Americans who would choke, even if they had no turkey bones in their mouth, who would choke on saying that.
And by the way, please never call the day Turkey Day.
Right?
It's not right.
It belittles the power of this day.
All righty.
Let's...
I tell you, folks.
Okay, let's get to some more here.
In Palm Springs, California, it's Mark on KGAM. Hello, Mark.
Dennis Prager.
Good morning.
Happy holiday.
Thank you.
I have to disagree with the woman who called and said that the...
That the schools are not teaching American values and appreciation.
After 25 years as a stockbroker, I just became a history teacher last week.
No kidding.
Right.
Teaching high school history.
You know what?
I want you to call me every year.
Okay.
I really do.
You see, I've always said, for me, it's either what I'm doing now or high school teaching.
I think you made a brilliant decision.
Go ahead.
Well, let me read you, it's very short, the California Standards for American History regarding the subject you're talking about.
It says here, students shall learn that the United States has served as a model for other nations and that the rights and freedoms we enjoy are not accidents but the results of a defined set of political principles and are not always basic to citizens of other countries.
Students shall understand that our rights under the U.S. Constitution are a precious inheritance that depends on an educated citizenry for their preservation and protection.
I'm teaching actually the Constitution right now in an American history class, and I try to instill the values of America.
By the way, that's a very interesting thing that that's a California guideline.
Yes.
Read the very beginning again, because that's remarkable.
Listen to that.
Yeah, go on.
Yeah, that's the only thing that I would take issue with.
It's a defined set of political and philosophical and religious.
Of course, they would never put that.
Definitely not.
Yeah.
And now, as far as teachers teaching this in their curriculum...
I don't know what they do in their individual classrooms, but a lot of the values that I teach and try to instill in my students now, I take from your show.
So I get a lot of good ideas from you.
Well, you made my day.
Thank you, Mark.
Thank you.
And really, let me know how your work continues.
Laura, Valencia, California.
Dennis Prager, Happy Thanksgiving.
Happy Thanksgiving to you, Dennis.
Thank you.
My question was...
To you is that if you think some of this not being thankful for America is because a lot of our children don't have connections to their grandparents or relatives who fought in say World War II or Korea or Vietnam.
Because I grew up hearing stories from my uncle and even my grandmother about what it cost them and what they gave up and what they saw when they fought and what they did for this country.
Well, it would be a sad day if we needed relatives to have fought in wars in order to be grateful to be American.
On the other hand, there may be something to what you're saying.
I certainly grew up with a father who was in the U.S. Navy for years during World War II and was very conscious of that fact.
Yeah, that's what I think may be missing.
To them, history is in a book.
Yeah, right, but you see, history is not in a book if holidays are made alive.
And that's part of it.
That's what I'm saying.
Listen, the founders of this country related very deeply to the Jews leaving Egypt, and none of them experienced any of that.
But they read it in a book.
True.
See, if the book is alive...
That's why I'm so big on keeping holidays alive.
If they're meaningful, then it's not any longer history in a book.
It's alive.
You see?
That's the key here.
Thank you, Laura.
That is the key.
That's why I am so holiday-oriented.
We shouldn't need to have had a relative who fought in a war.
Or who has stories about how bad it was in another country before coming to this blessed country.
That's the purpose of a holiday.
It substitutes for direct experience.
I know this because of the way Jews keep so much alive for so long, a little people that has been dispersed around the world.
Has somehow kept alive its people and its identity, and it's done through holidays, like Passover.
We need, and I've said this for a long time, and it's not original to me, a July 4th Seder.
Like Jews, have a Passover Seder.
Which brings me to my next call, Gerald.
Dennis Prager, happy Thanksgiving to you, Gerald.
Hello.
Hi.
Hi, Dennis.
I'm so happy to talk to you, and happy Thanksgiving.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yes, wait, I've got to get away from the radio.
My wife is listening.
Okay.
All right.
I just wanted to mention a couple things.
One, I'm a member of a Reformed synagogue in Fountain Valley, California, and it is a wonderful place, and one of the ladies there, a long-term member, wrote.
She had a long pipe dream, many-year pipe dream, to write a collection of things for Thanksgiving, and she did it this year.
And our rabbi referred to it as a Thanksgiving Haggadah.
That's great.
The Haggadah is exactly what I was saying.
That's the book that is used to recall the Exodus at the Passover Seder.
Yes.
