Glenn Beck gives his take on Hoffman loss

The Fox News host says "what's coming next year" will "dwarf 1994"

By Alex Koppelman

Topics:Glenn Beck, War Room, 2009 Elections, Fox News

If it weren’t for Glenn Beck, Doug Hoffman and his unlikely insurgent third-party candidacy in New York’s 23rd Congressional District might never have happened. Hoffman did, after all, recently name Beck as one of his mentors, and the Fox News and radio host gave the candidate a boost by putting him on the air.

So it was only natural that Beck would weigh in on Hoffman’s loss to Democrat Bill Owens during his radio show on Wednesday. And it wasn’t particularly surprising that Beck, like some of his ideological allies, would say the defeat was really a win. In fact, he said it was “setting the stage” for something next year that would “dwarf” the midterm elections of 1994, when Republicans swept back into power in Congress.

From the transcript made available on Beck’s Web site:

GLENN: Then you have New York 23, and I love the propaganda on this one. First of all, this just shows ‑‑ I mean, when you’ve lost Virginia by 20 points, Corzine loses in the most corrupt state in the union. No, my apologies to Massachusetts …. But anyway, when you lose that, when you’ve got the Democrats coming out and saying, yeah, but the congressional district 23. And here’s their case: Well, you know, this just shows the failure of the tea party. Okay. Let’s just go through this. Let’s just go through this. If I heard that one more time last night, I was going to blow my head off. Here it is. This is the failure, okay? ….

I like him, but he is not, he’s not flashy. He’s an accountant eight weeks ago that nobody even knew, a complete unknown. He’s a third party guy. The Republicans spent with what’s her face, Scuzzia, they gave her, I believe it was $800,000? Is that right? …. To destroy him. To destroy him. Then she drops out of the race and then she unites with the Democrats who are also spending money hand over fist to destroy the accountant! And you win by 3 points? That’s a victory? You’ve double‑teamed an accountant and you only won by three points. Boy, you guys are good …. That’s like the Yankees playing a high school team and winning by three runs. Oh, wow! ….

And here’s what the ‑‑ forget about the Democrats. Here’s what the Republicans should learn. The tea party movement, if you think you’re going to run people that are going to be, you know, ACORN wannabes and they’re just part of the corruption, part of the system, if you’re going to run those people, you can expect a tea party guy to come out, and the tea parties, they’ll help you lose every single election. Every single election. Because I for one am not ‑‑ if I believe in the Republican, I’ll vote for the Republican. But if you’re running somebody who’s like part of the system, I’m not interested. I’m not interested. And I think that a lot of Americans are like that. So the Republicans have a choice to make. You can either spend a million dollars trying to destroy a third party accountant, or you could say, wow, this accountant probably would come in within three points of beating the Democrat if we combined our efforts, Republicans and Democrats, spent a fortune, had our candidate then drop out and campaign for the Democrats, we might be able to come in with about a 3‑point margin. You might want to just say, “Maybe we should go with the accountants. Maybe we should go with the regular people….”

This is setting the stage for ‑‑ it’s going to dwarf 1994, dwarf it. Dwarf it. What’s coming next year, dwarf …. I really think that this is going to make what happened in 1994 look small.

One other Beck note: During his radio broadcast on Wednesday, the host reportedly suffered an attack of appendicitis. He’s since had his appendix removed, according the president of his production company. Salon wishes him a speedy recovery.

: Alex Koppelman is a staff writer for Salon. More Alex Koppelman

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If he can silence Glenn Beck, he can handle Barack Obama in a debate, right?

VIDEO

By Alex Pareene

Glenn Beck, being filibustered by Newt Gingrich (Credit: GBTV.com)

Topics:2012 Elections, Newt Gingrich, Glenn Beck, Republican Party

While it’s easy to pick through any Newt Gingrich interview and conclude that he comes out looking silly, because he is silly, I have to agree with Dave Weigel that Gingrich handily won his encounter with streaming Internet talk show host Glenn Beck. Look at the excerpts Weigel quotes: It’s typical word-salad nonsense from Gingrich, but those responses successfully cow Beck into changing the subject.

Just watch the first couple of minutes of this and watch Beck sit there, dumbstruck, as the disembodied voice of Gingrich rambles about Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” the Wright Brothers, and Alexander Hamilton’s Report on Manufactures (which Gingrich incorrectly refers to as his “First Report on Manufacturing” — such shoddiness from Freddie Mac’s historian in residence!).

This isn’t just because Gingrich is smarter than Beck, though he is.

There’s a reason Glenn Beck’s show generally featured monologues: The guy doesn’t do interviews very well. He’s easily filibustered. Remember him looking completely lost and dejected while attempting to get anything worthwhile out of a babbling Eric Massa?

