The Glenn Beck Program - Best of the Program ｜ Guests： Brad Meltzer & Chad Robichaux ｜ 3⧸14⧸22

00:00:00.000 Today's program filled with facts that your family needs.

00:00:04.100 One, what was the tripwire that happened over the weekend?

00:00:08.380 One of the few tripwires that I have placed for my own family on.

00:00:13.740 If this happens, it means we're getting close to something big.

00:00:19.240 That tripwire happened.

00:00:20.300 I explain it in hour number one of the podcast.

00:00:23.080 Hour number two, we talk all about Ukraine and ESG.

00:00:27.080 And then the great Brad Meltzer is on to tell us about his new book.

00:00:31.660 But all of the secrets that he has gone through in the in the government archives.

00:00:38.300 He tells us about his trip to the actual Indiana Jones warehouse, the real one the government has.

00:00:46.280 And I surprise him with Superman's cape all on today's podcast.

00:00:57.080 You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck Program.

00:01:05.660 Welcome to the Glenn Beck Program.

00:01:08.260 There's a couple of things.

00:01:09.480 First of all, let's welcome Mr. Pat Gray.

00:01:11.620 Thank you.

00:01:12.180 Great to be here.

00:01:12.780 Yeah.

00:01:13.020 Yeah.

00:01:13.320 Is it?

00:01:14.000 It is.

00:01:14.460 It is.

00:01:15.200 You wouldn't want to be any place else.

00:01:16.840 Nowhere else.

00:01:17.260 Not at home.

00:01:17.580 If I could choose one place to be at this moment, it would be right here.

00:01:21.180 Right here.

00:01:21.840 Yeah.

00:01:22.080 Not at Disney.

00:01:23.680 No.

00:01:24.160 Not some exotic vacation.

00:01:27.600 Nope.

00:01:28.080 Not even at home in bed.

00:01:29.640 Uh-uh.

00:01:30.020 No.

00:01:30.580 Right here.

00:01:31.200 No.

00:01:31.600 That is great.

00:01:33.300 Isn't it?

00:01:33.820 That's the kind of dedication you get from Pat Gray from Pat Gray Unleashed.

00:01:38.640 He's got a passion for being here.

00:01:41.920 Pat, how are you?

00:01:42.920 I'm good.

00:01:43.400 Good.

00:01:43.760 What was on your mind today?

00:01:45.240 What is it that you've seen?

00:01:46.100 That there's no trouble in the world.

00:01:47.740 There is no trouble in the world.

00:01:49.040 I'm very excited about the fact that everything's been fixed, except for the things Putin keeps

00:01:53.780 screwing up. 0.61

00:01:54.500 Yeah. 0.99

00:01:54.800 Oh, you pisses me off.

00:01:56.900 Everything would be perfect if it weren't for him. 0.65

00:01:59.120 Yeah.

00:01:59.420 We'd have a great economy.

00:02:00.520 Yeah.

00:02:00.860 Gas prices would be incredibly low.

00:02:02.940 You could buy a house for $1.98.

00:02:05.540 It's Putin.

00:02:07.460 Oh, the Putin.

00:02:08.660 Dang it.

00:02:09.140 I know. 0.65

00:02:09.640 I hate him for that.

00:02:10.540 Could we play Americans Don't Understand What We're Doing clip, please?

00:02:14.120 Never forget what we've accomplished together so far.

00:02:18.600 Yeah.

00:02:18.800 And by the way, the American people just trying to stay above water don't understand this.

00:02:22.920 Yeah, they don't.

00:02:23.500 You tell them what the American Recovery Act was, they look at you like, what are you talking

00:02:26.720 about?

00:02:27.340 Right.

00:02:27.740 Yeah. 1.00

00:02:28.020 They're so stupid, the American people. 1.00

00:02:29.640 They're so stupid. 1.00

00:02:30.500 They're so stupid. 1.00

00:02:31.200 So stupid. 1.00

00:02:32.800 And they don't understand that Putin has caused inflation. 1.00

00:02:36.040 Right.

00:02:36.480 Can I tell you something?

00:02:37.880 It is simply not true about government spending.

00:02:42.900 Listen to this.

00:02:43.600 When we're having this discussion, it's important to dispel some of those who say, well, it's

00:02:49.340 the government spending.

00:02:50.720 No, it isn't.

00:02:51.800 Her too.

00:02:52.380 The government spending is doing the exact reverse, reducing the national debt.

00:02:56.560 It is not inflationary.

00:02:58.040 Government spending is reducing the national debt.

00:03:01.920 Okay.

00:03:02.320 Look it.

00:03:02.800 Look it.

00:03:03.120 Look it.

00:03:04.940 Are you not?

00:03:06.040 You're married?

00:03:07.500 Yes.

00:03:07.940 Okay.

00:03:08.320 My wife is married to me.

00:03:10.500 You're married to Lisa.

00:03:12.120 Lisa and I have a lot of things in common.

00:03:14.840 For instance, honey, we're saving money by spending this money.

00:03:20.280 I've heard that.

00:03:21.520 Yes.

00:03:21.860 We're saving money by spending this money right now.

00:03:24.880 Yes.

00:03:25.260 And who doesn't know the basic principle?

00:03:28.540 When you're in debt, if you go out and put more things on the credit card, you're actually

00:03:35.880 not adding to debt.

00:03:38.580 You're making things better.

00:03:41.400 Don't think that through.

00:03:42.380 I mean, that's what she's saying.

00:03:45.160 That is what she's saying.

00:03:47.460 We're not adding to debt.

00:03:48.980 How are you not adding to debt?

00:03:51.800 Well, what we did with the money we spent was buy counterfeit money machines.

00:03:56.380 And now we're counterfeiting money and paying off debt.

00:03:59.180 All right.

00:03:59.600 There you go.

00:04:00.260 Well, they're already kind of doing it.

00:04:02.420 It's called fiat currency.

00:04:04.240 But that's a different story.

00:04:06.400 Here's the president.

00:04:07.880 He gets a little testy.

00:04:09.300 Cut three, please.