So we need a book to recall America's great epochal events.
And we should read that exactly.
So I would love to see the Thanksgiving Haggadah.
Well, if we can, I'll be glad to send you a copy.
It's not a Seder, you know, an ordered thing.
No, whatever it is, it's helpful.
It's a series of readings.
Good.
Maybe I'll use them on the air and I'll give her credit.
Fine.
Okay.
Could I mention also, one of the things that she mentioned that had to do with, when you mentioned Washington, having first declared Thanksgiving, that the practice...
The holiday had kind of fallen away until Sarah Hale, a lady named Sarah Hale in 1863, who had gone to four other presidents from Fillmore on, who all said, get out of here.
And finally, Lincoln...
That's right.
He really made the modern one, the modern Thanksgiving.
My wife brought home a children's book from her school library, private school.
Thank you, Sarah.
Well, that's correct.
That she should be.
Thank you.
What do you do with the anti-American at dinner?
Next call coming up on the Dennis Prager Show.
You are listening to the best of the Dennis Prager Show.
Hey everybody, a happy Thanksgiving to you on the Dennis Prager Show.
The absolute importance of holidays is why I broadcast on them.
And yes, I'll tell you, and I'm hardly telling you, I'm no hero.
The thought is laughable.
But, frankly, I'd love to sleep in and just be with the family and friends, absolutely.
But I believe that the importance of the holidays is more important than my rest.
And so that's why I broadcast on them.
By the way, I'm getting every day, talk about thanks, I get thanks from soldiers in Iraq.
And it almost makes me cry, it chokes me up that they're thanking me.
For my article, which if you haven't read this week, I don't know what to do.
I beg you to read it.
My letter to American troops in the American soldier in Iraq.
This one is, I won't give their names, but here's with, he flies every day with the 101st Aviation Regiment.
Wrote me from an army airfield in Iraq.
And he says, Among other things, because of what I do, millions can sleep at night.
They can sleep because I do not.
Things here continue to be hairy.
I get shot at most every time I fly.
And even still, I do my best to keep safe, fly with body armor, always sleep with my weapon, study the intel reports, because I have so much to come home to.
Thanks for your support.
First Lieutenant, and I won't give his name.
Yep, it's very touching.
Very touching.
So I send my thanks around the world as I send so many of yours to our soldiers there.
Roseville, California in KTKZ country.
Phone number here is 1-877-243-776.
877-243-776, which is 1-8 Prager, 7-7-6.
And that's Dave.
Hello, Dave.
Dennis Prager, happy Thanksgiving to you.
And you as well, Dennis.
I'm blessed that you're making my day for bringing me on the air.
I just want to let you know, the day that you announced that you were going to possibly run for the Senate, I was your first caller.
And I strongly discouraged you from doing that.
And I just want to say that today on Thanksgiving...
I'm profoundly thankful that you made the decision to stay on the radio.
Thank you very much.
I think it was the right decision.
Thank you.
It absolutely was, and you've been a blessing to me for years now.
Good.
One of the things I just want to bring up real quick is every time we get together with our family, we have a member of our family who I love, but am almost sickened by listening to her talk, and she seems to...
Be the loudest voice and the one who wants to continually bring up the charges of American imperialism in Iraq and all the anti-American leftist rhetoric.
And my family is so sweet.
They sit and just listen and smile and laugh and try to slough it off.
And most of them are not really willing to confront or engage or maybe they're not equipped.
I just wondered if you could help me at least be able to somehow Just something I could say to her.
How old is she?
Early 40s.
Is she married?
She's the long-time girlfriend of my cousin.
And how does your cousin feel?
He's sort of kind of neutral.
He's just an easy-going, good guy.
He just kind of puts up with it, I think.
Maybe he agrees with her to a degree.
American imperialism.
Yeah.
Well, you see, it would be my dream to have her on the show so I could ask her a few questions.
Ask her if she is aware of how many people Saddam slaughtered there.
And that we now know, we're not talking about the people that he killed as a result of his wars, that he actually killed.
And it's now up to 300,000 to 400,000 found in graves.
That's amazing.
Now, on what scale of morality, what scale does she use, I would ask her?
And I would do it as openly as possible, not as an accusation.
Dennis, should I do this?
Should I confront her and engage her right there in a minute?
Well, if she is opened up, you can say, look.
It probably would be best if we didn't talk politics at the table.
