Posted on 09/04/2009 5:45:58 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
I’m a Glenn Beck fan. I know that he’s become Fox News Channel’s most notorious gadfly, and that he accused Barack Obama of hating White people and regularly sheds tears on his television show, but that’s why I like him. America needs to hear voices like Glenn Beck, because if he weren’t on the air, he might do something really dangerous, like run for office, or actually create policy and that’s 100 times worse than anything he’s said on the air.
Beck’s show is replete with calls for taking over or taking back the government from the evil czars that control it. Liberals go crazy when Beck talks like this, and think that he’s inciting racial tensions in the country. I’m not so concerned. Whenever I hear him speak of “taking back” the government, I’m reminded of that famous ’60s song by The Last Poets about revolution. Beck fits the lyrics pretty well if you switch out the ethnic slurs:
“Glenn Beck is scared of revolution
But Glenn Beck shouldn’t be scared of revolution
Because revolution is nothing but change
And all Glenn Beck does is change”
Guys like Glenn Beck talk revolution because they’re afraid of change, and a Democratic president who got into office on a “change” platform is a tipping point for them. But I’ve known guys like him all my life; they’re always changing with the political winds. They’re NASCAR dads in the 1990s, “Bushies” after 9/11 and “South Park Republicans” in the new millennium. Always angry and frustrated that things are changing in this country in a way they don’t like, but too weak, emasculated and cowardly to do anything more about it than talk. Think Ed Norton’s character from “Fight Club,” before he became Tyler Durden. Of course now guys like Beck finally have their war, the one they can fight without really putting themselves in danger but can get angry about it nonetheless. Terrorists want to get us, jobs aren’t secure even for the educated, the nation is drowning in debt and they have to depend on a erudite Harvard-educated Black man as president to get us out of this mess. That’s a living nightmare for guys like Beck, who always believed the American Dream would be theirs to manage or mangle, come hell or high-water.
So the question is, what is there to like about a man who represents the spineless backbone that much of suburban America is made of? He’s honest! Glenn Beck is sincere, unvarnished and ultimately comforting in his inadequacy. He doesn’t hide from the fact that his personal life is strewn with drug abuse, failed marriages and a late conversion to a faith that many of his own viewers distrust (Mormonism). Beck is no ideologue. He’s like Sarah Palin or George Bush. He believes certain things but can’t really explain why, but he’s sure he’s right and I can respect that more than some of the other charlatans he shares the air with.
I’d much rather share a beer and talk politics with Glenn than a blowhard like Sean Hannity, who seems to have no sense of humor about politics and hates those who disagree with him with an alienating intensity. Or a phony like Bill O’Reilly who comes from money and education, but portrays himself as the scrappy Irish kid with working class roots. The closest O’Reilly’s come to working class Irish in the last 10 years was watching “The Departed” on Blu-Ray. And Rush? Any man who’s been on welfare, drugs and got caught with illegal Viagra on a flight back from Haiti has no credibility to anyone who isn’t a dittohead.
Ultimately, the best thing about Glenn Beck is his utter shameless embrace of his own impotence. He’s loud, he’s angry but he’s harmless. Men like him have never brought about real change. Men like Glenn Beck are always behind revolution, like way behind, in the bleachers watching others. Beck, despite having over 30 sponsors drop his show in protest, continues to have the highest rated show on Fox. He’s White, educated, successful and he lives in the most powerful, free and resilient nation in the history of civilization and yet he can play the victim for 48 minutes every afternoon. And that’s why I can like him, to paraphrase The Last Poets again, Glenn Beck is scared of revolution. Our nation has a long history of political cowards. So I can sit back and enjoy him for the entertainer he is, because revolution is brought about by men of action, and Glenn Beck is nothing but words.
*********
(Dr. Jason Johnson is an associate professor at Hiram College in Ohio.)
Incoherent.
Dr. Johnson is obviously a racist.
This man is not smart.
Must be one of Van jone’s and Wright’s buddies.
I am not a huge GB fan but I very much agree with what he has been saying. There is a discontent in this country (rage?) that I have never seen in all my born days — not even the ‘60s radicals were this fired up and vocal; plus these are not the youth (for the most part) but older folks. They plainly a) know what this country should be, b) remember it the way it was, c) are mad as $#*$# that it isn’t that way anymore and d) are ready to do whatever it takes to get it back. I think it’s great.
