Beck's Thanksgiving Challenge

(FNC)

This is a rush transcript from "Glenn Beck," November 22, 2010. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

GLENN BECK, HOST: Well, hello, America.

It is Thursday Thanksgiving — it's going to be Thursday and Thanksgiving. It's the week of Thanksgiving. Here in New York, things are getting a little all festive. I was out Christmas shopping for the family on Saturday and things are starting to get little nuts here.

You are probably, like I am, you are excited to enjoy a nice big meal with your family and friends — well, at least the meal part. I don't know, I'm always excited for people to come over for the holidays until the family actually arrives. And then you hear the doorbell and you're like — oh, crap, they're here.

Unfortunately, for as excited as we all may be, I'm about to rain on your parade. Yes, that's me. I'm your little black rain cloud. I'm going to issue to a challenge to you this Thanksgiving to try to think past the stuffing, think past the turkey in your face and watching football — and try to talk to your family this year about things that really matter.

I have a few — I have a few conversation starters for you. It may end up with you locked in the basement or outside, I'm not really sure. But I want to share them with you tonight.

I am the grim reaper of apathy. That is me. If you want to float down the stream of life and end up wherever the current takes you — well, you should turn the channel right now. I think "SpongeBob" is on at this time.

This is definitely not the show for you — because in the middle of your gravy-soaked mashed potato bliss, you will hear my voice going: tell them about inflation! You will. You will.

So, I want to apologize in advance, but it is important. If we don't wake up our family and friends up and we don't start having this conversation on a weekend like Thanksgiving, unfortunately, I don't think that they're going to know what hit them after the holidays.

I know it's not easy to talk to your families about anything — really anything. You know, our families are so divided right now and we have to try to stitch it back up. And it's hard to talk about anything other than football and food on Thanksgiving. But when you go through the news of the day, it's apparent that it cannot be business as usual in this country.

There's a couple of things here — first, on the terror front. I mean, we have the TSA, that's where — no, seriously. Hey, TSA, how is that working out for you, huh? There is something wrong with that TSA story. And we'll get into that maybe later on in the week.

But on the terror front, there's Operation Hemorrhage. This is the new Al Qaeda strategy — Operation Hemorrhage. Instead of going for one massive spectacular attack, they are attacking the enemy, quoting, "with smaller but more frequent operations is to what some might refer to as strategy of a thousand cuts. The aim is to bleed the enemy to death."

Where have I heard this before? Oh, yes! I remember — this show.

Now, they are claiming responsibility for the cargo bombing attempt. And I don't — I haven't figured this one out. They said, oh, you know, it appeared to be a bomb-like material. It's either a bomb or it's not.

Now, Al Qaeda doesn't care if the plot was foiled or not. All they want to do is a couple of things — increase fear. But may I also point out, as I pointed out after 9/11, Usama bin Laden said these words that he would do to America what he did to the former Soviet Union. Well, what is that? Bleeding it to death, financially.

That's why they hit our financial sector — they know the way — remember we talked about the Tower of Babel and the bricks that they built the tower? What is the Hebrew word for mortar in between? Materialism. What holds us together as a people? Materialism.

I want you to honestly think of this, this weekend when you are with your family, what holds this country together? Is it our values, our principles, our history? Or is it materialism? If our money goes away, are we in the street rioting and killing each other? That's got to change. That can't happen.

Now, Al Qaeda doesn't care if the package bomb plot failed. The question is: How much does it end up costing? This is death by a thousand papercuts.

The next thing I want you to consider is Net Neutrality, the FCC over Congress. We told you that Congress was making itself irrelevant. They couldn't get Net Neutrality through Congress. Well, the FCC is announcing plans next week for regulations that would ban the ISPs, like Comcast, from blocking or favoring content online. This is basically a Fairness Doctrine for the Internet.

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America, you lose the Internet, you lose the war, I think.

Cass Sunstein said it was bad for people that they could seek out information that only fits their point of view. They want to make sure that you get The Huffington Post on Fox News. No, thank you.

They're about to control what you see on the Internet and Congress doesn't even have a say anymore. They're being completely circumvented. Comcast, I believe, will likely go for it because their takeover of NBC, I'll bet you that it's being held hostage. So, Net Neutrality.

