BS: what about Glen Beck?

Subject: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 04:46 AM

Lately I've been forcing myself to watch The Glen Beck programme on Fox. It’s not easy; the man appears to be a total, albeit a dangerous, buffoon. What I've been wondering is, just who is his target audience? Given his constant use of visual aids, blackboards etc I am coming to the conclusion that it is either elementary school children or mentally challenged adults. Surely otherwise the use of such "aids" are superfluous and an insult to the average adult intelligence. Any sign of intelligent analysis of any of his chosen subjects seems to be absent from his shows. It appears to be replaced by screaming, jumping about and "gurning" (making faces to you non Brits) at the cameras. Could I be correct in my assumption that his show is not really for adults?

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Amos
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 05:28 AM

Buffonery is his most important product, quite right. Children from six to sixty get mesmerized by him.


A

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: katlaughing
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 07:00 AM

And, older folks, even. I have no idea why. Just read an op/ed piece which quoted a top dog GOP member, sorry can't remember who, deploring the GOP being taken over and led by such as Beck, Hannity, and Limbaugh.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 07:21 AM

God yes, I had forgotten the vile Hannity. He’s a bit like the proverbial barber's cat, full of wind and piss. Even Jesse Ventura put him back in his box. I have never seen Limbaugh, but some of his pronouncements that I have heard would not be tolerated in this part of the world. What worries me is that there seems to be an audience in America for the likes of them. I have an email friend from New Jersey who considers them to be Gods and the saviours of America.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Bobert
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 07:50 AM

Two words, MARINER: Betty Ford...

Yup, it might not be too late but then again, seeing as I don't kow you, maybe Betty Ford won't help becuase you may very well be one of those lower IQers you said would find Beck intertaining... I donno???

B;~)

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 08:07 AM

I think Betty Ford might be of more help to Beck and perhaps Hannitty. Although I believe Beck has been down that road before and it doesn't seem to have worked for him. And I don't find Beck entertaining. I don't even find him Entertaining. I just think he's a man with problems, maybe some kind of Tourets Syndrome. Then again you seem to know more about that kind of thing than I.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Bobert
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 08:23 AM

Yeah, M, I got a good friend with that stuff... She is a mess... So then, why do you watch him??? I'm real curious???

B~

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 08:28 AM

I don't watch him on any kind of regular basis,but I had heard so much about his shenanigans on camera that curiosity got the better of me and I tuned in to see what it was all about.Maybe that's the reason he acts so crazily, to attract curious viewers.I will have to stop these occasional visits though, lest I put my foot through the tv in exasperation.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 08:45 AM

I feel I should add though, that I find Fox "News" a most odd channel. It is full of opinion and little real news and appears to be populated by people that are unable to read their teleprompters properly. In particular one of the many blonde presenters called Megyn Kelly, who stumbles over her words regularly. Mind you, seeing as she can't spell her name properly, it’s normally spelt "Megan”, I shouldn't be surprised.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Bobert
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 09:13 AM

Well, yeah, M.... That's what FOX/FIX is all about... It is owned by Rupert Murdock who is as far right as far right can get without coming full circle bgack to the left (lol)... He also owns the Wall Street Journal and is trying to buy the supposed liberal New York Times...

But the reality is that FOX has such a hypnotic effect on it's full-timers that they believe everything that FOX reports and loves all of FOX's entertainers, Beck being one... But the scarey part if that FOX is out there to capture a certain number of the people that make up their market and then selll ads to companies based on that market share and in doing what they do, which BTW they do well, they have created an entire political party, the Tea Party, which is now runing the Republican Party ragged... This is a recipe for disastare... It used to be that the Rush Limbaughs and Glen Becks were just political entertainers... Now they are controlling one of the two major politcal parties???

I know, go figure???

B~

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Maryrrf
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 09:21 AM

I have unwillingly through circumstances been subjected to Glen Beck's television show. Unfortunately this dangerous buffoon has many supporters and a large audience who believe what he says and tune in regularly to his hate filled right wing propaganda program. They aren't the smartest people around but there are quite a number of them and he fires them up. I think it is frightening that such a person has enough followers to warrant having his own television program. It scares me and I don't like what it indicates about our society.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: MARINER
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 09:27 AM

That is frightening all right. Can you imagine President Palin and Vice President Beck?. They would knock you back into the stone age. The Dirty Digger is well known in this part of the world too.From my point of view the only positive thing about the Tea Party is that it will most likely fragment the Republican vote in the next election and help Obama carry on with his reforms.It has always puzzled me that America is the only country in the developed world that claims it can't afford to look after their old ,sick and vulnerable.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 10:04 AM

the only positive thing about the Tea Party is that it will most likely fragment the Republican vote in the next election

Not a chance- complete wishful thinking.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Alice
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 11:47 AM

Jon Stewart did an excellent satire of Glenn Beck on the Comedy Network, complete with the conspiracy diagrams, chalkboard and visual aids. Very funny.

