Category: Glenn Beck

Another Kooky Conspiracy Theorist

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Glenn Beck won’t back down. On second thought, Bill Kristol’s right. Mark Levin’s wrong. We’ve got to purge these hysterical extremist wackos or else they might take over the entire Republican Party!

“The communist plan for Hollywood was remarkably simple. It was merely to take over the motion picture business . . . [as] a grand world-wide propaganda base.”

What kind of Kool-Aid-drinking paranoid Bircher nutjob would say something as crazy and irresponsible as that? Continue reading Another Kooky Conspiracy Theorist →

Hey, Remember That Crazy Conspiracy Theory Glenn Beck Was Talking About?

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According to every Serious Foreign Policy Pundit, it’s absolutely insane for Beck to assert that the Left and the Islamists are in alliance to bring revolution to the Middle East. However, as Donald Douglas points out, that’s what the Left is telling us:

The neo-Stalinist ANSWER homepage has the announcement, “Emergency demonstrations: Stop all U.S. aid to Mubarak dictatorship” . . .
Code Pink’s Jodie Evans . . . served as a top campaign fundraiser for Barack Obama, and now her organization is leading a fundraising operation for the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt: “Code Pink: Obama, Hamas, Muslim Brotherhood Ally Raising (Tax Exempt) Money to Overthrow Egypt Gov’t” . . .

But don’t let yourself be distracted by mere facts. Bill Kristol says Glenn Beck is “hysterical” and it must be true because, after all, Bill Kristol is a Serious Foreign Policy Pundit and Glenn Beck is just . . . well, he’s just Glenn Beck, right?

And really, who is this Lisa Graas person who tells us about “Five Revolutions Backed by George Soros”?

“The Soros centre’s job in eastern Europe is nearly finished. Its main focus now is the Islamic world, Arab countries, Turkey, Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc.”

Oh, that’s not a quote from Lisa Graas. That’s a 2007 quote by Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh, a consultant for the Soros-funded Open Society Institute.

But don’t believe that crazy conspiracy-theory stuff. Trust the Serious Foreign Policy Pundits. Because they’ve never been wrong before.

My friend Dr. James Joyner, however, is of another opinion:

Going back at least to William F. Buckley, Jr.’s famous article casting the John Birch Society out of the legitimate conservative moment, it has been understood that letting the fringe define the cause hurts it. Buckley correctly reasoned that Birch founder Robert Welch’s crazy and outrageous conspiracy theories were tainting the legitimate anti-Communist movement.
Similarly, the psychotic rantings of Glenn Beck invite ridicule on the rest of us. Legitimate points are inevitably countered by comparisons with absurd variants by Beck, Coulter, Limbaugh, and others who make a living stoking the fears of the base. This is, at best, a distraction from the debate and, often, makes intelligent discussion of the issues next to impossible because they’ve been preemptively framed by the loudest, most shrill, most hyperbolic voices.

How many times have we heard variations of this argument? 

“Oh, Buckley purged the Birchers and therefore, we must now cast aside Uncouth Person X and distance ourselves from Populist Organization Y, because above all else, the Official Conservative Movement must maintain its precious respectability!”

If we had listened to that argument in 2009, there never would have been a Tea Party movement. Republicans would have rolled over and played dead and gone along with the whole Obama/Pelosi/Reid agenda because it was not respectable to oppose Keynesian “stimulus” spending, cap-and-trade, nationalized health care, and so forth.

Now that “the loudest, most shrill, most hyperbolic voices” have succeeded in fomenting grassroots opposition, however, we are told that elected representatives must ignore the people who elected them and, instead, must heed those respectable voices who did nothing at all to help encourage the Tea Party movement.

Hey, let’s dump Ann Coulter because, after all, “the Age of Ann has passed,” right? She’s only the author of, what, five or six New York Times bestsellers?

Yeah, let’s get rid of Coulter because a bunch of bloggers said so.

Purge Coulter! Purge Beck! Purge Sarah Palin! Purge Mark Levin! Purge Rush Limbaugh!

Purge! Purge! Purge!

And keep right on purging until the only people inside the Big Tent are respectable Republicans like Mike Castle, Lincoln Chafee, Arlen Specter and Charlie Crist, and the motto of the Official Conservative Movement becomes, “Me, Too.”

UPDATE: Linked by The Great One: “Cool it with the Stalinist purge crap.”

UPDATE II: Please permit me to point out that, while any conservative who mentions the influence of George Soros is portrayed as a dangerous conspiracy kook, it is perfectly acceptable for liberals to demonize the Koch brothers as right-wing puppetmasters.

