Three New York City Police Department officers have been hospitalized after drinking milkshakes from Shake Shack. Was it an attack on the cops, or was it an accident? Ben Shapiro joins us to go over what happened in the Supreme Court yesterday, Michael Rechtenwald on his new book, Beyond Woke, and we talk about how Chaz is NOT a street festival under any circumstances.
00:01:06.740You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.
00:01:11.680So yesterday, this was issued by the police union.
00:01:18.380I'm writing to alert you to another serious safety issue.
00:01:22.000This evening, several police officers assigned to a protest detail in lower Manhattan took a meal at the Shake Shack location on Broadway and Fulton Street.
00:01:30.380At some point during their meal period, they discovered that a toxic substance believed to be bleach had been placed in their beverages.
00:01:39.140The contamination was not discovered until they had already ingested a portion of their beverages.
00:01:44.820They're currently in a hospital receiving treatment and expected to recover.
00:01:48.060All the police union members are advised to carefully inspect any prepared food item that they purchase while on duty for possible contamination.
00:01:56.720Now, this is the second time in Washington, D.C., the National Guard, they were delivered pizzas with glass in the pizzas.
00:02:06.160It is a sad day when our police can't even trust the food that they're eating.
00:02:12.880Now, there is an update on this story.
00:02:15.580Shake Shack is one of my favorite fast food restaurants.
00:02:19.040There's nothing better than Shake Shack.
00:02:25.440And in New York City, we literally would stand in line for 20 or 30 minutes to get it.
00:02:31.960Now, in New York City, you stand in line for a stupid cupcake and, you know, and ballet shoes, too.
00:02:37.460So, you know, it's different, but it's such a great, great restaurant.
00:02:42.060When I heard this, I was outraged, just outraged.
00:02:46.420And I want to know what happened, because if Shake Shack has employees that are doing things like this, I'll never eat at a Shake Shack again.
00:02:55.500And I'll encourage all my friends not to eat at a Shake Shack.
00:03:01.960New York PD finds no wrongdoing by Shake Shack employees after officers get sick from milkshakes.
00:03:09.720Three New York City Department officers have been released from the hospital after getting sick when they drank milkshakes from Shake Shack Monday night.
00:03:17.820The shakes may have been tainted with bleach, according to the New York City Police Department.
00:03:22.940They launched an investigation after the officers fell ill and determined early Tuesday morning that there was no criminality by employees.
00:03:31.880This is according to an NYPD detective.
00:03:35.400Investigators believe a cleaning solution used to clean the milkshake machines wasn't fully cleared and may have gotten into the officers' drinks.
00:03:46.720So it just happened to the officers or did it happen to other people?
00:05:58.640Now, if you remember right, if you're a longtime listener of this program, the Bubba effect is something that I've warned that the military had been training for.
00:06:08.740I found out about it in around 2000, maybe 2004, 2006, somewhere in that area.
00:06:16.600And because I asked the special forces command, what are you most concerned about?
00:06:24.680And they said, well, one of the things we're training for now is the Bubba effect.
00:06:27.880And I said, I don't know what the Bubba effect is.
00:06:29.520And they said, that is when the country is so divided and no one trusts the government.
00:06:40.180And and they were they were looking at this at the time through the lens of making excuses for Middle Eastern terrorists.
00:06:50.800And they said, we're afraid that at some point a major terrorist attack will will happen.
00:07:00.400And the people in that in a community could be anywhere in the United States will go in a Bubba will go into a convenience store and see a Sikh who's not Muslim or a Muslim who has nothing to do with anything.
00:07:19.600And he'll go in and he'll say, you know, it's people like you and he'll shoot them.
00:07:27.520Well, the feds will come into town and when the feds arrive, the people will block their entrance to their town for the feds because they'll say you are part of the problem.
00:07:39.600We know what Bubba did was wrong and we'll handle Bubba.
00:07:42.840Bubba, get out of our town because you are the reason why people like Bubba are rising up because you excused it.
00:08:29.200A man was shot yesterday after gunfire erupted at a demonstration in New Mexico where protesters attempted to topple a Braun Conquistador statue outside of an Albuquerque museum.
00:08:45.780The man was taken to a local hospital where he was listed in critical but stable condition.