00:04:11.520 I'm sick of this stuff.

00:04:14.400 We have to talk about it because the American people think the reason for inflation is government

00:04:18.460 spending more money.

00:04:19.940 Simply not true.

00:04:22.580 Simply not true.

00:04:23.700 How?

00:04:24.160 Now, the treasury secretary of the Obama administration, Larry Summers, said it was true.

00:04:31.380 One of their lead economists, Furman, also said that it was true.

00:04:35.980 But obviously, every conservative economist says this as well.

00:04:42.320 But it's just simply not true.

00:04:44.200 It's simple.

00:04:45.180 Just because he says it.

00:04:46.360 He's sick of it, too.

00:04:48.260 Yes, he is.

00:04:48.820 I've noticed that he seems a little angry a lot of the time.

00:04:56.180 Yeah.

00:04:56.620 Or a lot angry a lot of the time.

00:04:58.480 Yeah.

00:04:58.700 Or a lot angry just off the cuff.

00:05:05.680 Just kind of like, hey, I like chocolate ice cream.

00:05:11.060 It's not true that I don't like vanilla ice cream.

00:05:14.440 Yeah.

00:05:14.640 I mean, he goes from zero to 60 in a heartbeat.

00:05:19.500 There's a little bit of the old man yells at cloud thing going on.

00:05:22.680 You know?

00:05:24.440 It's like, hey, there's something.

00:05:26.460 It's not normal.

00:05:27.920 He seems to burst into real visceral anger out of nowhere.

00:05:32.440 It is normal.

00:05:34.060 It is normal.

00:05:34.840 For a super old guy who's losing cognitive functions. 0.70

00:05:37.860 Yes, that is super normal.

00:05:39.340 We've all seen that in our family.

00:05:41.440 Yeah, yeah.

00:05:41.860 I guess that's true.

00:05:42.400 In that situation, it's true.

00:05:43.940 But it's scary.

00:05:45.500 It's not normal for a president.

00:05:47.100 No.

00:05:47.680 Yeah.

00:05:47.800 And you think about how he's losing it in front of crowds and at the press who has done nothing

00:05:53.860 but coddle him through this presidency.

00:05:55.820 I know.

00:05:56.760 He's mad at them.

00:05:57.900 Imagine what he's like behind closed doors.

00:05:59.920 I've heard that he is angry at the drop of a hat a lot.

00:06:09.060 In the White House.

00:06:10.220 I bet he is.

00:06:10.720 Well, his presidency is going down the drain.

00:06:14.160 It's it can't.

00:06:15.440 I don't know how you salvage it at this point.

00:06:17.660 And he is pissed off that people are noticing.

00:06:20.640 And yet they are talking this weekend that he is seriously thinking he's going to run.

00:06:27.240 I know that's for reelection.

00:06:28.840 Insane.

00:06:29.280 And no, no, no, that's not insane.

00:06:31.200 Here's what's insane.

00:06:32.100 The head to head polls between him and Trump.

00:06:36.060 It's a dead heat.

00:06:37.540 Yeah.

00:06:38.720 Are you.

00:06:40.720 What?

00:06:41.120 I mean, look.

00:06:45.580 My wife says this to me all the time, speaking of my wife, and she's always like, how can

00:06:50.400 like I don't understand how could anyone even think this would be close?

00:06:54.300 And how is it possible?

00:06:56.080 And it's like, well, we all sat here and complained for four years about the media turning Donald

00:07:02.000 Trump into Satan.

00:07:03.540 Right. 0.85

00:07:03.740 Well, that has an effect.

00:07:05.660 I mean, Donald Trump is going to if he runs when it seems like he will, he's going to

00:07:09.300 he's got the nomination locked up pretty much on his side in the primary.

00:07:13.600 But he's going to face this same treatment and multiple years of him being turned into

00:07:19.040 Satan by the media.

00:07:19.880 It's not going to be a cakewalk for Donald Trump if he runs.

00:07:23.320 I mean, they have we all sat here and day by day cataloged.

00:07:28.540 No, we can't.

00:07:29.460 How bad the media was against him and complained about it and said it was unfair and it was

00:07:34.400 but it was real and it occurred.

00:07:36.080 Yeah.

00:07:36.540 And they're going to go back and reverse themselves completely to anything negative that that

00:07:40.620 that Joe Biden is has done all the whatever they're already trying to do it in real time.

00:07:46.760 Yeah, it's going to be a lot.

00:07:48.060 It's kind of and it's their groundwork is already done.

00:07:51.060 It's going to be a challenge.

00:07:51.920 I mean, President Trump, if he runs, it's going to it's not going to be a cakewalk.

00:07:55.560 It's going to be hard.

00:07:56.520 And he's going to get he's going to have that same awful treatment from the media.

00:07:59.860 He's going to have to overcome.

00:08:01.380 And we've seen how difficult that is, even for Donald Trump, who's very good at dealing

00:08:05.340 with the media.

00:08:06.160 So I would you know, I know this is never going to happen, but I would love, love to

00:08:13.260 see President Trump endorse DeSantis and then take the role from Nancy Pelosi.

00:08:22.200 The Speaker of the House thing.

00:08:23.340 Oh, my God, can you imagine he would tear it apart?

00:08:28.780 The Speaker of the House.

00:08:30.500 He doesn't have to be in Congress to be Speaker of the House.

00:08:32.900 No, all he has to do is the ruling party needs to say we would like him Speaker of the House.

00:08:38.420 And I mean, they could do that, too.

00:08:40.860 Don't you think they do that?

00:08:41.620 If he wanted it, if he wanted it.

00:08:43.580 I don't know that he'd want it.

00:08:45.580 Can you imagine?

00:08:46.960 I mean, because then he is actually responsible for all of the investigations.

00:08:50.920 He would be responsible for, yeah, we're going to do a little investigation on Hunter Biden.

00:08:57.980 We're going to look into that one.

00:08:59.360 Oh, my God.

00:08:59.840 We're going to do a little investigation into into the Democrats that were here and doing

00:09:07.920 my impeachment.

00:09:08.900 We're just going to look into that.

