Best of the Program | Guests: Sen. Mike Lee & Alan Dershowitz | 6/19/25

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All right, we got a lot to talk about today

and some humor back, especially provided by that, I don't know, C or D list actress on the view.

She says it's worse to be black in America than to be a woman or a gay person in Iran.

Oh, that's an interesting view.

Also, Alan Dershowitz is here to talk about what the Supreme Court said yesterday.

And the big controversy today is Mike Lee is selling off all of our national parks.

Wait until you hear what the actual bill says.

Mike Lee is with us on today's podcast.

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You're listening to the best of the Blandbeck program.

You know,

it's been a crazy, crazy week, Stu.

You've really, you've missed out on some great

some great arguments, really.

Really?

People just ripping each other apart.

Friends, ripping friends apart.

And

I've never seen anything like it on our side.

And

it's got to stop.

It really has to stop.

You were on vacation, so you usually don't pay much attention.

Did you miss it?

Did you see any of this or you miss it all?

I felt like, first of all, an incredibly well-timed vacation.

I can't even describe how good I felt about the timing of that.

But yes, I did follow it a little bit.

I saw a lot of the back and forth.

I don't know how you feel about it, Glenn.

It just seems to me to be the opposite of productive.

I just don't get it at all.

I don't get it.

No, when we all start turning on each other?

No, our enemies don't love that.

Right.

Yeah.

I mean,

you couldn't be in Russia or China and Iran and

do anything more helpful than get all of us to start tearing each other apart on the same side.

Yeah, it's like, you know, as a Philadelphia Eagles fan, if the Eagles make a trade and you're not sure how to feel about it, one way to decipher that is to see how Cowboys fans react to it.

If they love the trade, you know it sucks for your side.

Right.

And that's kind of how I feel with this.

Like, you know, how, how does everybody on the left feel about this?

Are they, are they, gosh, angry about it?

Or are they really excited that the right seems to be trying to set itself on fire?

I think they're excited about it.

So

I would argue it's not the most productive activity.

Yeah, I had.

I had Sean Davis on yesterday from the Federalists, and he was just great.

He was great.

If you missed that in the podcast, make sure you get yesterday's podcast and listen to it.

Because we don't agree on everything, but tried to have a decent conversation.

And that is hard to do.

I mean, I didn't necessarily have a decent conversation yesterday at the beginning of the program.

With the beginning of the program, it was a little shameful.

A little shameful.

Shameful?

Is that a little bit?

Yeah, a little bit.

And I might say that when my producers brought up today, Glenn, you really have to talk about our federal government selling off 3 million acres of land for affordable housing.

I might have been a little shameful there as well.

I mean, I'm not a perfect guy.

I'm not a perfect guy.

And I'm going to try to not be shameful

in my response on the federal land today.

But I will tell you, that might be beyond my abilities today.

I am so

unbelievably tired

of

hearing about how we're not going to be able to hunt or fish

because Mike Lee wants to sell

3 million acres of federal land.

Oh, no.

Really, Glenn?

I can't believe that.

Why would he want to do such a thing?

He doesn't like hunting and fishing.

Yeah.

Well, I do have the reasons.

And

I'm going to get into that in a little bit on the program

because if I have to go into it right now, I need to really prepare.

Because I may have vented for about 20 minutes in a very unproductive way in our meeting today

because

I live surrounded by federal land.

And oh my gosh, they're such good stewards of land.

There's nobody better than the federal government.

No, when something's going wrong, I could just call Washington, D.C.

up and go, hey,

this is really bad for the land.

And they're right on it.

They're right on it.

They're the best landlords ever.

But we'll get into that.

Meanwhile, Whoopi Goldberg had something interesting to say yesterday.

She was on the view, and

that's a TV show.

TV.

That is a box that sometimes hangs on a wall, and it's from a network.

A network.

It's an old-style thing where people used to tell people what to say in their TV shows unless you were on the left.

Anyway, it's too much.

She's on this TV show, and she was saying that

she was saying that black people are treated badly here in America.

Now,

listen to what she says.

Just remember, too, the Iranians literally throw gay people off of buildings.