00:08:50.780The shooting tonight was tragic, outrageous and unacceptable act of violence.
00:08:54.540And it has no place in our city, said the Albuquerque mayor, Tim Keller.
00:08:58.660The shooting occurred during a clash between protesters and the New Mexico Civil Guard, a heavily armed civilian group that attempted to protect the controversial sculpture, a monument that features Spanish Conquistador in Albuquerque.
00:09:16.780Protesters reportedly wrapped a chain around the statue and started tugging on it in chance of tear it down.
00:09:22.260At least one person swung a pickaxe at the statue of New Mexico's 16th century colonial governor.
00:09:29.480Gunshots could be heard down the street just moments later with several people yelling, somebody's got shot.
00:09:36.680Police use chemical irritants and flashbangs to protect the officers and detain those involved in the shooting.
00:09:42.580We're receiving reports about vigilante groups possibly instigating this violence.
00:09:47.480If it is true, we'll be holding them accountable to the fullest extent of the law, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
00:10:46.080They have no right to come onto especially private property and tear down statues.
00:10:52.760They don't have a right to do that to public statues.
00:10:55.260And that's why people band together in civilian groups.
00:11:02.580Because they know a well-regulated militia has a right to keep and bear arms.
00:11:11.460And they know that they are the last stand.
00:11:16.100If the police won't do anything, if the mayor won't do anything, if the governor won't do anything, if the president won't do anything, then they have to.
00:11:27.920They're not going to just stand around and have their streets ripped up by mobs.
00:12:05.640And if you think that they're not going to come in, if they get control or the chance and come into your studio and drag you outside, anchor, chair and all, and kill you in a mob.
00:12:22.760Here's MSNBC, who's in love with the protesters, who's been saying this is a great thing, who's been defending them.
00:12:31.520Listen to what happens when one of them is on the street in Seattle.
00:12:35.360After more than a week of clashes between the demonstrators and the police, now you've seen essentially almost like a street festival type atmosphere.
00:15:39.100You know, I think that the idea of violent revolution is probably a fantasy.
00:15:43.120Because I don't think that that is something that most Americans are up for.
00:15:47.540But the idea that the country is coming apart, it seems that you're going to start to see greater divisions between states.
00:15:52.780And then between states and the federal government is very real.
00:15:55.560And I think the way that you could end up with actual violence is when the federal government is taken over by members of the left and they don't know what they don't know.
00:16:05.560Meaning that they actually believe that because they've been so ascendant in both the cultural and the political spheres, that there is no breaking point.
00:16:12.320That they're just going to be able to push for full-scale societal change on every level.
00:16:16.560And that there will be no resistance to that.
00:16:18.520And they're going to come up against some hard truths if they start to do things that, for example, if you get into Beto O'Rourke gun confiscation or if you get into shutting down religious schools.
00:16:28.480There are certain things that Americans just won't stand for, which is why I hope that at some point it will be everybody back away a little bit.
00:16:36.180But with the left pushing this hard, the real possibility of a countrywide division obviously is growing.
00:16:43.960And then the left is not shy about kind of wanting it.
00:16:47.300I mean, as soon as Trump wants it in places like California, we're talking about secession.
00:16:50.900The problem is if California becomes the entire federal government, then it's going to be a lot of people on the right who are talking about, can we actually last as a unified country?
00:17:00.220Ben, I want to go to what the Supreme Court did yesterday because they did a couple of things.
00:17:04.900And I think a lot of people who are conservative are torn on what they did to Title VII because, you know, most people, most normal people are, they don't have a problem with homosexuality as friends.
00:17:25.680I don't want to get into somebody else's business.
00:17:27.780But is this another jam down and another intrusion on businesses and religion?
00:17:41.800Tell me what you think of Title VII and what they did yesterday.
00:17:45.060So, I mean, to be frank, I've for a long time thought that Title VII probably is unconstitutional its entirety.
00:17:52.520The idea that the federal government was ever given the power to invade private businesses and tell them who and who not to employ seems to me incredibly problematic just from a constitutional, originalist level.
00:18:03.540Now, does that mean that I wouldn't have voted for the Civil Rights Act in its entirety?
00:18:06.660If I'm given the choice in voting for the thing or not voting for the thing, I vote for the thing.