00:09:10.760 He could approve.

00:09:11.700 He wouldn't be on the the the committees.

00:09:16.360 Well, it might be.

00:09:17.620 But he would be the one who would say we're doing it.

00:09:20.720 Can you imagine?

00:09:23.180 Because that may be a more important role, because if you want to clean out the hornet's

00:09:30.260 nest, you have to do it through Congress.

00:09:33.300 You have to do it for the president could sign all kinds of executive orders and do, you

00:09:38.760 know what this and that.

00:09:40.160 But that doesn't last.

00:09:42.100 And if the president wants to fire clean house at the State Department, all of you out.

00:09:48.580 He can't do that without Congress.

00:09:52.140 If he is the speaker of the house.

00:09:54.540 And Ron DeSantis is the president.

00:09:59.160 I think you have a one to punch.

00:10:02.920 I mean, this is a bit of a fantasy league we're playing here, but it would be interesting.

00:10:07.740 I don't think I don't think Trump would have as much interest in that role.

00:10:11.880 I had presidents go back and be in Congress.

00:10:14.800 If it's good enough for, you know, John Quincy Adams.

00:10:19.560 If John Quincy Adams was willing to do it and John Quincy Adams in the end.

00:10:24.540 Is the reason why we got rid of slavery.

00:10:27.140 He tried and tried and tried and tried and tried.

00:10:29.660 And then he saw this up comer, you know, that just came to Congress and he was like, you

00:10:33.580 get it.

00:10:34.420 And he he tutored that young congressman on how to stop slavery.

00:10:41.140 And that young congressman became the first Republican president, Abraham Lincoln.

00:10:46.520 I don't know.

00:10:47.740 I think it might be good.

00:10:49.120 It's a you know, it's not a joke to be in Congress.

00:10:52.480 It is now.

00:10:53.700 No, because Congress isn't doing anything.

00:10:56.860 We we send all these representatives and it's really only Schumer and McConnell and Pelosi

00:11:03.100 and maybe McCarthy that are getting together in the rooms and like, yeah, we're going to

00:11:08.360 do this and then just send it to everybody to rubber stamp.

00:11:12.120 That's the problem.

00:11:13.060 It would be fascinating to see.

00:11:15.720 Yeah.

00:11:15.840 By the way, have you seen all of the things that are in the spending bill that we didn't

00:11:21.020 know about?

00:11:21.660 Because nobody read the bill.

00:11:22.460 All stuff that's cutting inflation.

00:11:23.900 I'll tell you that.

00:11:24.860 Yeah.

00:11:26.060 People just don't understand it.

00:11:27.900 Why don't you get it?

00:11:28.840 It's cutting inflation.

00:11:30.340 Yes.

00:11:30.940 And there wouldn't be any if it weren't for Putin.

00:11:33.220 Yes. 1.00

00:11:33.900 Damn Putin. 1.00

00:11:35.240 God. 1.00

00:11:35.680 I don't like that guy. 1.00

00:11:37.140 I hate him. 0.96

00:11:38.880 Are you really angry? 0.96

00:11:41.400 I'm really angry at Putin.

00:11:44.420 Oh, dang it. 0.73

00:11:46.400 Oh, dang it.

00:11:49.120 So you really think that it's not printing of money?

00:11:53.380 Oh, it's Putin.

00:11:54.960 But it was starting.

00:11:56.000 That's an absolute lie.

00:11:57.700 I'm sick of it.

00:11:59.020 But he started before the invasion.

00:12:01.100 There was a Putin.

00:12:02.740 What don't you understand about Putin?

00:12:05.320 When I scream his name, does that not tell you it's Putin?

00:12:12.600 Fair point.

00:12:13.620 Ah, I think I get it now.

00:12:14.880 Yeah.

00:12:15.120 I think the American people get it.

00:12:17.000 Thank you very much, Pat.

00:12:22.960 This is the best of the Glenn Beck Program.

00:12:31.960 Huddled in a bomb shelter in Kiev, a seven-year-old girl named Emilia Anasovich sang a song in Ukrainian.

00:12:46.220 She sang Frozen.

00:12:47.300 It went viral as people commented on her sweetness, the innocence, and the hope for this little girl.

00:12:54.020 The video tugged on everybody's heartstrings.

00:12:56.940 In the beginning of the video, you can hear the whole room go quiet as the crowd realizes that she's singing.

00:13:03.740 Here it is.

00:13:04.380 The best of the demon will be coming out of the Ukraine. 1.00

00:13:09.140 The參加служащий god no how to do that.

00:13:12.960 Theabel of the

00:13:31.660 I am happy to report, after six days in an air raid shelter,

00:13:39.940 Emilia, her brother and her grandmother,

00:13:42.720 walked for about two days to the border and are now safe.

00:13:47.940 Her mother, along with her father, decided to stay behind

00:13:51.440 to provide food for Ukrainian forces.

00:13:54.920 But Dad said, I always knew Emilia was very talented and a sweet angel.

00:13:59.360 Now the whole world knows the same.

00:14:02.900 Currently in the hot spot is the founder and CEO of Mighty Oaks Foundation

00:14:09.200 and the co-founder of Save Our Allies, Chad Robichaux.

00:14:13.620 Hello, Chad. How are you?

00:14:16.080 Glenn, how are you?

00:14:17.460 The last time we talked, I was in Afghanistan.

00:14:20.020 I know. I know. Now you're in Ukraine.

00:14:24.580 Tell us the situation on the ground and what's happening.

00:14:27.400 Well, you know, it's pretty dynamic and very different in different parts of the country.

00:14:34.300 As you're aware, you know, over in Kiev and the cities more to the east,

00:14:38.960 you have the direct kinetic combat with Ukrainian troops, Russian troops,

00:14:44.260 as well as, you know, militiaed Ukrainians fighting for their homes and their towns.

00:14:51.760 And then over to the west, you still have major cities intact that are, you know, at threat.

00:14:57.660 And we've seen yesterday, you know, over at Lviv getting rocketed.

00:15:02.440 And so the whole country's in chaos.

00:15:04.220 Everybody's scared.

