On today's Glenn Beck Program, host Glenn Beck is joined by his good friend Michael Pelka to discuss today's events surrounding the testimony of former FBI Director Jim Comey in the James firings of Hillary Clinton and Loretta Lynch.
00:01:25.720I, of course, am still drinking, but not now, not this morning.
00:01:30.900I also worked at The Blaze and have written close to 3,000 pieces that you can find on TheBlaze.com.
00:01:38.540And for the past three years, have been working on The Blaze Radio with a little program called Pure Opelka that follows this show on The Blaze Radio Network.
00:01:50.100So I'm happy to be here, thrilled to be here, kicking off the first hour of what will be a marathon day for me,
00:01:56.420and probably a marathon day for you if you are interested in the politics.
00:02:02.460But you should know, today and tomorrow, my fill-ins here on the Glenn Beck program,
00:02:08.300will not be just dedicated to or completely covering politics, because there's more to life.
00:07:40.320We are also going to talk outside of the politics, as I mentioned, about a couple of situations going on in the country that I can't believe.
00:07:52.000Are you a parent who has a kid in school sports?
00:07:55.740Can you imagine being told that you cannot watch your child compete?
00:08:32.420I've got a mountain of stuff here, a mountain of paper and things I want to talk about all morning.
00:08:39.960I've also gotten just gotten a notification that we will be talking with one of the bars in Washington that has opened early today.
00:08:49.980And it's a bar that has decided that every time Donald Trump tweets during Comey's testimony that they're going to give a free drink.
00:08:59.300So it could be very expensive, could be very costly.
00:09:03.800But if if Donald Trump would not tweet, I think it would be a terrific thing.
00:09:08.720I think that would be surprising to many people.
00:09:12.280And I think it would throw the left off their game.
00:09:15.320They're expecting Donald Trump to tweet.
00:09:17.180They're expecting Donald Trump to troll James Comey.
00:09:20.860And I believe that if if he were to remain silent, it would be a massive distraction to so many on the left who are just waiting.
00:09:29.340They're standing by their by their desks in their offices, in their liberal media offices with a lighter ready to light their hair on fire and run around the office.
00:09:40.800The first time Donald Trump tweets something during Jim Comey's testimony.
00:09:44.560And each time it happens, Shaw's bar in Washington, D.C. has promised to give a free drink for each tweet up up to 20 drinks, because we all know at 20 drinks, that's where D.C. cuts you off.
00:10:00.100You know, you might in every other state in the union, you might say the bartender might say three or four drinks.
00:10:06.480Hey, you need to calm down, especially if you're driving in D.C.
00:10:09.900Only in D.C. do they set that bar at 20.
00:10:14.400And I believe that's known as the Kennedy limit, the Kennedy line.
00:10:18.700Senator, I think you may have had enough.
00:10:26.520There's also a bar in San Francisco that opened at six o'clock this morning, which is just about the same time this show started.
00:10:34.500And they are reportedly experiencing a packed house already.
00:10:38.580And so we we hope to get our hands on some of the merriment, some of the revelry, some of the the people who look at politics as sport on a day they like to look at as their Super Bowl.
00:10:51.180I wonder where Maxine Waters is today.
00:10:59.200Before we get into all the hyper political madness that's going on in D.C. today, there are some international events that we have to cover.
00:11:10.480So right at the bottom of the hour, we're going to welcome in Jason Betrill, who will tell us what's going on.
00:11:16.760There was a massive terror attack in Iran yesterday.
00:11:52.960But when we get back from break, I want to kick off the day and some of the fun here with one of the most magical moments that appeared on the Internet yesterday.
00:12:05.520No, I'm not talking about Jerry Seinfeld not recognizing Kesha and refusing to hug her.
00:12:11.520I'm talking about a moment that shows that there's hope, a moment that shows that there's possibly a good group of kids growing up in this country.
00:12:22.000I'll do that next when the Glenn Beck Program returns.
00:12:25.780That is the number to call into the Glenn Beck Program.
00:12:46.180My name is Mike Opelka, filling in for my friend Glenn, who's vacationing.
00:13:28.100Well, what's going on in Syracuse today?
00:13:30.580What do you want to discuss this morning?
00:13:32.820Well, I'd just like to say, you know, first thank you to you guys and Jeff and Rush and all you guys for being on the radio and bringing us the news that you do and keeping us informed of the real news.
