Yesterday Glenn Beck introduced a petition that he described as a challenge to America. In truth it was nothing more than a self-serving stunt that enumerated a bunch of repetitive calls to denounce violence. This sets Beck apart from the millions of people in America whom he seems to think are clamoring for more of it.
Today Beck spent almost the whole hour whining that only 14 members of congress signed his silly petition. That’s a pretty dismal showing of support. Considering that congress now has 289 Republicans (House and Senate), Beck only managed to snare about 5% of his ideological allies. He was obviously devastated at having been snubbed so brutally. He heaped scorn on those who rebuffed him, blaming them for playing politics. He went on ad nauseum about not being able to understand how anyone could refuse to sign the farce that he regarded as so well-intentioned.
Other than Beck, no one should be surprised that his petition was so universally dismissed. It would be like McDonalds circulating a petition denouncing junk food. Beck is perhaps America’s foremost purveyor of violence-soaked hate speech and has no intention of changing. His history of incendiary language is rich with examples that are indefensibly bloodthirsty. And despite his denial, this sort of rhetoric can motivate the weak, the gullible, and the paranoid. So without further ado I present Glenn Beck’s justifications for political assassination.
Glenn Beck’s Top Ten Reasons To Kill Your Congressman
- January 19, 2010: The progressive movement is sucking the blood out of each of the parties. This is their opportunity to finally win and progressives will, admittedly, do anything to win. They’ll lie, cheat, steal. Do you really think you can pull them off your neck with a ballot box? You must drive a steak through the heart of this movement. … [Obama]’s not a Democrat. He is a progressive.
- June 10, 2010: Shoot me in the head if you try to change our government. I will stand against you and so will millions of others. We believe in something. You in the media and most in Washington don’t. […] They believe in communism. They believe and have called for a revolution. You’re going to have to shoot them in the head. But warning, they may shoot you.
- November 13, 2009: Barack Obama and Congress are selling you a bill of goods. It is only when you take down the mask of sunshine and lollipops that you will see the real thing – the real image. Destruction. These bills are creating the path to America’s destruction.
- July 23, 2010: They’ve already taken over health care. Is there any greater control than that of deciding the fate of someone’s life?
- July 23, 2010: The financial regulation that the president signed into law yesterday is an unprecedented assault on our economy, our ability to do business and, quite honestly, the republic as we know it.
- October 30, 2009: When you pull back the curtain, you will see that free speech is being eradicated for controlled speech: Control over the media; control over the Internet; control over you.
- March 8, 2010: There is an effort to indoctrinate [our kids]. … Even President Obama, in his own Web site, targeting our children. … Get the kids out of this indoctrination or our republic will be lost.
- April 24, 2007: I have been telling you for months now that illegal immigration is creating a new civil war in this country.
- September 2, 2009: I’m going to show you the beginning of something that should scare the living daylights out of you. It is propaganda in America. The National Endowment for the Arts is now holding conference calls.
- December 14, 2009: The climate cult wants more than just your recycling bin. … what they want is total submission.
Glenn Beck has assembled a pretty comprehensive list of things that will doom the republic. They include health care, religion, financial regulation, education reform, Network Neutrality, immigration, art, global warming, cap and trade, the census, cash for clunkers, and even food safety. Did I leave anything out? Yes I did. How about…
People that don’t attend his rallies?: There are people now who are saying: I don’t know if I am going on 8/28. I don’t know if I’ll go to another Tea Party. Well, if you’re done, then the republic truly is done. If you’re done, they will take your liberty as well.
And how about…
Sarah Palin? Sarah, as you know, peace is always the answer. I know you are feeling the same heat, if not much more on this. I want you to know you have my support. But please look into protection for your family. An attempt on you could bring the republic down.
