Defending Faith, Family and Freedom Podcast

Guest (Male): You're listening to Defending Faith, Family and Freedom featuring Gary Bauer, Senior Vice President of Public Policy at the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute. And now, here's Gary.

Gary Bauer: Hello, this is Gary Bauer, Senior Vice President for Public Policy and Culture at the James Dobson Family Institute. Welcome to our podcast, Defending Faith, Family and Freedom. Wow, what a 250th birthday. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. I grew up in a very patriotic home. My earliest memories of being emotional about something was the 4th of July because I would see how emotional my parents were anytime we were celebrating our country. So it’s always been a big deal to me, and I suspect to many of you.

But look, people all over America, from one coast to the other, streets were filled with patriotic Americans celebrating our great country. And look, doing what we're supposed to do, thanking the heroes that have made our freedom possible. Did you see any of those videos or news stories out of New York Harbor, New York City? The tall ships sailing into New York Harbor, past the Statue of Liberty. One of those ships was, of course, the USS Constitution.

How apt that on a day we were celebrating the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution that would follow it, the ship in New York Harbor most prominent among many of the ships was the USS Constitution. Now, in Washington, DC, my family and I live in the greater Washington, DC area. And it was a little dicey in Washington, DC. If you were watching the coverage on TV later in the day, there were really huge thunderstorms that hit the city. The Washington Monument was hit by lightning.

I hope that wasn't some sort of omen or something; I trust that it wasn't. After all, the Washington Monument's the tallest building in Washington, DC. But it was struck by lightning. There were these huge thunderstorms, and tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people that had gathered on the Mall were told to seek shelter, to leave the Mall. Now, try to picture this: all of these folks, and they were you, they were people from all over America. I bet many of them saved their money for a long time just so they could make this trip to Washington, DC on the occasion of the 250th birthday of the United States.

And here they are, the storms hit, they're probably thinking, oh man, this whole thing's going to get blown up, the things we really came here to watch and do and hear, they're not going to happen. And then they get this order. Many of them had sat for hours to get through security, and now they were told they needed to abandon or evacuate the Mall. Now, the Trump administration opened up a lot of the government buildings in Washington.

So those good old American people from our heartland, from all over the country, many of them were told to get to the closest government building and go on inside, seek shelter until the storms have passed. I saw this great video of a throng of people, looked like several thousand people that had gathered in the lobby at the Department of Agriculture, which is a pretty impressive place. And who knows how it started, but it appeared spontaneously, they started singing our national anthem.

Over the last week, I’ve heard the national anthem played in a lot of different venues. It’s always impressive, of course; I love the national anthem. But there was something about the idea of this group of Americans, without any prompting, they're all stuffed into this government building. Somebody had to be the first person to start singing the national anthem, not an easy song to sing. And the next thing you know, those good old American-loving citizens belted it out.

As the hours passed, got deeper into the night, a lot of commentators were saying, well, I’m afraid that this has been washed out. The President's supposed to give a speech, and the fireworks won't happen until after the speech has been delivered. And here it is, 8:30, 9:00, 9:30. Some people have probably drifted back to their hotel rooms. But look, it’s President Trump. This is not a guy that plays by the usual rules.

So he got on the phone, or whatever he did, and he contacted one of the friendly commentators over at Fox News. He said to them, look, the show must go on. No matter what happens, I’m delivering a speech tonight. And when my speech is over, we are going to have the most incredible display of fireworks that have ever taken place in the United States of America. So the word went out, if you left the Mall, the rain's letting up a little bit, come on back.

So those folks had to go through security again, which they did by the tens of thousands. The President finally gets out of the White House and to the National Mall at 11:00 at night. And one of the things he said when he called the commentator at Fox News was, look, our greatest generation—we’ve almost lost all those men and women—our greatest generation landed on the beaches of Normandy in the middle of stormy weather and fought the Nazis and liberated Europe.

And you're telling me that Americans in 2026 don't have enough gumption to deal with some rain and some thunder? Are you serious? I’m going to be there and give that speech because this is one of the ways we can honor those heroes. And so our 80-year-old President, I’m sure you have seen this, the same media that said that President Biden was just fine. There was nothing wrong with him, even though we saw him wandering off, didn't know where he was, he would introduce people in the audience that were long ago dead.

I won't go down all that list; I don't want to kick around poor former President Joe Biden. But the media said, oh no, that’s just right-wing conspiracy theories, there's nothing wrong with the guy. But Donald Trump, who puts in 20-hour days regularly, oh, he’s showing signs of mental and physical decline. Well, our 80-year-old President, who we're told is declining, spoke a very short period of time for him.

