It’s no secret that the Koch brothers are financial supporters of Reason magazine.
Don’t be too surprised if the FreedomWorks/Glenn Beck alliance causes a major change in how the Reasonoids write about Beck. Here’s one slobbering change-of-heart already.
If Mrs. Suderman over at the Atlantic discovers a newfound respect for Beck, that will be a real tell.
Update. And here is more:
In a scene video, Reason’s Nick Gillespie, after interviewing a rally attendee who said that Muslims “are here to kill us, if you’re a good Muslim you’ll kill Christians,” told viewers that the rally is “about restoring a lost sense of America. The people here are somewhat inarticulate on what was lost, but they know they want to gain something back.” Inarticulate mobs who “know they want to gain something back” — that’s got to work out well!
MikeJ
From Edroso’s VV article:
He follows with the same Cavanaugh article you link to.
DougJ
@MikeJ:
Got a link to the VV article.
PeakVT
but the real reason I and my fellow coastal elites are wary of Glenn Beck is a lot more basic: He’s the fat kid you don’t want to be seen with at the lunch table. I’ll admit it! I find Beck a little bit creepy and gross and needy, and he gives me this sense that things are not going to end well.
I learned a lot about the author and nothing about Beck from that link.
ETA: Counterbalancing cuteness for a Monday.
John Cole
They get really pissy at Reason when you point out they are not actually Randian super-geniuses out making bank in the wonderful free market, but rather are on the wingnut welfare dole so long as they continue to spout what their masters want.
Keith G
Unfortunately, people of a certain age tend to remember a world that never existed. What they want back, they never actually had.
Amanda Hamilton
Well, in the NYT this morning, Ross Douthat found new respect for Beck. Thank goodness I hadn’t had breakfast yet.
El Cid
There are entire racks worth of magazines such as Reason which I effortlessly and guiltlessly blew off entirely. There’s always someone else out there finding a reason to slog it through and alert people if a semi-precious substance emerges on occasion.
DFS
@John Cole: Hunting of the Snark had a depressing little bit the other day on how the Reason dudes sincerely believe they aren’t just garden-variety whores. Yes, goes Matt Welch’s reasoning, I may be sucking off my corporate owners for money, but I’d still go down with gusto if they asked me to do it for free!
roshan
Hey DougJ, if it’s not too much work, could you put up screen shots of articles from glibertarian and wingnut sites in addition to the link? I just never feel like giving them a visit (pageviews and all) and want to have my epistemic closure right here.
Nutella
@PeakVT:
Another quote from Cavanaugh’s article:
He dreams of dumpy women with low self-esteem? Eeewwww.
MikeJ
@DougJ: FYWP. I know I already said that, but you still didn’t post it. Grrr.
Linky.
Mark S.
From the Reason article:
Christ that’s some lame analysis, especially from some dipshit who admits he’s only watched Beck like twice in the last year.
For those of us who are no longer mentally still in high school, there are some problems with Beck, such as his tendency to call anyone he disagrees with a fascist or a communist, or that he subscribes to a lot of nutty conspiracy theories.
Mark S.
Fixed.
joeyess
I read Balloon Juice everyday. It’s one of my go-to blogs. However, I have always wondered why anyone here, including front-page writers, ever read that horrible tripe that is posted at Reason.
It has always baffled me.
It seems to me a little like looking in the oven periodically at an already burnt pizza and wondering when it will turn golden brown and bubbly.
Or, in a word: futile.
Midnight Marauder
@Nutella:
If only we could all set our standards so high.
Marc
Another note-perfect title, DougJ.
beltane
Chris Hitchins just tweeted that Glenn Beck’s little freak show was the “Waterworld of white self-pity”. Observations like this are why I can never bring myself to hate Hitchins.
DougJ
@joeyess:
Fair enough.
Violet
I was in the car when Rush Limbaugh’s show started. Rush wasn’t there; he had a substitute. I found it very interesting that Rush picked today, the day after Glenn Beck’s big rally, to be gone.
Rush doesn’t like Beck because he’s challenging his (Rush’s) leadership of the wingnuts. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out, if Beck is now being treated as more legitimate by the moneyed interests.
Will Rush play along? Or will his ego get in the way and not allow him to say nice things about Beck? Who is the real leader of the wingnuts? Watching them fight over it will be interesting.
Huggy Bear
OK, now where’s the necessary meme from the other side of the political spectrum:
Beck, Palin to rallygoers: America has no honor
It’s so easy. Why isn’t this the headline somewhere, anywhere?
Stooleo
I had no idea that Beck was a Mormon. How does this square with all the evangelical tea baggers?
beltane
@Violet: Beck wants to be the wingnut messiah. I don’t think Boss Limbaugh will want to kiss the hem of his robe anytime soon.
Mike in NC
All together now: C-S-A! C-S-A!
