I Was Bored Today So I Watched Glen Beck. Big Mistake

I just finished watching the first fifteen minutes of Glen Beck and, just like every other time I have watched, I came away amazed at the "content" of the show. Today was the first show since his Restoring America rally at the Lincoln Memorial, so I was expecting him to talk about that triumph with a certain amount of Beckian smugness, but instead he spent fifteen minutes showing video clips of different media types attacking the whole thing. After each clip he reminded his viewers that he is the ONLY non-governmental figure IN HISTORY to have single-handedly convened 500,000 people for such a happening. (Actually, if you don't count Martin Luther King, the last person who got that many folks in one spot had to throw together a bunch of loaves and fishes to feed them all. Of course that couldn't happen in Washington because the waters around the city are too polluted.)In any event,he was sad when he shared his feelings of persecution when left-wing pundits bad mouthed the event, or when LIBERAL media outlets underestimated the crowd at only around 100,000.

I've always been amazed at the self-referential nature of the show, at the portrayal of poor Mr. Beck as a kind of martyr for the conservative cause who allows himself to be regularly pilloried by people like Joe Klein and news outlets like The Huffington Post. When he isn't congratulating himself for his courageous stands, he is drawing conspiracy theories that would make Mel Gibson blush. Well maybe not, but you get the idea. He seems more a caricature than Stephen Colbert and Colbert is trying to be a caricature.

He expressed his sadness, mixed with a little self-righteous outrage, over the skepticism with which his claims are met. What does he expect. His estimate for the crowd was five times the estimates of every other media outlet. He, of course, uses this disparity to support his claim that the media is simply a lap dog for PROGRESSIVES. Well, I'm a PROGRESSIVE (I keep putting that word in caps because whenever Beck uses it he seems to expect his audience to collectively shudder)who is skeptical of Beck's claims. After all, the last time The Tea Party had a Beck inspired rally in Washington, Fox News estimated the crowd at somewhere over a million strong. To prove their point they aired a photograph of a full-to-the-seams mall. There was one problem with the photo. It was taken years before at Bill McCartney's Million Man March. If you have been to Washington within the last couple of years, you have certainly seen the Native American Museum, an impressive addition to the network of museums in our capital. In the Fox photo, however, you could clearly see on the left the empty spot between the Washington Memorial and The Capital. If you looked closely you could also see a crane being used to erect the Native American Museum. The photo was a complete sham, just like Mr. Beck.

He even addressed the controversy over his choice of August 28 for his rally. As everyone who keeps abreast of things must know, August 28 is the anniversary of Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial. Beck claims that his choice of that date was completely innocent and merely coincidental. C'mon man! Beck would like us to believe that when he sat down with Sarah Palin and others to plan this event, they just stumbled upon August 28! "Oh look, I have the 28th free on my calendar." "Well let me see, so do I. This'll work out just fine." Please.

How can anyone in their right mind take this person seriously?