They don't adhere to basic human rights.

Listen, here's the thing.

Let's not do that.

Because if we start with that,

we have been known in this country to tie gay folks to the car.

Where they are

official policy

hanging black people.

So

it is not even the same.

I couldn't step foot wearing this.

No, wait, wait, wait.

That's not what you mean to say.

It is the same.

No, it's not.

The year 2025 in the United States is nothing like if I step foot wearing this young bitch

for me.

I'm sorry.

I can't have my hair showing.

I can't wear a skirt.

I can't have my show.

I'm telling you, everyone.

I literally said it was up to the Iranian people.

Yes, it is up to the Iranian.

And that's why I am saying

that it is the same.

Murdering someone for their difference is not good.

Whoever does it.

Wow.

What a stance.

What a stance.

Oh, she's so brave.

And so, I mean,

for a B or C grade actor.

in a forgotten movie system, she is really quite bright,

you know, when she's like, and we lynched people in America.

Yeah, 100 years ago.

A hundred years ago, that was happening.

And it was really, really bad.

I don't see the lynching happening.

And it was never condoned by the federal government, by the way.

That was something that was done.

Oh, go on.

Hold on, Whoopi.

That was done by the Democrats who started the Klan.

You can't say that.

That's 100 years ago.

Wait a minute.

You just brought up lynching from 100 years ago.

So I guess facts do matter.

And then, I mean, can you imagine?

Can you imagine if that bit were played in any place in the Middle East where women are like under their birk thinking, I don't want to live like this.

This is horrible.

And oh, by the way, my

husband can rape me anytime he wants.

You know, I was married when I was nine, and you have somebody like Whoopi Goldberg going on and going, that's just no worse than it is here in America.

Can you imagine the arrogance of that statement?

I mean, she's literally, again, I know we're mocking this show.

She's making millions of dollars.

She's a black woman.

making millions of dollars on television opposing the current president of the United States.

Do you think there's a lot of examples in Iran of this sort of behavior?

Are there a lot of Jews that have giant television shows

in downtown Tehran with their studios making millions of dollars as they carry on the networks

the programming that opposes the Ayatollah?

Is there an equivalent?

It's so inherently stupid.

Stupid.

It's just amazing how dumb you can be and have a show like this.

And honestly,

if we were in a just society, I would have arrested her just for her stupid haircut.

I will say that's offensive, Glenn, but not as offensive as your claim that she might be a B or C level actress.

No.

Come on.

That's way too kind.

Just try to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Can we focus on one other thing, too, I think is interesting about this development?

The opposition in that clip comes from Melissa Farah, whatever her name is.

She was,

and I think there's such a fascinating journey of this type of person who, you know, was a complete unknown.

She was a, you know, a communications official in the Trump White House back in the day and kind of turned into this like, oh, well, I'm notable now because I'm turning against Trump after leaving.

Right.

And there's like a whole like genre of people who have, who have gone through this process and whatever.

It seems to be very rewarding for them when it comes to their media careers.

And they do very, very well and they make lots of money.

And there's absolutely no way that without turning on Donald Trump and becoming this anti-Trump figure that she would have this job.

There's zero chance of it, right?

Like

she's an absolute no one.

No one had ever heard of her.

Like she was a no-one, but she became famous because of this one thing.

And there's this interesting thing that happens because you assume the fact that she at one point did serve under in the Trump administration, that she had some familiarity with,

I don't know, the right side of an argument or the conservative side of the argument or like just the fact that Iran is a danger or whatever.

She was, you know, involved in defense.

And then she's forced to go on here and do this show where every day her job is to say basically, look, I served in the Trump administration.

I'm obviously not a liberal, but I can't believe what they're doing.

It's so bad.

Like, that's her job.

And then something like this happens that is so overtly wrong, that something that she obviously knows is a lie.

And she has to make that decision on like, do I go with the truth here or do I do this thing that I've been doing?

Right.

Like,

and it's got to be perplexing to make these decisions because at some point,

There is a level where you just inherently can't say the words to go along with the party line that you're supposed to take these days.

