The NYT plays dumb about Glenn Beck
March 30, 2009 9:10 am ET by Eric Boehlert
No surprise, since this is the Beltway press' standard operating procedure when covering leaders of the conservative media: categorically refusing to spell out to readers what they actually say that makes them so controversial. In its A1 Beck profile on Monday, the Times dutifully follows those guidelines while adding in the twist of not quoting a single liberal who's critical of Fox News' cuckoo, pseudo-End Times host.
Here's how the Times politely dances around Beck's anti-government conspiratorial nuttiness, which has prompted even Fox anchors and conservative guests to mock him on the air. According to the paper, Beck offers up a "a mix of moral lessons, outrage and an apocalyptic view of the future" and "preaches against politicians, hosts regular segments titled 'Constitution Under Attack' and 'Economic Apocalypse,' and occasionally breaks into tears." Beck also "lingers over doomsday situations."
Actually, to be accurate, the Times does directly quote Beck in terms of what he's said on the air recently:
He says that America is “on the road to socialism” and that “God and religion are under attack in the U.S.”
And this:
“The truth is — that you are the defender of liberty,” he said. “It’s not the government. It’s not an army or anybody else. It’s you. This is your country.”
That's pretty much it. That's the direct evidence the Times provides for readers to suggest Beck says controversial things on the air. Hmm, if only there were an online resource the Times could have turned to to find a complete catalog of Beck's hateful inanities broadcast in recent week and months. That way the Times could have provided readers with an actual flavor of Beck's program.
BTW, according to the Times, Beck's a "populist" who represents an "alienated class of Americans." That's certainly one (disingenuous) way of putting it.
For context, imagine if (in some parallel universe) a radical Lefty TV host had a cable show at the turn of the decade where he wallowed into all kinds of dark, anti-government conspiracies in the wake of 9/11. Do you think the Times in its profile would directly quote lots of a nutty things that host said, and that the Times would quote a conservative being critical of the nutty host?
We do too.
UPDATE: Blogger Will Bunch also has a few problems with the Times "airball."
>>BTW, according to the Times, Beck's a "populist" who represents an "alienated class of Americans." That's certainly one (disingenuous) way of putting it.
Of course Beck style wingnuttery is what caused them to be alienated.
I read this article this morning, and it made me throw up in my mouth a little bit. In the "liberal" NY Times, we've seen fawning profiles of Beck and Limbaugh, while I don't remember seeing any profiles of say, someone who might be their liberal counterparts.
I don't really have a problem with the Times' article on Beck, but it was fluff. And that's fine, there really wasn't anything un-true in there, but they did gloss over the controversial part, after they said he was controversial.
I ran into one of his "ground soldiers" in his 9/12 Project this weekend at a local gun show (yes, I am uber liberal, and I like guns). It was a good run in. The man I talked to, definitely had his convictions, and I can respect him for that, and he professed to not like Beck either. And a lot of the "values" or principles that the 9/12 Project SAY that they espouse sound like good things. You know, things like, America is good. Be charitable. And so on, but it's the mere fact that the man espousing these things, Beck, doesn't really believe in them, or live them.
The best part is when he offered me a free copy of the Constitution, and I quickly pulled out the pocket edition that I carry with me at all times (yeah, weird I know), and showed him that I've read it, and that I don't believe our rights are being trampled on, now.
Why the Times article is not "fine" is because it diminishes the truth.
Beck did NOT criticize the administration when Bush was in charge like he does now. The economy tanked, we entered illegal wars and they ran up our deficit after being handed a surplus.
But now, all of a sudden, there is a Dem in the WH and now it is time for revolution.
The story completely ignores the most hate-filled parts of his program, just like the LA Times opinion piece highlighted here by MMFA ignores the same parts of Limbaugh's show.
The fact that Beck is distorting the truth, making stuff up and ginning-up hatred and violence MUST BE STOPPED before it is too late.
Case in point: Take a look at how this ignorance and hatred filled the head of MN Rep Michelle Bachmann last week. You want 1000s of Michelle Bachmanns running around, do you?
I don't agree with anything that Beck has to say, but if the NY Times wants to write this fawning article, fine. They're allowed to do that aren't they? And we, as seen here, are allowed to highlight the Crazy Beck that we all know, and don't love.
From the New York Times piece:
In an interview, Mr. Beck, who recently rewatched the 1976 film "Network," said he identified with the character of Howard Beale, the unhinged TV news anchorman who declares on the air that he is "mad as hell." "I think that’s the way people feel," Mr. Beck said. "That’s the way I feel."
So, this guy thinks he's Howard Beale, does he?
Then maybe he'll rat out his network to the American People, like Howard did...
HOWARD: "And when the 12th largest company in the worid controls the most awesome goddamn propaganda force in the whole godless worid, who knows what chit will be peddled for truth on this network."
I'm absolutely sure he never watched this scene.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BVqIjKyJh0
And I'm pretty confident Beck doesn't realize that Mr. Beale was CRAZY.
Mr. Jensen, the CEO played by Ned Beatty, was of course pretty ticked off at Howard, when he shouted him into a stupor, all to make him preach on-air "the corporate cosmology of Arthur Jensen".
