The problem with [Glenn] Beck, then, is not his narrative, which is entertainingly foolish to anyone who actually knows anything about anything. The problem is the size of the audience in the United States that actually knows nothing about nothing. This mass (my guess, about 12 percent of the electorate) is easily moved, the past summer and its continuing silly rhetoric on all kinds of issues indicate. They wear know-nothingness like a badge.
-— Charles M. Madigan, presidential writer in residence at Roosevelt University, opining on the real reason behind Glenn Beck’s surging popularity.
-via Pensito Review
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Then it is to say that your comment says something about absolutely nothing which is typical of the left.
ReplyDeleteIs the size of a know-nothing electorate really a problem for Beck? Sounds more like a target market.
ReplyDeleteBut I believe Madigan underestimates the size of the know-nothing electorate by roughly half. The other half.
Remember the bell curve. The bell curve shall set you free.
I'm not sure I follow, Andrew.
ReplyDeleteAnd Nonee, I consider you and me the exceptions. :)
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Madigan's comment is equally attributable to about the same number who voted for Obama simply because he was popular, or black:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.breitbart.tv/?p=194983
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5p3OB6roAg
Assuming then, that Madigan's comment is true but applies to both the left and the right (as the Stern videos prove), it would seem to be a valid statement that the media favoritism of Obama absolutely helped (decisively?) Obama win the election.
Hello! Obama knows all about this game, and that's exactly why he's trying to isolate Fox News. Because there's a good chunk of people who will go along with whatever they perceive as the "in" thing to do, regardless of the underlying substance.
(For the record, I've never heard more than 5 or 10 minutes of Beck. But my enemy's enemy is my friend, so I'm sure I'd like him.)
Glenn Beck is no different than Father Coughlin, and fifty years from now will be remembered in the same vein.
ReplyDelete(And if you have to ask who Father Coughlin was, then you've proved my point.)
according to Glenn Beck, the government tracks us through Onstar in our cars.
ReplyDeleteWhat scares me is not Glenn Beck, but the tens of thousands of his listeners who actually believe that crap!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/22/glenn-beck-meets-ithe-off_n_330186.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/22/glenn-beck-meets-ithe-off_n_330186.html
according to Glenn Beck, the government tracks us through Onstar in our cars.
ReplyDeleteWhich is precisely why I drive a Ford... No OnStar!
Rick - Bobby,
ReplyDeleteWhat I don't understand is what is the left's explanation for the sudden rise of the Becks, Limbaughs, Tea Partys, Oath Keepers, etc.
The underlying ideas have been around for a long time, but why all the sudden is Obama's presidency creating a sense of urgency? If you're going to blame it all on race, it will be met with considerable skepticism by me.
KofC, you don't remember what happened the last time we elected a Democrat? It was only 1992, but the reaction from the right wing was pretty much the same. It's just amplified now because in 1993 there was no blogosphere, only one 24/7 cable news channel, only one Rush (but a lot of local right-wing AM radio talk shows), yet from Day 1 it was Travelgate, Rose Law Firm, Whitewater, Vince Foster, and seemingly hundreds of little things that kept popping up, all seemingly based on the theory that somehow this "failed governor of a small state," as George H.W. Bush labeled him, had no business being in the White House. It went on and on, and Mr. Clinton didn't help it by feeding into it, either by design or accident -- gays in the military, Hillarycare, and of course Monica Lewinsky. I remember all too well the rise of the Michigan Militia and a similar run on guns and ammo because all of the dorks in their cammie jammies were sure that Hillary would take away all the guns and turn their kids into lesbians.
ReplyDeleteIt isn't as much Mr. Obama's race as it is that he's just another Democrat, but there is undeniably a tinge of "otherness" to him, whether it's his name or his multicultural background. But even without that, the right wing would have given him pretty much the same treatment. After all, look what they did to John Kerry to make him look outside the mainstream; they even turned his heroic service in Vietnam into a liability (oh, please don't even bring up the Swiftboaters; the birthers of 2004), and his foreign-born wife (the widow of a Republican senator). John Kerry couldn't have been any more of a patriarchal white guy and they still turned him into an "outsider."
Basically it comes down to the information explosion, the exponential rise in talking heads and punditry on TV, radio, and the internet, and the natural evolution of the intensity that came with it. Mr. Obama's race is just the icing on the cake for some people.