00:18:10.020But Title VII has always been a real problem because, again, it intrudes into areas that the government ought not intrude.
00:18:15.480Remember, the big problem with segregation in general was the governments of states that were cramming down segregation.
00:18:21.560And that there were plenty of places in the United States that were desegregated by private businesses.
00:18:27.140I mean, the Greensboro protests over the lunch counters in Bloomington, North Carolina, those particular – in Greensboro, rather – those protests were private in nature and ended with the desegregation of lunch counters.
00:18:42.320So the notion that you had to force private businesses to desegregate is not true.
00:18:47.180What you actually had to do is stop the state from forcing them to segregate in the first place.
00:18:50.420So put aside the general objection to Title VII, the decision itself is nonsensical on the merits.
00:18:55.920I mean, Samuel Alito's dissent is a masterpiece.
00:18:58.640I mean, it goes for 100 pages, but it tears apart savagely the majority opinion.
00:19:03.680There's a good case to be made that the reason that Roberts joined this opinion is specifically so he can get Gorsuch to write it.
00:19:08.840And the reason that he wanted Gorsuch to write it as opposed to Ginsburg, for example, is because if Gorsuch writes it and not Ginsburg, if Ginsburg writes this thing,
00:19:15.180then religious liberty is in a lot more danger from this specific decision than if Gorsuch writes it.
00:19:21.560So that really is the question right now.
00:19:23.740Now, here's my view on a lot of Supreme Court jurisprudence in general.
00:19:27.920The Supreme Court tries to very often settle questions that are still unsettled, and that really ought not be settled by the Supreme Court.
00:19:43.520America is as politically divided as it has been certainly in my lifetime and maybe in the lifetime of your listeners, including the 60s.
00:19:51.760And the idea that you're going to have anybody at the top of the federal government cramming down a one-size-fits-all rule is really a problem.
00:19:58.620I mean, what the founders figured is that in division lies unity so long as you have a diversity of thought and action that is allowed across the country.
00:20:07.340If you have a unified rule that crams down by 51 percent on 49 percent, that's when you get into really divisive areas.
00:20:13.280So are you going to keep the country running by allowing people to live their lives?
00:20:16.500Are you going to keep the country running by cramming down one rule from the top?
00:20:19.780This one crams down one rule from the top.
00:20:21.480And whether you like the rule or you don't like the rule, that's a dangerous thing.
00:20:23.720So, you know, I think that's what the French Revolution was all about and what separates us from the French Revolution is the French Revolution really was about you're we're going to enforce morality.
00:20:35.800We're going to enforce what we believe is right.
00:20:38.880And if you don't like it guillotine, it doesn't it doesn't work.
00:20:43.620The the question that I have, though, on this ruling, how does this affect me?
00:20:50.180And I keep I keep using let's say I'm I am.
00:20:55.020Well, let me just use a real life scenario.
00:20:57.040I think it's Bergdorf Goodman in New York that they hire, quote, models, not salespeople.
00:21:02.620I can't remember which store it is, but it may be Bergdorf.
00:21:05.480And this allows them to be able to say when, you know, a fat person like me comes in and says, I want to sell clothes here.
00:21:13.200They can say, I'm sorry, you don't fit the the look.
00:21:15.920And they do it specifically to get around the law so they can make sure that everybody looks a certain way, because that's important.
00:21:24.640I don't want to go in and buy a suit where the guys around me can't even fit into the suit or, you know, they can look at me and I can look at them.
00:21:32.780And they're like, dude, there's nothing here for you to buy, Glenn.
00:22:11.820Twenty one of these states already have laws that are very much like what the Supreme Court did yesterday.
00:22:15.860So New York, it probably won't affect you.
00:22:17.520And you probably had to worry about legal liability if you did that in any case.
00:22:20.720Now, if you do it in Texas, you have to worry about legal liability.
00:22:23.480Right. That's that's the real issue here.
00:22:24.800And by the way, the best example here is actually the case of if you're talking about things that are a problem, then we should worry less about, you know, the business that has models and more about your third grade teacher.
00:22:36.120Right. You got a bunch of kids in your school and you're in the teacher comes in one day and says they are the opposite gender and start teaching your child about transgender ideology.