00:14:33.340It didn't take me a half hour, Glenn, to get one through, but hopefully they caught that.
00:14:37.780Dan, you bring up a really good point, and one of the big problems that we have as a nation is we don't recognize that we have the power to change it,
00:14:49.320that we have the responsibility and the obligation to change it, and we need to do it by trying to force politicians to really make term limits happen.
00:24:50.720Glenn, if you're listening, it's Buttrell, not Buttrell.
00:24:55.280But Jason is a head writer and a guy who understands global security because you were in the intelligence business.
00:25:02.200You serve this country and you're a guy who gets it.
00:25:05.940And as the whole nation is wrapped up and obsessed with the Comey testimony, we're checking things out.
00:25:12.520And I'm looking online and in Iran, in Tehran, the UN just announced we're flying our flag at half-mast in honor of the victims of the terror attacks from two days ago.
00:38:56.860You went right down the path that I was hoping you would go because you hit the nail on the head.
00:39:01.840People who are watching the Comey folks right now, they are folks that have time to take out of their day, out of their job,
00:39:08.540and watch a wide variety of television stations that have made this into a media circus, seven pages that we've already read and dissected.
00:39:16.560And the rest of us in the real world had to leave for work this morning.
00:39:21.300And we're lucky if we only have to work one job at 5 a.m. wondering how our day was going to go, where Comey was something that we're thinking we're just going to read on social media because we have to deal with real-world issues.
00:39:33.400So, Mike, I want to start this off because your listeners are very hard-working, loyal listeners because I'm one of them.
00:39:39.500And I want to let them know that Comey is not the only thing going on today.
00:39:43.220In fact, I love the media circus there because it's a huge distraction because this morning you have Secretary Ryan Zinke, who is on the House floor right now,
00:39:51.420talking to balanced budgets with the House Appropriation GOP Committee about the issues going on in the interior.
00:39:57.720You have Senator Mitch McConnell just proposed a fast-track to the House bill for the Repeal and Replace Affordable Care Act.
00:40:05.920So, luckily, there are things going on on Capitol Hill right now which actually affect everyday Main Street Americans' lives,
00:40:14.920other than this circus that is quite disgusting, I'm not going to lie to you, to watch.
00:40:20.200But in the end, I think we're going to find today and the end of tomorrow, it's going to blow up on the Democrats, not the Republicans.
00:40:27.000Hence why you've seen these leaks and these big distractions the last 48 hours because the Democrats realize the Comey interview actually has a potential chance to hurt their fundraising
00:40:38.640and their negative connotation of the president and destroy that more than any damage it can do to the Trump administration or anyone affiliated with it.
00:40:48.980Well, we agree on so much here, Scotty.
00:40:53.560And the digestion isn't it for breakfast.
00:40:55.980Well, it is, but it's also really important for us to realize that other things are going on.
00:41:01.220I have been ranting for a few days now saying that the Democrats, by constantly opening up more hearings and more hearings,
00:41:09.260despite the fact they have a special counselor investigating this,
00:41:12.780all they are doing is stopping every Republican moment or push to try and get the agenda through.
00:41:19.320It's kind of heartening to hear Mitch McConnell is actually trying to fast track that bill.
00:41:25.060If he does and manages to do it because so many Democrats are not in in their offices today and not on the Senate floor,
00:41:33.380then good for him, smart for him to push that through.
00:41:36.380I know I know Rand Paul has been out in front of the media saying we need to get the tax program in.
00:41:43.280We need to get the health care repeal in.
00:41:45.460So I know there are some people trying.
00:41:47.800But I also look at the Chuck Schumers, the Nancy Pelosi's who Nancy Pelosi would rather show up on The View to talk impeachment.
00:41:56.140Maxine Waters would rather show up on The View to talk impeachment than deny impeachment than they would to actually do the jobs they are hired and paid to do.
00:43:17.420The second question, there's lots of questions, but what I think the two questions have not been a second question is,
00:43:22.940if you were so concerned about Russia, even though you've denied three times that President Trump was being investigated or candidate Trump was being investigated,
00:43:31.420if you were so concerned about the Russian intervention and the Russian hacking,
00:43:35.400especially considering the main, the main part of evidence is supposedly these DNC WikiLeaks emails.