But if you open it up, then I think the other side needs to be heard as well.
So I would like to ask you a couple of questions.
Then you can ask me a few questions.
So here, I will keep you on, Dave.
I will guide you through a few questions you might want to ask her.
Okay?
That's great, thanks.
All right, so hold on with me.
We will continue in a moment on the Dennis Prager Show this Thanksgiving.
You are listening to the best of the Dennis Prager Show.
As you enjoy Thanksgiving weekend with your family and friends, please remember my annual campaign for Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree.
For just $25, you can bless a child who has a mom or dad in prison with a personalized Christmas gift and a Bible.
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as you can.
Thank you, and again, Happy Thanksgiving Week.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Happy Thanksgiving!
You're listening to The Dennis Prager Show, and it is live on this Thanksgiving 2003. So if you have ever thought of calling in...
Here is your opportunity.
It's a holiday.
Easier to get in.
1-8 usually, not always.
1-8 Prager 776. 1-877-243-776.
And I broadcast, as I keep telling you on holidays, because it's the only way a civilization, a society, a nation can preserve its identity is through taking times to market.
So Thanksgiving has to become meaningful, and the idea of taking a day of thanks to God for being an American, that's what it is about.
Not everybody can do that, because not everybody believes in God, I understand that, but they could at least thank luck, fortune, their stars, their horoscope, whatever they want to thank, their ancestors for coming here.
But by golly, if you can't say, Oh, man, am I lucky that I'm an American.
There are a handful of people who can't say that.
I acknowledge that.
1%, less than 1%, where people who have, you know, just life has hurt them, I don't know, in some terrible way, owing to the fact that they live here.
I don't know what that might be, but it's a possibility.
But 99.9% of you?
It really takes a staggering amount of college education to knock that gratitude out of you.
It can do it.
It can do it.
They have four years to do it.
Let's see what you folks have to say, my friends, as we talk live on this Thanksgiving Day, proclaimed by George Washington, then later made a national holiday every year by Abraham Lincoln.
Two giants of our past.
Noreen in Riverside, California.
This is Dennis Prager.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Happy Thanksgiving to you, too, Dennis.
Thank you for being on the air.
Until I heard you, I thought maybe I was the little Dutch boy with my finger in the dike.
I'm in the Navy Reserve, and I've been to some third-world countries that maybe really appreciated even more being here.
And I think the problem with a lot of people is life is just too easy.
They've never had it hard.
They don't know what it's like to do without.
That's right.
The crowd has applauded because you are right.
Basically, I realized this when I was at graduate school in the 70s.
The students who were tearing my college apart in the name of humanism and peace and love and anti-war...
They fascinated me.
And to a person, they were spoiled brats.
They had grown up in upper-middle-class homes.
They couldn't spell the word suffer, let alone define it.
And these spoiled brats don't know what evil is about.
To this day, that is the weakness of the left.
It does not understand evil.
They think that global warming is evil, not Saddam's torture chambers.
And so...
You hit the nail on the head.
You with me?
Oh, yes.
Yes, I'm listening.
All right.
Well, no, that's it.
You got it.
You got it.
They don't know.
That's why they should all leave college and suffer for a year.
Well, keep on keeping on.
I'm keeping on keeping on, Noreen.
Thank you kindly.
That is correct.
Abel is calling to tell me that President Bush made a trip to Baghdad this morning and I already announced that and I'm happy to announce it again.
In fact, It is my desire to go to Baghdad and say what I say in my piece this week to the soldiers there.
They need to hear it.
They do indeed.
Let's go to Dee in Buena Park, California.
Hello Dee, Dennis Prager.
Hi Dennis.
Hi.
My name is Dee and I'm from Panama.
I've been living in this country since 1976. And most of my family have since migrated to this country.
But three of my sisters are Muslims.
They became Muslims of the Shiite sect.
Uh-huh.
Oh, maybe...
Where, in Panama?
Yes, in Panama.
Oh, very interesting.
And they hate this country.
And I turned to one sister and I asked her...
Which is pretty ironic for a Panamanian, since there would be no Panama, it would still be a province of Colombia if it weren't for the US.
And it would be just a muddy, wet country.
Yeah, exactly, because they would have built the canal in Nicaragua.
Exactly, exactly.
Well, anyhow, I turned to my sister, because I know they hate this country, but yet still, they continue to live here.
And I said, you know, why don't you just move away?
