The Islamic Republic followed the old playbook. Trump didn’t.



History offers a grim pattern: A tyrant rises, slaughters the innocent, and the world watches — then regrets. From the ruins of cities and graves of millions comes the same old lesson, relearned too late: Free nations must stand together or perish apart.

In the fifth century, Attila the Hun terrorized Europe. Theodosius II, the Eastern Roman emperor, bought peace by paying Attila 2,100 pounds of gold annually. The Western emperor, Valentinian III, stayed silent — happy to remain out of range. But Attila didn’t stop. He turned west, burned cities, demanded Valentinian’s sister in marriage, and claimed half the empire. Rome tried appeasement again. Gold flowed. But the hunger of predators cannot be satisfied with treasure.

History has handed us one last chance to learn its lesson. Let’s not waste it.

Modern history offers another warning. Adolf Hitler spelled out his genocidal vision in "Mein Kampf." He made no secret of his plan to build a racially pure Volksgemeinschaft by eliminating “inferior” peoples. Yet, the world did nothing.

When Hitler marched troops into the Rhineland, Europe’s powers stood by. When he absorbed Austria in the Anschluss of 1938, they did nothing. When he threatened Czechoslovakia, the world convened — not to confront him but to appease him. The result was the Munich Agreement, signed in the name of peace, but it delivered only conquest. Six million Jews died. Tens of millions more followed. Once again, the world failed to act until it was far too late.

The refrain “never again” echoed across continents. But history’s warning now blares once more — from Tehran.

On February 11, 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran was born. That August, it declared Al-Quds Day, with crowds chanting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.” The regime announced its goal: global domination under a single theocratic rule. Nonbelievers would be crushed. Sound familiar?

The alarms have only grown louder. In 1979, Iran seized 66 Americans at the U.S. embassy and held 52 of them hostage for over a year. In 1981, Iran’s Islamic Revolution inspired the assassination of Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat. In 1982, it supported the Syrian uprising that spawned Hamas. In 1983, Iran’s proxy Hezbollah bombed the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241 Americans. By the 1990s, Iran backed Ansar Allah — the group now called the Houthis.

Iran built a terrorist Hydra of proxies, encircling Israel with armed fanatics. And the world did what it always does: It looked away.

Even the United States bent the knee. The Reagan administration traded arms for hostages. Obama gave Iran billions in sanctions relief under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — an appeasement deal in all but name, dressed up as diplomacy. In return, Iran advanced its nuclear program while promising not to use it. A familiar bargain: Leave us alone, won’t you? Please?

RELATED: When American men answered the call of civilization

Illustration by Ed Vebell/Getty Images

Then came October 7, 2023. Hamas terrorists — financed by unfrozen Iranian assets — slaughtered more than 1,200 Israelis. They raped. They kidnapped. They filmed their atrocities. And still, Iran marched forward, building nuclear capacity for a “final solution.”

Enough.

President Donald Trump saw the danger. Intelligence revealed that Iran was weeks away from building a bomb. He acted.

Eight U.S. B-2 bombers carrying bunker-buster warheads struck Iran’s nuclear sites — Natanz, Isfahan, Fordow, and others. Trump announced to the American people that the regime’s key nuclear enrichment facilities had been “completely and totally obliterated.”

Trump did what history demands. He refused to sacrifice nine million Israelis while the world held meetings. He didn’t wait for Tehran to strike first. He acted to stop a second holocaust before it could begin.

This is the difference between a predator’s barbarism and a statesman’s vision. Trump offers peace through strength — as opposed to allowing predators to plunder, rape, and murder their way to barbaric “prosperity.” Trump’s prosperity emerges from shared interest. He champions a commonwealth built on commerce, not conquest.

History has handed us one last chance to learn its lesson. Let’s not waste it.

When American men answered the call of civilization



Eighty-one years have passed since American troops landed at Normandy — an event that changed the course of history and helped bring down the Nazi regime. Yet the 80th anniversary came and went last year with barely a murmur of national recognition.

That silence speaks volumes.

The most enduring lessons come not from strategy but from the men who waded ashore, knowing they might not live through the morning. Why did they do it?

Deep divisions have clouded American political life, but failing to commemorate the most significant amphibious invasion in history marks more than forgetfulness. It reflects a broader unease with our own history and the sacrifices that secured our liberty.