Lysana
And it finally struck me that for all these years, we on the left have been accused of being paid lackeys of George Soros. Now that we have the Koch brothers identified, we know the name of the film they’ve been projecting onto us in that area. They project their hatred of the Constitution, their racism, and their sexism onto us, after all.
Violet
@Stooleo:
They give him a pass because he’s Glenn Beck. That doesn’t mean they give Mormons as a whole a pass.
@beltane:
I don’t think so either. But watching the two of them fight over the mantle is going to be interesting. Limbaugh really doesn’t mention Beck very much. He doesn’t want to be overshadowed.
maus
Why is it that Libertarians always think that the mainstream Republicans will absorb them any day now… when they’re always the ones co-opted to sell the fundamentalist wingnuttery?
Your good ideas will never make it through, retards.
The ones I hate the most are the outspoken big-a Atheists, who will bend over and let any charismatic have their way with secularity as long as they namecheck Rand or the Truly Free Market.
licensed to kill time
@Stooleo:
I think most of them have no idea he’s a Mormon. Here’s a look at what some other more clued-in evangelicals (there’s an oxymoron for you) think about it, via Benen.
catclub
@Huggy Bear:
Instead of the usual mishmash:
“Stocks tumble under cloud of jitters.”
How about:
“Stocks tumble in wake of Beck rally.”
It makes as much sense.
Zandar
Reasonoids.
Because the right to hate everyone who’s not like you and using it as social policy is totally Libertarian.
Time for another field trip to Somalia I see.
catclub
@Stooleo:
Also a moron.
Nutella
@Stooleo:
They’ve got a stupendous ability to ignore simple facts, of course. It’s also an inconvenient fact that they loudly ignore that all mentions of religion in the constitution consist of exactly these two:
Anyone who reads English would recognize the constitution as a document that does NOT establish a religious government but they can ignore that just as well as they can ignore Beck’s religion.
Macsenmifune
@licensed to kill time:Are they really too thick to notice that he’s been adding Mormom doctrine to his three ring circus. Did anyone else see his expose on Native Americans the lost Hebrew tribe?
Violet
@licensed to kill time:
Apparently someone is making an issue of his religion. I was in the car off and on while his show was on today and he was talking about how someone (HuffPo? Some other publication?) was making fun of his religion and talking about how LDS women don’t have rights, etc.
Then a he took a call from a young woman who was at the rally. She went on about being there with her husband and kids, how nice everyone was, then near the end she mentioned she was LDS. Immediately Beck and whoever is his sidekick jumped on it and started saying things like, “So you’re another one of those LDS women who can’t think for herself,” and “Tell your husband to tell you to hang up the phone,” etc. They were talking over her. She was saying stuff, and I think was laughing along with them, but you couldn’t hear her at all. You could only hear them going on and on about LDS stereotypes.
It was really weird. They just jumped on the LDS thing and wouldn’t let it go.
Tom Levenson
Ah, but Boy Conor views Reason[warning — Sully’s place link] as the voice of reason when it comes to Koch influence on the world.
Yet another reason to celebrate the diversity of voices on the right or something. (Did I mention that Conor seems to me to epitomize the failure of thought on the Right? He’s regularly touted as one of the best young ‘uns they have over there, and most likely, that’s completely true — and yet he is routinely clueless.
I did mention that?
Oh sorry.)
licensed to kill time
@Macsenmifune:
Well, I think you have to know some Mormon doctrine to be able to identify it. So unless they are studying other religions or watching South Park (ha!) I doubt they would recognize Mormon doctrine if it bit them in the ass.
ipley
They’ve clearly lost their fucking minds, but I remain unconvinced that they’re self-aware enough to want them back.
Mark S.
@Violet:
Wait, Beck was jumping all over an LDS woman?
licensed to kill time
@Violet:
So, he’s defensive about it, huh? Haha. Bet he hates Big Love.
Also, every time I see LDS my brain reads LSD. It’s so trippy.
arguingwithsignposts
@Tom Levenson:
Any time I hear Conor Friedersdorf’s name, I am reminded of this (true/slant link):
(emphasis added)
mclaren
“Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority.” – James Madison, Federalist Papers 10.
Violet
@Mark S.:
They had a long conversation about the rally. And the end of the call she said she was LDS, and Beck and his sidekick both started saying, sarcastically and jokingly I guess, all sorts of things that were in line with stereotypes about LDS women. “Oh, hon, sweetie, did your husband let you use the phone?” Etc. This went on for awhile.
During all this, she was clearly trying to keep talking about how great Beck is, how great the rally was, etc., but you couldn’t hear her over the two goons going on about how she couldn’t do anything without her husband, etc., etc.
On the one hand they were trying to make exaggerated comments to show that no, LDS women are not like that. But on the other hand they completely talked over her and wouldn’t let her get a word in edgewise. And this was a women who had spent five to ten minutes going on about how fantastic Beck was. So it wasn’t like they were trying to shut her up.