00:43:42.820Why did you never ask for the DNC servers to look at the emails yourself and to go through and look at the security on these servers?
00:43:50.800Do we know that he never asked for those servers?
00:45:03.580Why didn't you throw the flag and say, hold on a second, the president is trying to influence me.
00:45:09.280And I think that lays out on the sidewalk that that he didn't really believe the president was trying to influence him.
00:45:17.640He may have thought he was being given a little bit of a push.
00:45:22.000But as Alan Dershowitz said, it's within the president's purview to do this.
00:45:27.260It's part of the president's executive privilege to actually be able to say, I don't want you to investigate this guy.
00:45:34.020I'm going to pardon him and let it go. And and yet he did nothing.
00:45:39.820He did nothing of the sort. Doesn't anybody wonder that?
00:45:45.020Absolutely. And if it was so much, you remember, according to the Trump Tower, the time Attorney General Jeff Sessions,
00:45:52.120he did not recuse himself from this whole investigation for two more weeks.
00:45:55.560So at the very least, why did you not go to the attorney general, your higher up, your hierarchy?
00:46:01.080Why did you at least not mention to him? But, Mike, you brought up a very good point about these memos.
00:46:05.440Once again, we are seeing this idea, these concepts, these things being thrown out there like memos.
00:46:12.860Yet we have yet to see the actual memo.
00:46:15.720Why has he not released the memos? Are they going?
00:46:19.120I mean, how are we supposed to have any sort of credibility?
00:46:21.480Are we just supposed to take their word to be truthful after time and time again?
00:46:26.800They have lied. And we, the American people, that's the whole thing about Russia.
00:46:30.320There is still no tangible evidence that any of this exists.
00:46:34.120It's all he said, she said, middle school drama.
00:46:37.760That the truth is, I have to wonder, Democrats, I know you've died more deaths than a cat since Election Day because I watch the funerals daily.
00:46:46.480Is this like the big wedding celebration you're looking for, that I think in the end you're going to find out that the groom is left at the altar?
00:46:53.740We're going to step aside and take a quick break.
00:46:56.060I have some questions about what the president's doing today, and we'll follow up on that when the Glenn Beck Program returns.
00:47:18.600Michael Pelka sitting in for my friend Glenn Beck.
00:47:21.000By the way, Fridays on Glenn's show, Bill O'Reilly has been joining Glenn in this second hour of the show, and he will continue to do so, but he refuses to appear with me.
00:47:36.420O'Reilly and Glenn just have a special friendship, and he's not going to appear with anybody else but Glenn.
00:47:42.700So next Friday, a week and a day from right now, Bill O'Reilly will be on in his usual spot with Glenn.
00:47:50.960The two of them will be sparring verbally and eventually physically, I think.
00:47:57.300And, you know, while Glenn has the age advantage, I think O'Reilly's a wily veteran.
00:48:04.180I think he's a wily fighter, and I think it would be one that I would, despite my friendship with Glenn, my long-time friendship with Glenn, I would have to put some money on O'Reilly.
00:48:15.280Because I think, frankly, I think O'Reilly would be like a WWE wrestler.
00:48:20.700He'd have like a handful of dust, and he'd throw it in Glenn's face and then take him out.
00:48:26.960Anyway, that's some sort of weird fantasy just came through.
00:48:30.780We are here on the Glenn Beck Program.
00:48:32.560As I've said, you can join the conversation, 888-727-BEC.
00:48:36.280Our buddy Scotty Nell Hughes, who is someone who's been a long-time supporter of Mr. Trump and a longer friend of mine, we've known each other for quite a while, attended CPACs together and covered conventions together.
00:48:50.080And now we're watching Comey Feifei 2017 together.
00:48:56.160Scotty, it's beyond crazy for me what's happening here.
00:49:00.060This is, I don't remember any Hillary hearings getting this much coverage.
00:49:04.640I don't even remember the, what was it, the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings getting this much coverage.
00:49:36.640Today is like this wedding celebration that you have been waiting for for a very long time.
00:49:41.980And you are wanting, but I have to tell you, I think your groom's going to be left at the altar, and you're going to be stuck with a high bill because you have put so much into these testimonies.
00:49:51.200And when we already know the main issue is that there was no investigation into President Trump, that right there makes all of this circus look to be completely what it is.
