IMO, he isn’t even a neocon. He is a career talking head. He will say whatever advances his career. He doesn’t have sincere stances, but because he is a narcissist he still manages to find plenty to talk about.
But for this reason he is useful as a barometer.
Well yeah possibly, and the role he is expected to play is that of a neocon.
Politics and the Power Elite - offers a great analysis. No doubt these continue today.
As far as Fox neocon talking heads go, Beck is one of the better ones. I watch him because my family does, and within the past month there were at least two episodes where he devoted a segment to the 9th and 10th Amendments. Constitutional government doesn’t mean much to a libertarian, but if he’s going to teach the masses about something they’ve probably never seen to get them worked up, that’s not a bad direction to take them.
I know all that Conza (and calling me names doesn’t really help convince anyone). I’m familiar with praxeology, I just think you’re jumping to conclusions that are too extreme. Some “statists” are much moreso than others. (I know, in principle it’s all the same.)
I won’t deny that he unknowingly helps prop up a side of that pyramid in the video, but there are topics where he hits awfully close to the roots of the ‘problem’ such as the Fed. He is still a neocon so I can’t say you’re totally wrong; I think you’re being too cynical and ignoring some of the inroads he’s made in certain areas. He’s inviting Ron Paul, Peter Schiff, and Judge Napolitano onto his show without not trying to make a circus out of it (unlike most media scum). This has to count for something. I don’t feel like he’s being judged fairly when this is completely ignored by his critics like it always is.
I meant his employer doesn’t have much power over him personally. Perhaps this is an overstatement and I should have said they don’t have “complete power”, and yes he wouldn’t be on the air long if he really became “extreme” in the eyes of the FCC, but I don’t think he’s anywhere near that point yet. He still has some freedom should he ever choose to exercise it, and his ratings certainly add to that freedom in terms of how much his employer will tolerate (until the FCC decides to step in I suppose).
I’m pretty sure Beck doesn’t support bailouts of any kind anymore (whether he thinks they were all a mistake up to the beginning, I don’t know). Economically (and maybe regarding privacy/big brother) he’s moved towards libertarian recently. Like I said before he’s not consistent (neocon still), but I never said he’s a flat out libertarian… I’m not sure why you’re alluding that I’ve done so. Now would you stop making me defend the selective libertarian tendencies of random neocons? [:P]
I’ll say this: if he changes his tone in 3 years when a Repub likely inevitably retakes the high ground, I’ll reconsider his fully intentional motives. I don’t think that he will go back to being a Repub fanboy as he was during the early/mid Bush years (well… it might if that president is Palin). During the late Bush years he was getting pretty critical on most fronts so I didn’t see the change in tone matching up perfectly with elections as some others seem to be claiming.
Beck has never been anything resembling a Libertarian, and will never be. I’m not sure if anyone caught a segment with Bill O’Reily awhile back where they were arguing which new taxes should be imposed. Beck actually supported the idea of a 2% tax on the entire US GDP to be paid directly to the UN.
I’m more afraid of a saboteur like Beck who manages to mix just enough truth in with his poison, than I am of idiotic talking heads who spew nothing but poison. As I said before, he is a Judas goat and a fraud who’s sole job is to destroy any possibility for real change.
The UN? How ‘awhile back’ is this? I thought he hated the UN. It seems to me many critics like to play time line games and make claims based on inconsistencies or changes in opinion, I mean he is allowed to change positions on things right?
The danger of mixing truth with bull is a good point, but I don’t think it’s anything unique to him, even the government itself pulls that crap all the time.
Nevermind I was wrong, it was to go towards paying down the national debt. Still, not Libertarian in the slightest.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/glenn-beck-for-dummies.html
Exactly.
The man is far from sincere, in fact he’s very much the oppurtunist!
Although I don’t agree with Alex Jones on quite a few things, he and the other author hit it right on the head there. He’s far from a “libertarian” to say the very least. Sometimes, I wonder if the man understands what he is saying.
(I used to like Glenn Beck, until I realized him for the fraud he was and how he really doesn’t care at all)
Just watch his speech at CPAC, come on guys!
Hmm. A 2% “VAT” to pay down the debt - a terribly, amazingly stupid idea, thumbs down of course. And yes, we can’t call him a libertarian.. I know.
From the link above:
His bizarre and clownish antics of fake crying, which were proven to be staged when Beck replicated them on demand for a GQ photo shoot, are doing nothing but reinforcing the stereotype that the freedom movement is extreme and unbalanced.
Really? This qualifies as “proof” that these episodes were staged live on the shows? Of course it’s not. This is the kind of thing that annoys me and causes me to be critical of Beck’s critics. If they’re stretching this truth, what else are they stretching in their article?
So while I disagree with the bold, I do agree with the overall statement. For all the assistance he provides for the liberty movement (putting people like Judge or Ron Paul on and so on), he probably causes close to or as much damage in other ways. But I don’t feel this is intentionally planned in the least (that sounds like a conspiracy theory). I don’t deny that it’s possible that he’s up to no good intentionally; I’m not yet convinced this is the case.