00:15:05.360 People are evacuating, not just out of the country,

00:15:08.300 but people are evacuating from one dangerous city to a safer place.

00:15:11.920 And, you know, a lot of people that are helping, like, say, our allies and other organizations that are helping

00:15:16.020 or just evacuating people from the country,

00:15:18.500 but actually moving people from a dangerous place to a safer place,

00:15:22.660 moving medical aid forward, moving supplies forward, and moving people out.

00:15:27.960 So, Chad, you've been in special operations for a very long time,

00:15:31.380 now retired from military service.

00:15:34.260 But what is Putin thinking?

00:15:37.820 What, I mean, I can't make heads or tails of this.

00:15:42.900 Yeah, you know, we were just in the middle of all the operations we're doing.

00:15:48.400 We kind of paused for a second a little while ago.

00:15:50.180 I just, what is he doing?

00:15:51.460 Why is he moving forward?

00:15:53.040 I mean, he's, obviously, he had everything the way he would want it.

00:15:58.520 If you look at, you know, economically and globally, he was winning.

00:16:02.600 He was, America was buying oil from him, even though we all disagree with it.

00:16:06.960 America was buying oil from him.

00:16:07.940 The rest of the world was buying oil from him.

00:16:09.540 He was just in a really good geoeconomic position.

00:16:13.260 And then he does this.

00:16:15.360 And for what?

00:16:17.200 To gain Ukrainian oil that he won't belt to sell now?

00:16:21.100 It just doesn't really make sense to someone who the world has thought was a very strategic thinker

00:16:26.180 and made decisions, all his decisions.

00:16:28.720 I mean, everyone you talk to on both sides of the aisle and politically and people around

00:16:32.460 the world said, you know, Putin's not a good guy, but he always makes calculated strategic

00:16:36.920 decisions.

00:16:37.360 And we're just not seeing that right now.

00:16:38.700 So we're seeing this weekend.

00:16:41.020 The U.S. said that he asked China for military help or at least supplies.

00:16:46.420 I'm hearing that he's going to get more vicious.

00:16:51.040 Do you have any sense that being there, what's coming?

00:16:55.960 Is this ending?

00:16:57.120 Is this getting worse?

00:16:59.080 What's your feel?

00:17:00.160 It's going to my feel is, and look, it's not just from my experience.

00:17:05.160 I'm here on the ground with people, the smartest minds and special operations community.

00:17:10.400 I'm here, I'm meeting with the highest level of, from all different governments of the

00:17:14.860 world, intelligence agencies and things like that.

00:17:17.500 Everyone is in a consensus agreement that it's going to get worse.

00:17:22.860 It's not going to get better.

00:17:23.920 If you watch what he's doing right now, you know, towns like Kiev, he's, he's, he's surrounding

00:17:32.660 these towns, holding, destroying infrastructure, roads, bridges, rails, any egress routes out.

00:17:39.880 And, uh, inside these cities, while the Russians are holding out a perimeter, they have the 0.91

00:17:44.460 ability to get resupplied, but those inside can't.

00:17:46.600 So medicine, medicine, like, uh, it's something as simple as insulin is, is it, is a debt, is

00:17:52.760 that's a debt, that's as deadly as a, as a nuclear weapon to someone with, uh, with diabetes,

00:17:57.560 right?

00:17:57.800 All these, uh, met a lot of children's hospitals have no medicine, no medical aid, no supplies,

00:18:02.740 water, pot of, uh, pot of water is gone now.

00:18:06.620 They're starving them out.

00:18:07.960 So, and, and, and not only starving them out at night, it's going to get, you know, 15 degrees.

00:18:11.260 So we get people freezing to death, particularly the people trying to evacuate, the women and 1.00

00:18:14.640 children trying to evacuate.

00:18:15.980 All right.

00:18:16.600 So, so what is it you guys are doing on the ground and how can we help?

00:18:21.560 So one of the things that we're doing, uh, you know, a lot of, a lot of great NGOs here,

00:18:26.120 evacuating people, trying to move supplies, food in, uh, medicine in.

00:18:30.880 And what we're doing specifically is we know that the cellular network is going to fail.

00:18:35.500 Um, and, and, you know, our experience and not only special operations, but some of our

00:18:39.940 teammates are some of the world's best precision recovery, precision rescue experts.

00:18:43.960 And we know that the most crucial thing is that communication.

00:18:46.680 So we're building communications infrastructure, uh, to make sure that everyone in all these

00:18:51.700 cities around Ukraine have the ability to communicate to us, with us.

00:18:54.840 So when a sailor network goes down, we can still rescue them. 1.00

00:18:57.460 We can still move supplies to them and we can still communicate with them.

00:19:00.000 So that's our priority mission right now is doing that.

00:19:02.720 And then tying that communications network and infrastructure to the ability to build

00:19:07.240 a rescue, move medicine forward, move, uh, medical aid forward, and then provide some

00:19:12.280 ambulatory services to be able to move people, uh, from places like Kaviv to a safer place

00:19:18.000 or to a medical station.

00:19:19.720 So that's the kind of thing that me and my team are doing.

00:19:21.940 And we're doing that through save our allies and we need all the support we can.

00:19:25.880 I know.

00:19:26.100 Thank you, Glenn.

00:19:26.760 Cause, uh, you may not even be aware.

00:19:28.620 I think you are, but you guys just made a donation to save our allies.

00:19:31.520 So I thank you for that because we can't do it without people like you.

00:19:34.920 Well, I, I have to tell you, Chad, we're big fans of, uh, of yours and save our allies.

00:19:42.640 We know what you, what you do, uh, and how important it is.

00:19:46.380 And we are proud to stand with you and stand behind you.

00:19:49.500 You just let us know what you need.

00:19:51.180 If you want to make a donation and be a part of, of saving Ukraine and saving the people,

00:19:57.800 literally saving the people, uh, you can give now to save our allies.org that save our allies.org.

00:20:06.980 If you forget that, just go to mercury one, uh, market for Ukraine and we'll get it to save

00:20:12.180 our allies.