Jon Stewart parody of Glenn Beck VIDEO

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Neil D
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 12:05 PM

katlaughing, that Republican top dog you mentioned is David Frum. I don't know that he's a top dog but he was a Bush speechwriter. I had previously cut and pasted the entire blog on the Republican Waterloo thread.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: CarolC
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 12:11 PM

I've got one of them in my family (one that I know of, anyway). His viewers and supporters are gullible, easily manipulated, easily brainwashed people who are incapable of critical thought.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 12:16 PM

Beck, Limbaugh, Hannity and Palin have the function of reinforcing the prejudices and false beliefs of those who want to cling to their false beliefs and still satisfy the urges of these people who were taught as children to base their positions on information and facts.

Since any objective search for truth quickly dispels many of theirs positions, such as, for example, that it is better for a private sector, profit motivated, bureaucrat to decide the fate of their health care rather than a government bureaucrat who has much less motive to let them die, the above mentioned media personalities provide alternate "facts" which suit their beliefs.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: olddude
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 01:27 PM

Simple one line answers to complex problems. Blame the other guy mentality   Offers no solutions, only complains about anyone who wants to make something better or even try to ...   typical of the far right today ...

yet, the less thinking people, some very good people ... get swayed by his speeches ... sad ... very sad ....

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Sawzaw
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 01:41 PM

Glen Beck was funny at one time on the radio but has transformed himself an idiotic clown trying to appeal to a certain fringe for his personal monetary gain.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 01:49 PM

Beck on his recent Friday show reversed his "grab your gun and take aim" rhetoric was replaced with "Be non violent like Gandhi" rhetoric.

Now he can show this Gandhi segment in response to a future sad and violent tragedy that will have his hate speak fingerprints all over it.

Too little too late.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 01:56 PM

Having him stop the violent rhetoric, for now, is a start.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Sawzaw
Date: 30 Jun 11 - 10:32 PM

Well Well Well. Glen Beck has Queeet [a west va term] Fox News.

Good riddance. Maybe he will show up on Current co hosting a show with Mr ED the other horse's ass that got so extreme he had to queet too.

postchronicle.com

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Amos
Date: 30 Jun 11 - 10:37 PM

I am happy to report that I agree completely with Sawzall, for once!


A

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Sawzaw
Date: 30 Jun 11 - 11:15 PM

Ooops. The other horse's ass on Current TV is Olbermann.

Ya know Amos, I think it is better if people find things to agree on rather than finding things to disagree on and argue about.

Some people find themselves defending bullshit that they know is wrong in an attempt to reinforce what they believe to be right.

Nobody is right all the time and nobody is wrong all the time. People should be free to decide on whether an individual thing that someone, a politician for example, said or did is right or wrong rather than blindly having to support everything that person says or does.

You have to be able to separate the good from them bad. Right from wrong or you are just a drone controlled by group think, Tribal politics.

However people like Beck, Mr Ed, Olberman, Limbaugh etc instill this tribal thinking and divide people into two camps. Then they proceed to make gobs of money by pitting people against each other.

Are we a bunch of sheep? Aren't we capable of independent thought and judging things for ourselves? I hope so.

When you hear these people telling you "now when they say this, what they really mean is that". Why do we need them to interpret things for us? Do they think we are too dumb to figure it out on our own?

I am not about to taken for granted as part of a herd to be stampeded into going the same direction as the rest of the heard.

Scare tactics do not convince me of anything. They merely alert me that the person using scare tactics is disingenuous.

Scare tactics is the tool of terrorists to over ride the common sense people were born with. They are used to control people, affect their judgment and cause them to do things they would not do otherwise.

Maybe a few things Beck says are right but mostly they are wrong and the percentage is getting higher as he tries to appeal to a certain audience and get them locked in so he can make even more money.

I am not falling for it.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Jul 11 - 12:13 AM

You're absolutely right, Sawzaw, that people need to think independently instead of just thinking along tribal lines. They shouldn't support someone in an kneejerk fashion just because he or she is:

a) a Democract
b) a Republican
c) a "conservative"
d) a "liberal"
e) white
f) black
g) Native American
h) female
i) male
j) gay
k) hetero
l) Christian
m) non-Christian

etc....

But so VERY often...they do! And when I take them to task for it, the following hilarious thing happens: they either accuse me of "colorless neutrality"...or they make the mistake of thinking that I am "on tbe other side" of the tribal divide...and I am not.