Another liberal with a mental disorder!
...Probably an O.J. Simpson fan.............
Ask Van Jones how that harmless expose by Beck is going ....roflmao...it’s going to be a bad weekend for the Communists in the White House as they have to figure out what to do next.
(Yeah, I know. THAT'S RACIST.)
You hit the nail on the head. Or should I say racist on the head.
So many lies I don’t know where to begin. But once again they attack the messenger instead of answer the real questions. Who’s the real coward, “Professor”?
Yeah .. JJ's a racist.
From the very first time I heard the word "change", I've been against it.
I have been here in FR for a long time mostly because I want input and feedback regarding gettting my nation BACK, not how to change it.
Norman Rockwell may have been more lefty than righty, but his art stirred MY vision anyway, to desire the bits I remember as a child he portrayed.
Google Rockwell and re-live those days of yesteryear.
You mean with all of the sneering references to “suburban” and “white”? Naw...
Well, we’ll see about whether Beck “can do anything about it” or not.
The ironic thing about this article is that, self-effacing as he is, Beck would probably agree with most of it.
I fart in your general direction!
Guys an ass. I am sure he has an education of sorts, It is just obvious that what he has been taught, and what he knows is so wrong.
The most effective talk show hosts are called entertainers by the left to diminish their effectiveness, but it is a fact that Beck is a bloodhound on the trail of the Marxists and radicals and they are squealing like stuffed pigs over on the Huffpuff post every night about Beck. So he must be getting to them big time just like Sarah Palin. I love it. Shining the light on the roaches is what needs to be done and he is doing an excellent job.
Glenn Beck might be considered harmless by this tool.
The author would be scared s**tless by me.
I am no longer silent.
I am no longer willing to allow this fed.gov to do what it wants.
I am a citizen, not a subject.
Oh, and I am armed and willing to defend the oath I took 21 years ago.
2nd ID Warriors OUT FRONT!
Completely incoherent.
Mine was 32 years ago. If he was half as smart as the media paints him to be, he’d resign next week. He went from hero to hated in under a year, Even run-of-the-mill liberals are disgusted, much less moderates, independents and conservatives. The only people he has left supporting him are the very hard left (the Van Jones, Cynthia McKinney, Michael Moore types, and not even all of them!) He’s more washed up than President Carter in 1980.
The writer is an idiot.
And, you are not alone.
The good professor has his head firmly buried in the sand.
The forced resignation of the Green Czar, probably this weekend, will be largely the result of Glenns actions.
More to come.
Dr. of what?
Guys like Glenn Beck talk revolution because they’re afraid of change…What an incredibly stupid statement! Dr Johnson, I assure you that if conservatives like Mr Beck had their way, there would be so much change, you wouldn’t know where to put your head because you couldn’t find your own ass anymore…
Comments? Yeah, GlennBeck is kicking some liberal ass.
Another Affirmative Action doctorate?
More to come."
Glenn has done an excellent job of taking a page out of Alinsky's book. He has isolated, frozen, and escalated with Van Jones.
Sunstein, Holdren, and Lloyd had better be very nervous because they're next....
Looks like he’s taken out a pawn.
Next up two rooks and a bishop and then lastly
the Queen
His motto should be “I don’t dither and I don’t wither”.
Johnson, Jason A.
* Assistant Professor, Comminication (sic) & Political Science
* 330.569.5399
* Email: JohnsonJA@hiram.edu
The thing that really disturbs me about his essay is his assumption that "revolution" is automatically "good" and that conservatives are "afraid" of it.
Obama's "change" is on the cutting edge of 1920s and 30s totalitarianism, both Marxist and Fascist. You'd think a Ph.d. in political science would grasp that. Obama is moving us backward, not forward.
Dr. Johnson is an obvious racist. Just scan through his piece and add the word "white" before every reference to "guys" and "men." I think you'll quickly see what the professor really meant to write.
And then some!
I was unaware that I had a spineless backbone because I can see that Obama is indeed the GreatZero. If you confronted this piece of work about his deragatory, inane insults he would want to just do more yaking.
