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The 25th Anniversary of 9/11 and the Hurt People Line: Jim Pfaff on On Second Thought | Sep 4, 2026

Published: September 4, 2026
Network: WHKY Radio, Hickory, North Carolina
Analysis: Conservative Caucus President Jim Pfaff

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Four words are being used to explain the September 11 attacks, and Jim Pfaff will not accept them: hurt people hurt people. On the September 4 edition of On Second Thought with Chuck Boozer on WHKY in Hickory, Conservative Caucus President Jim Pfaff took that line apart as the country approached the 25th anniversary of 9/11. Pfaff was on the phone from Fairfax, Virginia, one day out from flying to Dallas for the Republican National Committee midterm convention on September 9 and 10, and the hour covered three things: the jury instructions in the Lindsay Clancy trial in Massachusetts, what a culture without shame does to moral behavior, and what The Conservative Caucus is building on the platinum level of the stadium in Dallas.

Topics Covered

• Not Hurt People Hurting People: The 25th Anniversary of 9/11
• Beyond a Reasonable Doubt: The Clancy Jury Instructions
• A Culture That Does Not Press Moral Behavior
• From Fairfax to Dallas: The Midterm Convention Preview
• Half Staff for Dolly Parton
• Key Takeaways

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Not Hurt People Hurting People: The 25th Anniversary of 9/11

Boozer set it up plainly. He and his co-host David have been trying to do several things to remind people that the country is coming up on the 25th anniversary of being attacked on its own land, with thousands of Americans killed, and that the stated reason has never amounted to much more than they did not like us. Boozer called it a strange quarter-century to mark.

Pfaff answered by naming the explanation currently in circulation. Abdul El-Sayed, running for Senate in Michigan, said that hurt people hurt people — that, Pfaff noted, is being offered as the reason they did it. Pfaff would not let it stand as the lesson of the anniversary.

“This was not hurt people hurting people. These were evil people doing evil things.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

The distinction is not rhetorical. If the attacks were the product of injury, the response is therapy and grievance management. If they were the product of intent, the response is confronting the intent. Pfaff put the toll at 3,000 Americans killed and said the intent behind it has not gone away. He then stated his own conclusion about the religion, and drew the line himself before he did: he would not judge all followers of Islam as evil at their core necessarily, he said, because a lot of them seem to be nice people.

“I definitely would not judge all followers of Islam as evil at their core necessarily, because a lot of them seem to be nice people. I have come to the conclusion as time has gone on that Islam is, when properly followed, an evil religion.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

His case for that rests on history. He pointed listeners to Raymond Ibrahim — he spelled the last name out on air, with an I — as one of the experts on Islamic history, and said Christianity is not a white Christian religion: up until the sixth century two-thirds of the Christian religion was based in Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey, down through Israel to northern Africa, and the Islamic caliphates, in his account, literally destroyed Christianity by killing the Christians in all of those areas. Christianity kept its European centricity, he said, because two-thirds of it was gone by the end of the ninth century. “So this is the religion that did that,” Pfaff said. “It did it based on its books. 9/11 was perpetrated from that very same evil intent.”

Where he took it next was domestic politics. Pfaff said the country has a serious battle on its hands internally that is now getting worse, in that “we’re allowing Islamists to spew their trash as candidates for Congress” — a problem of the same shape as the one we covered in socialists in Congress and the oath of office.

“The United States is the worst country that there ever was except for all the rest.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

That is the frame Pfaff brings to the 25th anniversary of 9/11: Winston Churchill’s line about democracy, applied to the country itself. His point to Boozer was that every country has criticisms available against it throughout its history, and that this one is still the best on offer — and that it was precisely the country, not a policy, that was under attack on September 11. He added that people connected to China who do not believe the good about this country have held positions inside the government, and that many of them have been put out during the Trump administration.

Beyond a Reasonable Doubt: The Clancy Jury Instructions

The segment opened somewhere else entirely. Boozer had heard while riding his lawnmower that the judge in the Lindsay Clancy trial in Massachusetts had brought the jurors back in one by one — nine women and three men — on the seventh day of deliberations, after someone reported that the panel was not adhering to the rules.

Pfaff explained what the judge was doing.

“Beyond a reasonable doubt is a very high standard, because a reasonable person has to be able to say that they believe that there was a crime committed. And that can be a very challenging thing.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

Beyond a reasonable doubt is the standard in criminal trials. Preponderance of the evidence is the standard in civil trials, where what is at stake is a monetary judgment or something with monetary effect. Pfaff said a reasonable person has to be able to say they believe a crime was committed, and that this can be a very challenging thing to do.

Pfaff has sat in that room. He was the foreman on a gun trial when he was living in Colorado Springs, and the defendant in that case would have gone to jail. He called jury work pretty serious business when something is at stake, and read the judge’s conduct here the same way: after interviewing every juror individually, the judge felt it necessary to come in and make the standard explicit, which means something is going on in that room that the public does not know about.

A Culture That Does Not Press Moral Behavior

What bothered Pfaff was not the trial mechanics but the audience. He told Boozer it is interesting that we are in a culture where people are cheering on a defendant who by her own admission strangled her children, and that there might even be jurors who think it is okay. He called it one of the most bizarre cases he has seen in a long time, and he has seen the O.J. Simpson trial.