But don't forget what it was that Howard said, that got him in such trouble, and called on the carpet by Mr. Jensen.
He ratted out to the American People, that his company, the parent company CCA that owned his network UBS, was selling the American People's Public Airwaves to the saudis...
HOWARD: “…CCA took over the company that owns this network. But now somebody is buying up CCA. Somebody called the Western Worid Funding Corporation. They filed the notice this morning. Who is the Western Worid Funding Corporation? It is a consortium of banks and insurance companies who are not buying CCA for themselves but as agents for somebody else. Who is the somebody else? They won't tell! They won't tell you, or the Senate, they won't tell the SEC, the FCC, they won't tell the Justice Department... I will tell you who they're buying CCA for. They're buying it for the Saudi-Arabian Investment Corporation. They are buying it for the Arabs.”
That's what it was that Howard said, that caused so much trouble.
As I said, not only was Paddy Chayefsky many years in the television business, but he had great insights, almost prophetic, about it all. And so he made his fictional Howard rat out his network, that they were selling our Public Airwaves to the saudis.
Ever wonder how those saudis could murder 3,000 Americans on September 11 2001, and hardly a word about them, the saudis, was broadcast on television with regard to those attacks?
Do you know that the saudis own not only a sizable stake in News Corporation, but also in Time-Warner (CNN) and Disney (ABC): true. And by sizable stake, I understand their ownership to approach or exceed 10% of those companies: and I can assure you, they take a very active interest in their ownership stake in our American media.
Paddy was spot on, and this hack beck, he not only works for rupert murdoch, he works for saudis too... everybody at Fox does: that's why the saudis are all but invisible in the reports of Fox News Channel.
Also in the New York Times piece...
"Let me be clear," Mr. Beck said. "If someone tries to harm another person in the name of the Constitution or the ‘truth’ behind 9/11 or anything else, they are just as dangerous and crazy as those we don’t seem to recognize anymore, who kill in the name of Allah."
Notice two things there: he calls people who are trying to find out the truth about 9/11, he calls them dangerous, and even threatens them (I think)... and he of course neglects to say anything about saudis, when he invokes terrorists.
Like I said, he and everybody else at Fox, is in the employ of those saudis: and so when he rants against those who seek the truth behind 9/11, and calls them dangerous and even threatens them (I think), he's just doing his job for those saudis who pay him, right?
The whole business is sick.
Here's the rest of what Howard (or Paddy Chayefsky) said, word for word, immediately after he said what I included above...
HOWARD: "So you listen to me. Listen to me.
Television is not the truth. Television’s a goddamned amusement park.
Television is a circus, a carnival, a travelling troupe of acrobats, storytellers, dancers, singers, jugglers, sideshow freaks, lion tamers and football players.
We’re in the boredom-killing business.
So if you want the truth, go to God.
Go to your gurus. Go to yourselves.
Because that’s the only place you’re ever going to find any real truth.
But, man, you’re never gonna get any truth from us.
We’ll tell you anything you wanna hear. We lie like heck.
We’ll tell you that Kojak always gets the killer, and that nobody ever gets cancer in Archie Bunker’s house.
However much trouble the hero is in, don’t worry. Look at your watch.
At the end of the hour he’s going to win. We’ll tell you any chit you want to hear.
We deal in illusions, man. None of it is true.
But you people sit there, day after day, night after night, all ages, colors, creeds.
We’re all you know. You’re beginning to believe the illusions we’re spinning.
You’re beginning to think the tube is reality and your lives are unreal.
You do whatever the tube tells you.
You dress like the tube, eat like the tube, raise your children like the tube,
think like the tube.
This is mass madness, you maniacs.
In God’s name, you people are the real thing! We are the illusion!
So turn off your television sets. Turn them off now.
Turn them off right now! Turn them off and leave them off.
Turn them off right in the middle of the sentence I’m speaking now.
Turn them off."
Paddy Chayefsky knew what he was talking about, when he put those words in Howard's fictional mouth: he worked for years in television, as a writer of visionary, even prophetic, talent.
I guess what I find most surprisng is the fact that you hold the New York Times to a higher standard.
For those who think that the Times really has truth-telling as its primary goal, I offer 2 words....Judith Miller.
Beck inflamed America about the Terry Schaivo case. He told lie after lie about Michael Schaivo, a man who was going through unimaginable anguish. Example of a lie: Michael is killing Terry to get a big insurance settlement. Fact: There was no insurance settlement.
It must have been so awful for Michael to hear conjured anger from the whole country at such a difficult time. Beck knew all along he was lying too. He admitted he took the other side of the same controversy as a local DJ in Schaivo's Florida home town.
It takes a really sick man to sink as low as Beck sunk on the Schaivo case.
You just made a very good point, but it does point something out.
When it comes to right-wing pundits, the less civil (and more outrageous) the behavior of the host, the more likely that person will be successful and be given a platform.
How else to explain the increased visibility and influence of the Ann Coulters, Rush Limbaughs, Michael Savages and Glenn Becks?
These people are never held accountable for their behavior...and they know it.