Biography
Jason Johnson is a professor of political science and communications at Hiram College in Northeast Ohio.
He is a graduate of the University of Virginia and earned his PhD in political science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has extensive media and speaking experience on topics ranging from electoral politics to pop culture.
Johnson works regularly as a political commentator and contributor for radio, television, and newspaper outlets. He has appeared on National Public Radio’s “Morning Edition”, “Talk of the Nation”, the “Sound of Ideas” on the Cleveland NPR affiliate, “Radio Times” on the Philadelphia NPR affiliate and CKNW radio in Vancouver Canada. Johnson has also appeared on the O’Reilly Factor, the Jesse Lee Peterson Show, The Early Show on CBS, Al Jazeera English and is a regular contributor for both ABC and CBS affiliates in Youngstown, and CBS in Cleveland, Ohio. He has also appeared in the online edition of Essence magazine, Black Enterprise Magazine, the Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Through his connection with publishing conglomerate REALTIMES media, Johnson’s columns appear weekly in The Chicago Defender, The Michigan Chronicle, The Michigan FrontPage, The Tri-State Defender and the New Pittsburgh Courrier. His writing has covered subjects from the mundane to the sublime; from the failure of abstinence education programs targeted at African American teens to the political significance of candidate stage diving at the ‘96 Iowa Caucuses; and Hillary Clinton’s post Super-Tuesday strategy.
Johnson has been active in politics for years, making him a valuable guest or panelist in many venues. He has worked as a campaign manager and assistant slate director in House and Senate races in Virginia, Maryland, and South Carolina.
Johnson’s political expertise extends beyond the United States. He worked on the 2001 mayoral race in London, England, was an international election observer during Mexico’s turbulent presidential election in 2006, and was an honored guest of the Independent Electoral Commission in Johannesburg, South Africa during their parliamentary elections in 2007.
http://www.hiram.edu/jasonjohnson/
Glenn Beck is right on the mark about Obama, and that is wby the LIEberals fear him, he is exposing their marxist/radical agenda to take over the country and our lives and is one of only a few with guts enough to talk about it.
Yeah, middle class, White, conservative, Christian, sorta like the "weak, emasculated and cowardly" men that make up a majority of frontline US combat forces.
I guess the good professor feels more respect for da bruda' in da hood rappin' revolution and robbin' Whitey to get what he's owed.
"Dr." Johnson, reading your "column" I wasted 2 minutes of my life that I'll never get back and I am the worse for it.
BTW "the new black courier" is the local racial grievance rag that can't be given away, read mostly by the local "minority intelligentsia" and the ex-con streetsweepers hired by the city. No doubt it is afloat due to charity and gubmint grants.
I don’t think that liberals are really going to understand the backlash to Obama’s Socialism until our country goes through an actual revolution.
Once the dust settles, and we’ve incarcerated and hung all of the (very real) traitors to our country, the “useful idiots” of the former left will finally understand what’s happened, and why.
Besides being a racist, he’s also an idiot.
Race is the last desparate gasp of a losing side.
The left uses race as a crutch for everything these days.
They’re trying to sell something America thinks is extreme.
Everyone has they’re season; these mutts are squandering thier time.
Savor their failure.....
The good doctor is delusional?
It’s not that Glen (or the rest of us) are opposed to change. It’s that we are opposed to anti-Constitutional, anti-freedom change that promotes the socialist agenda. We are opposed to change that seeks to replace personal responsibility with governmental largess. We are opposed to allowing further governmental intrusion into our lives and our livelihoods. We are opposed to change that forces current and future generations to pay (literally) for the perceived sins of past generations. And, we are opposed to the near constant assault on the United States of America and its foundations of freedom, both individual and societal.
Who refers to himself as Professor sumpin?
If he were to be accurate, he might call himself Associate Professor sumpin, but why not just his name with no pretentious title?
This article sounds kinda “fishy”. Maybe the author needs to be reported to the White House(?)
He is right about one thing , if Beck were a politician he would be dangerous, If we only had 50 Republican Senators with his balls it would be great.
“represents the spineless backbone that much of suburban America is made of?”
That’s racist!
What an “ingnoramorous”
(My favorite Bugs Bunny quote)
Yikes...reads like High School, how old is this guy?
As they say, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”...
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