And Gingrich, who’d agree to sit down for a day-long “Lincoln-Douglas-style debate” with a Teddy Ruxpin doll, is selling himself as a candidate based in large part on his ability to talk. Republicans think Obama talked his way into the White House, mesmerizing voters with his fancy words and soothing tone. And certain conservatives are itching for Gingrich to face Obama in a talking contest. They think Gingrich would destroy him. And they base this impression on the sight of Gingrich dominating interviews with morons like Glenn Beck.

What Newt is good at — and it’s the exact thing Romney is awful at — is defending himself against charges of apostasy. Gingrich has been all over the political spectrum during his career, but when you try to nail him on some sort of offense against conservative orthodoxy, he talks his way out of it. Glenn Beck says Gingrich compared himself to Teddy Roosevelt, lately a “Progressive” villain. Gingrich responds with a history lesson and a defense of very basic public safety regulations that no one would argue with. Beck criticizes Gingrich’s support for ethanol subsidies, Gingrich responds with crowd-pleasing nationalism about competitiveness with Saudi Arabia and Venezuela and a bit of Obama-bashing.

When directly confronted with his attack on Paul Ryan’s Medicare plan, an attack that almost ended his campaign before it began, Gingrich defended himself by saying that he was right and also he’d vote for Ryan’s plan.

GINGRICH: Well, let’s go back to what I just said. What I was asked was if a program is unpopular, should the Republicans impose it anyway. We can go back and we can listen to exactly what I was asked on that show and what I said I stand by, which is in a free society, you don’t elect officials to impose on you things that you disagree with. We just went through this slide over ObamaCare.

Now, I also, ironically, I would implement the Medicare reforms that Paul Ryan wants, I would implement them next year as an optional choice and I would allow people to have the option to choose premium support and then have freedom to negotiate with their doctor or their hospital in a way that would increase their ability to manage costs without being involved, you know ‑‑ but I wouldn’t impose it on everybody across the board. I think that’s a very large scale experiment. But I think you could migrate people toward it. I’m proposing the same thing on Social Security. I think young people ought to have the right to choose a personal Social Security insurance savings account plan and the Social Security actuary estimates that 95% of young people would pick a personal Social Security savings account over the current system but they would do so voluntarily because we would empower them to make a choice. We wouldn’t impose it on them. That’s a question of how do you think you can get this country to move more rapidly toward reform, and I think you can get it to move toward reform faster.

GLENN: All right.

GINGRICH: By giving people the right to choose.

Gingrich even successfully spins his longtime vocal support of government action to reverse climate change by saying he was talking about tax credits for nuclear power and besides he never liked Al Gore and thought cap-and-trade was an attempt to establish government control over the private sector.

And because Beck’s a bad interviewer, Gingrich got away with all of this. But even if Beck wasn’t a bad interviewer, Gingrich is quite good at making himself sound good to conservatives. It’s a skill Mitt Romney lacks; in his long career, Gingrich has only ever managed to sell himself to credulous Beltway journalists and the right-wing rabble. Everyone else has tended to find him more than slightly ridiculous.

A Gingrich-Obama debate would certainly be more fun than a Romney-Obama debate, but I can’t imagine it’d be as easy for Gingrich as outwitting Sean Hannity and Greta Van Susteren.

: Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon. Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene

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"Remembering the day we forgot the lessons of the day we swore we had sworn we would always remember"

By Peter Finocchiaro

Topics:Morning Clip, Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, Jon Stewart, The Daily Show

Ten years ago, a tragedy brought us all closer together. Last night, Jon Stewart recalled another moment, just two days after, when all the solidarity engendered through a national trauma began to dissipate into the political ether. Opportunists — first Jerry Falwell, then Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, all the “Ground Zero Mosque” people (not to say anything of the folks in power) — began using the memory of that historical moment for their own personal advantage. “The Daily Show” paid tribute:

: More Peter Finocchiaro

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In Jerusalem, the right wing commentator styles himself as a religious leader of the Jerry Falwell variety

By Noga Tarnopolsky, GlobalPost

U.S. conservative broadcaster Glenn Beck address the crowd during his "Restoring Courage" rally in Jerusalem August 24, 2011

Topics:GlobalPost, Glenn Beck

JERUSALEM — House speaker John Boehner banned members of congress from attending Glenn Beck’s rally-cum-religious revival next to the Wailing Wall, in Jerusalem’s Old City, but Republican presidential candidates can do as they wish.

So if anyone was wondering what happened to Hermann Cain after his disappointing showing at the Ames straw poll, one had only to look toward the Holy City, where he was enjoying center stage with Glenn Beck at the final of three events set in Israel.

Under the aegis of “Courage to Stand,” Beck addressed a fairly sparse crowd of 2,000. Also on stage was Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and cantorial music superstar Dudu Fisher, who sang the Fiddler on The Roof’s version of a Sabbath psalm.

Outside the venue, in an archeological garden located on the spot where King David, it is claimed, established the city of Jerusalem over 3,000 years ago, Beck intoned, “The world is expecting movement, the world is expecting someone to lead!”

