Best of the Program | Guest: Duncan Stroik | 12/13/24

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Hey, today's podcast is really great.

We start with a historic moment in radio that kind of asks, helps us ask a few questions that maybe should be asked about the drones in New Jersey.

Also, is the reason that Joe Biden pardoned all these Chinese spies to take away the heat from his family pardons, or is there more to that?

And we talked to the architect of the University of Notre Dame about the Cathedral of Notre Dame.

I had heard that a lot of it had been changed and it kind of was in, they were trying to make it into a temple of reason.

Is that true?

What did they actually do to that classic temple?

He is the professor of architecture in Notre Dame.

He'll tell us all about it on today's podcast.

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

Okay, so this is this.

I want to talk to you a little bit about history, and there's a reason I'm going to take you through this

because I need you to understand, in many ways, we have been here before.

And

while what was

being said at the time wasn't true,

in some ways,

in some ways, and I'll explain, it was, and why people went crazy.

Ever since I've been hearing about these drones, and I know it's me because I'm

just a weird radio freak,

but I've been thinking of Trenton, New Jersey.

Trenton, New Jersey.

Every time I hear it, say over New Jersey,

I think of a time before television where people sat in front of their radios and listened to music and news reports and plays and other programs for entertainment.

In 1938,

you were only about 10 years into almost everybody having a radio in their home.

Okay.

So you're about as far away from the beginning of radio en masse

as we are now from everybody having a cell phone, you know, smartphone, okay,

and social media.

So we see the effects and society completely changed.

And just like everybody does now, we're at the end, hopefully,

the beginning of the end end of everybody just trusting what's online.

People have a hard time trusting anything.

They trust what's in people's hands as they film something much more than

they believe anything else, right?

If I'm hearing it from a regular person, I trust it more, okay?

Media has destroyed itself.

Media hadn't destroyed itself in 1938.

At the time, the Chase and Sanborn hour was number one.

This is how desperate people were for entertainment.

On Sunday nights at 8 o'clock, Charlie McCarthy was the number one draw of radio.

Charlie McCarthy was a ventriloquist doll.

Now,

how hard is it to be a ventriloquist on radio?

All right.

That was the number one thing.

And it was on, it was always in this Chase and Sanborn hour.

But they usually led with something kind of boring.

And on this particular Sunday evening, the day before Halloween,

a guy named Orson Welles, who was looking to make a name for himself for his radio program because he couldn't get past Charlie McCarthy, decided to do something that had never been done.

He took an old novel set set in England, H.G.

Wells' War of the Worlds,

and at 8 o'clock that night,

he gives a quick little like one-minute opening.

And you know it's a show, but remember, everyone at that time is tuned in to Chase and Sanborn to see who was on the show and when Charlie McCarthy was going to come on.

So most of America missed this.

The Columbia Broadcasting System and its affiliated affiliated stations present Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater on the air in The War of the Worlds by H.G.

Wells.

Clearly, a radio program.

And then Orson Welles himself steps up to the mic to begin the narration.

Ladies and gentlemen, the director of the Mercury Theater and star of these broadcasts, Orson Welles,

we know now that in the early years of the 20th century,

this world was being watched closely by intelligences greater than man's.

Stop.

I want you to put yourself

not just

listen to what he's saying, but also

listen to the words he's saying and apply them today.

Now he's just narrating, and he says, in the early 20th century,

the world was worried that there were intelligences beyond our own, beyond our own capabilities,

that could harm us.

Hmm.

All right, next.

And yet as mortal as his own.

We know now that as human beings busied themselves about their various concerns, they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.

Stop.

Are we being scrutinized?

Is everything we're doing being scrutinized, monitored, catalogued?

Is there an intelligence out there that is, that knows us better than we know ourselves?

With infinite complacence, people went to and fro over the earth about their little affairs, serene in the assurance of their dominion over this small, spinning fragment of solar driftwood, which by chance or design man has inherited out of the dark mystery of time and space.

Yet across an immense ethereal gulf,

minds that are to our minds as ours are to the beasts in the jungle,

intellects vast, cool, and unsympathetic,

regarded this earth with envious eyes and slowly and surely drew their plans against us.