UPDATE III: Did I ever mention that you never want to make Dan Riehl pissed off at you?

Glenn Beck Wants You to Threaten Violence Against Harmless Academics

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That’s what liberals have been claiming. The Nation published several nasty e-mails professor Frances Fox Piven received because she has become “the target of a relentless campaign to demonize her.” This accusation got repeated in a New York Times story with a scary headline:

Spotlight From Glenn Beck Brings
a CUNY Professor Threats

And that leads to Beck getting write-ups by Stanley Kurtz and James Taranto and links, links, links from Instapundit.

But why should Beck get all the blame? Blame me, please. In 2006, on page 149 of Donkey Cons, I wrote:

The welfare explosion of the 1960s was the brainchild of a group of Columbia University professors, including Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward and crusading  New York anti-poverty lawyer Edward Sparer. They saw welfare as a means to shatter “patterns of servile conformity” among the poor, transforming them into a force for revolution.

See? I was demonizing Professor Piven before Glenn Beck ever heard of her. But do I get any credit when she gets hateful e-mail? No. Why? Because I don’t have a Fox News show and Beck does.

Henceforth, whenever somebody sends France Fox Piven an e-mail calling her “big doody-head,” I’m claiming credit. I need the publicity.

Patterico: ‘Charles Johnson Doesn’t Care About Context or Truth Any More’

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“I was such a small fish at the time. I realized I was basically committing blog suicide by going against him. But he was wrong.”
— Pamela Geller, January 2010

It’s interesting how easy it has become to ignore Charles Johnson and Little Green Footballs. A couple weeks ago, Diary of Daedalus or the Blogmocracy had a post with a graphic showing the decline in LGF’s traffic since Johnson began his mad purge of commenters who didn’t cooperate with his site’s leftward shift. And I would have blogged about that, but why bother? Nobody cares about LGF anymore.

Johnson has tried to re-invent LGF as an amateur Media Matters, and Patterico caught LGF doing a phony “gotcha” wherein Glenn Beck last June supposedly told his viewers to shoot people in the head.

Patterico links the transcript of the program which makes clear that Beck never said or intended any such thing. What Beck was talking about was a “civil war” within the Democratic Party between pragmatic, mainstream liberals and the revolutionary True Believers who are intent on radical change By Any Means Necessary:

You’ve been using them? 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.
They are dangerous because they believe. Karl Marx is their George Washington. You will never change their mind. And if they feel you have lied to them — they’re revolutionaries. Nancy Pelosi, those are the people you should be worried about.

You will recall that after the 9/12 March on Washington in 2009, Nancy Pelosi gave a press conference warning about rhetoric that “created a climate in which violence took place” in San Francisco in the late 1970s:

And what Beck was trying to say on his June 2010 program was that Democratic leaders, who believed they could co-opt and use the radicalism of the Left for their political advantage, should worry more about extremism from their own allies than from the conservative opposition. You don’t have to believe that assertion — or be a Beck fan — to see that what the LGF post did was to twist Beck’s meaning into the exact opposite of what Beck intended.

What’s stunning is how easily Johnson — or rather one of his second-banana henchpeople, “Conservative Moonbat” — was gulled into that error. The Beck transcript was available online the whole time. The transcript was located by the third commenter on the LGF post and the fourth commenter observed:

So he says that Dems will have to shoot left-wing radicals “in the head”

So even LGF’ers quickly discovered that the headline on the post and the context-free video clip were misleading. What remains to be learned is whether “Conservative Moonbat” got this video from Raw Story, or vice versa. But it appears that Johnson’s second bananas are increasingly third-rate. What this episode highlights is the cause of LGF’s decline. At some point in 2007, Charles Johnson decided that his conservative allies were unworthy of his allegiance and needed to be destroyed. His war against Pamela Geller was the opening salvo in that campaign. But as Da Tech Guy once advised Joe Scarborough, “Sooner or later you have to join the side you’re on.”

In coalition politics we often find ourselves allied with people with whom we disagree, with people we don’t like, with people who we find in some way embarrassing or obnoxious. It may even be the case that prominent leaders and spokesmen of “our side” appear to be exactly the sort of people with whom we normally can’t stand to associate. We may feel that these leaders and spokesmen are in some way discrediting the cause we support. Nevertheless, when push comes to shove, these people are contending for the same cause and are therefore not our political enemies.

