Glenn Beck

Glenn Beck
Born	(1964-02-10) February 10, 1964
Status	Married
Occupation(s)	Talk-radio and television host
Spouse	Tania Beck
Website	GlennBeck.com

Glenn Beck (born February 10, 1964) is an American radio and television host, conservative political commentator, and entrepreneur. His nationally syndicated radio show, The Glenn Beck Program, airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks. Beck also hosts a self-titled television show, which began in May 2006, and was formerly on CNN's Headline News, but will move to Fox News Channel in the first quarter of 2009. In addition to broadcasting, Beck has gained success in publishing as author of two New York Times bestselling books and as publisher of Fusion Magazine. Beck also stars in a one-man stage show that tours the United States twice a year.

Career

Beck began his radio career when he won a local radio contest to be a DJ for an hour, and was eventually granted a part-time job. He hosted Christian radio on Saturday, rock on Sunday and country on weeknights. In the mid 80's he worked at WRKA radio in Louisville, Kentucky as a DJ. His show was called Captain Beck and the A-Team.

After graduating from high school, Beck pursued his career as a Top 40 DJ. By the time he was in his 20s, Beck was on WKCI-FM (KC101), a Top 40 radio station in Template:City, hosting the local morning show with Pat Gray. Originally the show was billed as the Glenn and Pat Show. When Gray left the show, Beck continued with co-host Vinnie Penn. While working in Connecticut, he appeared and sang background vocals on The Delrays' Red, White and Blues CD, a fund raising effort by then Governor John Rowland produced by guitarist Tom Guerra. The CD was well received and was promoted by a series of live appearances.

Years later, he began to explore the world of talk radio with a three-hour program on KC101's sister station, WELI. Beck then worked at Tampa, Florida's WFLA-AM and launched The Glenn Beck Program during the afternoon drive, filling the slot held by Bob Lassiter after the station's new owners, Clear Channel, fired him. Beck hosted the new radio show, combining politics and comedy. In the first year, The Glenn Beck Program moved from 14th place to the #2 position.

His theme song back in the Tampa days was a copy of the song, "AM Radio" by the band Everclear. "You got Glenn Beck on your AM radio... AM radio."

Within 12 months, Premiere Radio Networks offered Beck the opportunity to go national. In January 2002, The Glenn Beck Program launched nationally; by May 2008, it had reached over 280 stations as well as appearing on XM Satellite. With over six and a half million listeners, it was ranked 4th in the nation. In January 2006, CNN's Headline News announced that Beck would host a nightly news-commentary show in their new primetime block Headline Prime; the show, simply called Glenn Beck, began in May 2006.

On November 5, 2007, The New York Times reported that Premiere Radio Networks was extending Beck's contract. Two sources with knowledge of the deal said the five-year contract was valued at $50 million.

On July 21, 2008, Beck filled in for Larry King on the show Larry King Live.

In 2008, Beck won the Marconi Radio Award for Network Syndicated Personality of the Year.

On October 16, 2008, it was reported by the Drudge Report and The Politico that Beck has signed a contract with the Fox News Channel to host a weekday show at 5pm ET beginning in the spring of 2009, as well as a weekend version. Because of his new deal, CNN immediately discontinued the show on October 17, 2008 and replaced it with a news hour anchored by Jane Velez Mitchell.

Personal life

Born in Mount Vernon, Washington, Glenn Beck was raised a Roman Catholic. He graduated from Sehome High School in Bellingham, Washington in 1982.

His early life was pitted with tragedies. His mother committed suicide when he was 13. One of his brothers also committed suicide. Another sibling reportedly had a fatal heart attack.

Beck is a self-described reformed alcoholic and drug addict. In the aftermath of those three family tragedies, Beck said he used "Dr. Jack Daniels" and heavy drugs to cope. He and his first wife divorced amid his struggle with substance abuse. Beck cites the help of Alcoholics Anonymous in his sobriety, and he eventually converted to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which teaches against the consumption of alcohol.

Beck has spoken often of his religious beliefs and conversion. "God stalked me!...He had a giant baptismal rifle," Beck said. "I thwarted him. I led people astray as much I could but he kept putting Mormons in my way."

Beck has two teenage daughters, Hannah and Mary, by his first marriage; Mary has cerebral palsy. He has two children, Raphe (adopted in 2004) and Cheyenne (born 2006), with his second wife, Tania.

Glenn Beck is left handed..

On January 4, 2008, Beck posted a video on YouTube about a recent surgery he describes as "botched." Beck vaguely described his treatment at an unnamed hospital as gone "horribly awry," and recalled apprehension and suicidal thoughts brought on by sedation and his medication. He returned to radio on January 7, and indicated that he had been in for what he jokingly referred to as "butt surgery." He indicated that prior to his recent book tour he "started with three" and by the time the tour was over, he "had eight." He also joked that listeners would make jokes about "roid rage."

