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Ideologically untrustworthy?? Care to explain that?

Beck’s conservatism, such as it is, is late-arrived at and might be a mile wide and an inch deep. In his discourse he pays little or no homage to the giants, Buckley, Barry or Reagan. It was way beyond presumptuous to title his own book “Common Sense,” a title fully reserved to Thomas Paine by anyone truly enamored of the founders, as he says he is. And he cries a lot. As far as I know, and I’ve been around 60+ years having started out campaigning for Goldwater when I was 14, there’s no crying in conservatism.

All that said, I’m not completely dismissing him. He’s got a knack for somehow combining a libertarian streak with faith in God and making it work, and you don’t see that everyday. Plus, he persuaded Sarah Palin to attend his staggeringly successful event on the Mall and that rates high up there with me. And he’s very entertaining—when he is.

I’m not picking a fight here. I hope he stays on our side of the ledger, I do. And if I were running FNC I’d move him into the 8 pm spot and get rid of that annoying Ted Baxter guy and his blabber about “the folks.” But I do see Beck as a weak personality at heart, a man who teeters and who could end up seeking love and attention on the other side if things don’t go his way. We’ve seen others like that—David Frum, Sullivan, a guy who went to the NYTimes years ago who’s name I forget, that Huffington chick, Richard Clark...