Ain't that amazing? I am anything BUT neutral, that's for sure...but I do not sing in tbe tribal chorus, because to do so is not to think at all...it is to dance automatically to a pre-written tribal script.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 01 Jul 11 - 12:39 AM

Little Hawk, Maybe you should stick to advocating what you do believe rather than whining about how and why others disagree. Its easy for you to be misunderstood when you criticize without taking a stand.

Sawzaw. You don't watch Olbermann. I know this because he does not do any of the things you accuse him of.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Sawzaw
Date: 01 Jul 11 - 08:25 PM

What was that about a mashed up bag of meat with lipstick?

Was that something on the menu or a description of someone from the other tribe?

Who was that monkey posing as a newsman?

I guess I am not going to be invited into Jack's tribe.

I can think of a good example of tribalism when Bush said "you are either with us or against us on terrorism"

At the time I thought it was good that he was getting people focused on terror.

But then later I realized it was a logical fallacy known as the false dichotomy. It proposes that you have only two choices when there are more than two. It is an attempt to divide people.

You can be against terrorism and willing to take different degrees of action from launching a nuke to feebly sending diplomats to work things out.

I think we saw a good bit of that "we have to be fully against everyting the other side says or does no matter if it is wrong or right" Tribal thinking here.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Jul 11 - 08:48 PM

Yo, LH...

Must be nice to be "classless and free"...

They came for the communists but I was not a communist
They came for the trade unionists but I was not a trade unionist
They came for the Jews but I was not a Jew
Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me...

(Martin Niemoller)

Jack is right (correct), sometimes you have to take a stand other than the "classless and free" one that means absolutely nothing about who you are...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 01 Jul 11 - 09:17 PM

Sawzaw my tribe is humanity. I don't fight people. I fight BullShit. In terms of BS, KO would not make the top 10 on Fox. But his self righteous lecturing can be hard to take. But I do not fight self righteousness.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: LadyJean
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 12:14 AM

Glenn Beck, his current wife and 2 bodyguards went to see a Hitchcock movie in a park. The young woman sitting behind them was having a glass of wine, and spilled some. She let the Beck's know that she'd spilled some wine, and that it was getting on their blanket and Mrs. Beck's pants. Then she texted something called #makemefamous, to tell them the story.
Meanwhile, Mr. Beck announced that he had been attacked by an angry mob, that poured wine all over his wife.
Somebody should drop a net over that man!

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 01:00 AM

Wouldn't he just say it was Spiderman?

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: DrugCrazed
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 10:25 AM

Glenn Beck, the only man in the world who would take it upon himself to tell his viewers that Jews killed Jesus.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 03:57 PM

With the admission that I don't much listen to Beck--usually the last 10 or so minutes of his radio show, sometimes--I have never heard him speak ill of Jews or Israel. The few references I've heard were very positive to both. If he has referenced Jews as Christ killers elsewhere, it wouldn't jibe with what little I've heard.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 04:07 PM

Yeah, He said it. But he said it was "victory" for Christ to be killed. IMHO, he is a dangerous scatterbrained lunatic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QttAXEGz3g Your mileage may vary.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: gnu
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 04:07 PM

Haven't read the thread. Just heard a snippet of him on a US talk show website (Jimmy Kimmel)... the guy is Looney Tunes. He said Obama is a racist (on that site and it was an audio clip).

WTF? How can this guy... oh, nevermind... idiots and idiot followers are many. Sad but true. What a total no-mind asshole.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: kendall
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 07:45 PM

People who don't think for themselves will be told what to think by others.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 07:52 PM

There have been media personalities in the past such as the infamous Father Coughlin, Gerald L.K.Smith, Joseph McCarthy and even Walter Winchell that have been given to demagoguery. Beck is just the end of the line. These guys have always been around and eventually forgotten just like the aforementioned.

They ultimately have nothing of consequence to contribute to the US and therefore are "sound and fury signifying nothing", except that because of these little media tyrants, people have lost their jobs.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Kent Davis
Date: 02 Jul 11 - 09:52 PM

Glenn Beck is strong supporter of Israel, using his considerable fame and fortune to encourage the Jewish state http://www.glennbeck.com/israel/

As to him saying or not saying that the Jews killed Christ, I will eat my hat if anyone can find any evidence in his writings, or in his broadcasts, that he blames Jews EXCLUSIVELY for the crucixion.

He blames the Italians for the crucixion, and Herod, and the Sadduccess, and the Pharisees, and Pilate, and the high priest, and the Sanhedrin, and the military, and the mob, and the sinfulness of mankind, both Jew and Gentile.

The Jews did kill Christ. So did the Gentiles. That is what he says. That is also what all the available evidence says.

Kent

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 03 Jul 11 - 08:37 AM

He blames the Italians for the crucixion...

That's even more lunatic than blaming the Jews.

In Jesus' time, there WERE no "Italians".

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 03 Jul 11 - 10:33 AM

"In Jesus' time, there WERE no "Italians"."