00:50:01.920It's a PR message for the Democrats that I think has a real great chance of being spoiled today because in the end, the American people are going to see this is why President Trump was justified in firing Comey.
00:50:14.920Well, I hope you're right, and I hope we can get past all this instead of just inspiring more demands, more commands for more investigations, which is, I think that's what the Democratic prescription is.
00:50:31.120Because let's face it, we have not seen smoking guns.
00:50:34.540You had Senator Warner say we haven't seen evidence.
00:50:37.400You had Maxine Waters, the leader of the Impeach 45 chant crew, saying we have not seen any evidence of collusion.
00:50:45.860And now Comey, who yesterday, when he released the opening statement, actually verified what President Trump had told us weeks ago, that Jim Comey had confirmed with him three separate times that he was not being targeted by the FBI for an investigation.
00:51:03.760And the fact that Comey verified it yesterday, I thought was a huge win for the president.
00:51:09.440I thought it was a huge win for the for the GOP.
00:51:13.220And yet we're going to be mired in this for a while.
00:51:15.760If the Democrats are the big loser, who ultimately is the real winner here?
00:51:21.200Because as an American, I don't feel like I'm winning anything today.
00:51:25.540But today is a chance for Americans to win.
00:51:28.020And as we start off by saying, there are some real good things that are going through right now on on the Hill, which I don't know if it's good or bad, whether they're getting press attention, because maybe without the cameras on them, we might be able to get some things accomplished that we need to do for everyday Americans.
00:51:43.460Because what we're watching right now is Comey is truly just like a disgruntled ex-employee who has every chance he can, who has the bully pulpit to go after his former boss, who was justified in firing him because both sides at different points called for it to happen.
00:52:00.200And I think that's what the Senate should be doing this.
00:52:02.360I think that's how most Americans who have a logical mind are viewing this, that all they're doing is allowing this man to go on and have a free open open mic to bash this administration that he only served under for a short amount of time.
00:53:02.020I'll tell you when we go to the private session.
00:53:04.540So I don't see us learning anything new.
00:53:07.100I think it's a giant waste of time, which ultimately becomes a giant nothing burger in my book, to quote Hillary Clinton.
00:53:14.120And I just see the rest of the world saying, how can you be focusing on this America?
00:53:20.360Well, well, first of all, London's trying to reelect a government or form a new government.
00:53:26.460They're trying to deal with terrorism.
00:53:28.300Paris has got people running around with hammers and knives trying to attack us.
00:53:32.440And you've got stuff blowing up all over the world.
00:53:34.540We look like we are a high school clique that is arguing over whether that new kid who has all the money is cool enough to sit at our table.
00:59:36.140I salute your capitalist spirit taking advantage of this historic moment.
00:59:40.980That's, if you're out on the West Coast and you're anywhere near the Mission District in San Francisco, it's Clooney's.
00:59:47.520And, uh, they've got, they still have got a few more seats, but they apparently are doing as much business right now as they did during the NBA Finals game last night when the Warriors took the three game to none advantage over LeBron.
01:00:32.200Uh, we were talking about Jim Comey and yes, we do have a statement from Comey talking about the Trump administration trying to defame him.
01:00:40.780This is from seconds ago at the, at the hearing, the Senate intelligence hearing as, as it was carried live.
01:00:49.700I was also confused by the initial explanation that was offered publicly.
01:00:53.420That I was fired because of the decisions I had made during the election year.
01:00:58.840That didn't make sense to me for a whole bunch of reasons, including the time and all the water that had gone under the bridge since those hard decisions that had to be made.
01:01:07.800First of all, doesn't every employee wonder or kind of not understand fully why they are terminated?
01:01:15.680I mean, unless you're caught stealing from the company red-handed on a security videotape, sometimes there's a little squishiness in the termination and you always wonder, well, they didn't really have to fire me.
01:01:30.060So that's kind of a normal reaction from somebody who's been fired.
01:01:37.620And although the law required no reason at all to fire an FBI director, the administration then chose to defame me and more importantly, the FBI by saying that the organization was in disarray.
01:01:50.860Is there any question that the fact that the Democrats called for Comey to be fired and then the Republicans were calling for Comey to be fired, is there any question that that consensus might be an indication that there was some justifiable reason for the firing of James Comey?
01:02:11.900And maybe that's an explanation of the reason that there might be some disarray within the ranks of the FBI?