The next thing is the debt and deficit. We just had a blue ribbon panel and senator — former senator and co-chair of the deficit commission was Alan Simpson. He gave this warning — and if this doesn't sound like "The Coming Insurrection," I don't know what is. He gave this warning on the coming vote on the debt ceiling early next year:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN SIMPSON, DEFICIT COMMISSION CO-CHAIR: I can't wait for the bloodbath in April. It won't matter whether two of us have signed this, or 14 or 18. When the debt limit time comes, they're going to look around and say, what in the hell do we do now? We've got guys who will not approve the debt limit extension, unless — unless we give them a piece of meat, real meat off of this package. And, boy, the bloodbath will be extraordinary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: OK. I don't know if he meant it this way, but I think he's right. You're already seeing it. You know, in — what is it, San Francisco or Oakland, last week when they talked about cutting money for the schools. In Berkeley, California, they had — they had the rioters out in the street and some of the rioters took baton from a cop and almost beat him to death with it. They were screaming, "Get his gun, get his gun!" It's bad. What was in Europe is coming here.

Now, it's also going to be bad because the debt and deficit, there's also a lack of jobs. The reason why we have the deficit is because people aren't paying taxes, because the jobs, the jobs. And food pantries are really bad. Non-profit food distribution agencies are struggling at record breaking pace this year. The demand is outrageous. This is a picture from northwest Washington, D.C. There were 3,000 people that waited in line for grocery hand-outs — 3,000 people.

Bread lines — do you remember bread lines? They're back in America in 2010.

Reuters said over the weekend, the Reuters said that the economists is worried about U.S. inflation. Now, hang on just a second. Inflation? I've heard the Fed, Bernanke, say that, no, no, no, we're not worried. We're worried about deflation. But a national survey for the National Association for Business Economics ranked inflation a bigger worry than deflation. Sure, your house may deflate in price, but everything else is going to go up.

What does that mean to you? More in a minute.

Now, here was another one that I thought was incredible: The dollar — the weakest currency in the world. The weakest? The dollar? By the way, that's, you know, up there with the peso. Who said this? Don't worry, only JPMorgan — JPMorgan. The weakest currency in the world the dollar is on pace to become.

The next one is our cities are broke. Detroit suburb took steps to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy, a move that has revealed news of hundreds of cities in Michigan that are about to follow suit and declare bankruptcy. Again, who saw that one coming?

And China — China. Can you ask your friends — are they a friend or are they a foe? They're the new leader in the world. And the rest of the world now is looking to them to lead.

Did you see the story that happened this weekend? As we attempt to lessen our coal use and we're being told we have to stop it — look at that — we're told we have to stop. China has had a massive increase in coal production. Oh, and the other thing is — don't worry, it's such a happy place -- a woman was sentenced to a year in a labor camp over a tweet. It was really, really kind of cool. They — yes, they — she was arrested on the day after her wedding. Don't worry about it. It took about a week before people found out where she was.

Now, I know that you know all of this stuff. If you watch this show, you know. You're awake. You're engaged. But America is in a slumber. And I really — I mean, next year, I don't really care. I don't care. If anybody else wakes up, tough. We are going to move on because we have to be leaders.

And we made the case over and over. I mean, they're discrediting themselves. Everything they say — it's lying. It's just a lie. And the evidence and the proof is there. It's not my word against theirs, it's the evidence. Oh, really, you're not worried about inflation? Uh-huh!

In the last couple of years, we have come a long way learning history and current events and politics. But we're going to double our efforts — just us isn't enough. We got to get everybody we can on board before this ship sails. What better time to do it than when you're holding them hostage over roosted turkey stuffing and cranberries. You know what I'm saying?

But I don't want you to talk politics. And whatever you do, for the love of Pete, don't say, oh, I heard this on Glenn Beck. Don't! Talking — using my name is losing. Talking politics is worthless at this point. We're beyond that.

If you start talking politics, gravy is going to fly across the table. Politics are what got us into this mess. Instead, talk about the principles and values. Talk about gratitude. It's Thanksgiving. Gratitude has to be the first and most critical.

Have you ever read the last line — this is the — this is the Proclamation that was issued in 1777 on November 1st. And this is the proclamation of saying that we've got to have a Thanksgiving. And it talks about how it's further recommended that servile labor such as recreation, although at other times innocent may be unbecoming to the purpose of this appointment. And it may be omitted on such a solemn occasion.

So, in other words, give thanks but don't do anything else. Don't even have recreation. Wow! Innocent recreation is unbecoming on Thanksgiving.

I'm going to Macy's Day Parade. We watch football. We overeat. I mean, you got to be kidding me. We're shopping. Stores are open now. How far we have fallen.

We need to get that perspective back starting this week. We're going to need that soon. It's an easy one to work on in Thanksgiving, but how many of us will really do it?

You even might say now, oh, yes, you know, I'm going to do that. But really, once you get in the old habit, it's going to take a little more finesse really to talk about things that actually matter, you know, talk about that things that we're facing.