In the 39th year of the 20th century came the Great Disillusionment.

The Great Disillusionment.

It was near the end of October.

Business was better.

Business is better.

The war scare was over.

War scare is over.

More men were back at work.

Sales were picking up.

Sales were picking up.

On this particular evening, October 30th, the Crosley service estimated that 32 million people were listening in on radios.

All right, that's interesting.

The war scare.

In 1938.

We thought Hitler was going to invade, but, you know, Neville Chamberlain is just about to meet or just did meet with Hitler.

He's promising peace.

He doesn't invade until 39.

All right.

So the war scare is over.

Kind of like we all know Trump is coming into office and the war scare is over.

Does anybody else see any parallels to what's happening?

to us right now.

So he stops being the narrator and then he just becomes a character because nobody heard that part.

They were listening for Charlie McCarthy.

And it was about this time that people started to dial surf.

And this time they interrupt a program and say that there's been flashes off of Mars.

And they don't know what it is.

And then there are things seen in the sky, lights seen in the sky over New York and New Jersey.

And then something crashes in Grover's Mill.

So they send a team from Trenton, New Jersey.

They send the state police from Trenton, New Jersey to find out what it is.

In a few minutes, the Pentagon, not the Pentagon at the time, the War Department or the

Defense Secretary, will step to the microphone first and say, we have no idea what this is.

There's nothing to worry about.

And

then they start broadcasting.

And listen what happens.

Now, nearer home comes a special bulletin from Trenton, New Jersey.

It is reported that at 8.50 p.m., a huge flaming object, believed to be a meteorite, fell on a farm in the neighborhood of Grovers Mill, New Jersey, 22 miles from Trenton.

The flash in the sky was visible within a radius of several hundred miles.

and the noise of the impact was heard as far north as Elizabeth.

We have dispatched a special mobile unit to the scene, and we'll have our commentator, Carl Phillips, give you a word picture of the scene as soon as he can reach there from Princeton.

In the meantime, we take you to the Hotel Martinet in Brooklyn, where Bobby Millette and his orchestra are offering a program of dance music.

So you turn over from the other station, and you just hear that news break, and you're like, wow, that's weird.

Wonder what that is.

And then they play this little bit of music, and they break in back from Trenton.

And he's there, that quick.

Ladies and gentlemen, my aunt.

Ladies and gentlemen.

Ladies and gentlemen, here I am, back of a stone wall that adjoins Mr.

Wilmot's garden.

From here, I get a sweep of the whole scene.

I'll give you every detail as long as I can talk, and as long as I can see this.

More state police have arrived.

They're drawing up a cordon in front of the pit.

About 30 of them.

No need to push the crowd back now.

They're willing to keep their distance.

The captain's conferring with someone.

Can't quite see who.

Yes, I believe it's Professor Pearson.

Yes, it is.

Now they've parted, and the professor moves around one side, studying the object while his captain and two policemen advance with something in their hands.

I can see it now.

It's a white hackerchief tied to a pole.

Because

come out.

Those creatures know what that means.

What anything means.

Wait a minute, something's happening.

A humped shape is rising out of the pit.

I can make out a small beam of light against a mirror.

Look there.

There's a jet of flame springing from the mirror and it leaps right at the advancing men.

It strikes them head on.

Lords are turning into flames.

Out of a whole field followed by the woods of fires.

The gas tag tanks of the automobiles are spreading everywhere.

Coming this way now, about 20 yards to my right.

And then the broadcast cuts out.

And there's about 10 seconds of silence, and everybody in America's like, oh my gosh, what just happened?

What

just happened?

This might sound hokey to you now,

just as a lot of the stuff we're looking at now

in 10, 20, 70, 90 years from now, people will say, How the hell did they believe that?

But this is the way radio actually sounded

just the year

before

this broadcast.

America heard this over

and over and over again.

It's starting to rain again.

The rain had cracked up a little bit.

They backed motors of the ship are just holding it

just enough to keep it from it.

It's racing terrible.

Oh my, get out of the way, please.

It's burning and bursting in the flames and and it's holding on the blowing fast and all the folks between the this is terrible.

This is one of the worst catastrophes in the world.