00:20:12.760 It's save our allies.org.

00:20:15.340 Chad, stay safe.

00:20:19.400 Always, always.

00:20:20.360 Glenn, thank you so much.

00:20:21.700 God bless you.

00:20:22.360 Thank you.

00:20:23.540 Mighty, mighty Oaks foundation and save our allies.

00:20:26.200 I can't recommend them highly enough.

00:20:29.680 They are.

00:20:30.620 Chad is a remarkable guy.

00:20:33.260 Uh, and they've been, you know, mighty Oaks foundations works with, um, veterans to save

00:20:39.040 their lives because of suicide rate is just outrageous.

00:20:42.420 And, uh, he's a guy who contemplated it himself and, uh, somebody saved his life and, uh, started

00:20:53.200 mighty Oaks and now save our allies.

00:20:55.820 And these are, these are ex military guys that go in, they know how to help and they're not

00:21:02.960 shooting anyone.

00:21:03.960 They're getting and rescuing people.

00:21:06.960 And can you imagine, I mean, you kind of feel like your life was worth something when

00:21:11.660 you, if you were bringing insulin to a children's hospital, that's the kind of stuff they're

00:21:16.240 doing.

00:21:17.060 Please donate now to save our allies.org doing, they're doing not only great work overseas,

00:21:21.620 but the work they're doing here is really, really important.

00:21:24.260 Yeah.

00:21:24.560 So just awesome organization.

00:21:26.200 Awesome, dude.

00:21:30.520 You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.

00:21:33.960 Author of the lightning rod, Brad Meltzer.

00:21:45.420 How are you, sir?

00:21:46.440 I'm good.

00:21:47.020 It's so good to be back in person.

00:21:48.740 Yeah.

00:21:49.480 So you are, uh, you're one of my favorite people.

00:21:52.320 Um, let's start with, uh, let's start with a book and then I have a surprise for you.

00:21:56.740 Oh, I'm ready for surprise.

00:21:57.480 Okay.

00:21:57.700 So here's the book.

00:21:59.100 Uh, I always start, you know, with my great fears.

00:22:01.940 I think that's what you, when you write a thriller, you got to start with a book.

00:22:03.940 Start with your fears.

00:22:05.120 And so the opening scene has a character handing his car keys over to a valet at a fancy

00:22:11.320 restaurant.

00:22:12.560 Valet takes the car rather than parking the car.

00:22:15.100 He hits a little GPS button on the steering wheel, says the magic words, go home.

00:22:19.420 Now the car plots a route to the man's house.

00:22:21.680 The valet is going to have the car keys.

00:22:23.960 He's got the man's house keys.

00:22:25.480 He's going to break in.

00:22:26.420 This is a robbery.

00:22:27.620 But as he steps into the man's house.

00:22:29.480 Don't give that idea.

00:22:30.480 No, no, I'm telling you, but no, this is the key part.

00:22:32.440 As he steps into the man's house, the valet sees another man waiting with a gun.

00:22:37.060 This is not a robbery at all.

00:22:38.220 This is a trap.

00:22:39.620 And when his body goes to our hero, Zig, Zig finds something hidden on it that leads to

00:22:44.500 one of the government's most closely guarded secrets.

00:22:46.720 Now I just ruined chapter one of the lightning rod.

00:22:49.440 Oh yeah, but you just sold a lot of books.

00:22:50.960 But chapter one is, you know, and there's only two chapters in the book, right?

00:22:56.040 No, there's chapter two.

00:22:58.140 The funny thing was, I was at an event yesterday in Florida.

00:23:00.480 My nephew raised his hand.

00:23:01.640 My nephew's like eight years old.

00:23:02.720 And he said, Uncle Brad, what's chapter two?

00:23:04.880 And I was like, oh, I got my nephew now.

00:23:06.600 So that was good.

00:23:07.160 But the lightning rod opens with that.

00:23:08.560 And then obviously the action takes off from there.

00:23:10.060 So what is the closely guarded secret?

00:23:12.460 So let's talk about that.

00:23:13.400 That's the key part.

00:23:14.120 You know my, listen, I love the plot.

00:23:15.900 I love the murder mystery.

00:23:16.840 I love that you have great characters that everyone loves and we get to bring back.

00:23:19.920 But the fun of this is always the research.

00:23:22.280 I've taken readers, as you know, I've been on your show talking about the secret tunnels

00:23:25.460 below the White House.

00:23:26.360 We've done the hidden labyrinth below the Capitol.

00:23:28.700 This was the one I got for this one.

00:23:29.920 I spoke to the government.

00:23:30.980 There's a couple of them actually.

00:23:32.780 And the US government has, I did not know this, almost a dozen secret warehouses hidden

00:23:39.460 all across the country.

00:23:41.260 And they're there to deal with bioterror attacks, whether it's anthrax, whether it's smallpox

00:23:45.680 or anything else.

00:23:46.420 And if there's an attack in Texas, in New York, in California, Idaho, anywhere in between,

00:23:53.140 they will have within hours what they call a push package of antidotes right to your

00:23:58.400 doorstep.

00:23:59.280 And I'm like, you're telling me the government has secret warehouses all across the country.

00:24:03.540 No one knows what's inside them.

00:24:04.880 No one knows what they have inside.

00:24:06.180 No one can go in them.

00:24:07.580 You better believe I want to go in them, right?

00:24:10.160 I'm like, I want to go in that right now.

00:24:12.380 So thankfully, they took me in.

00:24:15.360 What you see when you're reading the lightning rod, you're turning the pages, you're trying

00:24:18.260 to guess the mystery.

00:24:19.540 The final section of the book takes place in the warehouses, the final scene of the

00:24:23.680 book.

00:24:23.960 And what you see in those warehouses, I did not make up.

00:24:26.880 What you see in there is really there.

00:24:28.960 And it's amazing.

00:24:30.060 It's like a...

00:24:30.760 You're not going to tell us, are you?

00:24:31.340 Well, I'll tell you, it's like a Costco for the end of the world.

00:24:34.360 They're massive warehouses.

00:24:35.760 I mean, they're like five Costco.

