The latest Texas primary elections are sending signals that have Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck deeply concerned about the future of the state — and the country.

Specifically because Glenn believes voters might look at Republican candidates Ken Paxton and John Cornyn — and see something fresh in James Talarico.

“He strikes me as dangerous, because you’re going to get — there’s a thing in Texas where I think Texans see scandal and they don’t like scandal at all. And that, I guess, is a good thing, but not when the scandal blinds you to who the other person is,” Glenn explains.

“And Talarico seems like a very good, smooth talker that can do exactly what happened in Virginia and say, ‘Hey, I’m a moderate; I’m just following the words of Christ. I just care about my fellow man.’ And then next thing you know, old Jed’s a millionaire who has had all of his money taken by the federal government for some stupid crazy program,” he continues.

And Cornyn does not give Glenn the greatest hope either.

“I would have a really hard time voting for Cornyn. It would take everything in me to check that box for Cornyn. Everything in me to check that box. And the only reason I would do it is because I would know who Talarico is,” Glenn says.

“But most Republicans are not going to pay that much attention, and they’re going to see this guy as, ‘Oh, you know what? I don’t really like Cornyn, and I’m kind of sick of Cornyn here. What has he done lately? We need some fresh blood in there. And this guy seems like a good guy of God,’” he continues, before sending Texans a powerful message.

“I’m telling you, Talarico is a real, real danger, especially with the way things are running in Texas. I’m telling you: We lose Texas, we lose the country forever. And Texans, wake the hell up,” he says.

“It’s not the Texas that it used to be. It’s not. They’re moving in from California,” he says. “What do you think they’re going to vote for?”

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Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) declared Thursday that he would no longer seek re-election for Texas’ 23rd Congressional District seat.

Neither Gonzales nor his opponent, firearms influencer Brandon Herrera, secured enough votes in Tuesday’s Republican primary race, triggering a runoff election on May 26. Gonzales and Herrera previously faced off in a 2024 runoff election, where Gonzales narrowly won.

‘Through the rest of my term, I will continue fighting for my constituents, for whom I am eternally grateful.’

Gonzales initially dismissed rumors that he had had an affair with a former staffer who later committed suicide by setting herself on fire, claiming that the allegations were smear tactics to sabotage his re-election campaign. However, on Wednesday, Gonzales publicly admitted to the affair.

“I made a mistake,” he said. “I had a lapse in judgment, and there was a lack of faith. And I take full responsibility for those actions.”

On Thursday, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who previously endorsed Gonzales, called on him to withdraw from the race and noted that the Ethics Committee had opened an investigation into the lawmaker’s conduct.

RELATED: House passes the buck on Mace’s push for sexual misconduct disclosure amid Tony Gonzales scandal

Tony Gonzales. Photo By Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Later that evening, Gonzales issued a statement announcing his withdrawal from the race.

“After deep reflection and with the support of my loving family, I have decided not to seek re-election while serving out the rest of this Congress with the same commitment I’ve always had to my district,” Gonzales wrote. “Through the rest of my term, I will continue fighting for my constituents, for whom I am eternally grateful.”

Gonzales’ decision to withdraw secures Herrera’s bid as the Republican candidate for the 23rd Congressional District seat in Texas. Herrera will run against Democrat Katy Padilla Stout.

RELATED: Speaker Johnson tells Tony Gonzales to drop re-election bid after affair admission

Brandon Herrera. Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Herrera responded to Gonzales’ announcement, writing, “I appreciate Tony Gonzales for making the appropriate decision.”

“I look forward to being the voice of TX23 that our district deserves. From the border, to oil theft, water rights, data centers, and many other issues,” Herrera continued. “It’s an honor to be chosen and together we will make Texas proud.”

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Here in America, we tend to treat racism as our defining moral emergency. Careers collapse over it, and institutions reorganize around preventing it.

Yet we seem unable to distinguish deliberate racial animus from the mere presence of a forbidden word. The recent ugly incident at the BAFTAs — and its even uglier aftermath — makes this painfully clear.

Forced into public contrition to satisfy a ritual demand for outrage.

One of the films honored at this year’s ceremony was “I Swear,” a dramatized biography of Tourette syndrome advocate John Davidson. In attendance was Davidson himself.