As it turns out, our republic must be pretty weak. Almost anything can bring it down according to Beck. I wouldn’t sneeze too hard if I were you. But one risk that Beck stubbornly refuses to acknowledge is that inflaming people’s fears about the end of the world that they know and cherish could drive certain individuals to take extreme measures in what they regard as the protection of their family and country. If you believed that our government were actually behaving in the manner described by Beck, that it was deliberately steering toward slavery, tyranny, and ruin, you might consider it your duty to take out a congressman or two in the name of patriotism. Beck fails to acknowledge this even though it has already happened on a number of occasions; even though he has been warned; even though he caters to advertisers whose products are dependent on such fears; even though his boss Roger Ailes told him to “shut up, tone it down, make your argument intellectually.” And that may be where Beck gets tripped up.
There has been a lot of debate lately about rhetoric and imagery. I think some of it has concentrated too much on trivialities. I don’t think Beck or Palin are responsible for the shooting last Saturday. I don’t think that maps with crosshairs are going to motivate anyone to commit murder, although they may seem horribly inappropriate after a tragic event like the one in Tucson. However, repeatedly using irresponsible language that dehumanizes rivals and casts them as mortal enemies and foes of goodness and Godliness is tempting fate. It is fomenting a hatred and/or fear of government and fellow citizens. That can turn an ideological opponent into an imminent threat. That is what Beck does every day and it has to stop.
If our republic is to survive (now I’m doing it) we need to be able to have partisan divisions that don’t devolve into civil malignancies. All people in public life need to reflect on this in pursuit of their political goals. And if Beck won’t stop out of a sense of moral decency, then it is up to those who have such morality to counter his repugnancy and work to evict him from the public platform that he does not deserve.
The notion that an attempt on Palin could bring the republic down is downright hilarious.
I mean really…..This is a woman with a 22% favorability rating; a woman who’s only accomplishment was serving as mayor of an Alaskan town with 6,000 residents; a woman who is a failed vice-presidential candidate; a woman who is widely credited with being a major reason that McCain lost the election; a woman who only managed to serve half her term as governor; a woman who can only engage the public through Facebook and Twitter.
Glenn Beck thinks that this woman’s fate could bring America to its knees?
Exactly, Beck’s remark begs the question, just what is your “republic?”
How do you go about evicting him from the public platform? By force of power, force of law, or force of persuasion?
Force of power: violently remove him? Thuggery / mob rule will certainly bring down the republic.
Force of law: free speech means tolerating things you may find offensive. Limiting political or other speech puts us way down the slippery slope that will bring down the repubIlic.
Force of persuasion: Beck and others like him are popular because they give voice and outlet to the ideals and feelings of his audience. You will make him irrelevant by winning the hearts of the audience to your side, by reason and persuasion. That’s the only way the republic can stand.
Good luck with that.
Public pressure on Fox News, News Corp, advertisers, and cable operators. There are already about 300 advertisers who will not place their ads on his show. His ratings are declining. If viewers protest and ad revenue drops the network may just pull the plug. Also, there are reports that Beck is not well-liked in the Fox newsrooms where he is said to embarrass them.
Beck is vulnerable. It wouldn’t be easy, but it’s not impossible. The biggest obstacle is that Fox may actually be afraid of Beck’s audience and their reaction to a cancellation. And I do mean “physically” afraid. But then, isn’t that the problem to begin with – his propensity to inspire violence?
And by the way, I would NEVER advocate using force or censorship.
How do you guys live with yourselves? I came to this link thinking you had some real list Glenn created but it’s a manufactured list of your own using quotes that have nothing to do with killing elected officials. You talk about his rhetoric.
I hope people take the time to click the links to read or watch the entire segments and not just read the quote you have. Makes alot more sense when you see the whole thing.
I hope people click the links too. That’s why I put them there. They show Beck to be a deliberately incendiary jerk who should be repudiated by caring, thinking people.
His quotes having everything to do with killing elected officials because they create an environment wherein elected officials are demonized and characterized as worthy of death. Obviously you didn’t read (or understand) what I wrote.