A hodgepodge of opponents weakly demanded that Beck go home. Leftists condemned his anti-Islamic views whereas religious Jews decried the un-Jewish character of his extravaganza being held so close to the Temple Mount. Former left-wing member of Parliament Yossi Sarid published an Op-Ed entitled, “Glenn Beck, Don’t Come Back.”

Beck, who appears to be drawing smaller crowds since leaving Fox News, ignored his detractors.

“He’s a guy who shares the beliefs of Christian Zionists throughout America,” said Zev Chafets, author of “A Match Made in Heaven: American Jews, Christian Zionists, and One Man’s Exploration of the Weird and Wonderful Judeo-Evangelical Alliance,” and “Rush Limbaugh: An Army of One.”

Those beliefs, he said, are rooted in Genesis 9:12: “I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you.”

Nonetheless, Beck has a spotty history with Jews. In the not-so-distant past he accused the financier (and Holocaust survivor) George Soros of collaboration with Nazis, and in a similar vein, referred to the children murdered in the recent terror attack in Norway as akin to Hitler Youth. In addition, he authored a strange novel blaming the attacks of 9/11 on a sniveling public relations executive based on the real life Edward Bernays, an American pioneer in the field of publicity and a nephew of Sigmund Freud.

Now Beck looks poised to claim the mantle of pro-Israel Christianity, which was previously championed by Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson and is now held by the Rev. John Hagee, who accompanied Beck to Israel.

“I think this is positive for Beck, because I think he wants to be the head of this parade when Hagee dies,” Chafets said. “He’s the prominent figure out there right now. He is reinventing himself as a religious leader, not a media figure. He is placing himself at a very advantageous spot. And at the same time, he is doing something very good for Israel.”

In the audience was Ronald Wiltsey, a Sarah Palin fan from Texas, who came to Israel with Beck along with his mother, Emma Caldwell, 76, and his uncle, Sam Miller, who is 68.

“I’m a history buff,” Wiltsey said. “I don’t agree with what we normally get back home about the Israelis. This is the land given to the Jews.”
Wiltsey, 52, spent 23 years in the army and is veteran of Desert Storm. “I did not get a good impression of Islam,” he said. “I’ve been through a lot. This is easy street now. This is a great trip.”

Before heading to South Africa and South America, Beck wrapped up his Israeli sojourn with an invocation, “We pray for the peace of Jerusalem. We have abused our positions and show no love for others. We are here to say, Israel, the Holy Land, you are not alone. … May God bless Israel, may God bless the Palestinian people, may God bless the United States of America. Amen.”

“He is a history nut,” Chafets said. “He garnishes his speeches with things like Christian anti-Semitism of which needs to be atoned for, and the close kinship between Muslim anti-Semitism and Christian anti-Semitism, which has to be repudiated.”

Two days before the rally, a uniquely Jerusalemite commotion threatened to do away with the musical accompaniment altogether. Eli Yaffe, the choirmaster and conductor of the Great Synagogue’s Choir, which was to accompany Fisher for the Israeli national anthem and other tunes, grasped the Christian nature of the event and hastily backed off. With him went 16 performers, all of whom are to sing at the synagogue’s High Holy Day services next month.

It then fell to Meir Briskman, a young acolyte, to improvise a replacement group with hours to go. One of the bass singers on stage with Beck was Steven Timoner, 39, a graduate of the Yale Conservatory and a Chicago native who is now married to an Israeli and living in Jerusalem. He made $500 for the gig. From his perch, he could see that people gave Beck “scores of standing ovations.”

“I think he gave a decent speech,” Timoner said, smiling. “Look, it was very good. It was coherent. He had a real message. It was nothing like seeing him on TV, where he’s just, um, a moron.”

: More Noga Tarnopolsky

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Watch: The worst way to advertise an iPad app, Glenn Beck blames Michelle Obama for "Spider-Man," and Post-it love

By Drew Grant

Being able to power down your girlfriend is a huge plus these days.

Topics:Viral Video, Celebrity, Glenn Beck, Michelle Obama, Spider-Man, Television

1. Post-It with love

Brazilian footwear company Melissa created a giant mural using 300,000 pages of sticky pads to open their flagship store. Bonus: viewers could write little notes of endearment on the Post-its, creating a huge mural composed with a lot of love.

: Drew Grant is a staff writer for Salon. Follow her on Twitter at @videodrew. More Drew Grant

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The Current TV host discusses hateful conservative reactions to the Norway terror attacks

By Natasha Lennard

Keith Olbermann (left) and Democratic strategist and columnist, Karl Frisch

Topics:Morning Clip, War Room, Glenn Beck, Keith Olbermann, Norway

In a move a Norwegian official called a “new low” for Glenn Beck, the firebrand talk show host compared the shooting victims of the Norway youth camp to the “Hitler Youth” on his Monday show.

Speaking with Democratic strategist and syndicated columnist Karl Frisch, Keith Olbermann on Tuesday asked what was behind Beck’s comment: “Is this ignorance? Is he obtuse? Is he insane?”