Oh, it seems a flakes 20, oh, four or five hundred feet into the sky, and it's a terrific case, ladies and gentlemen.

It's smoke and it's flames now, and the flame is rising to the ground, not quite to the mooring mass.

All the humanity and all the fairs are just speeding around it.

I don't do it.

I can't talk to people and friends around there.

You see, it's

I can't talk, ladies and gentlemen honestly just laid down massive smoking wreckage and everybody can't hardly breathe and talk and screaming lady i i'm sorry

honestly i i can hardly breathe i i'm gonna step inside where i cannot see it

darling that's terrible

i can't

I listen, folks, I'm gonna have to stop for a minute because I've lost the voice and work together.

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Sound

kind of like what they'd hear on the radio a year later?

Almost exactly.

So now, why is this important

today

with what's happening over New Jersey in the skies?

Stu, let me

just ask you a series of of questions here.

What is that story that has been

shocking to you and I for the last five years?

And shocking because nobody's talking about it, and it's pretty big.

And the government keeps furthering the storyline.

You're talking about the weird things with UFOs over the past few years?

Yeah, yeah.

Right.

Okay.

That there's these ships that are just appearing, and we have no idea what they are.

Could be ours, could be somebody else's.

We don't think they're ours, but when does the government tell you the truth on things like this?

Okay,

then what was the next part in the story?

First, we found out UFOs are real.

Then, what was the next part of the story?

You remember?

We have some,

we have pieces of some, and we're trying to

build them and and

retro design,

design from what we have and understand, design something using the technology that we found, right?

Reverse engineering.

Reverse engineering.

Thank you.

That was the next step.

Then the latest step is

we or someone else has them.

We're worried that Russia has them.

China has them.

We don't know if we have any, okay?

But whoever gets there controls the world

because

you can't track them.

They're too fast.

They avoid all radar.

They avoid everything.

You can't track them.

They can fly in the sky.

They can stop.

They can go underwater.

You just can't track them.

That was the latest in that five-year saga, if you were paying attention to it, correct?

Uh, yeah, I

mean, I guess maybe I remember parts, bits, and pieces of this, but it's weird, like, and you've made this point before, but you'd think every one of these developments would be the only thing we're talking about, correct?

But there's been so much other stuff that, like, it's been lost in the noise a little for me.

Correct, lost in the noise.

Now, let me ask you:

which one

is noise?

Is the whole UFO thing noise?

Or is the whole what's going on in Washington noise?

Unrelated to UFOs?

Which is which?

And why can't we figure it out?

What would we have said 25 years ago?

25 years ago, this was happening.

We would have said, That's the United States government doing something, right?

That's what I said to you yesterday.

But then some other things happened last night, and I thought,

How could I have gotten on yesterday and said, With such surety, this is nothing, this is us?

Because

this isn't Orson Welles.

Or is it Orson Welles, but not being paid by the media?

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Now, back to the podcast.

This is the best of the Glenn Beck program.

And don't forget, rate us on iTunes.

Before we get back into the drone story,

I want to

I want to just give you some disturbing things that are happening.

President Joe Biden is commuting the sentences of 1,500 Americans who were released from prison, placed on house arrest during the pandemic, will be pardoning 39 individuals who were convicted of nonviolent crimes.

Okay, that's the largest single-day clemency in modern history.

Okay, all right.

But he's also now pardoning people who are murderers

on death row

and setting them free.

Now,

that is disturbing until you read this.

President Joe Biden announced on Thursday granting 39 pardons, 1,499 commutations in his administration, blah, blah, blah.

However, as you're looking through, Joe Biden just pardoned multiple Chinese spies.

Also an individual that was convicted of possessing child pornography.

Now,

why?

Child pornography?

I don't know.

Maybe that was his son.

I didn't see any on his laptop, but

would anybody be surprised?

And we know that the Hollywood group and everybody else,

even the teachers' union, just doesn't seem to have a problem with any of that.

But the Chinese spies.

Now, that seems

a little odd, doesn't it?

Why would you pardon?

You exchange spies.

You don't pardon spies.

You know, unless you've been taking money from...

Oh, but that's right.

His son, who was the one that was actually taking money from the communist government, has been pardoned for everything

that he did or may have done

beginning in 2014 up to today.

