I like Beck's lectures. He manages to convey a heck of a lot of information clearly, and he often injects these little moments of slightly twisted humor (which I also enjoy).
I lost some respect for Beck after his radio interview with Peter Boyles (in which he disclosed he knew nothing about the "birther" issue) and his subsequent nastiness about it the next day on his show -- it was so at odds with his proclamation that we must "question with boldness" -- but I still watch him when I can and I appreciate that he comes up with info almost no other conservative does.
I agree with you about Shep Smith. One of the mysteries of the universe, right up there with who shot Kennedy, is why Fox News keeps Smith. And if they must keep him for some bizarre reason, why can't they switch his and Beck's time slot? No one can have truly good ratings in the long haul with a 5 p.m. ET show time.
I agree about Beck and the birther issue. You’re nice saying that you lost respect. Personally, I’m sure he flat out lied. There’s no way any barely awake purveyor of what’s happening in American news would have missed the birther story.
And Beck and his crew are ravenous consumers of info from the American news scene.
Summary: He lied about not knowing about it.
Was that better than saying, “If I try to deal with this, they will brand me and ruin this new start-up show.”? I doubt it. He could have simply said, “I’ll deal with this one down the road when I’m better prepared and the story is a bit more clear.”
Well, it’s clear. Obama has hidden a lot. Simply do the birther stuff as one of the pieces of evidence that Obama is not very forthcoming about anything having to do with his past.