Civil rights' new 'owner': Glenn Beck
By Dana Milbank
WashPost
Sunday, August 29, 2010
There is a telling anecdote in Glenn Beck's 2003 memoir about how the cable news host was influenced by the great fantasist Orson Welles. To travel between performances in Manhattan, Beck recounts, Welles hired an ambulance, sirens blaring, to ferry him around town -- not because Welles was ill but because he wanted to avoid traffic.
Most of us would regard this as dishonest, a ploy by the self-confessed charlatan that Welles was. Beck saw it as a model to be emulated. "Welles," he writes, "inspired me to believe that I can create anything that I can see or imagine."
I was reminded of Beck's affection for deception as he hyped his march on Washington -- an event scheduled for the same date (Aug. 28) and on the same spot (the Lincoln Memorial) as Martin Luther King Jr.'s iconic march 47 years ago. Beck claimed it was pure coincidence, but then he made every effort to appropriate the mantle of the great civil rights leader.
Beck as the fulfillment of Dr. King's dream? And you thought "War of the Worlds" was frightening.
(More here.)
WashPost
Sunday, August 29, 2010
There is a telling anecdote in Glenn Beck's 2003 memoir about how the cable news host was influenced by the great fantasist Orson Welles. To travel between performances in Manhattan, Beck recounts, Welles hired an ambulance, sirens blaring, to ferry him around town -- not because Welles was ill but because he wanted to avoid traffic.
Most of us would regard this as dishonest, a ploy by the self-confessed charlatan that Welles was. Beck saw it as a model to be emulated. "Welles," he writes, "inspired me to believe that I can create anything that I can see or imagine."
I was reminded of Beck's affection for deception as he hyped his march on Washington -- an event scheduled for the same date (Aug. 28) and on the same spot (the Lincoln Memorial) as Martin Luther King Jr.'s iconic march 47 years ago. Beck claimed it was pure coincidence, but then he made every effort to appropriate the mantle of the great civil rights leader.
Beck as the fulfillment of Dr. King's dream? And you thought "War of the Worlds" was frightening.
(More here.)
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1 Comments:
I do not watch or listen to Glen Beck so I can't really comment on his views however, Vox Verax and other progressives seem puzzled by his popularity. Glen Beck is growing in popularity think it is because the majority of the folks in the US are simply looking for both sides of the story, the one as told by Vox Verax, CBS, NBC, ABC, NPR, Vox Verax and the like, AND, the one told by Glen Beck. For Vox Verax to pretend that it represents "the truth" only aids Glen Beck. The following data (from Powerline blog) speaks volumes. "The Center for Responsive Politics has analyzed the political contributions of those who identified themselves as employees of CBS, NBC and ABC in 2008. The result: 88 percent of those contributions went to Democrats. The Presidential contest was even more lopsided: network employees made 710 contributions, worth a total of $461,898, to Barack Obama, and 39 contributions, totaling $26,926, to John McCain. If you're counting, that's 94 percent for Obama."
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