Boozer relayed a caller — an older woman he described as very smart and very streetwise — who made the practical point: if she was afraid she was going to hurt the children, she had every opportunity in the world to hand them to somebody else. Call a relative. Take them to the fire department. Pfaff agreed the caller’s statement was wise, and then explained why the option is harder than it sounds. A woman who has carried and borne those children has an emotional tie that does not release on command, whatever her mental condition. That is exactly where a culture is supposed to do some of the work.

“But we don’t live in a culture right now that supports proper moral behavior in the way it should.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

Pfaff’s read of the public is not pessimistic. He said most Americans, of any religious faith, still uphold a lot of what is in the Ten Commandments — they believe those things matter, they do not like being mistreated, and they want to treat others well. He was not claiming anyone is perfectly good. The failure he named is institutional: the culture does not press that sentiment, and there is no shame in it right now, which is one of the things that could help prevent problems like this in general.

From Fairfax to Dallas: The Midterm Convention Preview

Boozer asked whether Pfaff was headed to the midterm convention, and where he would land — Love Field or DFW. DFW, Pfaff said, flying out the next day, with the setup crew going in behind him. The RNC midterm convention in Dallas on September 9 and 10 is the first of its kind, and this interview ran a week ahead of it — the same week as the 25th anniversary of 9/11 — which puts it at the front of our coverage of the RNC Midterm Convention in Dallas.

“So we reserved a large suite on the platinum level of the stadium.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

Pfaff described going all out: regular broadcasts, live updates, a live feed so TCC supporters can watch what is happening, and interviews with members of Congress and key people. The logistics have a hard deadline attached. Everything has to be loaded in and the studio set up by Sunday night, because after the 7th the Secret Service shuts the building down and, as Pfaff put it, you can pretty much only bring your iPhone in. Broadcasts begin Monday and Tuesday, before the event itself. Anyone looking for the feed can find it at theconservativecaucus.com or by following TCC on X at TCCaucus.

Wednesday and Thursday are the part Pfaff says matters for the country, and his standard for the convention is a messaging standard.

“We’ve got to change the messaging on the Republican side of things. Republicans in Congress aren’t helping us.”
— Jim Pfaff, President, The Conservative Caucus

His argument runs in a straight line from there: Trump is doing great things, so Trump and JD Vance are the two who have to carry the message on those two days — what is truly at stake, and what Americans gain by not handing this thing over to communists. Pfaff does not soften the label. He told Boozer the Democrat Party is a socialist communist party, that it is seeking to overthrow this country, and that we need to fight against that. That is the case he went to Dallas to make, and the reason he treats a convention program as a turnout instrument rather than a ceremony.

Half Staff for Dolly Parton

With about three minutes left, Boozer raised a mayor somewhere who had refused to lower the flag to half staff after the president ordered flags lowered in Dolly Parton’s memory. Pfaff came down on the side of the honor. Everything he has heard from the few people he has met over his life who knew her in some form or fashion is that she was one of the kindest people you could meet, thoughtful of others, and a savage businesswoman who never took advantage of people.

He did not pretend the question is uncomplicated for someone of his convictions. By her own admission, he said, “she wanted to portray herself as the beautiful tramp” — that was how she described it, and she always joked about it herself — and there is a certain degree to which some people of Christian sentiment, himself included, might find some of that not quite as savory. His conclusion was that it does not govern the public honor. She built Dollywood and the businesses beyond it, she did great things for the country through her entertainment and her business acumen, and God sorts out people in the end. Short of a radical Democrat socialist who wants to destroy the country, Pfaff said, someone who has had that kind of an impact should be honored at half staff.

Key Takeaways

1. Evil, not injury – Pfaff rejected Abdul El-Sayed’s “hurt people hurt people” framing for September 11. On the 25th anniversary of 9/11, his formulation is that 3,000 Americans were killed by evil people doing evil things, and that the same intent is still operating. He would not judge all followers of Islam as evil at their core, he said, but he has come to the conclusion that Islam, when properly followed, is an evil religion.
2. Two legal standards, one jury room – Beyond a reasonable doubt governs criminal trials; preponderance of the evidence governs civil ones. The Clancy judge interviewed all twelve jurors individually on the seventh day of deliberations and restated the criminal standard, which Pfaff read as a sign of a problem inside that room.
3. He has been the foreman – Pfaff served as jury foreman on a gun trial in Colorado Springs where the defendant faced jail. His verdict on jury service: pretty serious business when something is at stake.
4. Shame is the missing institution – Pfaff says most Americans of any faith still hold to a lot of the Ten Commandments, but the culture does not press that sentiment and has no shame left in it — one of the things that could help prevent cases like this one.
5. TCC is on the platinum level in Dallas – A large suite at the stadium, regular broadcasts, live updates, a live feed and interviews with members of Congress, all loaded in by Sunday night because the Secret Service closes the building after the 7th.
6. The convention is a messaging test – Republicans in Congress are not helping, in Pfaff’s view, so Trump and JD Vance have Wednesday and Thursday to tell Americans what is at stake and what they gain by not handing the country to communists.

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About The Conservative Caucus:
The Conservative Caucus is a grassroots public policy action organization, formed in 1974. Headed by President Jim Pfaff, the Caucus is committed to advancing free enterprise, limited government, and traditional values.

Originally broadcast Sep 4, 2026 on On Second Thought with Chuck Boozer, WHKY Hickory, one week before the RNC midterm convention in Dallas.