The Trump administration has begun to reverse that drift, reviving public recognition of the past in ways absent during the Biden years. Critics have seized on moments like President Trump’s recent remarks at West Point, where he appeared to downplay Allied contributions. Those contributions must never be forgotten. But the American role in defeating Nazi Germany — and especially in the brutal and heroic assault on Fortress Europe — cannot be overstated.

No day better symbolizes that effort than June 6, 1944.

The beginning of the end

D-Day ranks with Gettysburg, Meuse-Argonne, and Iwo Jima in the American martial canon. Its outcome was anything but assured.

Operation Neptune — the seaborne phase of Operation Overlord — followed months of planning that began in late 1943 after Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin conferred in Tehran. Stalin had pushed hard for a second front to relieve Soviet pressure. Churchill preferred a Mediterranean approach. But the Americans insisted on France. We won the argument.

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower became supreme commander. British Gen. Bernard Montgomery was named ground commander. The invasion would take place in late spring.

Three major conditions needed to be met before Neptune could launch.

First, the Germans had to be pinned down in the east. Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 had already opened a two-front war that Germany could not sustain. Despite massive Soviet losses, the Red Army had recovered. The Wehrmacht had not. It was arguably Hitler’s greatest blunder.

Second, the Allies needed air superiority. Through strategic bombing and air-to-air combat, the U.S. and Britain weakened the Luftwaffe, hitting factories, airfields, and supply depots. By June 1944, Allied fighters controlled the skies over France.

Third, the Mediterranean had to be secure. Campaigns in North Africa and Italy tied down German forces and freed up Allied naval resources for the invasion of Northern France.

With those conditions met, the Allies selected Normandy as the landing site. Pas-de-Calais was closer to Germany and easier to resupply but far more heavily fortified by the Nazis. Normandy offered a more realistic point of attack — provided the Germans could be fooled.

Deception and preparation

Operation Fortitude aimed to do just that. Allied intelligence fed Germany a steady diet of false information. Fake radio traffic, dummy landing craft, and bogus army units — including a fictitious command under Lt. Gen. George Patton — convinced Hitler that Calais would be the invasion point.

The ruse worked. German commanders remained fixated on Calais long after troops began pouring ashore at Normandy.

Military theorists had long understood how war resists prediction. “Everything in war is simple,” Carl von Clausewitz observed, “but the simplest thing is difficult.” Clausewitz’s “friction” and Helmuth von Moltke’s warning that “no plan of operation extends with any certainty beyond first contact with the main hostile force” applied in full. Amphibious landings, by their nature, magnify every point of failure.

The plan called for landings on five beaches, with three airborne divisions deployed inland. U.S. forces hit Utah and Omaha. British and Canadian forces landed at Gold, Juno, and Sword. Airborne units dropped behind German lines to disrupt reinforcements.

The moon and tide had to align. Weather delayed the launch from June 5 to June 6. That delay caught the Germans off guard. General Erwin Rommel had left France to celebrate his wife’s birthday. Other commanders were away conducting war games.

The landings begin

Allied bombers struck German positions after midnight, followed by naval bombardment. Many shells landed behind the defenses, missing their targets. That failure would prove costly.

British forces advanced steadily, although only the Canadians reached their assigned D-Day objectives. Montgomery had hoped to seize Caen that day. British troops would not take the city for weeks.

The 4th Infantry Division at Utah Beach caught a break, landing in the wrong spot due to strong currents. But the division met light resistance and advanced quickly. The 2nd Ranger Battalion scaled Pointe du Hoc and took heavy losses but completed its mission.

RELATED: The Army called him a handicap. History calls him a hero.

Photo courtesy of Walt Larimore

Omaha was a bloodbath. German defenses remained largely intact, and U.S. troops were cut down on the sand. Casualties reached 2,400 — the highest of any landing. Despite the carnage, immortalized in “Saving Private Ryan,” small units clawed their way inland, broke through the defenses, and held the beachhead.

By nightfall, the Allies had established a tenuous grip on Normandy. U.S. forces pushed toward the port of Cherbourg. British units hammered away at Caen. American troops slogged through the bocage.

On July 25, U.S. forces broke out at Saint-Lo. By August, the Allies had encircled 50,000 German troops in the Falaise pocket. By the end of August, Paris was liberated. Operation Overlord had succeeded.