Okay.

Or, sorry, two weeks ago.

Gee, what, 2014?

Why was that that?

Oh, that's right.

Because that's when Ukraine started.

What was happening in Ukraine?

Well, as we showed you when we did our investigation on that perfect phone call in a four episode series on what really happened in Ukraine.

When we did this, I don't know, 2018, we were shocked at what we found.

What we found was the United States was sending money to NGOs.

It was all dirty money.

They were all over

doing all kinds of things and trying to overthrow the government and did of Ukraine.

And who was one of them besides the Bidens?

Hillary Clinton.

Now, isn't it strange that for the first time,

Bill Clinton comes out and says, hey, I'm not, I don't want my wife to be pardoned.

She didn't do anything.

Except yesterday, he's saying to the Bidens, hey, maybe you should add my wife to a pardon?

Why?

Because he's not, Donald Trump already proved he wasn't going to go after her.

Why?

She's not a political enemy at this point, but she's deeply involved in Ukraine.

Oh, by the way, did I mention earlier this week, President Biden gave another $600 million to Ukraine.

And yesterday, another aid package to Ukraine worth $500 million was granted.

Huh.

Now.

As I said last hour,

we have all relaxed a little bit on war because Donald Trump is coming in.

But we see what our government and Joe Biden's administration is doing just to keep poking and poking and poking and trying to get people to respond.

Democrats now have called on Biden to tie Trump's hands over the U.S.

nuclear strike capabilities.

That is the job of the President of the United States.

They want him to now tie the hands on our strength.

Donald Trump is the clearest president on nuclear weapons since Ronald Reagan.

They cannot be used.

If you do anything with nuclear weapons, we blow up the entire world.

We kill everybody.

You cannot he's been warning and warning and warning.

And the threat

is what matters.

But why do the Democrats want to take that threat off?

Oh, by the way, also the DOJ, the

investigating general,

that office

came out and said, by the way, yeah, we found out 26 FBI informants were there on January 6th.

What?

A shock.

Meanwhile, Pete Hagseth, there was a story going around yesterday, he never even, he wasn't even, he didn't even apply to go to West Point.

He certainly wasn't accepted.

And we've talked to the government officials at West Point, and they agree.

Nope, not true.

How did that end?

He happened to keep their letter

accepting him into West Point.

Okay.

So I just want you to think about everything that is going on as we go back to the drone story.

I want you to remember the record of our military right now under this president.

I want you to keep

remembering that guy is barely in control of his bladder,

let alone the United States of America.

He's just pardoned Chinese spies who are known for their drones.

China just gave a bunch of drones to Iran, which he has also funded.

Now, I told you last hour, the most boring explanation of this is these drones that are over in New Jersey and everywhere else, that they can't seem to lock in.

They can't detect them on radar.

Hmm.

Wow, that seems like a problem.

These drones, the most boring explanation is some of them aren't drones.

They're just people are seeing things that aren't there or they're seeing planes that they think are drones.

But some of them are drones.

This, again, this is the best explanation I can come up with.

And like I said yesterday,

And the rest of them are ours, and we're showing that the government has some some new technology that nobody else has that even can get past our defenses.

Okay.

All right.

Maybe, maybe.

But it's from this government, this administration that has projected weakness forever.

My mind changed yesterday when I read about the spies being,

and I thought, you know what?

That is.

This is, this would be too strong for this Pentagon and this group of girls in the White House to project strength to the rest of the world.

I don't believe it.

I just, I, I, I, it probably is true.

I no longer believe what I told you yesterday.

Okay?

The problem with the

most boring explanation that it's, it's, it's really just hobbyists is that shows that our government is so inept

that we can't catch hobbyists.

That's a problem.

That does not project strength to the rest of the world.

Jason Buttrell is joining me now, chief researcher.

He's also former military intelligence.

Okay,

where do you stand on this?

Because yesterday we were kind of in line, but I just have a hard time with this.

Just on the drones, or what about the pardons?

I wanted to interject a couple of different times there.

So, yeah, okay.

So, um, let's start with the pardons and then we'll get back into the drones.

Go ahead.

I, your TV show on Wednesday almost kind of goes right in line with my thinking on these pardons.