And this is one of those instances where, like, no, it's obviously not as bad for black people in America today as it is for gay people in Iran.

Like, it's just so overtly false that you can't even stop yourself.

And I find it interesting

where they confirm that.

How dare you say that?

Do we try to give black people the opportunity to learn how to fly by throwing them off of buildings?

No, we don't.

We don't

know what the good Iranians are doing.

They're like, I think these gays can fly.

And one of them will be able to do it.

And then once one of them does it, they'll all be able to spread their wings and fly, baby, fly.

That's true.

That's all they're doing, Stu.

That's all they're doing.

I had taken that cure in America.

We don't give black people or gays the chance to fly.

I guess they just believe in them so much.

They're so much better than us.

They can fly.

That's what the Koran is actually saying.

Give them a chance to fly.

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Now back to the podcast.

This is the best of the Glenn Beck program, and we really want to thank you for listening.

Alan Dershowitz, my friend, how are you?

I'm doing great.

How about you?

It has been a really confusing week.

I'm losing friends, I think, because I stand with Israel's right to defend themselves.

And I'm pointing out that while I don't want a war,

Iran is a really bad place.

And then I see the Supreme Court comes out and there are three justices who are like, I don't know,

I think children, you know, can change their identity before we even let them drive or carry a gun or enlist in the military.

It's insane.

It is insane, especially since the radical left says that a 17 and a half year old can't consent to have

voluntary sex with their boyfriend.

That would be sexist and that would be horrible.

But they can consent to have an abortion and they can consent to have radical surgery that can't be reversed.

By the way, the decision is like six to two and a half.

Elena Kagan, my former colleague at Harvard, didn't reach the merits of whether or not a state could actually ban these operations on a minor.

She got involved in whether or not you need super duper scrutiny or just super scrutiny, a kind of, you know, a very technical thing, but she didn't rule on whether under any kind of scrutiny the state could do that.

So

definitely two of them said that the state could do it, but not necessarily a third one.

Okay.

Can you break this argument down and why it should have been unanimous?

Oh, it should have been unanimous.

There's no question.

States under the Constitution have the authority to decide medical issues.

States decide a whole range of medical issues.

I remember when I was a young professor, there was an issue of whether or not

one twin could be operated on to remove a kidney to be given to another twin.

And, you know, that case went all the way through the courts.

The federal government never got involved in that.

That was up to the state of Massachusetts.

And, you know, they made an interesting decision.

Some states go the other way.

Half the countries of Europe go one way on this.

Half the countries of Europe go the other way.

And Justice Brandeis once said that states are the laboratories of constitutional experimentation.

They have the right to do things their own way.

and then we'll see over time.

Over time, I predict that we will find that this kind of surgery is not acceptable scientifically for young people.

The New York Times had an absurd op-ed yesterday by the mother of a transgender person, and it never mentioned you do the arithmetic, that the person was now 18 years old.

And the decision doesn't apply to anyone who's 18.

If you're, you know, just wait.

Don't make irreversible irreversible decisions when you're 12 years old or 13 years old, because we know the statistics show that some people, at least, regret having made these irreversible surgical decisions, particularly.

Yeah.

So

why is it just that the state, why wasn't the argument, you can't do this to children?

Well, you know, that's the question, whether or not if the state says you can do it to children, that violates the Constitution.

I think states are given an enormous amount of leeway in deciding what's best for people.

You leave it to the public.

And, you know, for me, if I were

voting, I would not vote to allow

a 17-year-old to make that irreversible decision.

But if a state wants to do it, and if a country in Europe wants to do it, All right.

But the idea that there's a constitutional right for a minor who can't, you know, isn't old enough to consent to a contract or to have sex, is old enough to consent to do something that will change their life forever, and they will come to regret

is absurd.

So I don't know how you feel about Justice Thomas, but he took on the so-called experts

and

really kind of took them to the woodshed.

What were your thoughts on that?

Well,

I agree with that.

I've devoted my whole life to challenging experts.

That's what I do in court.

I challenge experts all the time.

Most of the major cases that I've won have been cases where the experts went one way and we were persuading them that

persuaded a jury or a judge that the expert is not really an expert.

