 And this is the problem with how American exceptionalism is used. It is a mixture of truth and falsehood. It is, again, I think, a package deal, what Iron Man called a package deal. A package deal is a concept in which you've put in lots of different things that don't necessarily belong together, that often indeed contradict each other. Now, I truly believe America is an exceptional country. I am a believer in American exceptionalism. And I follow Ayn Rand as articulated in much of this book and her other writings, right, the New Textbook of Americanism, the Politics of Ayn Rand, that America is unique historically. That America is the first and only country established on the basis of a moral principle, ethical principle, the principle of the sanctity of the individual, the principle that the individual owns his own life, the principle of individual rights, that you are as an individual free, free to pursue your life, free to act in pursuit of the values necessary for your life as you see fit, free to engage your mind in pursuit of those values. Nobody has a right to interfere. Nobody has a right to use coercion. Nobody has a right to use force to stop you from pursuing your values. And indeed, the United States was founded on this principle and the idea of government is there to protect your freedom, to protect your life, to protect you from coercion, from others. That's what made America unique. That's what made America exceptional. That's what made America the greatest country in human history, the only country to be founded on the basis of a moral principle. And it is that principle that made America the first capitalist country, truly capitalist country. It is that principle that allowed America to be a free country politically, embracing aspects of democracy, but more like representational government. It is that principle that made America a economically powerful country. It is that principle that made America a militarily powerful country. But it is that principle that makes America exceptional. Again, the idea of individualism, the idea that the role of government is to protect your right, the recognition of your right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. And that makes in America, that makes this country exceptional. And unfortunately, no country has picked up on that. No country has identified that. No country has embraced that anywhere near as much as America has. Reagan asks, do you think certain rights and principles of American freedom descend from Magna Carta and British-American common law, jury, personal sovereignty? Yeah, I mean, I think that's definitely the case, right? Definitely the case, that the American principles do not come out of nowhere. They come from a certain intellectual tradition. Now, primarily that intellectual tradition is the intellectual tradition of the Enlightenment. But even the Enlightenment itself is enriched by knowledge and by an intellectual tradition that includes the Magna Carta, that includes British common law, that includes ideas of individual liberty that developed over hundreds of years, primarily Northern Europe. I'd say primarily in place like Holland and in Britain. But were coalesced, developed, enriched, made philosophical by the thinkers of the Enlightenment, by the great philosophers of the Enlightenment and by the political theorists of the Enlightenment, and then put into action by a unique combination in the founders of intellectuals who are men of action, intellectuals who are men of politics, intellectuals who are ultimately men of revolution who are willing to implement their ideas, to risk everything, everything that they had, to implement these ideas of the Enlightenment, these ideas that have their roots in Greece and in Greek philosophy and in Greek ideas, but also in Roman law and ultimately in the Magna Carta and in common law, a rich intellectual tradition. You notice a rich intellectual tradition where I think only a minor part of it involves Christianity, overwhelmingly a secular intellectual tradition. Again, Greece, Rome and Northern Europe, Amsterdam and Great Britain where these ideas are developed through the secular mechanisms of common law but also through the great secular philosophers of that time. So American exceptionalism is that. It is this unique combination, intellectual political combination and identification combination that identified individual rights as the foundation of this country and manifest themselves in 140, 50 years of pretty much some of the greatest freedom in all of human history. Now, again, with the tragedy of slavery being thrown in there, who knows what American history would be like without slavery, but with the tragedy of slavery. But given that this history of 140 years of relative freedom is certainly at post civil war from civil war on till about 1913. Really, you know, the freest probably economy, the freest country in the world. And I'd say more than that, this freedom manifested itself. And I know this is going to be very controversial, but I think it's you cannot separate what America became and what America is in that American sense of life from the fact that in the 19th century America was a nation of immigrants. From the fact that people from all over the world, the risk takers from all over the world came to this country seeking that freedom, seeking a better life, being willing to risk everything, being willing to turn their back on their past, to turn their back on their nation, to turn their back on their family. They would never see their family again for the most part. And come here, come to America and be accepted into this country. Not so much with open arms. There was a huge anti-immigration movement in the 19th century. But politically, that anti-immigration movement had very little power, at least until the 1890s. So that these people were ultimately accepted into America and the opportunities were here. Legally, they weren't restricted. They could get a wagon and drive west and find land and cultivate their land and build their future. They could go to Pittsburgh or Cleveland and go work in the steel mills. They could go to Detroit, Michigan, and work in the auto factories. Or before the auto factories, Michigan was a huge lumber place and chemicals were started over. Michigan used to be the Silicon Valley of the United States. It used to be where entrepreneurs went to start new companies and achieve great things. How things change in America. So a big part of this was the openness of American society. And the bringing in of the best and the brightest and the best and the brightest in a sense of risk takers, in a sense of people willing to take on freedom, to embrace their own life, to try something new and to reject. And this is key. America attracted people to its shores who are willing to reject their homeland, their cultures, their traditions, their history, their ethnic group, their nation. They're willing to reject the tribalism and the nationalism of their home countries. And they're willing to start over as individuals and anything was possible. Anything was possible. I don't think you can understand America without that. When we say America is a nation of immigrants, yes, it very much is a nation of immigrants. Immigration plays a huge role in turning America into what it became. Because you can't separate freedom from immigration. A free country embraces the opportunity that people coming to its shores provide. A free nation does not reject new immigrants. It embraces them. It allows them the opportunity, the freedom to create, to produce, to make, to build, and to merge into the fabric of the culture that exists. A free nation is confident enough not to worry about the importation of culture, but to realize that when people leave to come to America, they are leaving for a reason because they want something better and they identify America as something better. And that's what America was. And that's part of what made... It's that idea of founding the country and the principle of individual rights, which makes America exceptional. That makes then possible capitalism, freedom, free immigration, and this notion of anything is possible. The notion of unlimited potential.