Everything is a psyop.

Everything is a deep state psyop.

I don't buy for a second that right after he pardons Hunter Biden and we're expecting other pardons like

maybe James,

maybe his wife, who knows how many others.

He makes a record-setting commutation you know pardon list that dominates the headlines and suddenly we're not talking about

why did he pardon hunter going from 2014 to to 2024 for crimes that he may have committed or did uh why is he pardoning uh james like who else is involved what are the connections that we can draw like oh no no no no no now it's just this record-setting commute no i don't buy for a second that you know and we know that these pardons especially presidential pardons, they're not because the president's like, you know what?

I've been following these, you know, these cases personally.

No.

They're being brought to him.

Yes, they are.

And the same way that the military-industrial complex is handling, in my opinion, this drone situation, they're the ones directing that.

It's not the president of the United States.

Definitely not

the guy with

the pudding eater in chief right now.

He doesn't have any freaking clue what's going on.

Or the president, Barack Obama.

Or exactly, exactly, right, on his third term.

Yeah.

But I think everything is a psyop.

And I think that I think these pardons are going to get more and more interesting.

We need to stay on top of them because they're going to try and misdirect our attention on some of these other things.

But what you really need to be looking at, I love the way that you're looking at the China situation, these Chinese pardons, because who are they?

Do they have any connections that go back to CEFC?

I don't know.

I haven't looked at them.

But that's the type of questions we need to be asking.

CEFC is the company that the Bidens were doing business with.

Do they have connections connections with drone technology?

But how do you go out?

For instance, they're also selling the border fence now.

We have all this stuff that's ready to go sitting there at the border, been sitting there for five years.

And we tried to sell it once, nobody wanted it.

And so now we're selling it at pennies on the dollar, and it's all being hauled away.

Yeah.

Now, why would you do that?

I mean, I am approaching the

place, and Stu, you know this, I do not use the word treason because it is in the Constitution and it means death if you're convicted of treason.

It's very hard to convict somebody of treason, et cetera, et cetera.

But I'm having a hard time with all of these dots that are out there

that are just

weakening us.

Trying to preserve that weakness, trying to subvert the will of the next president of the United States on not just some things,

everything.

Everything.

I'm having a hard time in the last few weeks of this guy.

You?

Just meaning whether you're going to, because the treason part kind of complicates, I think, your question.

I'm just saying

that, but

I am, for the first time, getting to an area where I'm like, you know, if you can prove all this stuff, this was a traitor in chief.

Geez, yeah.

I mean, you know,

it's hard to even understand if he's president.

I don't even know, you know, you point out, like, does he know what's going on?

I don't even know how that would work, honestly, in this case, because he doesn't seem to be even aware of what's occurring.

So if he's not president, then who is the traitor?

And because it is treasonous to take the powers of the president and just be a shadow president, whether you're vice president or not.

That also is against the Constitution.

And it would be nice, too.

They put on the nice face for the transition.

They invite Trump to lunch, right?

Like there's all these nice things that they seem like they're doing.

We're going to give a, they make the speeches about the peaceful transition.

But I mean, their actions

don't line up with that at all.

You know, and I, I,

every, everybody, we should get back to that.

It's a it would be a good idea to get back to that and respect what the people actually say when they vote.

It's interesting,

these proponents of big government, you know, like the people that are in power now, I think that they're the ones that don't...

They don't agree with a strong executive.

And a strong executive used to be like a bad word or a dirty word.

Even the founders agreed with a strong executive.

Go back to any of the Federalist papers when they talk about it.

They wanted a strong executive.

They wanted a strong legislative and judicial branch.

They wanted them strong.

Why?

Because they have the power to push back on each other.

The current brand of progressivism does not want a strong executive.

They want a committee that's in charge of the executive.

Because it's 100 years into this and they have eviscerated, and Congress and the Senate have given their powers to the executive branch.

And the executive branch had to be strong to protect all of those things.

But now the executive branch is so strong,

the only thing holding it back is the Supreme Court.

And so now

you want all of the people just to run what the plan has been.

You don't need the president anymore.

Well, yeah, the president is not the executive in this case.