Charles Johnson has cut himself off from conservatives and made them his enemies, without actually bothering to declare himself a liberal. Liberals were happy to celebrate Johnson’s defection from the Right, but the one-time dividend of a New York Times profile hasn’t yielded any lasting benefit.

No blog is an island. If you aren’t linked by other blogs, you can’t increase your readership. That which does not grow will eventually begin to die. When Johnson decided to make war on erstwhile blog allies, he also cut himself off from their readers, and without a readership — beyond the dwindling cult of sycophants — he has become irrelevant.

And Pamela Geller “was such a small fish,” y’know? It’s amazing what a “small fish” can accomplish.

She’ll be at CPAC next month with a world-premiere movie.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!

Good News! Unemployment Hits 9.8%

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It’s the most wonderful time of the year isn’t it? New York Times:

In a jolting surprise to the economic recovery and market expectations, the United States economy added just 39,000 jobs in November, and the unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent, according to the Department of Labor.

Did somebody say “surprise”? Yes! Which can only mean . . . ? Yes, it’s time for the magic word!

Employers added fewer jobs than forecast in November and the unemployment rate unexpectedly increased, vindicating the Federal Reserve’s decision to pump more money into the economy to spur growth.

Everybody loves unexpected surprises this time of year, don’t they? And why are you so very merry this Christmas season? Because when I said, “Hey, maybe Glenn Beck’s got a point with this gold thing” — in May, when gold was under $1,200 an ounce — you listened.

You did listen, didn’t you?

Gold prices jumped back above $1,400 an ounce Friday to settle at a fresh record-high as the U.S. dollar slid following a surprisingly weak report on the nation’s job market.
February gold futures rose $16.90, or 1.2%, to settle at a nominal all-time high of $1,406.20 an ounce.

Yes, you are having a happy, happy holiday! And what makes it even happier? Because you know that those 1,800 soon-to-be-unemployed Democrat congressional staffers will be entering the worst U.S. job market in 30 years!

Ho, ho, ho!

UPDATE: And welcome, Instapundit readers!

Malkin and Coulter Underrated?

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Conservative Home, a new Web site run by people you never heard of, has published the results of a survey of “1,152 Republican activists” identifying their favorite pundits.

The top five are Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Charles Krauthammer, Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity — i.e., the top talk-radio star, three Fox News hosts and and a Washington Post columnist who appears frequently on Fox News.

Before you say “epistemic closure,” let me point out that Michelle Malkin is ranked No. 7 and Ann Coulter No. 9 on the list. Both of them are more conservative than O’Reilly or Newt Gingrich (No. 6) and both of them have written important, heavily-researched books that were also huge bestsellers.

Malkin’s Invasion must be ranked as the best book on immigration policy since Peter Brimelow’s Alien Nation (which is very high praise) and In Defense of Internment . . . my God, talk about poking the hornet’s nest of political correctness with a stick.

As for Coulter, her books are much better than is suspected by people who know her only for her snarky jabs on TV. As for her right-wing bona fides, I still remember the shock of reading Godless, in which she described Joe Sobran as her “mentor.” If you know anything about Sobran, that one reference ought to give you pause the next time you hear some idiot dismiss Coulter as a “neo-con.” 

Malkin and Coulter and George Will (No. 10) would all rank above O’Reilly in any fair ranking of conservative pundits, but “favorite” is not the same as “most conservative,” of course. I’m also surprised that Mark Levin didn’t make the list, but you see that — with the exception of Limbaugh and Will — the basic factor here seems to be, “Who gets the most airtime on Fox?”

The Conservative Home editors themselves have other concerns:

Worryingly, columnists often regarded as among the most thoughtful conservatives did not fare well. David Brooks of the New York Times only mustered a mention from 1.3% of the panel (14 people). Ross Douthat, also at the NYT, won just four votes and Mike Gerson, Washington Post writer and former speechwriter to President Bush, gets just three mentions.

These omissions are entirely understandable:

  • David Brooks is not a conservative, period. He has described himself as a “moderate,” and I say we take his word for it.
  • Douthat is conservative and, as the editors say, “thoughtful,” but his thoughtfulness manifests itself as an unwillingness to reach out, smack liberals upside the head and yell, “You’re wrong!” (Metaphorically, of course.) A good conservative pundit has to be confrontational toward liberalism, and aggressively so. This has been true of every great pundit of the Right since Buckley smacked Yale upside the head in 1951.
  • The basic problem with Gerson can best be summarized in the phrase “former speechwriter to President Bush.” Gerson recently wrote a good column, which makes him 1-for-the-season by my count. In general, Gerson’s prose is boring and bland. David Frum considers Gerson his intellectual inferior and this is one point where even Frum’s worst enemies wouldn’t argue with him.