Political views

Beck often says "I am a conservative who happens to not be a Republican." On his show, Beck addresses many current political, social, and economic issues using traditional conservative governing principles.

Political correctness

Beck is a frequent critic of political correctness. For instance, during the Christmas season Beck plays a "politically correct" version of O Holy Night. The lyrics have been changed to remove all reference to religion and gender, and the song is re-titled, O Somewhat Important Night. Beck coined the term RamaHanuKwanzMas, a portmanteau of the holidays Ramadan, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Christmas, as the name of the ultimate politically-correct winter holiday.

Beck has said "political correctness is the classic Great Idea Gone Wrong. All it's done is shut us up. It hasn't changed anybody's mind. It hasn't changed our hearts. It's changed our faces. It's taken every opinion we have, it's taken every joke we have, and it's forced us to conceal it and hide it and bury it. It's made us superficial."

George W. Bush

On May 11, 2006, Beck said the following on his Headline News show, "And that's why I found myself taking a hard look at George W. Bush lately. I'm actually starting to feel a little like John Kerry, flip-flopping on my opinion of him every day, you know. Sometimes I think that the biggest problem with G.W. is that he just might be the worst communicating president since Buchanan."

Beck has recently said that, after seven years, he is "through with" Bush and is no longer willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. He questions the Bush administration on certain issues, especially on border security and the treatment of U.S. Border Patrol Agents, and government spending.

Global warming

While Beck has stated that he believes global warming is real, he is skeptical that it is attributable to human activity, that it may pose a threat to human civilization, and that there is an attainable solution. Beck claims there is an under-reporting of scientific findings that do not support the theory of human-created global warming.

On April 30, 2007 on his nationally syndicated radio show, Beck compared the convincement tactics used by global warming activists to those used by Hitler, specifically during the Holocaust:

"Al Gore's not going to be rounding up Jews and exterminating them. It is the same tactic, however. The goal is different. The goal is globalization. The goal is global carbon tax. The goal is the United Nations running the world. That is the goal. Back in the 1930s, the goal was get rid of all of the Jews and have one global government. You got to have an enemy to fight. And when you have an enemy to fight, then you can unite the entire world behind you, and you seize power. That was Hitler's plan. His enemy: the Jew. Al Gore's enemy, the U.N.'s enemy: global warming. Then you get the scientists -- eugenics. You get the scientists -- global warming. Then you have to discredit the scientists who say, 'That's not right.' And you must silence all dissenting voices. That's what Hitler did."

Abraham Foxman, director of the Anti-Defamation League, responded:

Glenn Beck's linkage of Hitler's plan to round up and exterminate Jews with Al Gore's efforts to raise awareness of global warming is outrageous, insensitive and deeply offensive. Unfortunately, his remarks are just the latest example of a troubling epidemic on the airwaves, where comparisons to Hitler and the Holocaust are becoming all-too facile.

It has become almost commonplace for talk-show pundits to use comparisons to the Holocaust and Nazi imagery to attack people whose views they disagree with, whether the issue is global warming or immigration, as we witnessed when CNN's Lou Dobbs recently suggested on his program that immigrant rights groups use tactics similar to those of Nazi propagandists.

The six million Jewish victims and millions of other victims of Hitler deserve a measure of respect. Their deaths should not be used for political points or sloganeering. Every time a radio or television personality takes that unique event in history and twists it for their own political agenda, it cheapens the public debate and distorts and trivializes the Holocaust.

In Chapter 1 of An Inconvenient Book, Beck clarified this viewpoint further, pointing out that one of the key elements of Fascism was "controlling public thought using fear to silence dissent". He went on to quote such advocates of alarm over global warming as Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Christine Stewart, Stephen Schneider, George Monbiot, Jacques Chirac, Paul Ehrlich and Prince Phillip making a wide variety of representative statements to illustrate their use of fear and desire for control.

Beck also writes: "God bless you, Hollywood, for speaking out. But what you have to understand is that if you find yourself in the minority opinion, it's not because of some vast, right-wing or left-wing conspiracy. It's because you're out of step with everybody else. You're not going to be rounded up in the middle of the night and taken to jail...That doesn't happen in America."

On his CNN Headline News program, Beck dedicated an entire show to the topic of global warming. The show, promoted as a mini documentary, was entitled "Exposed: The Climate of Fear".

