ANALYSIS: "Fearmonger in chief" Glenn Beck taps American paranoia

By Andy Goldberg Oct 15, 2010, 3:00 GMT

Los Angeles - Back in the day before Fox News, back in a time where a deranged Florida pastor threatening to burn Korans would not be the biggest news story in the world, a personality like Glenn Beck would most likely have been dismissed as little more than a blowhard, fit for little more than ranting on street corners and at extremist rallies.

But in the America of 2010, Beck is a media superman and the most popular political pundit in the nation. And in the run-up to the crucial mid-term Congressional elections, he is the man who has done more than any other to stoke the greatest swelling of rightwing outrage since Bill Clinton soiled Monica Lewinskys dress.

Beck represents the increasing polarization of the media in the US, where comment and opinion often outweigh straight news. Fox News' claim to the rightwing audience is hardly counter-balanced by the weaker liberal followings of MSNBC, whose Keith Olberman leads a nightly left-wing mantra, and Jon Stewart of Comedy Centrals The Daily Show.

The big question is how this highly partisan atmosphere will affect voters on November 2 when they choose anew the 435 members of the House of Representatives and one-third of the 100-member Senate.

The mid-terms are seen as a referendum on the previous two years of a president's performance, and US President Barack Obama's Democrats face stiff winds, not only with the ongoing economic slump but also with personalities like Beck who are whipping up Republican frenzy to take back control of Congress.

Beck, whose prime time show on Fox News is the highest rated show on all the cable news networks, is regarded as the high-priest of the Tea Party movement, whose only equal as a leader of the incensed right wing is Sarah Palin.

A grey-haired, former alcoholic at 46, Beck is a born-again Mormon who attracts over 2 million viewers to his vitriol-filled show every night and makes over 30 million dollars a year from his various speaking and merchandising ventures. His self-declared Restoring Honor' rally attracted between 100,000 to half a million people to the Washington Mall in late August.

He has really perfected his act,' says Bob Thomson, a professor of popular culture at Syracuse University. He appeals to a lot of people and their sense of anger and fear.'

Becks deepest personal hatred is for President Barack Obama, who represents Beck's despised progressivism and big government. A magnetic speaker, Becks signature style is to compare his opponents to Hitler or Communist icons and scare his viewers into thinking that the great old US of A is just a single step from total totalitarian meltdown.

Progressivism is the cancer thats eating America,' proclaims Beck on a regular basis. He has also compared climate change education in schools to the Hitler Youth, declared many US universities akin to Iranian and North Korean reeducation camps, and likened Obamas stimulus actions to a Nazi economic program.

Becks critique of Obamas ideas on health care reform epitomized his rabid style. Beck played an old tape of Obama making the case for a 'single-payer' government-run health-care system. 'I am not comparing him to this, but please, read 'Mein Kampf' for this reason,' Beck told his radio listeners. 'You see that Hitler told you what he was going to do. He told the Germans.'

The Washington Posts political commentator Dana Milbank believes Beck has a Hitler fetish. According to Milbank, in Becks first 18 months on Fox News since January 2009, he and his guests invoked Hitler 147 times, Nazis an additional 202 times, and fascism 193 times. The Holocaust got 76 mentions, and Joseph Goebbels got 24.

No surprise then that the Jewish organization The Anti Defamation League called him Americas fearmonger in chief' or that Beck is a lightning rod for his arch-rivals of polemics, Stewart and Olberman. These TV stars are the high preachers of the increasingly besieged liberal approach, but they only each enjoy about 1 million viewers on average.

But political and cultural experts question whether Becks influence is really as great as his opponents make out - an issue that may become clearer on October 30, when Stewart leads a liberal rally on the Washington Mall.

Don't confuse loud with big,' says Justin Holmes, who teaches public opinion and political psychology at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls.

Holmes sees the proliferation of alternative media - talk radio, cable TV, the Internet, blogs - as a diffusion of rhetoric. Essentially, it means there are more people on more soapboxes speaking more loudly, he says.

'Even if 100,000 people march on Washington, that means 300 million Americans didn't,' Holmes says.

Thompson agrees, to a point.

(Beck's) influence is disproportionate to its actual size,' says the popular culture professor. He has tapped in to a real vein of paranoia in this country.'

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