He spoke from 11:00 until midnight. He stood there, rain pouring all around, occasional lightning, and gave a one-hour speech. And then that was followed by really just an unbelievable display of pyrotechnics, I think is the official word for it. And look, if Donald Trump had not done that, oh my goodness, he would have regretted it the rest of his life. In fact, he’s been excited, I know because I’ve been with him when he has talked to very small groups of people about this, how excited he has been that he was President.

And then he believes he was cheated out of being re-elected, but then finally he was re-elected four years later. And that meant that he’s been President of the United States when this incredibly important birthday celebration has taken place, and he is grateful for that. He is happy that history will record that he was in charge of how America would celebrate our 250th birthday. Now, I was thinking about this the next day. There was a lot of great things that happened.

Some other things I also want to discuss. But you know, there was a big thing that did not happen, and thank God that it did not happen. For weeks, US intelligence agencies have been intercepting incredible amounts of what the intelligence community calls chatter. They don't mean chatter like talking over the back fence with your neighbor. They mean communication going on between really bad people, really bad people outside of the United States and, I am sorry to say, some real haters inside of the United States who wanted to lay us low on July 4th on our 250th birthday.

And by that, I mean they wanted to kill us. They wanted to harm our nation. They wanted to blow up the celebration, all of which was not only to take lives and cause pain and suffering but to depress us, to make us feel hopeless and helpless, like everything is lost and America can't even protect its own citizens. And those attacks did not take place because there are people whose job it is to make sure that that doesn't happen.

So we'll never know, or maybe we will but it'll be years from now, we'll never know how many plots were stopped. All we'll know is that they didn't happen because brave men were on the watchtowers guarding our freedom. Well, look, 4th of July has of course passed. And I know there will be a tendency, a natural tendency to say, man, that was fantastic, I’m kind of sorry it’s all over. But it’s not all over.

This whole year is the 250th birthday of America. On July 4th, we celebrated the birthday of the issuing of the Declaration of Independence. But we're going to celebrate the whole year. The President intends to celebrate the whole year. And this whole year is a good chance for you to continue to talk with your children and grandchildren about our country, the great history of our country. And by the way, you're on the James Dobson Family Institute website to listen to this podcast.

Check out some of the things we have on there. I’ve done a series of what we are calling American Moments, little three- or four-minute stories about America that we all ought to know but we don't because they've been taken out of our textbooks and a lot of our children have been robbed of their heritage. So check out those little American Moments, and there's a lot of other stuff there that you'll be interested in, including an essay contest that we held for high school students and junior high school students.

An essay about—they were asked to write about how God was present in the founding of America and what they hope to do as young Americans when they get older to preserve this great experiment and what they hope God will do to continue to protect our nation. And we picked a couple of winners, and you're going to love listening to what they wrote and listening to the radio shows in which we interviewed those young people. Now, sadly, there always has to be a skunk at the wedding, right?

And we had our skunks at the wedding. There were a bunch of leftists over the July 4th holiday weekend celebration that were carping, carping, carping. And some of it was so outrageous and irritating. I saw one—I don't know if I can even pronounce her name—she's a Princeton University professor. She was part of a counter-4th of July event. And she told the crowd, who roared, "This audience is all about F the United States."

Yeah, well, thanks a lot, lady. She told the audience, "We have to reject the idea of loving a nation, right?" Holy cow. Well, here's somebody whose name I can pronounce: Alicia Keys. I kind of—she's a singer, you know, I kind of like her, she's a talented lady. She celebrated the 4th of July by claiming that American women don't have equal rights in America. I don't know what she’s talking about, ladies. Will somebody please inform me? What are you missing?

The last time I looked, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, right to worship God, right to protect yourself with a gun, right to go to church, you name it. Come on, what is she talking about? The only thing I could come up with is that maybe she was referring to the so-called right to kill an innocent unborn child. That’s usually what these folks are talking about. I don't know. As I mentioned, I live in the greater Washington, DC area and specifically in Northern Virginia.

And that has become a liberal enclave. And so I was checking out some of the local places you can go where people living in Northern Virginia and different neighborhoods are talking to each other and sharing messages with each other. And you're not going to believe this, but the number of those folks—and they're overwhelmingly liberal, I have to say it, I’m out of step for the most part with all of my neighbors—a lot of the people in Northern Virginia were complaining because military aircraft were flying over Washington, DC all day on July 4th.