Experts have become partisans just like everybody else.

And so I'm glad that

expertise is being challenged by judges.

And, you know, experts ought to challenge judges.

Judges challenge experts.

That's the world we live in.

Everybody challenges everybody else.

As long as we're all of us allowed to speak, allowed to have our point of view expressed, allowed to vote.

That's democracy.

Democracy doesn't require a singular answer to complex medical, psychological, moral problems.

We can have multiple answers.

We're not a dictatorship.

We're not North Korea or Iran where the Ayatollah or the leader tells us what to think.

We can think for ourselves and we can act for ourselves within limits.

It's really interesting because this is my argument with Obamacare.

I was dead set against Obamacare, but I wasn't against RomneyCare when it was in Massachusetts.

If that's what Massachusetts wants to do, Massachusetts can do it.

Try it.

And honestly, if it would work in a state, we would all adopt it.

But the problem is some of these things, like RomneyCare, doesn't work.

And so they want to...

They want to rope the federal government into it because the federal government can just print money.

And

any state wants to do anything.

But for instance, I have a real hard time with California right now because I have a feeling when they fail, we're going to be roped into paying for the things that we all knew were bad ideas.

Why should I pay for it in Texas when I know that wouldn't work?

And I've always wanted to live in California, but I don't because I know that's not going to work.

Yeah, but, you know, conservatives sometimes take the opposite point of view.

Take guns, for example.

The same Justice Thomas says that a state cannot have the authority to decide that

guns should not be available in Times Square or in schools, that there has to be a national

openness to guns because of the Second Amendment.

And

you can argue reasonably what the Second Amendment means,

but

conservatives, many conservatives take the view that there has to be a single standard for guns and states can't vary in their decisions how to control guns.

I'm in favor of letting the states make those decisions.

Doesn't that just take what the

Bill of Rights

is about and turns it up outside the head?

I mean, it says, you know, anything not mentioned here, the states have the rights, but they cannot, the federal government cannot get involved in any of these things, and these are rights that are enshrined.

So, I mean, because you could say that, but I mean, when it comes to health care, that's not in the Constitution,

not in the Bill of Rights.

There's a big difference, of course.

The Second Amendment does provide for the right to bear arms.

The question is whether it's interpreted in light of the beginning of the Second Amendment, which says

essentially a well-regulated, well-regulated militia, whether that applies to private ownership as well, whether it can be well-regulated by states.

Look, these are interesting debates, and the Supreme Court decides these.

But all I'm saying is that many of these decisions are in some way influenced by ideology.

The words of the Constitution don't speak

like the Ten Commandments and God giving orders from on high.

They're often written in ambiguous terms.

Even the Ten Commandments,

it says, thou shalt not murder.

And it's been interpreted by some to say, thou shalt not kill.

The Hebrew is lo tirtsach.

Tirtzach is the Hebrew word for murder, not kill.

And of course, we know that in parts of the Bible, you are allowed to kill your enemies.

If they come after you to kill you, rise up and kill them first.

So, you know, every single, human beings are incapable of writing with absolute clarity about complex issues.

That's why we need institutions to interpret them.

But the institutions should be fair.

And the Supreme Court sometimes has taken over too much authority and too much power.

I have an article today on Gatestone, which starts with a quote from the book of Ruth.

And it says, when judges ruled the land, there was famine.

And I say, judges were not supposed to ever rule.

Going back to biblical times, judges are supposed to judge.

People who are elected or appointed appropriately are the ones who are supposed to rule.

Quickly, two other topics, and I know you have to go.

So if I can get a couple of quick takes on you.

The Democrats that are being handcuffed and throwing themselves into situations, do you find that to be a sign of a fascistic state or a publicity stunt?

Of course, it's a publicity stunt.

And they would admit it, you know, give them a drink at 11 o'clock at night in a bar, and they'll tell you that they're doing this deliberately to get attention.

Of course, a guy who was running behind in the mayor race in New York goes and gets himself arrested, and now he's on every New York television station, probably will move himself up in the polls.