What D-Day means now

The victory in Normandy depended on strategy, deception, adaptation, and above all, human will. The Allies fought as partners — ideologically divided but functionally united. The Axis powers, despite ideological similarities, failed to coordinate effectively.

Every war plan eventually collapses. Things go wrong. What matters is how commanders and soldiers respond to chaos. D-Day demanded that kind of adaptation under fire. Clausewitz understood this. So did the men who stormed the beaches.

The most enduring lessons come not from strategy but from the men who waded ashore, knowing they might not live through the morning. Why did they do it?

J. Glenn Gray, in “The Warriors: Reflections on Men in Battle,” offers one answer:

Numberless soldiers have died, more or less willingly, not for country or honor or religious faith or for any other abstract good, but because they realized that by fleeing their posts and rescuing themselves, they would expose their companions to greater danger. Such loyalty to the group is the essence of fighting morale.

These soldiers protected more than one another. They preserved the American republic. They fought against an ideology bent on erasing it.

Success in war depends not only on weapons and tactics but on leadership, courage, honor, and duty. These virtues allow men to overcome fear and endure the chaos of combat. On June 6, 1944, those virtues burned white-hot in a handful of men who refused to retreat.

U.S. Army historian S.L.A. Marshall wrote that “thousands of Americans were spilled onto Omaha Beach. The high ground was won by a handful of men who on that day burned with a flame bright beyond common understanding.”

That flame still burns.

We’ve seen it elsewhere throughout our history — at the Chosin Reservoir, in Hue, in Fallujah, and in Helmand Province. America continues to produce men willing to face death to protect others. We should thank God for that fact — and pray we remain a nation worthy of such sacrifice.

Fashion icon turned Nazi ally: Coco Chanel’s dark wartime secrets (plus the nation that revived her)



It was Coco Chanel who said, “In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.” She was talking about fashion and personal branding, of course.

However, during the dark years of World War II, the maxim took on a dark meaning when the visionary fashion icon’s drive to remain indispensable led to cultivated strategic ties with German elites in order to secure her personal safety, social status, and business interests in Nazi-occupied France.

Glenn Beck, who just returned from vacation in Europe, tells Stu Burguiere that many have no idea that “Coco Chanel was a despicable human being.”

During WWII, “most of the designers just close down and they're like, ‘We're not making anything for anybody right now.’ But not Coco Chanel. She decides she's going to move into the hotel where all the Nazis are,” says Glenn.

Once she was living in the Ritz, she started “making dresses for the Nazi wives” and “[sleeping] around a little bit with a few Nazis.” One Nazi she had a strategic romantic relationship with was Hans Günther von Dincklage, a German intelligence officer who gave her protection and influence.

At one point, she outed the French Jewish family who had partnered with her to fund the iconic perfume Chanel No. 5, but thankfully, they had already “transferred ownership to somebody else” by that point.

“Is it fair to call her a Nazi spy?” asks Stu.

“Yeah, she was known as a Nazi spy,” says Glenn.

But if her Nazi allegiance was well-known in France, how is her brand still thriving today?

It turns out that the answer lies right here in America.

When the war ended and she saw that Nazi collaborators were being executed, Chanel moved to Switzerland. From there, she put together a French couture show, which Vogue Paris rejected due to her Nazi ties.

However, Vogue America — “the same people that started the Met Gala in 1948” — decided to “whitewash her,” says Glenn.

“They brought her out on a new collection” that pitched “the little black dress,” which to this day is said to be something every woman should own. Her brand soared again.

“When did Vogue magazine come out and go, ‘You know what? That whole Nazi thing with Chanel was probably pretty bad’? Oh, I don't know — never!” says Glenn.

To hear more about Coco Chanel’s Nazi ties, as well as the story of another French designer who was a war hero, watch the episode above.

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The real tyranny? Institutional groupthink disguised as truth



Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny” has become a pocket-size gospel for progressives in the age of Trump — a secular catechism of 20 rules to resist looming fascism. It’s pitched not just as a historical analysis but as an urgent survival guide, borrowed from the dark lessons of the 20th century. The message is clear: Authoritarianism is always just one election away, and Donald Trump is its orange-faced harbinger.

Such moral urgency unmoored from historical context tends to collapse into political theater, however. “On Tyranny” is not a serious book. It is an emotive pamphlet that relies less on the actual historical complexities of rising tyranny than on the reader’s willingness to conflate MAGA hats with brownshirts.