00:24:37.740 So instead of being like a, you know, in Costco or BJ's, a giant jar of mayonnaise and bug

00:24:42.440 boxes cereal, there's obviously, they have everything from, you know, things to deal

00:24:48.000 with radiation poisoning.

00:24:50.120 They have iodine tablets.

00:24:51.720 They have everything you can imagine from amphetamines to, they have cobra venom.

00:24:58.020 God knows what cobra venom does. 0.94

00:24:59.500 Like you're going down these aisles.

00:25:01.080 The one thing they all have in common though, which I love, is they all have giant, the

00:25:06.480 only thing that they all, every warehouse has is a giant American flag.

00:25:10.060 They make it say, and what's great about it is this started, and you're going to love

00:25:14.580 this little history lesson for it, is back when nuclear war was the great threat in the

00:25:19.280 Cold War, they decided to commission and figure out how are we going to keep the president

00:25:23.340 alive?

00:25:24.400 How do we make, if there's a nuclear war, how do we get them to live?

00:25:26.940 They create a secret commission called Operation High Point, and High Point is designed to

00:25:32.620 figure, it's the beginning of the continuity of government.

00:25:35.140 So they make Mount Weather and all these places where Dick Cheney went in 9-11 and where, you

00:25:40.060 know, just outside of D.C., it's where the senators go, it's where the president goes, it's where

00:25:44.740 the top staff goes so the government can run.

00:25:47.000 What they also commission in Michigan is Operation Low Point, and that's to discuss what happens

00:25:52.200 to the rest of us.

00:25:53.540 What happens if there's a nuclear war to everyone else in America?

00:25:56.000 They make a whole plan, they study it, they say mail carts are going to turn into hearses

00:26:00.520 and carry bodies rather than letters, they have giant plans for everybody.

00:26:04.700 And the one thing they finally realize, this is all true, you think I'm making it up, I

00:26:07.720 can see your face, it's all true, right?

00:26:09.800 No, no, I know you will.

00:26:10.280 It is all, you can look it up, just Google it, and the thing that's so incredible.

00:26:14.460 We'd look under Operation Low Point?

00:26:16.400 Operation Low Point, Operation High Point, you will see it.

00:26:19.160 And you can see this all in the lightning rod, the whole history is in the thriller, because

00:26:22.720 obviously I said it all, the warehouses, but one of the things that's really amazing

00:26:26.020 to me is they study all of this.

00:26:29.340 And you know what they finally figure out, Glenn?

00:26:31.440 None of it's going to work.

00:26:33.120 None of it's going to work.

00:26:34.000 If there's a nuclear war, it doesn't matter for you.

00:26:35.660 That's why we don't hide under our desks anymore.

00:26:37.680 They were like, we're all going to die.

00:26:39.000 That's what's going to happen.

00:26:40.360 And basically it goes away.

00:26:41.820 They kind of figure like, we're not going to do this anymore.

00:26:43.980 We do have Mount Weather still.

00:26:45.500 We do have secret locations for the president.

00:26:47.140 We do have all those.

00:26:48.600 But for the rest of us, we're in trouble.

00:26:50.660 Until this one guy, Stephen Bice, in the 90s, a government employee, has an idea.

00:26:56.800 And he says, you know, the threat today is not nuclear war.

00:27:00.660 The threat today is bioterrorism.

00:27:02.220 That's what we got to worry about.

00:27:03.760 So we should probably have like a warehouse somewhere that houses all the stuff to deal

00:27:07.800 with whatever comes out, whether it's hantavirus, whether it's anything you...

00:27:11.140 And for the first time in like, I feel like in recent memory, the government listens to

00:27:17.800 a good idea and says, we should do it.

00:27:20.420 This is the most positive thing I've heard from our government.

00:27:24.240 I bring some good for you today, right?

00:27:25.940 I bring a good idea from 40, 30 years ago.

00:27:28.500 And in the 90s, they basically say, we should do that.

00:27:31.760 And they do.

00:27:32.560 And they build not just one, but many of these secret warehouses.

00:27:36.080 And they pack them full of disaster materials.

00:27:38.840 When anthrax hit after 9-11 in DC and in New York, I know you remember that.

00:27:44.620 The reason it didn't get out everywhere is because this is who dealt with it.

00:27:48.420 They had push packages within hours to New York and DC.

00:27:51.920 My wife was working in the US Capitol at the time.

00:27:54.860 She was nine months pregnant with my son at the time.

00:27:58.120 And I remember they opened that first thing of anthrax powder and going, oh my God, my kid,

00:28:02.600 my unborn child is there.

00:28:04.000 My wife is there.

00:28:05.520 And that's who dealt with it.

00:28:06.760 It was what became the strategic national stockpile, which is now all over the country.

00:28:11.780 So did you read this weekend about Switzerland?

00:28:15.660 What happened in Switzerland?

00:28:16.480 Switzerland has fallout shelters.

00:28:19.880 Oh, I did read this.

00:28:20.840 That are going crazy, yeah.

00:28:22.020 Every citizen, they've had it for a long time.

00:28:24.920 They almost stopped requiring them by law after the wall fell.

00:28:29.860 And they thought, you know what, let's just keep it.

00:28:31.800 So every house that is built, every apartment building, every office building has a fallout

00:28:39.200 shelter in it, or you have to pay a part of your taxes to be part of the closest fallout

00:28:45.780 shelter.

00:28:46.040 Well, this last week, they decided to activate all of those things again, and they said, go

00:28:54.400 into your fallout shelter now and report on what you have, because there are certain things

00:29:00.460 that every citizen has to have in their fallout shelter, and it's water and food and everything

00:29:06.140 else.

00:29:06.540 And I thought, I mean, there's a country that has prepared, and I'm actually glad to see

00:29:12.480 we have-

00:29:12.960 No, we, that the great thing is, is no one, we have.

00:29:15.600 We actually, for once, now, obviously in COVID, everyone's, I'm sure, thinking right now, well,

00:29:20.380 what happened in COVID, right?

00:29:21.480 I started researching the lightning rod as a book five years ago.

