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Glenn Beck – and others who think and act like him in the media and the world of politics – are taking America a dangerous step backwards while pretending to honor the principles on which our country was founded. Our founders engaged in constructive dialogue for a common cause – to honor the dignity of all human beings – while working together to create our Declaration of Independence and Constitution despite strong differences of opinion. Our Constitution states that one of its main purposes is to “promote the general welfare” of the American people.
Glenn Beck and company have made a career of destroying reputations rather than working with others to solve our problems. They use words like “patriotism” and “honor” to describe the qualities of those who agree with them. But their real agenda is anti-American – anti-working people, anti-poor, anti-minority, and anti-immigrant. Patriotism means love of country – not love of only those whose race, color, and politics you approve. Honor means standing behind the principles of our founding, not what is politically expedient to bring us power at the expense of others.
Glenn Beck and those who think and act like him – including his Fox “News” cohorts – pretend to have simple answers to our problems, but their real solution is championing the short-term interests of large corporations and the wealthiest among us while posing as patriots and telling us who to hate. They promote a callousness and lack of respect for American citizens that have led to financial meltdowns, coal mine calamities, poor responses to natural disasters, and record-breaking oil spills. Glenn Beck even called for the death of Republican “progressives” – those who would dare work with others toward solutions to our problems, as did Republicans Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. He has fooled many people with his act of compassion and understanding while denying any malicious intent. He has convinced many to vote against their own best interests.
Hateful acts across our country have resulted from the rhetoric of Beck and his fellow travelers, for example, violence against Muslims and the Tides Foundation. His disdain for Americans shows no limits – he has recently disparaged a man who lost his home due to forgetting to make insurance payments. He says of fat people: “Let them die.” He promotes racism while calling our first black president a “racist... [with] a deep-seated hatred for white people,” yet tries to downplay his racism by assuming the mantle of Martin Luther King, Jr. He has sponsored hatred of Muslims by pushing a lie that a Muslim cultural center would open on September 11. He has promoted hatred of Jews by stating that “Jesus would have come back from the dead and make the Jews pay for what they did.” He continually ignores and distorts historical and scientific facts to support his real message of divisiveness.
If we are to follow Beck’s principles all Americans would be left to sink or swim according to the “choices” they make. But many are financially unable to make choices that could help them. Millions lack jobs, healthcare, or a means to retire. Yet many self-styled “conservatives” – with the backing of the country’s most wealthy industrialists – seek to end the minimum wage, deny healthcare to those who need it and to “privatize” social security, which means paying high fees to Wall Street while leaving retirees vulnerable to stock market crashes. Beck has called on Christians to leave their churches if they hear preaching about social or economic justice, saying they are code words for communism and Nazism. Like all who are paid to think like him, Beck denies climate change and even evolution.
Some political movements have helped our country move forward and others have been dedicated to holding back progress. Many who call themselves “conservatives” oppose our basic principle of honoring human dignity. Rather than true conservatives, they are reactionaries whose purpose is to destroy those with whom they disagree. Real conservatives are those who support our country’s core values.
Civilizations throughout history have collapsed because of wars between inner factions. This happens most often in difficult economic times, when people seek simple solutions and want to know who to blame. Leaders emerge who provide the certainty that people seek. Germany during World War II prosecuted gradually large numbers of internal “enemies” in an effort to spread fear and unite those in the “majority.” Glenn Beck blames others for using methods similar to the Nazis, but in his speeches and writings he shows that he has perfected those methods for his own use.
In times of uncertainty, people – by nature – want to find a clear path to provide them guidance. But there are no simple answers. The best path is respectful dialogue among citizens and their representatives to determine the best way forward. To only disparage and blame others moves us further from solving our problems.
Our country has done best when we have been inclusive rather that exclusive – when we have worked together for the good of all. The end of segregation, the vote for women, and child labor laws all were opposed by the “conservatives” of their times but have made our country a more just and prosperous place. The average American has lost financial ground over the last 30 years while income disparities have widened. Glenn Beck is paid handsomely by those who want to keep everything they have and get much of what you have as well.
We invite Glenn Beck and his cohorts to return to our founding principles to promote constructive dialogue and “the general welfare” – to join with others toward solutions to our problems based on what works for all of us, rather than spewing empty and hateful rhetoric that divides us. There is room for many viewpoints in America, but intolerance and bigotry are not among them.