Why do you stay here if you feel that way about this country?
She says, it's not the country I feel this way about.
It's the American government.
Oh, I know, don't you?
I always loved that.
But the American government was elected by the American people.
Exactly.
And it was not a coup d'etat contrary to the left.
Exactly.
Exactly.
I always love that.
We love Americans.
We just hate its government.
Exactly.
I told her the very same thing.
And I said, well, why don't you move to another country?
Because I'm not going anywhere else.
She gets angry when I say that.
Because there is an America, and that's why I'm here.
And I said, okay, let's pretend America didn't exist.
Where would you want to go live?
What did she say?
The Sudan.
She said the Sudan?
The Sudan.
Do you know, I would literally, I want you to know this.
I would start a campaign to raise funds to send, was this your sister?
My sister.
I'm serious.
And her husband.
I would raise funds to send them to live in Sudan.
I turned to her and I said, you know what?
Do you know they're practicing slavery in the Sudan today?
What did she say to that?
What did she say?
She said, that's a lie.
Well, you see, that's how she could live with herself, by denying what is true.
Mm-hmm.
It's a lie.
It's a lie that there's genocide against blacks and Christians in Sudan.
And she really hates the Jews.
Yeah, shocking.
Of course she thinks I'm a Jew lover.
A Jew lover.
That's the lowest.
Well, you know what's very sad?
That converting to Islam made her a worse person, not a better.
Oh, she's very hateful.
Isn't that...
You know, it's very...
And this doesn't happen to all converts.
I'm not saying it does.
But it is remarkable to think...
That a person reaches some religious epiphany and becomes meaner, crueler, and stupider.
That's really, you know, Muslims, good Muslims must hear this and just want to, you know, tear their hair out.
But it is not uncommon, I'm sorry to say, that becoming a Muslim today means that you develop a great series of hatreds, not a great series of loves.
It's not true for everyone.
By golly, it isn't.
But for Westerners, I should be specific, for Westerners becoming Muslims today, that often happens.
All right, Dee, I thank you kindly.
And let's go to Sharon and wherever Sharon is.
Sharon, where are you?
Hi.
Where is Grand Terrace?
Grand Terrace is by San Bernardino and sandwiched between San Bernardino and Riverside.
California.
Thank you.
Yes.
Dennis, I want to just throw something out at you, and then I'd like to hang up and hear your response.
Throw away.
Okay.
I'm a public school teacher in the Riverside area, and we have a Thanksgiving potluck for the teachers, and there was a sign-up sheet.
Okay.
There was a big sign for people urging people to sign up to bring rice and beans.
So, prior to the potluck, I made a comment on our break.
Half joking, half, you know, serious.
Where's the turkey?
Where's the stuffing?
Where's the cranberry sauce?
Come on, people, let's sign up for these things.
And I myself signed up for that I would bring stuffing.
A Hispanic who happened to be sitting on the couch listening to my comments from that fellow teacher, co-worker, said with a bit of attitude in her voice that they celebrate with rice and beans.
And I'm just wondering what your comment on that was.
It shut me up.
Now, wait.
Let me understand this.
This is a school asking for people to bring food to help others celebrate Thanksgiving?
No, no.
This is a potluck for the teachers themselves.
Oh, all right.
It's a potluck for the teachers themselves to celebrate Thanksgiving?
Yes.
Though not at their homes together?
At the school, yes.
At the school prior to Thanksgiving?
Correct.
Okay, fine.
Okay, fine.
And a Hispanic said to you, With a sneer, we do it with rice and beans, meaning we don't do it with turkey and stuffing.
Exactly.
I'd like to hang up and hear your comments.
I don't have many cell minutes.
I don't know if this is a micro-issue or not.
Well, oh no, it's a great issue.
First of all, this is a great example of someone I would love to have on the air, but I would say, you know what?
We don't tell Hispanics how to celebrate Cinco de Mayo.
And you don't tell Americans how to celebrate Thanksgiving.
Is that a deal?
We'll be back in a moment.
1-8 Prager 776. You are listening to the best of the Dennis Prager Show.
Hi everybody, this is Dennis Prager.
1-8 Prager 776. And I want to explain my answer to the last call.
A teacher who was looked at sneeringly by apparently a Hispanic teacher.