Snyder believes a tyrant is always the populist outsider, never the insider who manages democratic decline in a suit and tie.

Such historical flattening is the first and most obvious flaw in Snyder’s argument. He leans heavily on the atrocities of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia to suggest that Trump’s rise follows the same trajectory. But this is not serious analysis — it’s emotional manipulation. It’s one thing to warn against patterns; it’s another to flatten every populist movement into a prequel to genocide.

Snyder, a Yale historian, surely knows better. But “On Tyranny” depends on your feeling like you're living in 1933 — whether or not such historical parallels are actually true. And they’re not.

A democratic mandate

Snyder warns against the rise of a single leader claiming to represent the will of the people and establishing a one-party state — equating the 2016 Republican sweep of the White House and both chambers of Congress to Hitler’s consolidation of the Third Reich. Such a comparison isn’t just blatantly false; it’s a cruel dismissal of the democratic will of the people for merely voting in Republican candidates.

Surely Snyder didn’t accuse Barack Obama of fascist one-party rule when he and the Democrats swept the White House and Congress in 2008. Such electoral outcomes aren’t a harbinger of fascism. No, no! That was a mandate from the American people, democratically spoken, demanding change from the status quo. Voters sent that message loud and clear in 2008 — as well as in 2016 and 2024.

Snyder’s false equivalency counts on fear rather than critical thinking — any semblance of which would entice Democrats to pause for a moment of self-reflection and listen to what the American people are saying through the electoral process. But Snyder’s one-sided alarmism silences the electoral voice — merely because it rallied behind Trump.

Civic theater

Snyder’s advice to citizens reads like a secular sermon: “Defend institutions.” “Stand out.” “Be calm when the unthinkable arrives.” On the surface, it sounds noble — defiant, even. But strip away the aesthetic of resistance, and what’s left is a deeply superficial understanding of civic virtue.

What exactly are we defending when we’re told to “support the press” or “protect truth”? In practice, Snyder’s rules amount to an uncritical loyalty to legacy institutions that have forfeited public trust — media outlets that gaslight, bureaucracies that bloat, and experts who contradict themselves while silencing dismissive voices.

Snyder dismisses the possibility that institutions can rot from within, that the loudest defenders of “truth” are often its gravest opponents. Instead, he offers something simpler: the feeling of resistance while catering to the institutional elites.

The real culprits

The irony of “On Tyranny” is that the tactics Snyder warns against — censorship, moral panic, political conformity — have not come from MAGA rallies but from the very institutions Snyder holds up as guardians of democracy. It wasn’t Trump who quashed dissenting speech on COVID-19 or colluded with social media companies to throttle viewpoints that didn’t conform with the government’s narrative. It was the political elite and their complicit peddlers in the mainstream media and social media companies.

Unfortunately for Snyder’s brand, tyranny doesn’t always wear a red hat. Sometimes it comes in the name of “safety,” or “science,” or “social justice.” Sometimes it cancels you over a social media post, not because you’re dangerous, but because you’re not sufficiently obedient.

If Snyder were genuinely concerned with authoritarianism in all its forms, he might have warned against this progressive impulse to control thought and punish deviation. Instead, he gives it cover — because the real threat, in his mind, is always the populist outsider, never the insider who manages democratic decline in a suit and tie.

Less performance, more courage

Snyder is right about one thing: democracies don’t die overnight. But they do die when fear replaces thought, when virtue becomes branding, and when citizens outsource their moral judgment to bureaucracies and mainstream news.

“On Tyranny” offers the illusion of courage but none of the substance. It is performance art disguised as resistance. To preserve freedom, we should defend institutions and champion truth. But that requires holding corrupt actors in such institutions accountable, whether it be within the federal government or legacy media. That was the democratic mandate communicated loud and clear in 2024, and if Snyder were genuinely concerned about defending democracy, he would listen.

Rule by the people? Not anymore in the Western world



On Friday, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency officially labeled Alternative for Germany — the country’s most popular conservative party — as a “right-wing extremist” organization. The nationalist party surged to second place in February’s federal election, winning 20.8% of the vote. This new designation grants the ruling government expanded powers to surveil Alternative for Germany leaders and supporters and sets the stage for an outright ban.

Germany has now joined a growing list of Western governments that delay elections, disqualify candidates, and ban opposition parties — all in the name of defending democracy.