Glenn Beck makes no sense regardless of how much of his garbage you read. He is simply the Jim Jones of politics, preaching fear and hate and paranoia. Unfortunately he has appeal in a country where, if our intelligence is linked to the top-rated TV shows we supposedly watch, many people seek simple cheap empty entertainment. With conspiracy everywhere around you, you can absolve yourself of responsibility to deal with reality.
All this week I’ve been listening to the rightwing talkers accusing the media of blaming the killings in Tucson on Sarah Palin. Just once I would like for them to either show a clip of some MSNBC person saying that, or read a statement from same saying that “Sarah Palin is responsible for those shootings and not Jared Laughner.”
It’s my opinion that the right might be feeling a little guilt for all the “Government take-over,” “Socialist stealing our Country,” “these people hate the Constitution,” talk that they spew 24/7/365, and are hearing something from the media that the media just hasn’t said.
From Laura Ingraham to Mark Levin shreaking about “the left is blaming Sarah Palin for the shootings” is a Lie. The media has just taken the opportunity to point out the obvious, that all the hate talk and talk of “2nd Ammendment remedies” is over the top and is not helpful in settling our difference’s.
Fox”News?” had a scroll at the bottom of the TV that said Sarah Palin is getting a lot of “death threats” as a result of the demonization of her previous statements. Really? Can you prove they are related? Or is Fox”News?” just putting two and two together and saying they are related?
Isn’t that what they are accusing the Left of doing, while at the same time, saying that violence directed toward politicians and the Government have absolutely nothing to do with the anti-politician and anti-Government rhetoric that is spewed 24/7/365 on talk radio, Fox”News?,” and Republican politicians?
Please rightwing, play the clips of those people who, you claim, say Palin was the shooter.
Simple. Otherwise stop Lying about it.
Good point. They are scrambling to turn the debate to something that exists only in their imagination.
People have criticized the “tone” that the media sets, but NO ONE of any note in the media has blamed Palin or Beck for the shootings. And rather than discuss the real problem with tone, they want to divert the discussion to the imaginary problem of blame.
My friend posted & I will go through this because it is WAY TOO ONE SIDED & I think there are a lot more than 2 sides that need to be looked at in our society of complex and multi facetted life styles and believes. I am a Green, which is definitely not believing in either Pres. Bush-Obama’s concepts of breaking laws or creating new ones in order to be allowed to give cruel and unusual punishment & not allow the public access to the truth and those that want to sacrifice their lives for honesty and truth as seen with some in our country including the following: Amy Goodman, Julian Assange, and Andy Worthington.
January 19, 2010: The progressive movement is sucking the blood out of each of the parties. This is their opportunity to finally win and progressives will, admittedly, do anything to win. They’ll lie, cheat, steal. Do you really think you can pull them off your neck with a ballot box? You must drive a steak through the heart of this movement. … [Obama]‘s not a Democrat. He is a progressive.
I don’t think it matters because his actions and policies are with the cooperate. He has not fought against the following:
-Unbiased trial for a child in Guantanamo given a tortured sentence
-Release of Guantanamo victims who are documented as innocent & have been tortured & held now for going on 10 yrs.
-Put a young 19 yr. old in charge of seeing the 10’s of 1,000’s of hyaenas murders and atrocities to the Middle Eastern civilians by the US military and then when he wanted to change this policy and continued genocide put the truth teller in a torture prison, & the president is not stupid enough not to know solitairy confinement, esp. with restricted movement and natural light is not torture.
-Despite the fact that the UK Foreign Secretary Hague asked for the last innocent father of the Uk family to be reunited with his family & receive the $Million dollars for their part in putting US money & oil above the concern of their citizens, the Pres. Obama will not allow Shaker Aamer, the proven innocent man to return to his family in the UK.
– He has bombed Yemen secretly & called it al Qaeda and then sent Hilary Clinton to try and buy a better deal since their leader was revealed as probably bought & not caring about the 38 innocent in Guantanamo, nor those Pres. Obama had bombed that WikiLeaks revealed.