So, no,

I don't believe in that, and I don't believe we should

take it seriously.

Last question.

I am proudly for Israel, but I'm also for America, and I am really tired of foreign wars.

And I think you can be pro-Israel and pro-America at the same time.

I don't think that you can you don't you don't have to say I'm for Israel defending themselves and then that makes me a warmonger.

I am also very concerned about Iran and have been for a very long time because they're twelvers.

They're Shia Twelvers that want to wash the world in blood to hasten the return of the promised one.

And so when they have a nuclear weapon, it's a whole different story.

No, I agree with you on that.

Ken Tucker Carlson is absolutely wrong when he says you have to choose between being America first or supporting Israel.

Supporting Israel in this fight against Iran is being America first, is supporting America.

Israel has been doing all the hard work.

It's been the one who's lost its civilians and

fortunately none of its pilots yet.

But

America and Israel work together for the interests of both countries.

So

I'm a big supporter of the United States, a patriot, and I'm a big supporter of Israel at the same time because they work together in tandem to bring about

Western values.

Should we drop a bomb?

Yes.

Should our plane drop a bomb?

Yes, we should.

And without killing civilians, it can be done.

It probably needs four bombs, not one bomb.

First, one bomb to open up the mountain, then another bomb to destroy what's going on inside.

In my book, The Preventive State, I make the case for when preventive war is acceptable.

And the war against Iran is as acceptable as it would have been to attack Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

If we had done that, if Britain and France had attacked Nazi Germany in the 1930s instead of allowing it to be built up, it could have saved 60 million lives.

And so sometimes you have to take preventive actions to save lives.

When is the preventative state out, Helen?

Oh, just now.

Just now.

And it's done very well on on Amazon.

New York Times refuses to review it because I defended Donald Trump.

And the Harvard Club canceled my appearance talking about the book because I haven't been defending Harvard.

I have been defending President Trump's attack.

By the way, I have a new book coming out soon called Trump to Harvard.

Go fund yourself.

Okay, well, let's stay on this one.

I'd love to have you on back next week to talk about the preventative state, if you will.

Of course.

Thank you, Ellen.

I appreciate it thank you so much you bet alan derschwitz uh harvard law school uh professor emeritus host of the dirse show and the author of the new book that's out now the preventative state i think that is a really important topic um because we are we are traveling down the roads where fascism on both sides where fascism can start to creep in um and uh and it's all for your own good and all for your own protection beware beware we'll talk about that uh next week with uh alan Alan Dershwitz.

This is the best of the Glenn Beck program.

Oh my gosh.

Mike Lee is here, a man who hates land, who hates fishing, who hates water, who hates air, who just wants to sell all of our national parks, or at least good portions of them, to private fat cats so he can build, quote, affordable housing.

And we all know what that's code for, right?

I mean, this is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.

And I have had this conversation with my family and I've tried to explain that to them calmly and peacefully.

And it doesn't seem to make an impact.

But maybe Mike Lee, who is a much better orator than I am, can actually bring the facts to the table so we can stop having this stupid argument on selling the federal lands.

Mike Lee, welcome to the program.

Thanks so much, Glenn.

Good to be with you.

Thank you.

You are hated by many members of my family because you want them to stop fishing.

You want them to stop going to the national parks.

They've been hunting in certain areas and you are going to take it from them.

Now, look,

if all I knew about this bill were that falsehoods being circulated by the left, I'd hate it too.

But look, Glenn, here's the truth.

Every one of those statements that you made in your opening reflects falsehood.

What we're dealing with is an entire generation of Americans that all failed to launch if we can't bring the dream of homeownership back within reach.

And years of failed policies that's helped drive up inflation and helped make living entirely unaffordable for young Americans.

We can't let that happen.

Meanwhile, the federal government owns 640 million acres of land, nearly a third of all land in the United States.

The vast majority of that land has zero recreational value.

Disposing of a fraction of 1% of that so that the next generation can afford a home is a common sense solution to a national problem.

Now, there are a lot of

Mike.

I will tell you that that sounds great, but you're talking about building affordable housing deep in the Olympic Peninsula, which is a rainforest.