Democracy has become a marketing slogan — useful for justifying war and globalist expansion, but disposable when it interferes with ruling-class priorities.

To call Germany’s relationship with authoritarianism “complicated” understates the case. The country’s historical memory fixates on Nazism as the ultimate expression of right-wing extremism and mass atrocity. But that singular focus conveniently ignores the fact that the Soviet Union, which helped defeat the Third Reich, imposed its own brutal regime across East Germany until the Berlin Wall fell.

Modern Germany has seen tyranny from both the far right and the far left. Yet its national identity now orbits entirely around a rejection of right-wing politics. Anti-fascism has become something like a state religion. But when a country builds its identity on shame and self-repudiation, it risks cultural collapse. We’ve seen the same pathology infect America, where elite institutions push a national narrative defined entirely by slavery and racial guilt.

Every nation has dark chapters. A mature society learns from them. It doesn’t define itself by them forever.

While German history explains some of its deep aversion to nationalism, the trend of suppressing populist movements in the name of democracy has spread far beyond Berlin.

Brazil’s Supreme Court banned former President Jair Bolsonaro from seeking office until 2030. Romania’s Constitutional Court voided its 2024 election, citing supposed Russian influence in the rise of populist candidate Călin Georgescu. And in the United States, courts came dangerously close to removing Donald Trump from the ballot — while the president now fights legal battles over whether he can exercise executive power at all under Article II of the Constitution.

This isn’t democracy defending itself. It’s ruling elites trying to outlaw their opposition.

Western elites justify their dominance by invoking democracy and individual liberty. That wasn’t always the case. The West once called itself Christendom — a civilizational identity grounded in faith, tradition, and truth. But it abandoned that foundation in favor of secular platitudes.

The United States has waged entire wars in the name of exporting democracy to places like Iraq and Afghanistan — nations that never wanted it and were never going to keep it. These projects were doomed from the start. Yet at least they wrapped American power in the language of benevolence.

Today, even that fig leaf has disappeared.

The modern West treats democracy as a branding exercise, not a principle. Leaders like Joe Biden, Justin Trudeau, and Keir Starmer love lecturing the world about “liberal norms,” even as they jail political dissidents, censor speech, and turn domestic intelligence services against their own citizens. They condemn Vladimir Putin’s authoritarianism while staying silent as NATO allies crush dissent at home.

Democracy has become a marketing slogan — useful for justifying war and globalist expansion, but disposable when it interferes with ruling-class priorities.

Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio both slammed the German government for labeling Alternative for Germany as extremist. On social media, Rubio went further, blaming Germany’s open-border policies for the Alternative for Germany rise and calling the state’s surveillance powers tyranny in disguise.

Germany’s Foreign Office issued a formal reply, insisting the decision stemmed from an “independent” and “thorough” investigation.

The claim is absurd on its face.

No government can “independently” investigate and condemn its most prominent political opposition — especially not when the accusation is “extremism,” a term that now means little more than holding views the ruling class finds inconvenient.

I’ve made no secret of my dislike of modern mass democracy. But the original concept, at least, had merit. Democracy once meant rule by the demos — the people of a particular nation, rooted in shared history, culture, and civic identity. Its legitimacy came not from procedure or process but from the bonds between citizens and their country.

Today’s ruling class has twisted that definition beyond recognition. As I’ve written before, globalist elites now use the word “democracy” to describe a system governed by unaccountable institutions they alone control. Populism, they say, is dangerous. Democracy, they insist, must be preserved. But in practice, they oppose the popular will and protect only the process they’ve captured.

Elections have become sacraments — rituals that legitimize the rule of bureaucracies, not expressions of the people’s will. The process is sacred, not the outcome. That’s why Western politicians now speak of “our sacred democracy,” which must be defended not from tyranny, but from actual democratic movements.

Western leaders still try to justify their global power by invoking freedom and liberty. But their credibility has collapsed. It’s farcical to hear men like Justin Trudeau or Keir Starmer preach about “shared Western values” while jailing political opponents and silencing dissent at home.

The moral authority of liberal democracy is crumbling. And the cause isn’t Putin or China. It’s Western leaders who’ve gutted the electoral process and replaced it with rule by managerial elites.

The Trump administration should continue to expose this hypocrisy. But it also must act. That means offering political asylum to dissidents facing persecution in places like Germany, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Americans rightly recoil at repression in Russia. They should feel the same revulsion when it comes from our “allies” in Berlin, Ottawa, or London.