01:04:32.780But did the president in his meeting with Comey, the same meeting we're talking about.
01:04:37.980Did he ask or actually show purposeful obstruction of justice?
01:04:45.680There might have been discrepancies between facts and his FBI testimony.
01:04:52.320In your estimation, was General Flynn at that time in serious legal jeopardy?
01:04:57.860And in addition to that, do you sense that the president was trying to obstruct justice or just seek for a way for Mike Flynn to save face, given he had already been fired?
01:05:10.680Well, General Flynn at that point in time was in legal jeopardy.
01:05:13.980There was an open FBI criminal investigation of his statements in connection with the Russian contacts and the contacts themselves.
01:05:21.860And so that was my assessment at the time.
01:05:23.980I don't think it's for me to say whether the conversation I had with the president was an effort to obstruct.
01:05:29.360I took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning.
01:05:32.560But that's a conclusion I'm sure the special counsel will work towards to try and understand what the intention was there and whether that's an offense.
01:05:39.520So we're going to leave this to the special counsel.
01:07:28.840But listen to the future Mr. Brzezinski Scarborough try and talk Mika in off the ledge as she really did declare the president to be mentally ill.
01:09:01.640He's trying to save her, but the Mika train can't be derailed.
01:09:06.340But the point is that he feels he can say or do things that are different than the norm because he's famous, because he's a celebrity, because he has power.
01:09:54.420With this, all with this going on, and when it's found out that there's nothing, is will there be an investigation on CNN because they conspired to instruct the election when they gave Hillary Clinton all the questions to their debate to unfairly give her an advantage on a national television audience?
01:10:14.300That's the first thing that I would hope that we can do since we're such an objective society now and we're thinking in terms of rational and rationale.
01:10:22.760Now, the second question is, I'm seeing a lot.
01:10:25.320The real question is, I'm seeing a lot of people run behind.
01:10:29.620Like, they counted down when Comey's testimony was going to be.
01:11:57.060I am filling in for my friend Glenn Beck today and tomorrow on the Blaze Radio Network and here on your local radio station on the Premier Radio Networks.
01:12:07.460I appreciate you sticking with us today.
01:15:23.440Alan Dershowitz is not a guy that the GOP would normally call in to say, hey, can you back us up on this?
01:15:29.900And Alan Dershowitz was talking with Anderson Cooper last night on CNN, and they were discussing the seven-page statement that Comey put out that was his opening statement today.
01:15:42.520So the whole world saw the opening statement already.
01:15:45.460And in there, we have said there is no evidence of obstruction of justice, while the Democrats are all saying this is all obstruction of justice.
01:15:54.620At least the only guy who at CNN will say that is Jeffrey Toobin.
01:15:59.900And then every Democrat quotes Toobin, saying, Toobin says that it must be obstruction.
01:16:06.280But Alan Dershowitz gave us some great clarity on this.
01:16:09.680Professor Dershowitz, you said this is not obstruction of justice by the president, and that it actually strengthens his position against Director Comey.
01:16:40.400Historically, presidents have been able to tell the Justice Department and actually have told the Justice Department, stop this investigation.
01:16:51.620It's within the power of the president.
01:18:11.440Nobody talked about obstruction of justice.
01:18:13.580You cannot have obstruction of justice when the president exercises his constitutional authority to pardon,
01:18:20.360his constitutional authority to fire the director of the FBI or his constitutional authority to tell the director of the FBI who to prosecute, who not to prosecute.
01:18:30.140So let's get out of the weeds and let's look at the big country.
01:25:25.140You're going to be a rocket scientist to figure out that Comey came with one intent.
01:25:32.100And, you know, my complaint about Comey is he could have said all these things in closed session if it was that big a deal before he was ever fired.
01:25:45.660Some Republicans are going to fall away like a 60-cent pair of wet socks.
01:25:51.260And the Democrats are going to pull together and they're not going to let this go, period.
01:26:02.200No matter what happens, and especially with a special prosecutor, I mean, he was a protege of Comey.
01:26:11.860He's going to do everything he can to lift Comey up and make him look as good as he can in this investigation.
01:26:18.440And all I can say is, you know, I pray for Trump every day, but I also pray that, number one, he doesn't stick his foot in his mouth and nothing else comes up.
01:26:31.860Because they're going to turn over every rock from Lutawisi to Russia to find something on this guy.