When they were bringing food for a potluck Thanksgiving or pre-Thanksgiving meal, and she said that she was bringing stuffing, or had mentioned Thanksgiving turkey and stuffing, and the other one said, well, we do it with rice and beans.
Now, let me make clear, because it's so clear to me, but you never know when you communicate if it's totally clear to the listener.
I have total respect for anybody who celebrates Thanksgiving any way they want.
You want to do it with rice and beans?
God bless you.
It's a non-issue to me.
But to tell somebody else that the way Americans have been doing it for 100 years is the wrong way, that's chutzpah.
And that's what I was reacting to was the chutzpah, not the rice and beans.
I mean, if you want to do it with your own ethnic food, God bless you.
It's not my issue.
However, I do believe that national traditions have values.
And that if one can, one might want to say, overtly, I identify with the American system of celebrating this holiday.
And that's the way it goes.
Alrighty, let's go to Alec in Orange, California.
Dennis Prager.
Hi, Alec.
Hello.
Hi.
I just wanted to say that I called to tell you that when my teacher was saying that we were going to maybe have a cultural party for Christmas, I just wanted to tell you I brought in your article about Christmas.
Oh, good.
We should call it Christmas.
Yeah, a cultural party instead of Thanksgiving?
No, no, no, for Christmas.
Like, we were talking about planning ahead.
Okay, fine.
And that's what your teacher called it, a cultural party?
Yeah, something like that, because she said not everybody celebrates Christmas, and so I just wanted to, the next day...
When you brought in my article, did she read it?
Yeah, she was like...
It was yesterday, the last day of school before our break, and then she was reading it as I was, like, leaving, and I said...
This is for our cultural party, and I just told her, like, you might not agree, but I just thought I'd bring it in just to show you what I thought about it.
I hope...
I would like you to give it out to the class.
I'm not kidding.
You think I should bring, like, 25 copies?
Yes, of course.
And, you know, force an honorable discussion about it.
Here's a guy...
I mean, they can't accuse me of anything typical, because I don't even celebrate it.
All I am...
Yeah, that's why I brought it in.
That's rough course.
So I have absolute credibility on that issue.
If 99% of my civilization, 95%, celebrate a holiday, who am I to be so arrogant and a member of the 5% that doesn't to deny you your holiday?
It is arrogant.
It's despicable.
And then for people in the majority culture to think they're sensitive, they're not sensitive.
Let's make something clear.
If you are sensitive to 5% and insensitive to 95%, then you are only 5% sensitive, aren't you?
Right, exactly.
They think they're sensitive, but they're profoundly insensitive.
So you let me know what happens.
All right, I will.
Thank you so much.
Have a good Thanksgiving.
Yes, you too, Alec.
That's great.
Boy, I tell you, that's why I write.
Tanya in San Diego, Dennis Prager.
Hello, Tanya.
Hi there, Dennis.
Happy Thanksgiving to you.
Happy Thanksgiving, Tanya.
All right.
As I was telling your screener, I think what one of the issues is here is that many of the non-white groups, like black Americans, of which you know I am, actually tend to dwell on past grievances.
That's correct.
They feel that, well, because of what happened back in the time.
In which, you know, most of my ancestors, well, all my ancestors came over as slaves.
And so, therefore, we can't really partake in any national celebration of anything doing with America.
And to me, this basically undermines the values that we have.
And especially, you know, I was listening at the beginning of your show when you talked about the fact that this nation was founded.
On Judeo-Christian values.
Now, having said that, of course, you know, slavery was one of the worst parts of our history, but it doesn't justify this continued anger and the fact that, you know...
Yeah, exactly it doesn't.
No, no, that is exactly the point, Tanya, and I know you feel that way, and I bless you for it.
It is, who doesn't have a grievance?
Do you have to have come here on the Mayflower?
Do you have the ancestors there not to have a grievance?
For every African-American, every black American who feels the way you're describing, Tanya, give them Keith Richburg's book, Out of America.
Here is a black American who says, point blank, I have been to Africa.
I know about slavery.
Slavery was a horror.
Horrific sufferings.
Thank God they did, because I could live here.
Now, if a mind cannot live with those two competing ideas, it is not exactly a developed mind.
Whether it's a white mind or a black mind, there's no such thing.
Only on the left, they believe that blacks and whites inherently think differently.
But if it's the mind of any person...
Can you not live with two competing facts?
Slavery is evil, and you're lucky to be a black in America?
I mean, we're not talking juggling massive contradictions.