Racial Grievance Theater Is About Humiliation, Not History

Americans should be wary of all historical and political narratives that leverage racial grievance and victimhood.

Safe spaces or speech traps? Unpacking the left’s ‘free speech’ ruse



Freedom of speech is essential to a free society, yet progressives have spent years distorting its meaning to mislead the public.

In a recent attack on the Trump administration, CBS host Margaret Brennan claimed that “weaponized” free speech caused the Holocaust. This dangerous misrepresentation of history ignores that the Nazi regime sought to suppress free speech, not promote it. Her remarks reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the First Amendment.

Courageous Americans must reject this twisted version of free speech and defend open dialogue — especially on college campuses.

Brennan is hardly alone, of course. Progressives have redefined free speech under the banner of tolerance, equality, and “safe spaces.” In practice, this has enabled targeted discrimination and harassment against those who oppose their political agenda. The result is widespread self-censorship and intellectual conformity.

Americans became accustomed to a dystopian reality, where praying in public, questioning the origin of COVID-19, and refusing to use someone’s preferred pronouns were labeled “dangerous” forms of speech that had to be silenced — sometimes even through violence.

With Donald Trump’s return to the White House, these restrictions are lifting. People are slowly readjusting to speaking freely without fear of government reprisal, cautiously voicing opinions once deemed off-limits. This newfound freedom is promising, but the fight against state censorship is far from over.

Meanwhile, university campuses are again in turmoil over the Israel-Palestine conflict. Activists have threatened Jewish students and occupied buildings, prompting administrators — mindful of the federal government’s new stance against such behavior — to crack down. Yet, protesters insist their actions are protected as “free speech.”

The same thing is taking place outside of schools, too. Consider the Maine legislature’s efforts to discipline state Representative Laurel Libby (R) — an elected official who had the audacity to question the continued presence of men in women’s sports in her district. For the crime of flagging such an incident on social media, Libby was censured by the legislature in a straight party-line vote — unable to vote on behalf of her constituents until she apologizes.

Remind me again which party poses a threat to democracy?

Liberals often resort to distorting the truth and rewriting history to justify their extreme measures. Margaret Brennan’s comments didn’t emerge out of nowhere; they reflect a broader progressive campaign for intellectual conformity through censorship, intimidation, violence, and revisionist history.

Benjamin Franklin warned in his Silence Dogood letters that “whoever would overthrow the Liberty of a Nation, must begin by subduing the Freeness of Speech.” Censorship remains the most direct path to tyranny.

Young adults are in a crucial stage of their lives — a time to develop resilience and critical thinking.

Courageous Americans must reject this twisted version of free speech and defend open dialogue — especially on college campuses, where future leaders are being force-fed a false narrative of their rights and pressured to stay silent. Students deserve better.

We Need To Ban Idiots From Using Historical Analogies

Idiots like Russell Moore should abstain from using historical analogies in their pitiful attempts to influence the public discourse.

To Europe’s leaders: We aren’t drifting away from democracy — you are



Dear esteemed leaders:

I write to you as an American commentator who has long studied the histories of our respective nations and the principles that have shaped the modern world. Your recent remarks, exemplified by German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock’s warning to the United States about its alleged failure to support liberal democracies, compel me to respond — not out of antagonism but out of a shared concern for the democratic ideals we once jointly championed.

I respectfully submit that Europe, rather than exemplifying liberal democracy, is drifting toward a system that bears troubling parallels to the authoritarian regimes it once overcame. Allow me to outline this case with clarity and evidence with the hopeful aim of fostering mutual understanding.

Are you honoring the principles we fought for together?

Liberal democracy, as articulated by thinkers like John Locke and fortified through centuries of struggle, rests on the people's sovereignty, expressed through free speech, free elections, and accountable governance. Yet, across Europe, we observe a troubling erosion of these pillars.

In Germany, citizens face prosecution for questioning state policies on gender or immigration. Speech deemed inconvenient is silenced under the guise of protecting social order. The United Kingdom has detained individuals for silent prayer near abortion clinics, a stark infringement on both expression and conscience. Sweden imposes penalties for critiques of religion, narrowing the bounds of public discourse. These are not isolated incidents but symptoms of a broader trend: the suppression of dissent, once a hallmark of the Soviet system, not the Europe that triumphed over tyranny.

