Christopher Hitchens Takes On Glenn Beck
Christopher Hitchens takes to the pages of January’s issue of Vanity Fair to take on what he sees as the cynical message that Glenn Beck is peddling to his listeners:
Most epochs are defined by one or another anxiety. More important, though, is the form which that anxiety takes. Millions of Americans are currently worried about two things that are, in their minds, emotionally related. The first of these is the prospect that white people will no longer be the majority in this country, and the second is that the United States will be just one among many world powers. This is by no means purely a “racial” matter. (In my experience, black Americans are quite concerned that “Hispanic” immigration will relegate them, too.) Having an honest and open discussion about all this is not just a high priority. It’s more like a matter of social and political survival. But the Beck-Skousen faction want to make such a debate impossible. They need and want to sublimate the anxiety into hysteria and paranoia. The president is a Kenyan. The president is a secret Muslim. The president (why not?—after all, every little bit helps) is the unacknowledged love child of Malcolm X. And this is their response to the election of an extremely moderate half-African American candidate, who speaks better English than most and who has a model family. Revolted by this development, huge numbers of white people choose to demonstrate their independence and superiority by putting themselves eagerly at the disposal of a tear-stained semi-literate shock jock, and by repeating his list of lies and defamations.
There’s more like that at the link, so get over there and read it.
*peddling.
> hysteria and paranoia
Take these away and the far right pretty much ceases to exist. And the Glenn Beck’s of the world have to get real jobs.
Gee, exactly what I’ve been saying since, forever.
Christopher, should I be concerned that not a single one of the four Horsemen have an opinion of Julian Assange that is findable on the Internet?
Christopher Hitchens, lol, drunken idiot……
Hitchens is always good for a laugh; he and beck have to much in common.