It is possible to be erudite and serious without being pompous, snobby, wishy-washy or dull, and the Brooks/Douthat/Gerson troika can’t seem to transcend that hurdle.

Buying Gold? Caveat Emptor

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On previous occasions, I’ve made the point that gold prices are going up and that, in times of uncertainty — as, for example, when the Federal Reserve is pursuing a clearly inflationary policy — gold is a good investment. (Did I mention the DJIA lost 251 points this past week?)

The title of my most recent post on this topic was, “You Should’ve Listened to Glenn Beck.”

A reader decided to investigate and created a post at an Internet discussion board, which linked to a very interesting graphic from Ritholtz.com.

Ritholtz.com contends that a gold retail company promoted by Glenn Beck is guilty of deceptive practices. I have no time to investigate the controversy myself, but would urge anyone planning to invest in gold (or anything else) to do their own research and be sure that they are getting a fair value for their dollar.

Economics 101: It is always in the seller’s interest to maximize his profit from any transaction and you, as the buyer, are responsible for looking out for your own interest.

In the interest of fairness, I now link “Why gold is a bad investment,” by Jonathan Burton of MarketWatch. But I am not personally persuaded by Burton’s argument, given that he is obligated to mention that (a) gold is still about $900 an ounce below its 1980 peak in inflation-adjusted dollars, and (b) George Soros has a substantial investment in gold.

Wait: George Soros getting investment advice from . . . Glenn Beck?

Come up with your own crazy conspiracy theory to explain that one.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! A lively discussion in the comments below, including a link to the Classic Liberal, who discusses the difference between bullion coins — sold for the per-ounce value of their gold content — and numismatic coins, sold for their value as collectibles. The later category seems to be where concerns about ripoffs arise.

Let me provide what may be a helpful analogy. I’m a consumer fireworks buff. (You can hit the tip jar and help fund next year’s Fourth of July show.) Fireworks retailers offer all kinds of “discount” come-ons to entice buyers, most commonly the BOGO (Buy One, Get One “free”) and alleged freebies (e.g., spend at least $500 and get a “free” 6-shell mortar kit).

Of course, nothing is “free.” The stores don’t make money by giving stuff away. All this alleged “free” stuff is a marketing gimmick, encouraging the unwary consumer to spend more in the belief that he’s getting an awesome deal.

Sooner or later, the really avid fireworks freak stumbles onto the Pyrouniverse forums and learns that he can buy fireworks by the case from wholesalers. In the process, he discovers that the 6-shot mortar kit that retails for $24.99 ($12.50 with the BOGO “discount”) has a wholesale price of $54 for a case of 12 kits — $4.50 a kit. Furthermore, wholesale companies also have volume discounts, e.g., 10% off purchases over $500, so that you could effectively get that entire case of mortar kits “free.”

This discovery of the vast gap between retail and wholesale prices frequently results in the fireworks buff becoming profoundly bitter about retailers. “What a rip-off!” he declares, explaining that he spent more than $1,000 retail on last year’s Fourth of July show, thinking he was getting a great deal, only to learn too late that he could have gotten an equivalent amount of fireworks for less than $400 wholesale.

Well, caveat emptor, my friend. And let me ask you, “What else are you buying retail without really shopping around for the best price?” Clothes? Furniture? Electronics? What is true of fireworks is true of nearly everything else you spend money for, including investments.

Except in punishing outright fraud, however, the answer to “rip-offs” is not government regulation or class-action lawsuits. The answer is to stop being a chump.

Government cannot abolish stupidity. If the government can’t abolish the kind of stupidity that leads to fireworks injuries — and they can’t — they certainly can’t abolish the kind of stupidity that leads to people paying too much for collectible coins.

But government never ceases in its tireless effort to “protect” you, and guess what our friends in Washington slipped into the ObamaCare bill?

Starting Jan. 1, 2012, Form 1099s will become a means of reporting to the Internal Revenue Service the purchases of all goods and services by small businesses and self-employed people that exceed $600 during a calendar year. Precious metals such as coins and bullion fall into this category and coin dealers have been among those most rankled by the change.
This provision, intended to mine what the IRS deems a vast reservoir of uncollected income tax, was included in the health care legislation ostensibly as a way to pay for it. The tax code tweak is expected to raise $17 billion over the next 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

Whoa! A tax on everything you buy, including gold? You want to talk about a rip-off . . .