PS: One added component to this is that with the explosion of the number of voices out there, it naturally happens that you have to raise the volume, and the more outrageous the better just to be heard above all the others. It's like the saying in theatre (and opera): If you can't be good, be loud.
ReplyDeleteIf I understand you correctly, you believe it is primarily the amplifying effect of the Internet that distinguishes the reaction of the right to Clinton from the reaction to Obama.
ReplyDeleteI don't agree, because I think you overlook a fundamental difference between how the right perceived Clinton's supporters versus how they perceive Obama's supporters. Further, how the media treated Clinton versus how the media is perceived to be treating Obama. These issues, in and of themselves, are a major reason for the right's greater inflammation over Obama than Clinton.
The problem begins with under-educated, neglected kids. Which is what we've been dealing with in the U.S. for decades. They grow up to be ignorant, apathetic voters. 12 percent of the population? What about the average 50 percent who don't even vote for a president? All tuned in to Fox, where they find actors mimicking some sort of similar rage, for commercial profit and political gain. Propaganda and spin, and illogical logic, all designed to bring about commercial and political behaviors.
ReplyDeleteIt makes me simultaneously smile, and feel sad, to read KofC comments, because they illustrate so many of these points. Creating new definitions, using nefarious sources, spinning logical fallacies, and not being able to engage anyone in any sort of debate without pushing hot buttons, like her frequent use of loaded words like "fascist," etc. It's sad. And it's even sadder that this is what goes for democratic debate in South Florida.
I know that KofC will aggressively respond to this comment, using much of the same inanity, but so it goes.
Anon-
ReplyDeleteWhat is really amazing, just from a people-watching standpoint, is that you somehow make the leap from "under-educated, neglected kids" to ... Ok, I really don't know where you go with it.
Did you not watch the Stern videos I linked to above? Are you in utter and complete denial that there are also some pretty dim bulbs voting for Obama?
Would you agree that there are high concentrations of "under-educated, neglected kids" in high-population, urban areas? Would you agree that Obama draws tremendous support from those areas?
Have you ever tuned into Olberman on MSNBC? Did you ever tune into Al Franken on Air America? Do you believe those gentlemen promote any kind of intellectual discourse?
"frequent use of loaded words like "fascist,"
Do you really believe that the left does not do the same? Is "Tea Baggers" and "Little Limbaughs" a product of the left or right?
Its just interesting to watch another human being go through life completely oblivious or in denial of arguments and evidence contrary to their emotional world view.
If I understand you correctly, you believe it is primarily the amplifying effect of the Internet that distinguishes the reaction of the right to Clinton from the reaction to Obama.
ReplyDeleteNo, that's just a part of it. As I said, the right doesn't care who it is that is on the other side; they'd raise a stink against anyone because he or she isn't one of them. It's been intensified by the information explosion and exacerbated by Obama's obvious "other" qualities, since he's not a W.A.S.P. like all but one of the previous presidents.
As for the rest of what you said, I can't respond because you don't specify the difference you perceive between the right's perception of Obama and Clinton and how the media perceived Clinton.
Peace.
I don't remember the Clinton-era media ever being charged with protecting him. I believe his presidency was the tail end of a time when we had a number of balanced media outlets. Post-Clinton, I believe CNN went left, which fermented the rise of Fox on the right.
ReplyDeleteThe right generally believes that the media protects Obama, and has abandoned their historical watch dog role. Many "old school" journalists, themselves liberals, have agreed this appears to be the case. The media was traditionally a check on power in this country. No more. And that has many concerned, unlike the Clinton era.
Again, Jon Stewart sees it. It bothers him. But apparently nobody else on the left. That's dangerous.
The right generally believes that the media protects Obama, and has abandoned their historical watch dog role.
ReplyDeleteThat perception of the media started long before Clinton. It goes back generations; certainly back before FDR, and it's usually voiced by the people who are out of power. They say the president is getting away with murder -- literally or figuratively -- and yell "Why isn't the press covering this!?" Sic semper punditry.
As I said before and have said again, the game isn't any different; it's just louder with more bells and whistles.
The one difference between now and previous administrations is that for the first time in memory, the Republicans do not have an heir apparent waiting to challenge the incumbent, and so it's a huge free-for-all in the GOP to see who can get the most attention and suck up to the base. I pity the poor person who will emerge as the front-runner in 2012: he or she will have to unit the party, and it will be like trying to round up a field full of sugared-up six-year-olds.