Well, of course they were. The American military is what preserves our freedom. And if you just would get off of your computer, liberal Northern Virginians, and walk outside and look up in the sky, you would see some incredibly impressive aircraft flying overhead, piloted by brave men and women. And yet here these Northern Virginia liberals were. "Oh, can you believe this?" One woman said she felt like she was living through the apocalypse. Lady, you haven't been in an apocalypse, none of us have, so I don't know what you're saying about it.

But I found myself grateful that my father, Spike Bauer, is no longer alive. Because he did not have to see these ungrateful people trashing the country he fought to defend. My dad was part of that greatest generation; he fought in the South Pacific. I had a couple of uncles that fought to liberate Europe. My father would have been—well, I was getting ready to say he’d be mortified—no, he’d be angry.

And my dad had an anger management problem anyway, probably the reason he made such a good marine. He would have been an unhappy guy, and pity a liberal, a leftist, an American-hater that would have gotten in his way on that day. Well, the celebration of the 4th of July, I said we should keep it going. But leading up to the 4th of July, virtually everybody in the Trump administration was giving speeches around the country.

And I think the President's speech on the Washington Mall was a great speech. But I tend to think, and time will tell, only time will tell, that the speech the President gave in South Dakota—you know what I’m talking about here—Mount Rushmore, that famous monument. Mount Rushmore is the place where they've carved into the stone four of the greatest presidents in our history. George Washington, who in his first inaugural address said America only became an independent nation because of God's grace and protection.

Thomas Jefferson, who authored the Declaration of Independence. And that Declaration of Independence states our liberty comes from God, not from government, that we're all made in the image of God. Abraham Lincoln, the president that presided over a civil war in which 600,000 Americans died to end the national sin of slavery. His second inaugural address quotes or refers to the Bible a dozen times.

And Theodore Roosevelt, who totally rejected the idea of hyphenated Americanism. Do you know what I’m talking about, hyphenated Americanism? You meet somebody, "Well, I’m a this-American, or I’m an African-American, I’m a Danish-American, I’m a European-American," on and on the list. "No, you're an American," Teddy Roosevelt said. There is no hyphenated in America. You come here, we're supposed to be a melting pot. E pluribus unum: from many, one.

And so those four presidents are carved in at Mount Rushmore. And the President praised these giants of history. And then he praised America. And let me just read this quote to you because I think the President has been able over the years to capture the voice of America and of American greatness in a way compelling—to me, it’s right up there with the way the president I served for eight years, Ronald Reagan, was able to do this.

But Trump told the patriotic crowd, "At 250 years, America is the oldest republic on earth. We are the freest people on earth. We have the most righteous and enduring constitution on earth. We are the strongest and most powerful country on earth. And by the grace of God, the United States of America is the most successful, most accomplished, most exceptional nation ever to exist in human history." Wow. You know, some people say he ought to be carved on Mount Rushmore. I don't know, maybe he ought to get his own mountain; I’m not sure there's any more room up there.

But I want to bring up why I think his speech at Mount Rushmore may end up being historic in a way that I think is not widely understood, but I fear it will be understood eventually for maybe the wrong reasons. President Trump devoted a good portion of that speech, as I just gave you an example of, praising America, praising freedom, praising liberty under God, praising our founding documents. And then, Paul Revere-like, he issued a warning about something bad coming our way. And it’s not a new bad; it’s an old bad. It’s communism.

Now, a lot of people thought when Soviet communism, communism in Russia fell, that that was the end of communism. Well, communist China is a rising power today, and certainly the United States is going to have to deal with them down the road. They have great desire to dominate the world, and they intend to replace us as the world's great power. But I don't think the President was even necessarily talking about communist China.

I think he was referring to the communism that is showing its face clearly right now in the United States of America. Now, they don't call themselves communists, although some of them say they're Marxists. Most of them are just calling themselves socialists, but there is no doubt about it, they are communists. And if they ever gain power, everything America stands for will be destroyed. And your children and grandchildren will have lesser lives as a result.

Now, President Trump spent a little bit of time on this. I’m not going to share the whole thing with you, but I’m going to share a couple minutes of it because he speaks sort of the way my dad would speak. I mean, this is not the Gettysburg Address. I could listen to this part of the President's speech and I could hear Spike Bauer saying it. So let's listen a second as the President talks about communism and why it must not be allowed to gain a foothold in the United States of America.

Donald Trump: Communism is a mortal threat to American liberty. It is the greatest threat to our country, including World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor, or even 9/11. We're not going to let this happen to us. Believe me, we're not letting it happen. Because communism is the enemy of free people everywhere, everywhere in the world. It never works. It’s the enemy of the Constitution; above all, it’s the enemy of July 4th, 1776.