Iraq

Beck supports the war in Iraq. On his April 24, 2007 Headline News show he said, "Either you think that we should have never gone there in the first place and we should get out immediately, or you're like me and you think we should finally start fighting this with everything we've got."

He went on to say, "If we withdraw from Iraq right now, it will be our country's biggest moral scar since Vietnam." He claimed that one reason some Democrats were trying to add a timetable to withdraw from Iraq was to "throw a bone to some of your anti-war base and say, "Hey, look, we were just -- we're just like you, you know, liberal hippie communists. We tried, but the president is a big, bad man and he won't let us." He said, "It is immoral for us to do what we're doing right now, to abandon these people and let them get slaughtered after we started it. If we did that now, this would be America's most shameful act of immorality since slavery."

Border security

Beck is a proponent of strong security along the United States borders, and he supports the release of Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean.

Second Amendment

Beck supports an individual rights interpretation of the Second Amendment, and is against gun control legislation. On June 2, 2008, Beck interviewed Governor Brian Schweitzer of Montana on his syndicated radio talk show about the Second Amendment, gun control, and the state of Montana. The interview was mostly focused on Montana's status as a state if the United States Supreme Court ever ruled that gun ownership was a collective right, thus violating Montana's compact with the United States government for its entry as a state. The interview also covered several other subjects including global warming, high fuel prices, alternative energy, and Schweitzer's ideas on how best to deal with the aforementioned issues. When speaking of presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain on his June 4, 2008 radio show, Beck said, "He's consistently pro Second Amendment. Amen to that. That one is a huge one for me… I became (I am) a member of the NRA, a lifetime member… a year and a half ago." "I've adopted the NRA as one of my personal (causes) - it is the only charity that I will give a large sum of money to that is a private charity, that is outside of my church or whatever… I believe in the Second Amendment so much and I believe it is so critical to our survival. It is the last line of defense, the Second Amendment, and I believe this organization absolutely believes in it full fledge and I will, over time, give an extraordinary sum of money to the NRA."

Other issues

Beck has often proclaimed himself pro-life, including being opposed to euthanasia, and has also suggested on "The Glenn Beck Program" his support for the death penalty; "I kind of like the fact that I keep getting his name wrong. Medellin? Medellin! He's been executed" [August 6th, 2008]. He has not stated a definite position on embryonic stem cell research. He admits his daughter's cerebral palsy affects his viewpoint. "It's easy to say, Well, it would help my daughter. Having to look my daughter in the eye and say, This might repair you. And then say, I have to say no, because I don't think it's right to do it. I'm not sure that it's wrong to do it. I'm just not sure it's right. And so as we go and take measured steps, I think technology gets ahead of philosophy sometimes. And I'm leery on taking these giant steps before we've really thought it through."

For a long time, Beck was opposed to capital punishment. However, on his January 10, 2008 show, he announced that he had changed his position and now supports the death penalty. He has, however, also expressed that the death penalty is still an issue he continues to struggle with.

Beck has spoken supportively of "tough interrogation methods" as a means of obtaining terrorist information in certain circumstances. He is critical of the entertainment industry, and is opposed to anti-smoking regulations. He describes himself as pro-capitalism and supports a free market.

The Glenn Beck Program

Main article: Glenn Beck Program

The Glenn Beck Program began in 2000 airing on WFLA (AM) in Template:City, and took the afternoon time slot from 18th place to #1 within a year. In January 2002, syndicator Premiere Radio Networks launched the show nation wide on 47 stations. The show was then moved to Template:City, where it picked up new flagship station WPHT-AM. In the spring of 2006, Beck relocated his studios to Radio City Music Hall in New York City in preparation for his new TV show with CNN Headline News.

Beck's show contains less news than discussion about politics, conservative commentary and social humor. Beck frequently says that he hates politics, and claims that his show contains "half the politics and twice the comedy" and "is not about right vs. left, it's about right vs. wrong."

The program can be heard live on weekdays from 9:00am-12:00pm EST (with a "best of" weekend edition on some affiliates).

Glenn Beck on Headline News

Main article: Glenn Beck (TV program)

Beck's first television show, simply called Glenn Beck, aired nightly at 7:00 p.m., repeating at 9:00 p.m. and 12:00 a.m. (All times Eastern) from May 8, 2006 to October 16, 2008.

The network has described the show as "an unconventional look at the news of the day featuring his often amusing perspective on the top stories from world events and politics to pop culture and everyday hassles."

Glenn Beck on Fox News

On October 16, 2008 it was announced that Glenn Beck would join the Fox News Channel, leaving behind CNN's Headline News. The new show is set to begin in Spring 2009 and will air nightly at 5:00 PM Eastern time.