And again, it looks like most of the references (other than the 2% VAT idiocy) came before the 2008 election period (in some cases, way before). His commentary softened around that point, he started reading more about the founders, and so on. Still not perfect of course, but don’t forget that many of us (maybe the majority) were once neocons or partisans at one time too.
I’ve yet to listen/watch him for about a year though so perhaps my opinion is outdated (but I’ve yet to see any new criticism from the past year), and I don’t really have much of an urge to start tuning in again…
I don’t know if this means anything, but he has apparently stated that he believes global warming is caused by mankind ( I don’t know where everyone stands on this). But, again this goes against what he has been screaming about for quite sometime as he did cover “Climategate” and did rip on Al Gore countless times when I tuned in to him.
Besides having Andrew Napolitano and Ron Paul on, he has hardly done anything to prove he isn’t a statist at the end of the day. I know you haven’t listened to the man in a while, but he is just so vague and obscure at times, that it really makes you question what he’s up to.
But again Ansury, your entitled to your own thoughts about him, so I really don’t want to pester you any further about this.
It’s no pestering at all, I’m always open to honest discussion and considering opposing opinions. (Unless it’s Paul Krugman’s opinion. [^o)] )
Beck’s anthropogenic global warming view, I have definitely not heard before, and this is new to me. Most here (I believe) think this is either a complete scam or there’s no solid evidence IIRC the latest thread right. I thought he was still in the “not enough evidence” camp. It’s even more confusing because one of my old email addresses still gets his newsletters and I recall seeing “climategate” references recently. I also recall hearing “global temperature decreasing for the last decade” or so (although I was never able to verify that in my own research…) and I think that came from him too.
Meh. Part of the reason I lost interest was things like this. He reports something or makes some claim, but when you go and look for it yourself just to check… maybe the “Google Research Method” just isn’t enough, but often I can’t find any backing evidence that appears credible. The sad thing is (and he claims he has a large research team to verify facts, whatever that means), many of these things could be true, but if they don’t provide the sources of their information how can they be confirmed? That’s crap…
This is one of the many sites where you can find this.
Posted: February 22, 2010
Brand spanking new. Seems he may have made disappointing progress over the last year.
I used to follow Beck pretty closely sometime around '08 and early '09 when it seemed like he was legitimately moving toward libertarianism. Although it’s become increasingly clear that he is a neo-con giving libertarian lip-service. He’s really more of an anti-progressive, than anything else. He is really stuck on the “Constitution” and views it as a divinely inspired document.
The only reason he bags on the Fed is because it was setup under Woodrow Wilson and the story is the same as any other program setup under a progressive administration. He just gives a pass to any other infringement since they are “in the constitution”. I had to finally turn him off in disgust when he said to the effect. (paraphrasing) “It is immoral (referring to US troops) to fight a war and not be 100% committed to it, if you’re going to fight a war, you need to fight to win and go in with the full power of the military and you shoot them in the head, until they understand not to mess with us any more and then you come home”. Ughh
I would argue that the man doesn’t even wholly understand the document (the Constitution) that he advocates for incessantly on his show. With that being said, it’s not like I know the Constitution like the back of my hand, but it’s fairly obvious that he does disregard the document during many points of his show, while paying lip service to it! I personally think the man is an utter waste of time, I’m sorry guys.
The Glenn Beck program this past Friday (Feb 26th) he had the episode dedicated to Libertarianism. He presented a pole for Americans to take - believing that most Americans are Libertarians and they don’t even know it. If you can find the episode on Fox or Youtube or something, it may be worth a view.
http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/36990/
So, I was a little excited about the episode. Judge Napolitano was on the entire time, addressing questions, who actually knows someting about Libertarianism. Everything was going well but then Beck got an audience member to stand up. Beck asked him what it meant to be a Libertarian and what was Anarchy. The guy said that Anarchy equaled destruction. At that moment, if it wasn’t against the law to discharge a firearm in city limits, I probably would have shot my TV.
Yes! His “drifting” towards libertarianism (that I can confirm) was taking place right during that period (end 08 to early 09), but then I can’t speak for what happened afterward since I stopped watching (too busy reading mises.org and such I suppose). And of course I did notice that he wasn’t really making the jump on foreign policy or terrorism at all which I think factored in to my loss of interest…
And nobody corrected? What was the response?
Found this which sums up part of how I feel about Beck’s critics, not that I disagree with them–I just want the critics to know what they’re talking about.
Napolitano is a decent guy, but he does say a lot of absurd things, in that clip it made me laugh when he said “At some point it (taxes) becomes theft”.
Also, as Ansury pointed out above, I think when Glenn and his program talk about Anarchy, their referring to the only Anarchists they know which are the Che and Communist crowd chanting “don’t tread on me” as they throw a brick through a business window. I don’t think he’s even heard of anarcho-capitalism or even has a clue to what it is.
Not to derail the topic, but while I agree this sounds absurd on the surface, perhaps he didn’t mean to imply that this “point” is the same for everyone. If someone is willing to “purchase” all the lousy services the government offers, if someone is willing to voluntarily purchase a portion of their services, or if someone doesn’t want ANY government junk-- all these people are stolen from to different degrees.
But, it’s entirely likely that I’m giving Judge too much credit and he doesn’t really consider this at all.