00:22:46.060That could very well be a violation of Title seven of the Civil Rights Act.
00:22:49.760Now, now, this is nonsensical. I mean, just on a legal level, it is completely bull crap.
00:22:53.840When I say that, I say it advisedly with respect toward Justice Gorsuch, who typically I think is a much better textualist than this.
00:22:59.760But he admits in the decision that has nothing to do with the Civil Rights Act.
00:23:02.700He says in the decision that there's no way that the people who wrote the Civil Rights Act meant to encompass in this homosexuality or transgenderism.
00:23:10.740And the Democrats know this, by the way, Democrats have been trying to pass a separate bill called the Equality Act that would do exactly this without religious exemptions for years.
00:23:18.040And so the idea that magically you can now read the Equality Act into the Civil Rights Act is insane.
00:23:23.240I mean, this is something that Alito mocks and correctly so, because there is nothing textualist about the idea that you can take the word sex and then read into it sexual orientation or transgenderism.
00:23:33.760In fact, it's the only way that this is the hilarity of it.
00:23:37.100The only way you can actually read transgenderism into the Civil Rights Act is to reject the claim of transgender people that they are members of the sex to which they claim membership.
00:32:56.700It's been going on in the universities for 50 years.
00:32:59.740And it's finally taking some sort of roots and taking the roots are finally, I should say, sprouting these weeds into the into the culture and into the into the popular sphere and also into the political sphere.
00:33:15.200Because we have many politicians from the Democratic Party buying into it and supporting it and, you know, giving it their full endorsement.
00:33:25.100So, you know, it's been a long haul through the institutions, a long march through the institutions, which was the idea that was floated by Antonio Gromsky, the Italian Marxist, would be to wage an ideological war for ideological hegemony or over over, you know, complete dominance.
00:33:45.960And, you know, that's what they've been up to for 50 years.
00:33:49.100So, Michael, as I have studied revolutions, you need education, you need the universities, the academics, you need people on the inside of the government, you need the media, all these different things you need.
00:34:15.160Is there anything that you have seen in your studies like we know that violence is part of it and they want they're begging for violence?
00:34:24.500The the left has been begging for the right to stand up and be violent so the the press could make us into monsters.
00:34:32.820What is the thing that, in retrospect, the people of China or people in revolutions could have done, besides violence, that we could still do to stop this?
00:35:28.220I know you know who Edward Bernays is and the study of propaganda and and the study of crowds that he and his his uncle really did a lot of work on Sigmund Freud.
00:35:44.000There is I just read a bunch of stuff from him last night.
00:35:47.080And there is something to the psychology of a crowd that when they are going, they shut off all critical thinking.
00:35:54.720So how does making the case that these guys are Marxist penetrate when we are so deeply divided into our groups?
00:36:03.020Well, you have, you know, a great number of people that don't know what's going on.
00:36:08.260They are you know, you see the support for Black Lives Matter has has dramatic dramatically risen despite all the all this violence and despite the intention being clear.
00:36:18.620So, I mean, those people are a critical mass that have to be reached first.
00:36:23.160And then you isolate the radicals from the rest.
00:36:26.620That's the way to do it, because we have to get to the people who are unwittingly supporting communist revolution.
00:36:33.380And those people are just not educated as to what's happening.
00:36:39.120And, you know, the bully pulpit is the best start.
00:36:52.380And, you know, get some of these people in the room and then start talking to them, because as it is, everybody's in an echo chamber here as they very well set up these echo chambers.
00:37:04.340And there's no crosstalk going on at all.
00:37:08.900Michael, you wrote in your book, and I think this is absolutely brilliant.
00:37:13.120You said first the left translated Marxism into identity politics.
00:37:17.200Now, with the Black Lives Matter movement, they're translating identity politics back into Marxism.
00:38:03.340Now, subtly and ever so surreptitiously, they have realized that they've translated this, they have translated this identity politics right back into Marxism, where they wanted to be in the first place.
00:38:17.400That's exactly what's happening, because we see Black Lives Matter really has an anti-capitalist agenda.
00:38:23.400We see the Antifa, of course, is anti-capitalist, but all this identity politics and fighting against the so-called Nazis, all this was a part of reintroducing Marxism into the agenda.