I mean, he's part of it, but you're mostly looking at his appointed people that are carrying everything out, the bureaucracy.

You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.

Welcome to the Glenn Beck program.

So last weekend, everybody was in,

well, everybody who was anybody.

Of course, I wasn't there.

You weren't there.

Nobody I know was there.

But all of the leaders of the world were in France for the reopening of the Cathedral of Notre Dame.

And it's supposed to be marvelous, wonderful, and

way ahead of schedule, etc.

But I heard at the beginning that they were going to make this kind of into a temple of reason again and kind of finish what the french revolution started um and they they didn't they restored part of it but there was a big argument of do we go modern or do we put the gothic back in and i hate this i absolutely i i have no problem against i have no problem with modern architecture um

but there is

you know jefferson said if you want your civilization to survive even beyond you, you must embed your principles in your architecture.

Greece, we get it because of their architecture, a lot of it.

The medieval times, we get it because of the architecture.

And maybe it's time for all of us to go modern because so much of it makes no sense that you're like, yep, well, that's a sign of our times.

Duncan Stroijk, he is an architect, and I wanted him on to talk about what did they do to Notre Dame in the end.

Duncan, welcome to the program.

It's great to be here, Glenn.

I've really enjoyed your recent programs, especially with this great time of emphasis on the Nativity.

Well, thank you very much.

So

Notre Dame,

the last time

that I know of, that it was really desecrated and almost destroyed was during the French Revolution, and they wanted to make it a temple of reason.

And then I heard they were going to do this again, and it was going to be to, you know, the earth and all of this crap.

Did any of that happen?

And what changes did they make

to the cathedral?

That's a great point.

I agree with you

that

our great cathedrals, especially in the Gothic period, have had three enemies, fire,

vandals, and iconoclasts.

And poor Notre Dame has had all of those.

And the fire was devastating.

But what makes it even more painful is that after the fire did its work, that the iconoclasts came in and wanted to vandalize.

And was it, I mean, because I know there was this big panel put together and everything else.

Was there anybody that was really, that actually in France believed in God that

was on the architectural board?

I think there is, but they're not supposed to admit to it.

There's a wonderful interview

with Philippe Villeneuve, who was the head architect and who really fought.

to restore it the way it was, especially the spire, the 19th century spire.

And he gets, I give him the major credit for the restoration and preventing the vandals and the iconoclasts from doing their work.

But Philippe never said anything.

And I talked to him in person a couple of times.

He never said anything about God or about faith.

But there's a recent interview with him, and he admits that he has faith, that

was kept him going during these last six years, and also that the mother of God helped him immensely in rebuilding this little church.

I can't imagine what it was like being a God person

rebuilding the most famous cathedral in the world and not be able to say, hey, you know, there's some God stuff here in this Gothic architecture

we may not want to lose.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And it's so amazing because Mac Cron, the president, he,

you know, originally he wanted to have a competition to redo the outside of it and do something 21st century, something of our time.

And the elites and the architects were, you know, excited,

you know, greedy little animals wanting to eat up this beautiful building.

And fortunately, the people of France fought that.

But he did not give up.

Every step of the way, he says, well, could we have a competition to redo the stained glass?

Could we have a competition to redo the side chapels?

Could we do, you know, anything he could do to get the contemporary in there?

And unfortunately for him, not for me, but for him, the contemporary means the secular.

So what did, what is massively different when you go there now?

I think Philip Villaneuve got 98% of it.

I mean, he really succeeded.

They rebuilt the roof exactly the way it was, including with medieval axes.

They rebuilt the spire the way it was in 1860 with handmade joinery, wood joinery.

They redid the lead roof,

which is very handmade, very phenomenal.

They redid all the stonework, the five huge openings in the ceiling that had been destroyed.

They restored and cleaned some of the side chapels and the paintings, which just are, you know, were kind of darker.

Now they're beautiful.

So he got 98% of it.

Mac Cron got very little.

The elite art world that doesn't go to church, doesn't believe in church,

are very influential.

They got very little.

But unfortunately, the Archbishop of

was philosophically or at least aesthetically in league with Macron.

So some of the things that he spent money on are of a contemporary.

Most people won't even give them a second thought because they are so out of, you know, out of touch with the rest of the building.