-The 1 to 10% of the Wealthy & the Pres. Corp. don’t care as much about freedom of speech as they care about US citizens knowing the truth, which is seen as the US tries to lock up journalists (Assange an Australian citizen), & as of this week a Icelandic Parliamentary representative who believes in the public knowing the truth.
– He would not acknowledge Mr. Arar when he was kidnapped from JFK
-ON & ON
June 10, 2010: Shoot me in the head if you try to change our government. I will stand against you and so will millions of others. We believe in something. You in the media and most in Washington don’t. […] They believe in communism. They believe and have called for a revolution. You’re going to have to shoot them in the head. But warning, they may shoot you.
I think he is half right. The most of the regular tv channels in Colo. 2,4,7,9, CNN are censored from the oil co.. Thank goodness for link, 375 & Democracy Now. However most of the really informed Americans believe we need a PEACEFUL revolution that allows all of the US to know ALL of the truth that our govenment is doing & BEGIN to DO WHAT MARTIN LUTHER KING SUGGESTED, which is to spend more money on the social needs of the people than on weapons, war, & violence.
November 13, 2009: Barack Obama and Congress are selling you a bill of goods. It is only when you take down the mask of sunshine and lollipops that you will see the real thing – the real image. Destruction. These bills are creating the path to America’s destruction.
July 23, 2010: They’ve already taken over health care. Is there any greater control than that of deciding the fate of someone’s life?
Yes, I agree. The president should never have supported the bankers, nor the Bush tax bill, & probably not the Healthcare Bill. A better way would have been to say no to bankers, yes to home owners, A flat tax so that a no resounds against those who are lining their pockets with violent war & oil anyway, and only the same kind of healthcare bill that has made Australia the country that has the longest lives in the world and most all of the countries that AREN’T 3rd world have public health care, which is neither what Beck nor Obama suggested. I would like to throw in another idea on Bills. Their should be one issue per bill & the districts should vote so that the Representatives in each district REALLY represent their constituents.
July 23, 2010: The financial regulation that the president signed into law yesterday is an unprecedented assault on our economy, our ability to do business and, quite honestly, the republic as we know it.
Sorry, I don’t know enough about this & I’ll get on it.
October 30, 2009: When you pull back the curtain, you will see that free speech is being eradicated for controlled speech: Control over the media; control over the Internet; control over you.
TRUE!, Maybe it is time to give more taxes to the media & press of our choice: I chose Assange with WikiLeaks for the Guardian & Goodman for Democracy Now, Linktv with Mosaic, Computer reporting & sites like andywothington.co.uk, Truthout, Alternet &
March 8, 2010: There is an effort to indoctrinate [our kids]. … Even President Obama, in his own Web site, targeting our children. … Get the kids out of this indoctrination or our republic will be lost.
What? This is too vague. I do believe that we need more teachers with more freedom. Most parents do not know what the curriculum looks like that every teacher is nearly suppose to memorize. Teacher’s should have more autonomy because China may be great in Mathematics, but they don’t do to well in history and journalism, which comes from a passion for truth. Different parts of the country need to explore different truths. In the south the Civil Rights and Katrina should be explored in depth and in Colorado the lack of media coverage of the connection between Weapon production and the Columbine killings should be discussed. Of course this is high school ages. They are certainly not too young because Bradley Manning was one year out of high school before he had to look at mass genocide by the US and then put into a torturous situation most Americans didn’t even know could take place.
April 24, 2007: I have been telling you for months now that illegal immigration is creating a new civil war in this country.
This is totally bogus, except that the CIA tries to stir people against each other and certainly by stating this it does legitimize it, but not in a good way. Most of the immigrants in the US are from Mexico and are part Native Americans and were run out of their own country during the European expansion. Native Americans or part Native Americans should be allowed to travel across the US in & out of any country they chose. Also the Mexican people get pay checks with taxes withheld that contribute to a wealthier nation and they purchase good that the rest of us sell. This is the reason why the US has tried to be like the Roman Empire that made all conquering people citizens. This seems right for neighboring countries we befriend, like Mexico and Canada. But we do not have any business violently conquering the 3rd poorest country in the world to either find one man and his few followers while our Presidents (Bush-Obama) pretend to be al Qaeda and secretly bomb the citizens (as revealed in WikiLeaks with Obama bombing Yemen & Bush allowing the execution of 10,000 Iraqi citizens).
