The "real" Glenn Beck!

[drogulus]

    Thanks to Keith Olbermann. This really is remarkable.

    http://www.youtube.com/v/83tnWFojtcY

     Could it be? Naw.........Beck wouldn't have watched this show. Not in this universe he wouldn't. Yet.....I must keep an open mind.

[XB-70 Valkyrie]

I just wish the Tea Party folks could decide whether Obama is a socilist or a soshalist! 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pargon/sets/72157623594187379/

[drogulus]

     Teabonics! Yes, now we should have a Professor of Cultural Studies explain how this isn't a debased form of English: "These people have wonderful, colorful modes of expression that are as rich and meaningful....."

     

     

[oabmarcus]

Oh come on, don't rip on the poor Beck. His ratings have gone down 1/3 and advertisers are avoiding him like the plague. His life is hard enough already...

[WI Dan]

Great thread!
Hey, .... can you spell    " N    o    v    e    m    b    e    r "     ?

 

[drogulus]

Hey, .... can you spell    " N    o    v    e    m    b    e    r "     ?

 

       Now I can. My soul has not been Teabonicized.

       That's a nice Objective Smiley!

       

       Dave Foley was on the Olbermann show last night and he thinks Beck stole his act. Incidentally, some of the blog comments I've read are quite pro-Beck.

       Like this:

     Why can't we actually talk about the points Glenn Beck makes. Who cares if some Saturday Night like spoof is like something in reality. Obama and cronies are taking our country in a direction we don't really want to go. Cap and Trade is a scam, that is the real story. And most of America is behind Glenn, not Olberman.

       I don't know about most of the country. These cable commentators have small audiences no matter who wins the ratings wars in their niche.

[oabmarcus]

       Now I can. My soul has not been Teabonicized.

       That's a nice Objective Smiley!

       

       Dave Foley was on the Olbermann show last night and he thinks Beck stole his act. Incidentally, some of the blog comments I've read are quite pro-Beck.

       Like this:

     Why can't we actually talk about the points Glenn Beck makes. Who cares if some Saturday Night like spoof is like something in reality. Obama and cronies are taking our country in a direction we don't really want to go. Cap and Trade is a scam, that is the real story. And most of America is behind Glenn, not Olberman.

       I don't know about most of the country. These cable commentators have small audiences no matter who wins the ratings wars in their niche.

over 2 million viewers is "small"?

[drogulus]

     Yes, it's a small slice of the electorate. Cable show audiences, even today, are much smaller than broadcast network audiences. If Beck or Olbermann were on a network show they would double their audience and the network would take them off the air because their audience would be too small. Cable shows are narrowcasting instead of broadcasting, which is why their shows are designed to alienate one segment of the audience in order to appeal all the more to another segment. Though I like Olbermann I don't really care for the way he and MSNBC operate as an anti-Fox News. I don't think Fox should be mirrored in that way. I would prefer all news and opinion networks to observe a few rules about reflecting a wider set of views even if they continued to lean in one direction or another.

[Fëanor]

... some of the blog comments I've read are quite pro-Beck.

       Like this:

     Why can't we actually talk about the points Glenn Beck makes. Who cares if some Saturday Night like spoof is like something in reality. Obama and cronies are taking our country in a direction we don't really want to go. Cap and Trade is a scam, that is the real story. And most of America is behind Glenn, not Olberman.

Glenn Bech for Fuehrer!! 

Selective facts, distortion, lies, deceit, and above, stoking the fears and prejudices of the audience where hallmarks of the Nazis.  I don't think it's Obama who's the Nazi nowadays.

[Josquin des Prez]

Glenn Bech for Fuehrer!! 

Selective facts, distortion, lies, deceit, and above, stoking the fears and prejudices of the audience where hallmarks of the Nazis.  I don't think it's Obama who's the Nazi nowadays.

Says the guy stoking on fear and prejudice.

[drogulus]

     

Glenn Bech for Fuehrer!! 