That's actually good news because I thought a lot more had been done that was bad.

So that is really good to hear.

You are a great story.

It really is.

I'm very thrilled.

Complaint of these little minor interior decorating things that look like they're ephemeral and you can get rid of them next year.

It really is a triumph.

So you're a professor of architecture at the University of Notre Dame.

And I want to ask you,

so much

of our architecture is just meaningless.

And I'm not against modern architecture.

Some of it is interesting

only because of what we can now do.

But

it doesn't really even speak to anything,

even a century from now, I don't think.

But I was reading that there is this new

AI-driven machinery that can now recarve from solid marble in a fraction of a time and not even close to the cost.

You know,

you could rebuild all of the great statues and go back to even a Gothic kind of architecture at a fraction of the cost.

and the time.

But, you know, I kind of think when you see David, I have to tell you, went to Florence and my wife and I stood in the square.

I didn't know that the one in the square was a fake.

And we were standing in the square and I went, huh?

Well, I've seen that before in all different sizes, and it wasn't that impressive.

And then I went into the museum where the original is, and I cannot tell you what the difference is, but that one is alive.

The other one is not.

Yes.

What is the difference?

And

will,

you know, by getting rid of handmade things,

don't you think that just changes absolutely everything?

Totally, totally.

And especially when it comes to art with sculpture, with decoration, with figures, with floral things, the hand is where it's at.

And I do,

we use modern technology to cut our marble and our limestone.

But the thing that gets me so excited is to see that guy with his hands actually cutting into the stone and making a Nacantha sleeve.

No question with sculpture.

I believe totally with sculpture that it's the key.

And so, yes, the David is a great example because there's a couple of great, great copies in Florence.

And the one that we're all moved by is the one by that Michelangelo guy.

Why is that?

And they look identical.

Yes, yes.

Totally.

And

they were very good sculptors who did it, and they were copying it as closely as they could.

And so

there's something beautiful about the hand.

I'm with you.

And I really want to, and they did that as much as they could at Notre Dame in this new restoration.

And I think we want to, and young people were involved in it.

That's what's also exciting is that young people today want to do things with their hands.

Some people do.

Other people want to do video games.

But, you know,

I think there's a good future for a lot of this.

Yeah, I think the more we get into AI, there's going to be a real problem of dislocation dislocation of people and artists and everything else that we're going to have to figure out soon.

But once we get past that,

it's kind of like

it's kind of like when clothing went to machine-made.

At first, everybody wanted it made by machine.

Now, if it's handmade, Holy cow, is it different?

You know, even from, I was just talking to somebody about, you know, everybody buys ripped jeans now.

We were embarrassed when I was a kid because our moms would patch them.

Now you'll pay $150 extra if they're patched by a machine, but we're trying to buy that authenticity that, yeah, I wore these out, even though we didn't.

You know what I mean?

Yes, yes.

And one of the things that really amazed me was at the roof of Notre Dame, which took about 1,500 trees, some 80 feet tall, that they had to use from the old state forests for the great buildings to make this roof.

1,500 trees, and most of them were cut by hand using axes.

1,500 trees.

They had 60 men working for three or four years cutting these trees and then forming them into square timbers and then joining them with dovetails and mortise and tenons.

And it was all handmade.

How did they get this done?

I mean, the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

took forever.

How did they do this so fast?

Well, I think it was national pride, and it shows you that the French still have it in them to restore, but I also believe build things of that quality of the Middle Ages.

They still have it.

They have the people that love it.

And even though the elites and the leadership, you know, the political leadership don't think it's valid, but the regular people and the craftsmen, they know this was a high point.

This is a golden age and that we could do it again today.

So I'm very excited about the French.

I want to export the French,

these mastercraftsmen, to other countries, especially the U.S., where we can afford it, and get them to train us and lead us to do this in America on a smaller scale or whatever.

But

I think we want to do that.

Duncan, thank you.

If you're ever in Dallas, please let me know.

I'd love to have lunch with you sometime.

You're fascinating.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for what you do, Ben.

Thank you for speaking up.

You got it.

Duncan Stroich, he is an architect and the professor of architecture at the University of Notre Dame.