September 2, 2009: I’m going to show you the beginning of something that should scare the living daylights out of you. It is propaganda in America. The National Endowment for the Arts is now holding conference calls.
Not sure about the National Endowment of the Arts holding calls. I will look into it. However I certainly believe in the propaganda. The synonyms for propaganda are deception and lies, which the US is an expert at as seen in just a few of the following ways by the Presidents:
Obama:I will bring change, close Guantanamo (we thought he meant prosecute torturers, reunite innocent with their families), no longer hold BIASED military trials for the children and men in Guantanamo, Pull the soldiers of Iraq out (we thought he meant bring them all home -he left 50,000), Work for better healthcare (He only invited one out of many Sgl payer representatives & then still entertained the Privated companies more),
Bush: We have devoted our best to finding out the truth about 9-11 (The families had to make them do anything & when it was over, those that were there through the formation of the report had to say despite the fact that before the 9-11 explosions many had voted for Mr. Bush, they now find he is obviously lying and withholding information.
It is common knowledge 2 planes did not knock over 3 buildings & that Obama is covering up the mass murder of Bush, which would be difficult to stay in a Middle Eastern War without the 9-11 propaganda.
Bush called ALL OF the Children & Men in Guantanamo the Worst of the Worst & now less than 200 are left with many of the countries having provided $millions of Dollars for the injustice.
There were no WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION like is found in Israel and in the US.
December 14, 2009: The climate cult wants more than just your recycling bin. …
This is propaganda on Beck’s part because even if he doesn’t believe in the “Climate Change” (I’m sure he hasn’t taken a poll from the Colo. University Science PRofessors) he could care about something that would still be a huge concern if people were alarmed about Climate Change and that is pollution. Pollution of air, water, soil and land, which causes among a million other things, more asthma every year, cancer, and when we run out of oil the soil will need to be worked like it hasn’t in a 100 years. We need people to return to knowing how to do this like Cuba did when they no longer had oil in their soil and we certainly don’t want Monsanto controlling the food market with GMO’s.
“No one is blaming Beck or Palin for the shootings…”
Lefties keep thinking that all they need to do is say those magic words, and then after that they can insinuate that very point until the bile rises in one’s throat. Well, it’s not working. The polls are showing that.
It is the lefty liars who will be repudiated. They have no narrative left on this incident anymore.
You really want to change the debate to one that no one is having. When I say that no one is blaming Beck or Palin for the shootings, it’s because that’s the truth. If you want to have an argument over whether or not Beck or Palin is being blamed for the shootings you’ll have to have it with yourself and your imagination.
Beck claims to be a Christian.
There’s a little bit of advice straight out of the bible.
“Quench not the Spirit. Despise not prophesyings. Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil.” (1 Thess. 5:19-22)
To paraphrase this scripture in modern speech:
Stop being mean spirited. Embrace the truth. Do philosophy (honest debate, rather than hateful ad-hominem, revisionist, deceptive, or fallacious argumentation). Since ‘good’ is a subjective concept, and cannot be something empirically proven, it can only have meaning by consensus. This means we should hold fast to the ‘good’ that all people accept as just, and to cease holding fast only to those things that divide. And finally, avoid even the appearance of hateful and violent political/racial/religious bigotry if such speech has been ‘misunderstood’ by so many as being provocative of violence.
This is so ridiculous. Although I’m not a Beck fan, your headline claiming that Beck gives 10 reasons to kill your congressman is nothing but a lie. Unfortunately for you, the article follows the headline… YOU are the one talking about killing – not Beck. You’re certainly not helping the left’s cause beause, in my opinion, this article makes YOU look like the hate-monger…
I’m just curious…Where is it that I am talking about killing anyone?