Elections, the bedrock of democratic legitimacy, have also been undermined. Ukraine’s indefinite suspension of voting, however justified by conflict, sets a precedent that weakens its democratic fabric. Romania’s recent nullification of an election result — because a sovereigntist party prevailed — suggests that outcomes displeasing to the European establishment may be discarded. In Germany, discussions to ban the Alternative für Deutschland, a party with significant public support, reflect a willingness to override the electorate’s voice.

This behavior is not one of a confident democracy but of a system fearful of its own citizens — a system reminiscent of the Eastern Bloc’s “managed” elections, not the vibrant pluralism that defined postwar Europe.

Globalist policies that bypass democracy

Further compounding this drift is the imposition of policies that lack a democratic mandate. The aggressive pursuit of climate goals and environmental, social, and governance frameworks often bypasses public consent and is driven instead by unelected bodies and elite gatherings like the World Economic Forum in Davos. These initiatives, while framed as moral imperatives, impose sweeping economic burdens — rising energy costs and shuttered industries — without clear electoral backing.

Historically, centralized control over vast swaths of life, unchecked by the people, was a feature of the Soviet Union’s command economy, not the free societies that rebuilt Europe after 1945. The parallels are not exact, but they are unmistakable.

The United States is not without fault. Our own democracy has faced its trials — overreach, elitism, and polarization among them. Yet in November 2024, we held an election, and the American people chose a path of renewal, reaffirming government by consent. This stands in contrast to Europe’s trajectory, where the will of the people is increasingly subordinated to the priorities of a technocratic class.

Is history repeating?

History offers a sobering lens. Europe’s leaders in the 1930s failed to recognize Adolf Hitler’s rise, not because they lacked elections, but because they tolerated the erosion of liberty under the pretext of stability.

Force, fear, and expansive state control supplanted democratic norms then as they risk doing now under different banners. The United States played a pivotal role in dismantling that fascism and, through the Marshall Plan, rebuilding your nations — not to enable new autocracies but to secure liberty’s foothold. With that legacy in mind, I urge reflection: Are you honoring the principles we fought for together?

JD Vance’s remarks at the recent Munich Security Conference underscore this divide. He called for unfettered freedom of speech, the uninterrupted conduct of elections, and an end to U.S. funding of Europe’s state-aligned media — positions grounded in first principles of self-governance. He questioned NATO’s relevance in a post-Soviet world and America’s disproportionate burden within it. He did not espouse provocations but rather rational appeals to adapt to new realities. The elicited dismay from European leaders suggests a growing philosophical rift — not over petty differences but over the essence of democracy itself.

Back to the basics of democracy

I write here as an individual, not on behalf of any institution, but as someone who listens to and speaks with millions of Americans every day through my program. While some in our own country fail to recognize the message, “We the people,” which was sent to our capitals in 2024, leaders across the West mustn’t continue to mistake a movement that simply demands a return to long-established norms of law, order, and the Bill of Rights as “Hitlerian.”

The failure of elites to listen and respond to their people builds dictators. Nascent authoritarians — “baby Hitlers” — are among all of us, waiting in the wings. But by ignoring the will of the people, you water those seeds and, perhaps unknowingly, allow their scope and power to grow.

I harbor deep respect for the peoples of Europe and the United Kingdom, with whom Americans share an enduring bond. Our intent is not to abandon you but to refocus on our own renewal — a task long overdue.

We are stepping back from the role of global enforcer, not out of indifference, but from a belief that each nation must secure its own destiny. NATO, designed to counter a now-defunct threat, requires re-evaluation; its costs, borne heavily by the United States, must align with current needs, not past promises. We will no longer subsidize systems that stifle the very freedoms we once defended together.

I implore you not to misconstrue this as a threat but as a call to mutual accountability. The greatness of our civilizations — yours and ours — stems from the people, not their rulers. The courage of ordinary citizens felled fascism and communism, and their voices must still guide us. I hope we can realign with those founding truths, restoring a partnership rooted in liberty, not lecturing.

With respect and in earnest dialogue,

Glenn Beck

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CBS News: Free Speech Caused The Holocaust

CBS News’ Margaret Brennan claimed Sunday that free speech was to blame for the Holocaust. During an interview with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Brennan spun a wild theory that free speech in Germany paved the way for the Holocaust, arguing that Vice President J.D. Vance’s criticisms of European attacks on free speech were problematic […]