All right, Tanya, bless you.
I thank you kindly.
Let's go to Bob in Whittier, California.
Boy, the Californians are deluging today.
Hi.
All right, Dennis.
How are you?
I'm doing well.
Happy Thanksgiving to you.
You too, my friend.
I just wanted to call you to tell you about something that happened to me this week, doing something I thought about doing for years.
I'm a Santa Claus at a mall.
And the first day I was there, two young boys came up with their mother, and I asked them if they'd like to tell me what they wanted for Christmas, and they said no, because they're not Christian.
And learned that the two boys were actually Jewish, and that their mother was taking them.
Annually, she takes them to see Santa Claus or see Christmas lights and just to learn about what Christians are doing to celebrate Christmas and other holidays as well.
So we talked, and I wished them a happy Hanukkah and asked them what they wanted for Hanukkah.
The mother and I, I know a little bit of the dreidel song, and the mother and I sang the dreidel song for them.
By the way, only in America, and I mean literally, will a Santa Claus sing a dreidel song with a Jewish mother.
Really, literally, only in America on Earth.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Well, the reason I wanted to call you is because I wanted to say something.
I guess I was trying to say something profound to the boys, and as they were leaving, I did say to them, I wanted them to understand that the reason that Christians celebrate Christmas is to honor the birth of a little Jewish boy.
And the mother seemed to like the idea.
I said that I would kind of like your opinion as to whether that was a proper thing to say.
Not only a proper thing to say, that's how I've explained it when my little kids were little.
This is what Christians are doing.
They're honoring the birth of a Jew.
And my kids looked up at me and go, yeah?
Because in Jewish life, they're not doing much honoring of Jewish things.
So many Jews flee from it.
Back in a moment.
You know, it never fails.
I never know in advance.
I don't even know if calls will come in, people resting, not listening to radio.
It never fails that the holiday shows are among the most meaningful of the year.
So I always feel vindicated in not taking the time off and broadcasting on the holidays to try to make them meaningful for all of us.
And I thank you because, like that last call, I mean, I've had calls now today from people from all parts of the world just saying how thankful they are to be an American.
I'll tell you, the last call from the gentleman from El Salvador really should just be played over and over because people have a vision of many of the Latino immigrants as ungrateful to America.
And some are, absolutely.
But many are profoundly grateful.
All righty, let's go to Bill, a Buddhist in Santa Monica, California.
Hello, Bill.
Thank you for calling.
Hi, Dennis.
We spoke a couple of years ago regarding the death penalty.
As a matter of fact, you were very kind.
You said, after talking to me, you said you would actually consider switching religions.
Because I support the death penalty and support your view on that, and I think you actually found that to be surprising for me as a Zen Buddhist priest.
That's true.
But I was calling you today, first of all, to thank you so much.
I'm getting ready to go to a Thanksgiving feast at our Zen Center here in Santa Monica.
And what I'll be reading today, and thanks for...
In a spirit of thankfulness and appreciation, is your letter to the soldiers in Iraq.
Oh, God, another call making my day.
Thank you.
Thank you.
That's so beautiful.
And I pass that on to the rest of our community as well, too, as a way of really, really appreciating this.
We're an extraordinary country that lets us practice our religious faith with freedom.
And not only with freedom, but we honor each other.
Yes, very much so.
Yeah, that's the thing.
When a Santa is singing a dreidel song, you know you're in a special place.
Yes.
Well, thank you, Bill.
You've touched me.
Dennis, thank you.
And your teaching has and will continue to make, I think, a huge impact on...
Zen Buddhism, particularly in this country, as it comes through our center, because the distinctions that you have about good and evil that seem to have gotten dropped out of Buddhism as a result of it sort of being hijacked by, I would consider the liberal left, is transforming Buddhism in a way that nothing else ever has.
And I want to appreciate you for having, through me, being able to bring that teaching back into...
Well, from your mouth to Siddhartha's ears.
Thank you so much, Dennis.
Thank you very much.
Have a great Thanksgiving.
Yes, I am already.
Well, my dear, dear friends, take 30 seconds out.
Thank God for being American.
Thank the soldiers and pray for their welfare.
And just know we're very lucky.
The question in life is, do you recognize you're lucky?
And then, what do you do with that luck?
That you have unearnedly received.
Happy Thanksgiving, my friends, from the Prager family to yours.
Dennis Prager here.
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