00:29:25.600 This, all those, the warehouses at that point, they're just, it's an asterisk in the government.

00:29:30.000 No one cares about it.

00:29:30.640 So I go in, it's fine.

00:29:32.040 They take me to the headquarters, the command center.

00:29:34.460 I see where everything's taken care of, then COVID hits.

00:29:37.700 I call my sources.

00:29:38.680 I'm like, is this you guys?

00:29:40.020 They're like, this is us.

00:29:41.380 So what happened, right?

00:29:42.540 What happened is, and it's so easy to Monday morning quarterback and say this, but from

00:29:46.580 Trump to Obama to Bush, they've been warned for administration after administration.

00:29:51.440 Listen, there could be, there's a likely chance that we could have this kind of natural virus

00:29:55.180 occur like this, but everyone bet on the wrong thing.

00:29:58.700 And I hate to say it, but Trump doubled down on it.

00:30:01.360 You can't know the future.

00:30:02.460 No one can predict what was going to happen.

00:30:04.460 But they believed that the only thing that was going to attack us was a foreign government.

00:30:09.280 So we were perfectly, and still prepared for that.

00:30:11.860 If there's anything like that, we're ready.

00:30:13.740 They could have never prepared for anything like this.

00:30:16.480 But this is where all the ventilators are.

00:30:18.460 This is where all the masks are.

00:30:20.040 This is where, that's where they were coming from at the beginning of the pandemic.

00:30:22.960 No one knew what the name of it was.

00:30:24.200 They just were appearing from the quote unquote government.

00:30:26.640 But it was these secret warehouses that the government has stockpiled with stuff.

00:30:30.680 The author of the book, The Lightning Rod.

00:30:33.100 It is out today.

00:30:34.220 It's a thriller by Brad Meltzer.

00:30:36.820 I love your books because they always, they always are accurate and things that I just never

00:30:44.860 knew about.

00:30:45.500 And usually about American history because you and I are brothers from another mother on

00:30:49.920 that.

00:30:50.100 Always, always.

00:30:51.000 So listen, my love of this one, I do a lot of work with the USO.

00:30:55.300 And I've been, the USO has asked me as a thriller writer to go and tell stories to our troops

00:30:59.720 all around the world.

00:31:00.800 I've been to Kuwait, Omar, Qatar, Turkey, Cuba, you name it.

00:31:05.520 I've been to military bases reading to our troops.

00:31:08.440 And I'll tell you that it was there I first heard and came on my radar, Dover Air Force Base.

00:31:14.040 And you know Dover, even if you don't know the name of it, Dover is where when our service

00:31:18.280 members die in service to the country, their bodies come back to Dover.

00:31:23.080 And those coffins with the flag on top, that's where you see everyone saluting, that's Dover.

00:31:27.920 And that's also where the president's plane is.

00:31:29.920 Of course.

00:31:30.600 And what's amazing about Dover is the morticians who work there will spend such care on our fallen

00:31:37.180 troops.

00:31:37.640 They'll spend 12 hours rewiring someone's jaw, smoothing it over with clay so a family can

00:31:43.440 see their son one last time.

00:31:45.020 Rebuilding someone's hand from scratch because a mother says, I want to hold my son's hand

00:31:49.360 one last time.

00:31:50.020 These are the best of the best of us working on the best of the best of us.

00:31:53.240 That's the hero of the lightning rod is a hero named Zig who's a mortician at Dover.

00:31:57.240 And that's where the body comes to.

00:31:59.140 But what I love about Dover and the history lesson I have is this, is that when the space

00:32:03.840 shuttle exploded, the astronauts' bodies were brought back to Dover.

00:32:08.260 When 9-11 happened, all the Pentagon victims' bodies went to Dover.

00:32:11.920 I didn't know.

00:32:12.600 Oh, yeah.

00:32:13.140 I didn't know the astronauts.

00:32:14.220 They found bodies.

00:32:14.920 They did find bodies that came back.

00:32:16.580 I had no idea.

00:32:17.900 It's incredible.

00:32:18.780 And it's called mass fatalities.

00:32:20.660 They all go to Dover.

00:32:21.400 So even our, all of our spies, our CIA spies all around the world, our 007s, their bodies

00:32:28.280 go to Dover too, which means Dover's a place filled with secrets.

00:32:31.220 So that's one of my heroes in the book.

00:32:32.660 I'm like, oh, we're going into Dover and we're going to see what that's like.

00:32:35.320 And then the other one, another history lesson for, that I found that I was with the U.S.

00:32:39.680 military and they took me to a warehouse that is, it's right out of something you're going

00:32:44.400 to love because it's a warehouse filled with art.

00:32:47.400 I'm like, why does the army have all this art?

00:32:50.040 And they don't just have art painted by service members.

00:32:53.180 That's where Adolf Hitler's art is. 0.73

00:32:55.020 They took me to the room with all of Hitler's art that he painted.

00:32:58.080 I'm like, why does the military have all this art in one place?

00:33:00.900 Was he a good painter?

00:33:02.420 He thought he was.

00:33:03.620 He thought he was.

00:33:04.560 That's what I was going to say.

00:33:05.860 Very, very flat.

00:33:07.060 The thing that is very flat and the great part is, is you see a giant hole punched in his

00:33:12.320 face because he puts himself up on a horse.

00:33:14.440 Our service members, when they took the art-

00:33:16.120 We have that painting?

00:33:17.060 We have the painting.

00:33:18.240 I saw it myself.

00:33:19.060 And there was a punched hole in it where a service member just basically either kicked

00:33:24.600 it or punched through it and the hole they never repaired, which is beautiful.

00:33:28.320 It's breathtaking.

00:33:28.900 So I'm like, why does the military have all this art?

00:33:32.440 They explained to me that since World War I, this is true, the US military has had an

00:33:36.600 actual painter on staff that paints disasters as they happen.

00:33:41.680 So whether it's storming the beaches of Normandy, whether it's Vietnam, whether it's 9-11,

00:33:46.600 they've got someone painting it as it happens.