It's a beautiful place.

You just want the Olympic Peninsula to have houses in it?

Absolutely not.

And look, the map being circulated by the Left-Wing Wilderness Society, run by President Biden's own BLM director and eco-terrorist, you know, Tracy Stone-Manning, is flat out misleading.

First of all, when this bill puts land up, puts it in the category of eligibility for sale.

It doesn't mean for sale.

It just means there's a process by which it could be transferred.

That's impossible right now.

Secondly,

with regard to any of these protected lands, the crown jewel lands of the United States,

in this bill,

it can't operate.

Like legally, it excludes anything that's within any of the 15 designations of federally protected land.

So if it's in a national park, a wilderness area, a recreation area, wild and scenic rivers, trails,

preserves, seashores, lakeshores, historic parks, memorials, any of the 15 categories, it's not even eligible for this.

And they're working on changes to further limit eligible lands to those

Forest Service-owned lands within two miles of a population center and lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management within five miles of a population center.

So this deals with land that is only

in or near a place where people live,

and it doesn't authorize the sale.

It authorizes a process whereby it could be considered for that purpose.

I have heard from my environmentalist friends and family that that doesn't give anyone any, they have no say in their own lands.

They have no say in their own lands.

You're just going to take it, and there's no process.

You're just going to decide and take it and sell it.

Yep.

All absolute falsehoods.

And

look, the bottom line.

What is the process?

What's the process, Mike?

The process for it, it requires the nomination, the application to the Bureau of Land Management or to the U.S.

Forest Service.

They say this meets these criteria.

It doesn't fit within...

any of the categories of protected land.

It's within either two miles or five miles of an existing population center, depending on whether it's Forest Service or BLM land.

And at the end of the day, if the land is deemed suitable for single-family housing, and by the way, that's all it's allowed for, is single-family housing, not high-density housing of any kind,

then and only then can it be purchased at

a

discounted rate so that more people can have access to land.

Now, look, we're talking here about nothing that would affect grazing rights.

It incorporates existing, valid existing rights, including grazing rights, and would take that land out of eligibility

for sale on something like this.

There is no land that will necessarily be sold, transferred, or handed over just because it appears on one of these maps.

What we're dealing with is a fraction of 1%

of the land owned by the U.S.

government, an entity that was never to own

between a fourth and a third of the land in the United States.

And this is not the crown jewel land.

This is garden variety land that's just sitting there vacant where people can, do, and should live.

Mike,

why is this so controversial among conservatives?

Well, frankly, I think some of it is being driven by the left, by misinformation driven by the left, and by people like Tracy Stone Manning.

I think there are other people,

other people who would consider themselves conservatives, who, for one reason or another,

are not

working off of accurate information.

And because they mistakenly believe that this bill would do more than it actually does, that it would sell

every parcel of land that we've got or every parcel of land that's listed as potentially eligible here, that that's going to bring on Armageddon.

But again, we're talking about a tiny fraction of all the land the U.S.

government owns, a fraction of 1% of all that.

In a state like mine in Utah, where the federal government owns close to 70%

of the land in our state, and meanwhile, we've got people moving in from places like California.

We've got families that are growing, and people are experiencing a genuine housing shortage.

This is there to help address that.

President Trump knows that this is unacceptable, that America should be dealing with such a housing crisis, especially in Western states like mine, where there's a lot of federal land.

That's why President Trump has talked about this sort of thing.

He said they can't find housing.

We have so much land, and we're going to put it to use.

And I applaud him for doing so.

What are the chances that this goes through as is?

Look, I think we've got a very good chance of it going through as part of the big, beautiful bill,

which the Senate will be considering as early as next week.

And look, the American people will be better off as a result of this.

We have to realize that it's more important,

particularly in lands that are in or near existing population centers,

we ought to make some of that available, especially in states with a lot of public land like mine.

I have family members, Mike, that I've been joking about it here, but I have family members been going back and forth with me.

We've had great conversations.

But it is,

they are really, truly terrified that the land that they have hunted on, they've camped on, they've hiked on, is all going to be gone, and they won't have anything to say about it.