Disruptive and involuntary

Tourette syndrome is a neurological disorder marked by involuntary motor and vocal tics that range from mild movements to disruptive speech; Davidson suffers from coprolalia (essentially Latin for “sh**t-talking”) — the rare but notorious form involving uncontrollable obscenities that, in the popular imagination, has come to stand in for the entire condition.

“I Swear” portrays the trials of living with such a condition, which at one point led Davidson to attempt suicide by walking into a river. It depicts a man who has been bullied, punched, and otherwise assaulted throughout his life because he can’t stop himself from saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.

Even in his moment of triumph — with the film about his life winning five awards, including Best British Film, Best Actor, and Best Screenplay — Davidson’s Tourette syndrome came back to haunt him.

‘The opposite of what I believe’

Throughout the evening, Davidson experienced multiple vocal tics. While actors Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo were presenting an award, one of those involuntary outbursts included the N-word. As Davidson would later tell Variety, he “ticked perhaps 10 different offensive words” that night; the racial slur was one among several.

Davidson added, “What you hear me shouting is literally the last thing in the world I believe; it is the opposite of what I believe. The most offensive word that I ticked at the ceremony … is a word I would never use and would completely condemn if I did not have Tourette’s.”

The audience had been warned in advance that vocal tics, including involuntary swearing, could occur.

Insult before injury

Host Alan Cumming addressed the incident from the stage, asking for “understanding” and apologizing “if you were offended.” Not long after, Davidson chose to leave the auditorium, later explaining that he was aware that his condition was causing distress.

But in the aftermath of the incident, some black Hollywood elites were quick to ignore the medical context in favor of moral condemnation. Actor Wendell Pierce wrote on X that “it doesn’t matter the reasoning for the racist slur,” insisting that “the insult … takes priority.”

Jamie Foxx, commenting on an Instagram post, was blunter: “Nah, he meant that s**t.”

“Sinners” production designer Hannah Beachler, who attended the ceremony, argued that the apology fell short, calling it a “throw away” response.

But the awkwardness of Alan Cumming’s on-stage apology — “if you were offended” — reflected an unusual moral dilemma To apologize unequivocally on Davidson’s behalf would have implied agency and culpability, as though a neurological disorder were a character defect. Yet to say nothing would have signaled indifference to the inflammatory power of the word.

Davidson himself drew the line the following day. “Whilst I will never apologize for having Tourette syndrome,” he said, “I will apologize for any pain, upset and misunderstanding that it may create.”

Permissible sin

Davidson was a careful to separate regret from guilt. But such nuance is apparently not possible where this particular slur is concerned. In America, we are expected to believe that uttering the N-word — regardless of intent or context — is one of the worst moral assaults any person can commit.

And so a man whose disorder makes him incapable of controlling certain outbursts was forced into public contrition to satisfy a ritual demand for outrage. The reaction was less about justice than about reaffirming the hierarchy of permissible sin.

You could ask for no better illustration of the kind of race-based narcissism our country has encouraged in attempting to atone for its genuinely racist past. By treating black Americans as permanently wounded and permanently aggrieved — so that even a wealthy and powerful celebrity like Foxx can feel victimized by someone like Davidson — we see them not as individuals, but as almost sacred symbols.

This attitude is dehumanizing. It denies agency. We all know that Foxx’s accusation is wrong; Davidson didn’t “mean” to offend. But there’s a sense in which we assume Foxx himself “can’t help” but react the way he did. After all, this is the N-word we’re talking about.

This is the same infantilizing impulse that makes honest discussion about persistent dysfunction in parts of the black community — crime, family instability, educational failure — feel radioactive.

RELATED: Tourette advocate’s BAFTA slur gets no empathy from stars

Aurore Marechal/Getty Images

Grandiose traits

The theory seems to be that black people have been so oppressed by pervasive “systemic racism” that it isn’t possible to hold them morally accountable in the same way you would anyone else. We’ve spent the last decade hearing about the “white supremacy” at the heart of America. This isn’t just an opinion — it’s actual science!

But there is some other science that complicates this story of permanent psychic injury. Decades of research have found that black Americans report higher average levels of self-esteem than white Americans.