CNN immediately moved to blunt any competitive advantage by pulling the program off the air, a common strategy with personalities who sign with a new network. The program was ended by the network on October 16, 2008, and will not return. Instead, a news hour with Jane Velez-Mitchell will take Beck's former slot, with repeat slots filled by Lou Dobbs Tonight encores .

Criticism and controversial statements

• In January 2006, the "progressive" media criticism watchdog group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting criticized CNN president Ken Jautz's description of the newly-hired Beck as "cordial" by pointing out statements he made against figures like Michael Berg, Michael Moore, Hurricane Katrina rioters, and certain 9/11 victims. FAIR brought up a 2005 comment Beck made on his radio program where he noted he was "thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it. No, I think I could." Beck responded to FAIR by saying that these comments were taken out of context.

• Another self-described left-wing watchdog group, Media Matters for America, highlighted comments Beck made in an interview with Keith Ellison, the first practicing Muslim elected to the United States Congress. In the November 14, 2006 interview on CNN Headline News, Beck said to Ellison,

With that being said, you are a Democrat. You are saying, 'Let's cut and run.' And I have to tell you, I have been nervous about this interview with you, because what I feel like saying is, 'Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.' And I know you're not. I'm not accusing you of being an enemy, but that's the way I feel, and I think a lot of Americans will feel that way.

Beck later said that his remarks were "poorly worded" and he "wish[ed]" he "could take back and rephrase." He also stated in An Inconvenient Book that at numerous other points in the interview he stated quite clearly his belief that Congressman Ellison was not an enemy of the United States.

• On June 28, 2007, Beck read on his radio program a fake ad created by the "Insiders" — a group of subscribers to his web site — that recommended turning the bodies of Mexican illegal immigrants into fuel. Beck noted at the outset that "sometimes the Insiders go too far," and remarked "I don't think we need to make the illegal aliens into fuel....That would be evil conservative, yeah. I don't even know if that's conservative. That would be...psychotic, perhaps? Sociopathic, perhaps?" Despite Beck's comments distancing himself from the fake advertisement, Media Matters pointed out that "the ad was posted on the front page of Beck's website under the title 'Picture of the Day,' with a caption that described the 'ad' as a 'brilliant creation.'"

Live events

In March 2003, Beck ran a series of rallies called Glenn Beck's Rally for America in support of troops deployed for the upcoming Iraq war. While generally attended by war supporters, Beck spoke of those who "disagreed with the war, but still supported the troops." He ran the final rally at Marshall University over the Memorial Day weekend.

In subsequent years, Beck has toured American cities twice a year, presenting a one-man stage show. His stage productions are a mix of stand-up comedy and inspirational speaking.

For his annual winter tour, Glenn Beck's Christmas Tour, Beck focuses on a Christmas theme.

In 2005, the summer show Glenn Beck on Ice advocating diminishing the role of politics in daily life. The 2006 summer show The Mid-Life Crisis Tour featured life's lessons from the perspective of a middle-aged man.

Each year in January, Beck and Stu Burguiere return to their original home station of 970 WFLA to provide commentary on the yearly Gasparilla Pirate Festival parade.

In June 2007, Beck completed his latest tour called An Inconvenient Tour which, despite the name parodying Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, had very little to do with global warming or climate change. It instead focused on the inconvenient aspects of everyday life.

On July 4, 2007, Beck served as host of the 2007 Toyota Tundra "Stadium of Fire" in Template:City. The annual event at LaVell Edwards Stadium on the Brigham Young University campus is presented by America's Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit organization whose mission is "to provide deeply felt emotional experiences that celebrate and promote the traditional American values of family, freedom, God and country."

On May 17, 2008, Beck gave the keynote speech at the NRA convention in Louisville, Kentucky.

In 2008, Beck's summer show was Beck '08: Unelectable, a political comedy tour.

Books and magazine

Beck has written three books. His recent, An Inconvenient Book, was released on November 20, 2007 and occupied #1 on the New York Times Best Seller list for the week of December 9, 2007.

Glenn Beck has also authored The Real America: Messages from the Heart and Heartland.

Beck has a third book, The Christmas Sweater, which is slated for release on November 11, 2008.

Beck is also the founder and editor of a comedy magazine called Fusion, which is a play on The Glenn Beck Program's motto, "The Fusion of Entertainment and Enlightenment."

See also

As political commentary, Glenn Beck refers to conflated holiday celebrations such as:

• Chrismukkah
• Chrismahanukwanzakah
• Festivus

External links

• CNN transcript of Glen Beck - Dina Sansing

Official websites

• Glenn Beck — official website
• Glenn Beck — CNN
• List of radio stations streaming Glenn Beck Radio Show