It is the enemy indeed. Even while the radicals and extremists attack our incredible history at every turn, they are silent on the miserable history of communism itself because it never worked. Thousands of years, if you look at it, under different names, under somewhat different ideologies and systems, that system has led to more death and destruction than any system ever tried. It killed 100 million people just in the last century alone.

Communism is the exact opposite of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It’s death, tyranny, and the pursuit of evil. The godless communist morality states that anything is justified to bring about inhuman visions and to really propose what's good. They don't want good. They don't love God and they don't want God. They don't love religion and they don't want religion, and they won't have it. But we will not let them win. They have no chance against us.

They have no respect for law, justice, principle, tradition, or your God-given rights. It’s an ideology of mass theft, mass control, mass lies, and mass murder. Such doctrines can be given no quarter in a democracy because the first thing they do when they get into power is turn around and destroy it. It always is destroyed, just as communists have done in other countries all over the world, no matter where you look. Very simply, communism represents the worst ideas and abuses in history by the worst people.

The American founding represents the best ideas and traditions in history by the best people, like you. You can be loyal to Karl Marx or you can be loyal to America. You can be a communist or you can be a patriot. You cannot be both.

Gary Bauer: Wow, that last paragraph, I’m going to repeat it again. "The American founding represents the best ideas and traditions in history by the best people, like you. You can be loyal to Karl Marx or you can be loyal to America. You can be a communist or you can be a patriot. You cannot be both." You know, the media hated this part of the President's speech. Now think about that for a second.

There's a number of communist countries around the world, and the media in those communist countries, none of the media in those communist countries are free. The freedom of the press does not exist in any of the communist countries. It does exist, and it sometimes drives me nuts, here in the United States. So the President of the United States warns the country, now don't go in the direction of communism, and the American media that is a free press gets upset that the President is criticizing communism.

I can't even begin to analyze what that’s about. Look, if you have any doubt about—well, maybe this is why the media was upset. The President issued this warning on the eve of July 4th for an obvious reason. He gave this warning because all over the country, communists and socialists along with radical Islamists are winning elections in heavily Democrat districts. And they're campaigning on things like open borders, abolishing the police, closing prisons, antisemitism, anti-Americanism, more big government, transgender insanity, abortion on demand, and disdain for the God of the Bible.

And I’m telling you, my friends, if they get the upper hand, the American experiment is over. There will be no 300th birthday celebration of the United States. Oh, there may still be a place called the United States. That could linger long after the heart of the nation has been ripped out of it. But in fact, there would not be a United States if this alliance of radical Islamists, socialists, Marxists, and communists continue to gain ground.

They already control the faculties of major American universities. They already control the two major teacher unions whose members are teaching your kids. They have tremendous influence in the media. You see their work in many different places. And they're being very open now about who they are and what they believe in, and they're winning elections, not just in New York City, but they've won seats in Pennsylvania, in Colorado where the James Dobson Family Institute is headquartered.

One of them just won a primary in Denver and is likely to be a Marxist representing part of Denver in the United States Congress come this November. So it’s happening right now. And that’s one of the reasons that the James Dobson Family Institute will continue to devote incredible amounts of resources, time, and energy to basically being your Paul Revere, warning you about what's coming and urging you and cajoling you and educating you to walk into the public square.

We're not asking you to land on the beaches of Normandy and liberate Europe. We're asking you to walk into the public square in America and defend faith, family, and freedom. Defend this great land that your fathers and grandfathers and grandparents sacrificed to give you. Because we're blessed to live here. We were blessed by God when He allowed us to be born here. We must not be ingrates. If you've been given something and you don't take care of it, that makes you an ingrate.

You're not ingrates; you're patriots. So we are dedicated to helping you be an educated Christian citizen. It’s one of the reasons the James Dobson Family Institute exists. It’s one of the main reasons that Dr. James Dobson devoted his life to faith, family, and freedom. So keep coming back to our website, keep reading what we're putting out, keep listening to these podcasts. Educate yourself, educate your children.

You are the first and most important teachers your children have. Together, maybe someday, who knows? Our future relatives will look back at our generation and say, "Wow, back in 2026, that generation saved America again from Marxist communism and godlessness." Well, that’s my message today. Happy 250th birthday. Onward and upward. Love God, love your country, love your family. Until we are back together again on Defending Faith, Family and Freedom. Thanks very much.

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