Selective facts, distortion, lies, deceit, and above, stoking the fears and prejudices of the audience where hallmarks of the Nazis.  I don't think it's Obama who's the Nazi nowadays.

      No, I don't think this is a case of "Spot the Fascist". The problem is that American demagoguery has a style and substance that differs from the European model. We should be looking at William Jennings Bryan, Huey Long, George Wallace and Joe McCarthy. Bryan and Long were closer to the left than the right in some ways.

      Keith Olbermann has correctly pointed out that the Elia Kazan film A Face In The Crowd gives a primer in how TV demagogues operate. Here's the fictional Lonesome Rhodes:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/b8h6mXznd7E

     

[drogulus]

      Another point of difference is that American demagogues aspire to the soft dictatorship of conformity within a tight legal framework, not an overthrow of democracy. They would like to see U.S. law conform to Christian dictates and efface forever the secular origin of the country. Apparently this is pretty easy to do. Republicans, for instance, have managed to forget Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. Jefferson, Madison, and Adams have been reengineered as Christians. Thomas Paine has disappeared. I wonder what they will do about Franklin? How will they "disappear" him?

[WI Dan]

Glenn Bech for Fuehrer!! 

Misspeller! 

drogulus!  drogulus! 
I caught one!

Careful, now .... he might be a Christian, too! 

[WI Dan]

http://www.youtube.com/v/9TeBQUDh7Lc

[Fëanor]

      Another point of difference is that American demagogues aspire to the soft dictatorship of conformity within a tight legal framework, not an overthrow of democracy. They would like to see U.S. law conform to Christian dictates and efface forever the secular origin of the country. Apparently this is pretty easy to do. Republicans, for instance, have managed to forget Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. Jefferson, Madison, and Adams have been reengineered as Christians. Thomas Paine has disappeared. I wonder what they will do about Franklin? How will they "disappear" him?

Yes, many US fathers were secular humanists.

But no, US demagogues are not so welling to be confined within a "tight legal framework" as you suppose. All that talk of the sanctity of the consititution is for consumption by a gulible public.  Consider the efforts of the Bush/Cheney/Rowe presidency to consolidate Executive power further than ever from Congressional and Judicial oversight, and to weaken or ignore human rights.

Contrary to Beck and the other Fox Network pundits, there is no threat from the "far left"; the threat in the case of the United States is and has always been from the far right.  By the "far right" I mean the coalition of the financial right (the ultra wealthy elite and big corporations) and the populist social conservatives -- with the true agenda being driven by the former; I assure you they give less than a crap about favorite issues of the latter, such as abortion, but if sponsoring these causes buys them support they're all for them (for the time being).  Fascist dictatorship has not yet come about due to the relative persistance of good times in the U.S. But there is a sea change in the world: U.S. preeminence must wain and will fanish in the next generation.  Then watch out: we might see a fascist America.

[Fëanor]

Misspeller! 

drogulus!  drogulus! 
I caught one!

Careful, now .... he might be a Christian, too! 

I think he knew who I was talking about -- or do you prefer Führer to Fuehrer?

I'm an atheist, thank you.

[WI Dan]

I think he knew who I was talking about --

I'm sure he did, Feanor.  He's even into "Teabonics", from what I hear.

I'm an atheist, thank you.

..............

[david johnson]

      Another point of difference is that American demagogues aspire to the soft dictatorship of conformity within a tight legal framework, not an overthrow of democracy. They would like to see U.S. law conform to Christian dictates and efface forever the secular origin of the country. Apparently this is pretty easy to do. Republicans, for instance, have managed to forget Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. Jefferson, Madison, and Adams have been reengineered as Christians. Thomas Paine has disappeared. I wonder what they will do about Franklin? How will they "disappear" him?

put that in reverse and you will be closer to the truth.

[WI Dan]

put that in reverse and you will be closer to the truth.

I don't think that's what he was going for, David.  (Sorry for stating the obvious.)

Liberals are in a major panic, these days, understandably.  November elections are staring them in the face, ... like that big tree at the bottom of the sled run.