Yes, well, and that's simply not true.

Look, we've got state and local government consultation requirements, and the agencies are still going to have to comply with

all kinds of existing federal laws,

including the APA necessitating a public process by which these lands would be considered.

And so those who are suggesting this bill does more than it actually does, in some instances, people might be operating on good faith based on things others have repeated.

But I think a lot of this is being driven by the far left and by people like ecoterrorist Tracy Stone Manning, who accept as almost an article of faith that you can't ever allow any land that is today

under the ownership of the U.S.

government.

You can't ever let that be owned by anyone else.

So It's simply illogical, and it's very unfair to those who live in public land states.

And 30 by 30 wants 30%.

So they want to gain another 3%.

And 50 by 50 wants 50% of the American land.

That is the goal of the left.

And, you know, I don't understand how people are not talking about that part of it, which is well documented.

I mean, Biden put it into play.

Why isn't anybody talking about this?

We're talking about

less than a half a percent,

and they're talking about gobbling up 3% in the next three years alone.

I don't know.

I think that kind of seems important.

And the other thing that really bothers me that the federal government is doing, our treasury is doing, is they're trying to put all of our land onto our balance sheet.

I don't like that, Mike.

What happens in the end when we can't pay our bills because we just would never face reality?

I mean, what happens then?

Who's buying the big banks, maybe foreign governments?

Who gets that land when the government is just pissed it away

in

debt?

No, that's exactly right.

We've got to get a hold of our debt and deficit.

We've also got to make it possible for people to continue to live the American dream.

And the way to happiness is not more government ownership.

The way to happiness is to allow the American people a fighting chance in the race of life and the ability to raise their families.

It's just on no planet is it unreasonable to say we're going to take a fraction of a percent of federal land that's not protected and make it potentially eligible for consideration for a place where people could live.

Aaron Powell, quickly, Mike,

how did they get all this land?

How did this happen?

All right.

As states were added to the Union,

starting really with the Louisiana Purchase, land that was not owned by somebody as of the moment of statehood was very often deemed federal in the Statehood Enabling Act of the state in question.

And states like mine, and many of those states added since the Louisiana Purchase,

got language in there contemplating that federal land would ultimately be sold and that as it was sold,

a percentage of it would go to the state,

often as is the case in Utah's Enabling Act, for the benefit of the state's public education system.

The U.S.

government honored that plan with respect to states throughout the Midwest.

When we got to the Rocky Mountains, the land was regarded as rugged, not as valuable, and it didn't unfold that way.

And policy changed in the mid-70s not leading to that.

But this all comes back to something that was actually discussed at the Constitutional Convention.

I believe it was Erbridge Gehry of Massachusetts who in September of 1787 raised a concern talking about the fact that

it could be a problem

if the U.S.

government controlled too much land in some of the states and utilized a vast authority over that land, it could compel those states to an undue sort of subservience to the U.S.

government.

And it's a legitimate concern.

And it's a concern that I think is reflected in this bill.

But this bill, more than anything, is there to help the American people afford housing, particularly in states like mine where there's a lot of federal land that doesn't have any recreational value or aesthetic value or scientific value, but is in a place where people live and need homes.

That should at least be eligible for consideration.

Right now, it's not.

That's unfair.

This bill would fix that.

Thanks, Mike.

I appreciate it.

I got to tell you, there's not a single person that signed the Constitution that would have signed it if they knew the federal government could control 70% of their land.

They would never have signed it.

Never have signed it.

Mike, thank you so much.

Appreciate it.

All right.

Let me tell you about you bet.

All you have to do is just get the facts.

Just get the facts.

And it's so clear on this one.

Mike and Alyssa are always trying to outdo each other.

When Alyssa got a small water bottle, Mike showed up with a four-litre jug.

When Mike started gardening, Alyssa started beekeeping.

Oh, come on.

They called it truce for their holiday and used Expedia Trip Planner to collaborate on all the details of their trip.

Once there, Mike still did more laps around the pool.

Whatever.

You were made to outdo your holidays.

We were made to help organize the competition.

Expedia, made to travel.