Over the past few years, Glenn Beck has called the overwhelmingly poor and Black survivors of Hurricane Katrina locked down in the Superdome—in his words—"scumbags." He has ranted that progressives are a "cancer" that have to be "eradicated" from America. On an episode of his TV show, Beck envisioned—with barely concealed glee—an armed uprising of "bubbas" (white racists). He claims Barack Obama's White House is highly influenced if not run by communists, and that Obama "has a deep seated hatred for white people and white culture." A wide-ranging array of right-wing militia members, Tea Party mobs, and heavily armed desperate people get much of their picture of the world, along with organizational direction, from him.
But Glenn Beck argues that all he is really saying is that the U.S. needs to return to the government envisioned and prescribed by the "Founding Fathers" in the U.S. Constitution. To return to the days before "big government" got so out of hand, with the collusion of both parties, before a tax-obsessed political class enslaved the middle class to fund programs that feed the corrupt and lazy—from Wall Street to those on welfare.
Is Glenn Beck ideologizing and organizing a draconian, racist, and ominous reactionary movement? Is he a harbinger of, and organizer for, fascism? Or, as he claims, is he simply basing himself on the values and vision of the "Founding Fathers"?
The answer, as we shall see, is… both. And that poses a profound challenge to all who are outraged by what Beck spews out and represents.