00:33:49.100 And I said, you're telling me everyone's racing in with guns blazing and you've got

00:33:53.000 someone racing with paintbrushes in their pockets. 0.98

00:33:55.620 That guy's crazy.

00:33:56.640 I got to meet him. 0.70

00:33:57.280 I want to meet him.

00:33:57.940 And they said, you mean her.

00:33:59.760 You want to meet her.

00:34:00.880 It was a woman. 0.60

00:34:01.920 It was our current artist in residence.

00:34:04.040 So that's the other hero of this book.

00:34:05.740 Zig and Nola, a mortician at Dover and this painter are the heroes.

00:34:09.900 And they obviously are both based on the reality of me being able to pull apart this world that

00:34:14.420 no one ever gets to see.

00:34:16.780 Where does the painter sit?

00:34:18.840 The painter sits actually where this warehouse is in Port Valois in Virginia.

00:34:23.840 But where they really sit is wherever they want.

00:34:27.160 They can go.

00:34:28.060 They have unlimited access to go.

00:34:30.080 If 9-11 happens, they want to paint 9-11, you go to 9-11.

00:34:33.280 When the 13 service members came back from Afghanistan, you want to go there?

00:34:38.240 You go there.

00:34:38.580 How did they get selected?

00:34:40.200 You've got to be a good painter.

00:34:41.660 It's literally a contest.

00:34:42.780 That's the thing is you literally submit your paintings.

00:34:45.360 And the military said they pick one painter who is selected by the military to be our person.

00:34:50.700 Amy Brown was the woman who it was.

00:34:52.260 I named my character Nola Brown after her to honor her.

00:34:55.140 And they have a new one now.

00:34:56.220 They keep going over and over through history.

00:34:58.060 And the fun part is for me is, of course, finding out their secrets.

00:35:02.320 So I went to the government and I said, how do you possibly?

00:35:04.780 I went to my friend who works as a high-level security guy and one of the great security

00:35:08.400 agencies used to work there.

00:35:10.300 I said, how do I communicate with my friend Glenn when everyone's watching all our emails?

00:35:14.880 How do any of us communicate when everyone can see what we write?

00:35:17.960 And he said to me, listen, the moment you hit send on your email, I don't care if you

00:35:23.380 use Signal.

00:35:24.000 I don't care if you use WhatsApp.

00:35:25.320 Anyone who wants a crack will find a way to crack it.

00:35:28.140 He said, here's what you're going to do.

00:35:29.440 Here's the trick, Brad.

00:35:31.020 He said, and I put this in the lightning rod.

00:35:32.540 He says, you take a Hotmail account.

00:35:35.600 You open the account.

00:35:36.800 You write an email.

00:35:37.640 Do not hit send.

00:35:39.060 What you're going to do is hit save draft.

00:35:41.300 Now I give Glenn the sign into my email.

00:35:43.700 You come in my email.

00:35:44.640 You open up the save draft.

00:35:45.860 You write back whatever you want.

00:35:47.320 You don't hit send.

00:35:48.100 You hit save draft.

00:35:48.900 Now you and I are having a secret conversation.

00:35:50.740 We've never put a thing into cyberspace, which is a great idea until General Petraeus,

00:35:56.320 the former head of the CIA, used that trick that's in my book, The Lightning Rod, to cheat

00:36:01.560 on his wife with his mistress.

00:36:03.380 And I said to my buddy, I said, I need a new trick.

00:36:05.620 He just used the trick you gave me.

00:36:07.060 I got to get a new trick.

00:36:08.080 So what he gave me in the book, you'll see something called Black House.

00:36:13.080 Now here's the history that you're going to love.

00:36:16.380 We all know the White House, of course, is the White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

00:36:19.940 When Richard Nixon famously recorded himself and his staff without telling anybody, every

00:36:27.500 staffer in the White House realized, oh my gosh, all of our stuff could be recorded.

00:36:31.800 So what do they start doing?

00:36:33.360 They all start figuring out where can we have a private conversation in this place if everything's

00:36:37.000 being recorded?

00:36:38.280 That's not called White House.

00:36:39.340 That's called Black House. 0.88

00:36:41.060 And Black House moves generation by generation. 0.98

00:36:43.960 Okay?

00:36:44.360 I do love you.

00:36:44.780 It is just a code name that someone gave me, right?

00:36:46.860 And it's basically George Stephanopoulos supposedly did it during the Clinton era in a gym.

00:36:51.840 Dick Cheney, maybe he sat in his, you know, homemade man size safe and had kind of God knows

00:36:56.840 where he did his.

00:36:57.580 But every, there's always a place in the White House where all the staff knows this is where

00:37:02.360 we can sit and have a private conversation.

00:37:04.660 You will see in this book what Black House really is and the trick he gave me, I did not 0.99

00:37:09.600 make up.

00:37:10.240 It's an incredible one from the government.

00:37:11.760 You'll see it in the lightning rod.

00:37:13.280 I mean, if you don't want to read this book now, you're dead. 0.99

00:37:16.860 You're dead. 1.00

00:37:17.480 You're dead. 1.00

00:37:17.700 No, listen.

00:37:18.080 James Patterson said, you can see the things on the back.

00:37:21.520 James Patterson said that it was his favorite book by Brad Meltzer so far.

00:37:26.240 And the guy who created Reacher said that Nola Brown, our hero, was like the girl with the

00:37:31.580 dragon tattoo, one of the best modern creations in fiction.

00:37:34.460 It took those two things.

00:37:35.620 I tell you that simply for one reason.

00:37:37.220 I finally impressed my wife.

00:37:39.180 She does not, she doesn't care about anything I write, but my gosh, the fact that James Patterson

00:37:43.860 loved the lightning rod.

00:37:45.020 I'm waiting for that moment with my wife.

00:37:47.280 I am waiting for that moment.

00:37:48.620 She finally was like, finally, Brad, you did some good.

00:37:50.740 Yeah.

00:37:50.960 Na, na, na, na.

The Glenn Beck Program - March 14, 2022

Best of the Program ｜ Guests： Brad Meltzer & Chad Robichaux ｜ 3⧸14⧸22

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