On Thursday, June 4, 2009, Glenn Beck devoted his entire show to attacking ACORN with what seemed to be reruns of past segments. But – lo and behold! – the show also included Beck’s get-together with BFF Bill O’Reilly from May 28 in which they seemed to finally be admitting that their evidence of any ACORN badness is pretty thin. But they didn’t let little details like lack of proof or factual verification stand in the way of a good smear. Beck even threw the Obamas into it, while also admitting it was pure speculation. Rock on!
Andy Cobb (you can read more about him here) found inspiration in our post about Glenn Beck’s incest fantasy, which he delved into at great length in his book, The Real America. Now Cobb has brought Beck’s words to life!
Anybody see the White House Correspondents Dinner? President Obama and Wanda Sykes were funny and I loved the jokes about Fox. Obama joked that the whole press corps had voted for him and then apologized to the Fox table. Sykes ribbed Hannity about chickening out of his offer to be waterboarded. “He can’t take a waterboarding. I can break Sean Hannity just by giving him a middle seat in coach.”
Glenn Beck threw a sanctimonious hissy fit yesterday when a representative from ACORN had the nerve to suggest he is afraid of black people. Of course, Beck and Fox can demonize ACORNandminorities all day long, but my, how sensitive Beck’s widdle feewings get when the tables are turned. In the clip, Beck angrily brags to his audience (which he always self-importantly addresses as “America”) that he threw out guest Scott Levenson of ACORN for saying, during the commercial break, that Beck is afraid of black people.
Interestingly, Beck seems to have understood that as an accusation that he hates black people. But if it was really as ridiculous an accusation as Beck claimed, wouldn’t he have just dismissed it without getting upset? And if it’s so important that Beck wanted to address it, why not have the guy back and prove him wrong to “America?” Meanwhile, Beck’s record of hostilities to ACORN and people of color is well documented. No amount of self-righteous posturing is going to erase it.
Hats off to Dave, at $ave the Rich, for catching this remarkable coincidence: FreedomWorks, a right-wing organization with a history of organizing “grass-roots” movements and which has admitted being “one of the main driving forces” of the recent tea party protests, just happened to start applying for permits for a September 12th rally in Washington a few hours before Glenn Beck announced his September 12th project in which “we’ll meet back here” on that day. As Dave points out,
There was an air of mystery surrounding Beck’s special. Fox News had organized national viewing parties in anticipation of a big announcement on the program. What he would say was not public.Yet, somehow, FreedomWorks had a heads up. They applied for a permit for the same day, on the same day. Yet, still they deny the obvious coordination at the top of their recent tantrum. I’m not sure that Fox and FreedomWorks can sustain that position any more.
Jon Stewart dropped some logic on Fox News and the other sponsors of yesterday’s tea parties. He slammed Fox for aggressively pushing the demonstrations, and mocked those protesting wasteful spending by pointing out they were wasting a million tea bags. And for a bowl of chicken soup for the economic soul, watch Stewart interview TARP overseer Elizabeth Warren, who actually instills confidence in him.
Fox can try to deny the fact that they aggressively pushed yesterday’s tea parties, but Media Matters has the proof. They found Fox aired 23 separate segments promoting the protests between April 6-13, along with 73 in-show and commercial promotions. Hannity and Neil Cavuto were the biggest offenders, as you can see from the Media Matters table. With so much Tea Party coverage, when does Fox Find time for real news?
Here are some highlights from yesterday’s teabaggery.
Glenn Beck was able to keep a dry eye earlier today when he offered up a new-to-me conspiracy theory about gay marriage, that it’s really about “going into churches and attacking churches… Then you also have to go into the schools.” His guest for the segment was Megyn “I love to hatepeopleofcolor” Kelly. Kelly didn’t buy Beck’s theory. Instead, she took a gratuitous swipe at President Barack Obama, offering her own conspiracy theory, that he secretly supports gay marriage. Of course, she had no evidence to back that up, just her “feeling” that he leans further left than he wants to admit.
In a discussion about the recent Iowa Supreme Court ruling that a ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional, Beck said he agrees with Obama in that they both support civil unions for gays. But marriage is different, according to Beck. Lowering his head with dramatic intensity, he said, “I believe this case is actually about going into churches and going in and attacking churches and saying you can’t teach anything else. When you say marriage – civil unions is different – when you say marriage must be defined as this, well then you also have to go into the schools.”
On the O’Reilly Factor, host Bill O’Reilly brought on fellow Fox News personality Glenn Beck to celebrate the two shows’ “huge ratings.” They then talked about the downside to their fame — criticism being leveled at them from “Internet fanatics” who are allegedly blaming them for the recent mass murders. “It’s absurd,” said O’Reilly. “It is hateful, obviously.”
O’Reilly and Beck then became upset that at times, they feel personally threatened. Beck said that he has had to have two police cars outside of his house, and O’Reilly said that NBC News — driven by GE and “Internet haters” — have “hired guys” to personally “hurt” him and Beck:
BECK: [W]hen the ratings first started, you pulled me aside and said, “Buckle up, they’re going to come after you.” And they have. […]
O’REILLY: Because Immelt and Zucker, the two villains at NBC, have directly ordered this. They’ve hired the guys to do this. And they’ve done it because they have no other way to compete.
Now, both of those men are in trouble. They could be fired at any time, because the performance of General Electric and NBC is so abysmal. But they did it, so then, “Let’s see if we can drive Beck and O’Reilly to do something crazy. Let’s see if we can do — hurt them personally. Terrorize their families.”
BECK: Can I tell you something? When you have to explain to your 5- year-old why you have two police cars in front of your house for days. […]
O’REILLY: That’s driven by two elements. Internet haters, all right, and the General Electric Corporation.