Don't say, boy, have you heard about our government and how it's not worried about inflation, but rather deflation? No.

Instead, whoever it was that did the shopping for the food for Thanksgiving, just say this at the dinner table: Man, have you seen the price of milk? Have you seen the price of food? Have you seen — what did this cost you? Have you filled up the gas tanks lately? My gosh!

And whoever is filling up the gas tank, whoever is doing the shopping will take it from there.

And then you can say things like, do you know that Ben Bernanke is saying that we should be worried about deflation? Here he is:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BEN BERNANKE, FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN: Rates of inflation, the constraint imposed by the zero lower bound on nominal interest rates is too tight. The short-term real interest rate is too high, given the state of the economy — and the risk of deflation is higher than desirable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Oh, yes, OK.

George Soros says the same thing. He says in a spooky dude voice, "It is the — it is the U.S. that is not in the position of Europe's heavily indebted countries, which must pay heavy premiums over the price at which Germany can borrow. Interest rates on U.S. government bonds have been falling and are near record lows, which means the financial markets anticipated deflation not inflation."

And I'm a spooky dude.

All right. They don't care. And you know what? George Soros and Ben Bernanke ain't going out and doing shopping. Mom and grandma are. Your wife is!

And inflation isn't even computed like it used to be computed. The government figured it out. The government realized that people could recognize how bad things actually were so they changed how we calculated it. So, in other words, the TV could say there's no inflation and you'd be going, I'm broke! How is that happening?

Now, they calculate inflation without adding in the price of food and energy. Oh, so other than those going up, we're set!

Now, don't start at the dinner table talking about, you know, how to calculate inflation. Again, that's a gravy tosser. Ask: Has anybody noticed the price of food or gas going up? Or how about the price of energy?

If you have one of these, make sure you have this ready at the table. This is note from Gateway Energy Services and it's talking about how PECO in Pennsylvania is going to have a 30 percent increase of rates at the beginning of the year — 30 percent. And this company is saying, we're going to save you 10 percent on that.

Oh, so you only have 20 percent interest or 20 percent rate hike. Well, that's good. How do you do that? How do you do it?

Hey, grandma, things are getting more expensive. Ask this question: Is your Social Security check going up to cover the cost next year? The answer is no. Why? Because they changed the calculation.

If the costs of going — are going up 30 percent on energy and food and other essentials, how does grandma make ends meet? How does she do that?

She doesn't.

Let me ask you this: How do you stop inflation? Do you know? If you have all of this money and you're printing more money and pushing it out to boost the economy, get people to spend dollars, how do you get those dollars back out of the system? Because remember, inflation is too many dollars chasing too few goods. So, how do you get those dollars back to the Fed and destroy them?

You suck them up with interest rates.

I'm going to show you a chart: Two years ago, at the start of 2008, we had about $7.5 trillion in currency circulation around the world. Now, we have $8.8 trillion in circulation and I don't even believe that.

In the 1970s, we had inflation. Ronald Reagan stopped it. But do you remember how? Most people at the table won't remember. Just ask them — ask them: Do you remember trying to buy a house in the late '70s and early '80s? They'll say, oh, yes, we had 20 percent interest rates. That's the Fed sucking those dollars back in so they can be destroyed.

If we had 20 percent interest rates under Jimmy Carter and we didn't have this kind of cash in the system, what kind of interest rates do we have to have now? How high do interest rates have to go to stop inflation this time? How do you do that without killing the engine of the country?

Remember the song "Allentown" by Billy Joel? There's nothing left but I think like a tattoo parlor to close down in Allentown.

Ask the family — ask the family around the dinner table what they possibly think of America having the weakest dollar in the world. When they laugh say, no, that's according to JPMorgan Chase, akin with the peso.

See if you can get your dinner table to agree. The city can't pay for the teachers' pensions. Remember grandma's pension here. But should grandma be paying for the teachers' pensions now? Because we can't do them, the cities can't do them, should we pay for them?

And ask them this — propose this: Everybody over 65, if you're retired right now, you get full Social Security. If you're at 60, you work until you're 68. If you're 65, you work until you're 70. You're living longer. And if it's under 50, you get nothing. Let's take care of the people in the system. Look, I'm 46 years old. Not a chance I'm going to get Social Security and I've known it my whole life.

Things are changing. It's going to take a revolution in thought and expectations. But, in the end, if we have that revolution of thought, if we think outside of box, we will have freedom. We will have freedom.

And isn't that what the Pilgrims took pause to recognize: that they had freedom? And with freedom and God combined, anything can be accomplished.

And that is what we give thanks for.

— Watch "Glenn Beck" weekdays at 5 p.m. ET on Fox News Channel

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