And some research even shows that this can tip into pathology. A 2011 study in the Journal of Personality Research titled “Racial Differences in Narcissistic Tendencies” found higher self-reported levels of certain grandiose narcissistic traits among black participants.

Tourette’s-induced slurs are, of course, are not a widespread occurrence. But it’s worth noticing how the BAFTA incident strips the issue to its essentials. A mature society should be able to hold two ideas at once: that racial slurs are degrading and historically charged and that neurological conditions are real and mitigating.

If we can’t, we have a deeper problem. The woke era’s tendency to see racism everywhere means our current moral reflexes are less about serving truth than they are about protecting a narrative. The more we allow this collective delusion to take hold, the harder it will be to speak plainly to each other. A society that cannot speak honestly about motive and meaning will not remain merely confused; it will grow brittle. And brittle things tend to break under pressure.

​Narcissism, Lifestyle, Tourette’s, Tourette syndrome, Movies, Baftas, Jamie foxx, Racism, John davidson, Entertainment, Intervention 

President Donald Trump doesn’t tiptoe around the obvious. Even in his State of the Union address, he put dangerous, destructive realities in blunt terms.

So why doesn’t it land?

Many people cling to nonsense even when the nonsense has been exposed.

Why do ordinary people hear the twisted “logic” of the woke mindset and not respond with the only reasonable reaction: What?! That doesn’t even make sense!

Consider three simple propositions Trump has stated plainly.

“There are two sexes.”

“Men masquerading as women do not belong in women’s sports.”

“The first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens.”

Most Americans answer those without breaking a sweat: Yes. Of course. Move on.

Glenn Beck noted that the third line — “protect American citizens, not illegal aliens” — should land like Ronald Reagan’s “Tear down this wall!” A statement so clean should do serious damage to the Democrat brand — maybe even serve as the kill shot.

And yet we keep watching the same evasions, the same doublespeak, the same manufactured confusion. Even when someone drags the truth into the light, too many people stare at it and blink.

That’s the puzzle. Once a fact is stated plainly in a public forum, shouldn’t observers think: Of course, I see it! I knew it all along!

Learning is supposed to work that way. A rational mind stores what it sees and hears. When new evidence appears, it updates. When a similar situation comes along, it draws on what it already knows and responds accordingly.

So what explains the opposite? What explains a person seeing something that is as plain as day and still refusing to interpret it correctly?

Some cases are easy. Some people are self-deluded. Some are wicked. Some know they’re lying and do it anyway for profit, power, or self-aggrandizement. They surround themselves with gullible followers and use them.

Set those cases aside for a moment. Even then, you still face a stubborn reality: Many people cling to nonsense even when the nonsense has been exposed.

RELATED: The common-sense case for nationalizing US elections

Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images

That’s where a grim insight from Dietrich Bonhoeffer may help. Bonhoeffer wrote from a prison cell in Nazi Germany and reflected on “stupidity.” His point wasn’t that stupid people score poorly on tests. His point was moral and social: A person can become hardened against reason itself. He wrote:

Stupidity is a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice. One may protest against evil; it can be exposed and, if need be, prevented by use of force.

Evil always carries within itself the germ of its own subversion in that it leaves behind in human beings at least a sense of unease.

Against stupidity we are defenseless.

Neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed — in such moments the stupid person even becomes critical — and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental.

In all this the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self-satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack.

For this reason, greater caution is called for when dealing with a stupid person than with a malicious one.

Never again will we try to persuade the stupid person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous.

In modern vernacular, that insight has been whittled down to “you can’t fix stupid.”

So is that the answer? Does stupidity explain why so many people cannot process statements as basic as “there are two sexes” or “government must protect citizens first”?

Maybe.

Not as a way to sneer at strangers, but as a warning: Once a society trains itself to treat reality as negotiable, argument stops working. The debate stops being about evidence and becomes a test of loyalty, emotion, and power. At that point, the obvious doesn’t fail because it’s unclear. It fails because too many people have learned — willingly or not — to reject clarity.

Editor’s note: A version of this article appeared originally at American Thinker.

​Donald trump, State of the union, Woke mindset, Dietrich bonhoeffer, Two genders, Logical thinking, Woke left, Democrats, Opinion & analysis, Logic, Reason, Argument, Language, Nonsense