The whole thing was very odd. It was like they proved the LDS critics’ point that women are belittled in the Mormon church by trying to show they’re not.
Cacti
Oh, Beck’s religion is an issue.
Esp. since he’s now trying to be the head of an Elmer Gantry style “national revival”.
Make no mistake, evangelicals think Mormons are heretics. His popularity as radio host won’t make them let go of that.
flukebucket
My understanding was that Beck became a Mormon so his current wife would marry him. I don’t think he actually believes any of their stuff. Hell I don’t believe he believes any of his own stuff.
I think it was TPM that had an interview with Beck where he was asked about what he thought of Jon Stewart and the fact that Stewart made fun of him all of the time. Beck said he thought Stewart was funny and that Jon should “write him a check”
I think that is ultimately what it comes down to with Beck. Write me a check. I guarantee you he pinches himself every morning to be sure he is not dreaming. I bet even he did not realize that there were this many rubes in the country.
licensed to kill time
@Violet:
Very astute observation!
Might also be a bit of ham-fisted clunky conservative ‘comedy’ being attempted there. Or perhaps like the kid who tells jokes about himself before the other kids do in an attempt to ward off humiliation. A sort of Beckian evil eye amulet.
Cacti
@licensed to kill time:
If you really want to see Beck or any other Mormon get defensive…
Bring up the fact that Mormon scripture teaches that dark skin is a sign of being cursed by God, and white skin is a symbol of his favor.
maus
@Cacti: Enemy of my enemy is my friend. They want to lead a Christian rebirth of the country, as soon as that happens they will DESTROY Beck. But, of course, until then they’ll even tolerate the Moonies, the Scientologists, anyone who would choose to weaken Church/State separation.
licensed to kill time
@Cacti:
Ah, the Sons of Ham. Well, Beck looks like a big pink ham, just sayin’.
Cacti
@licensed to kill time:
More than just the Sons of Ham.
Native Americans are the descendants of white Israelites who migrated to and populated the western hemisphere. The rebellious branch of this group was cursed with dark skin, but eventually wiped out the white ones once they had fallen out of favor with God.
thomas Levenson
@arguingwithsignposts: Oh sweet.
I’ve had one email exchange w. young Conor, back in his Culture 11 days; I noted that this source of new thinking on the right had a stunning lack of material on science, and he complained that I was jumping the gun. (I wrote after the site had been up a few days.)
So, I waited. No science. Nothing. Not ever. Conor fits right in where he sits, not knowing what he does not know.
wasabi gasp
Heaven’s gonna suck.
Macsenmifune
@flukebucket: It doesn’t matter if he believe’s it or not, point is he is using religious and John Birch code language to indoctrinate people into his cult of personality. What we are trying to parse is whether his fundamentalist viewers realize he’s be slipping Mormom doctrine into rants. It seem fundies and mormoms are willing to put aside their differences and fight their mutual enemies. Prop 8 being biggest example.
Bob L
MLK for states right. Oh that is funny. @flukebucket: Beck was a Catholic before he heard the call of the Planet Kobold, or rather to according to a friend of mine who went to high school with he was a stoner with a radio show.
Since he is druggie on the wagon I suspect he is sincere about his religion, that twelve step stuff.
licensed to kill time
@Cacti:
I thought it was all Lamanites and Nephites and a whole raft of other-ites, but it’s been a while since I read Under The Banner of Heaven, which is where most of my understanding of Mormon doctrine comes from. Well, that and the South Park episodes.
catclub
@Cacti:
A little goodie from the link to ‘Mormon are Heretics’
“He accuses President Obama of false theology. Beck is hypocritical as the Mormon church has propagated deception for years. Obama’s liberation theology is in equal error.”
Liberation theology is somehow heresy as well to the far right Christians. Except the author does not (cannot?) show which ‘tenets’ of liberation theology are heretical, while doing so for the Mormon doctrines.
El Cid
@catclub: Liberation theology was heretical enough for the Reagan administration to do all it could to exterminate the leaders and followers of that movement throughout Latin America in the 1980s, and the Catholic Church did all it could to help.
LanceThruster
Their ability to form and express complete thoughts?
Their baby fat?
Amir_Khalid
Some of the pop culture-savvy commenters here must have noticed DougJ’s quote from the Rolling Stones’ obnoxiously sexist little ditty, Under My Thumb:
Under my thumb
She’s the sweetest pet in the world …
It’s down to me
The way she does just what she’s told
It’s down to me
The change has come
She’s under my thumb …
LanceThruster
Do the people that came to the rally and accept his Beckness as their own personal savior now get their own planets?
At least this time he’ll sell you the golden plates.
His chalkboard antics are in “Reformed Egyptian.”
Comrade Kevin
@Bob L:
YOU NO TAKE CANDLE!
Bulworth
What was lost was a Republican majority in Congress and a Republican in the WH.