From Wikipedia: "By the time of Emperor Augustus, the multi-ethnic territory of Italy was included in the Roman Italy (Italia) as the central unit of the Empire; Cisalpine Gaul, the Upper Po valley, for example, was appended in 42 BC."

So it seems that while Beck was not precise in his blaming Italians rather than Romans for the death of Christ (if he actually did so), he was not entirely wrong using that umbrella term.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 03 Jul 11 - 10:43 AM

IF you believe Blog-O-Pedia.

Do you have any real sources, John?

"Not Precise"? GREAT example of weasel-words. Translations: wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 03 Jul 11 - 11:07 AM

Sorry Mr. F--It don't work that way. You make an unsubstantiated assertion. I gave you a source that refutes your unsubstantiated assertion. If you don't like my source, it is incumbent on you to counter it with a different source.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Kent Davis
Date: 03 Jul 11 - 02:22 PM

Greg F.,

"Italians" was my term not, as far as I know, Glenn Beck's term.

The province in which Rome is located was called "Italia" in Roman times, as a quick look at any historical atlas will show. Unless I am much mistaken, a person from Italia would be an ...Italian.

I am sorry you think those of us who use the term are "lunatics".

Kent

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 10:10 AM

If you don't like my source, it is incumbent on you to counter it with a different source.

Hardly. Particularly if yours is a questionable source.

But perhaps you believe all "sources" to be of equal value - The Protocols of the Elders of Zion being the equivalent to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, for example.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 10:20 AM

"Italians" was my term not, as far as I know, Glenn Beck's term.

Exactly. He's who I was referring to, not you, Sunshine.

Unless I am much mistaken, a person from Italia would be an ...Italian.

You are much mistaken. As one example the OED cites the first use of the word "Italian" in the 16th Century - just a bit later than the crucifixion

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 12:37 PM

Were not the members of the Roman Empire from all parts of it? I don't think you had to be from Rome to be considered a Roman. But even if that were case, blaming a current group for anything a small number of its members did 2000 years ago seems pretty bigoted.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 01:53 PM

Greg, you may find a source questionable...you may disagree with facts or interpretation, but you must refute them, not just dismiss them out of hand. This is true whether it is Wikipedia, the Oxford History, or The Protocols or... Granted all sources are not equal, but none can be dismissed because you may not like them; you must show where they are wrong, or unreliable. In the case of the Protocols, that's pretty easy. Wikipedia is often correct, sometimes not. you have to determine which it is when. You haven't done that. Even the Oxford histories are not totally correct, and are revised and updated periodically. So until you refute, I stand by the quotation I posted.

It is interesting, that of all the criticisms you might have made of Beck's arguments, you chose the alleged misuse of the term 'Italian' to focus on, something not germain to his comments. For example, suppose in commenting about the French and Indian War I wrote the following: 'Colonel George Washington led American troops in battles against the French.' But wait. He did not lead Americans, he led Colonists (probably mostly from Virginia) against the French. Those Colonists would not be Americans until the Declaration of Independence a dozen years later, or perhaps until the ratification of the Constitution. Using the word Americans is a shorthand, perhaps imprecise, for the soldiers Washington commanded, and it gives one the feeling for where and who they were. But that's not the importance of the statement; what is important is that Washington commanded troops and fought the French. Incidentally he did so with troops who would later in history be called Americans.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 02:14 PM

"I don't think you had to be from Rome to be considered a Roman"

This may be both true and untrue. One was generally considered part of the conquered province, then under control of Rome, but not Roman. However there were many paths to Roman citizenship, being born of Roman citizen parents, service to Rome, purchase of citizenship, etc. For instance the Judean Saul (later Paul, later St. Paul) held Roman citizenship, but was still a Judean. Jesus, a Judean in that Roman Province was neither a citizen of Rome nor Roman at all.

I have not studied general Roman History for nearly 50 years, so maybe someone else can expound on this more fully.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 02:42 PM

Actually, John, in the example you cite regarding the Seven Years' War, Major Geo. Washington led Virginia Militia (British Provincial troops) to be correct- and in pretty much a single battle at Fort Necessity; overall commander of the British force being General Braddock.

Using the word Americans is a shorthand,...

Yes it is- and its still incorrect.

and it gives one the feeling for where and who they were

and that "feeling" is misleading and largely incorrect.

REAL history is about fact, John, not "feelings" and wishful thinking.

As for other criticisms you might have made of Beck's arguments[/I> I would not waste my time debating a Holocaust denier & Beck's idiocies place him in the same category.

Subject: RE: BS: what about Glen Beck?
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Jul 11 - 02:45 PM

Sorry, "I would not waste my time debating a Holocaust denier & Beck's idiocies place him in the same category" should not have been in italics.