Fox News and radio talker Glenn Beck held a rally Saturday to promote his new book, to be released in October. The “Restoring Honor” rally was held at the Lincoln Memorial, on the 47th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous “I have a dream” speech.
Estimates on the size of the crowd differ. CBS News, using aerial photography, put the number of people at 87,000; organizers said the number was 500,000 and Fox News said it was more than eleventy billion.
In planning this event, Beck originally said it would be a civil rights rally in honor of King, then changed it to a salute to the troops, then changed it once again to a world changing life altering event where God would speak through him and become the biggest moment in world history. Right before giving his speech Beck said he changed his mind and decided to reveal the true reason for the rally.
“This is a day that we can start the heart of America again,” Beck said. “It has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with me using a bully pulpit to make a lot of money off of the uninformed, sow hatred and ignorance and get people to buy my new book that just so happens to be coming out soon.”
Beck repeated his claim that civil rights leaders distorted King’s ideas of equality and economic opportunity. Instead, Beck argued that civil rights are really about letting corporations and the wealthy do whatever they want.
“We’re here to re-claim the civil rights movement, to pick up Martin Luther King’s dream. People claim it was all about giving everyone their Constitutional rights and economic equality. To me it’s about support for the rich and the corporate interests,” Beck said. “We are the people of the civil rights movement, the ultra-conservatives who fought against equality and distort the Bible and ignore the parts we disagree with, like helping the poor and the unfortunate.”
Beck told the crowd it was important to “get the poison of hatred out of us,” then led them through a series of his “biggest hit jobs” of anger and fear.
“When I talk about the poison of hatred I mean from the other side, not myself. Like when I called President Barack Obama and the Democrats a bunch of vampires and said the only way to stop them was to drive a steak into their hearts or when I joked about poisoning Nancy Pelosi. I’ve also said ‘a global economic holocaust is coming’ and that we’re on the verge of a dictatorship,” Beck said. “When I talk about anger and fear, I know what I’m talking about because fear and paranoia are all I’ve got. That’s why I keep claiming Obama is part of some socialist conspiracy or that everything he does will lead to Adolph Hitler and genocide.”
Beck said his book, “Broke: The Plan to Restore our Trust, Truth and Treasure” would be just as delusional and fear mongering as his last book, “The Overton Window” in which Beck attempted to put his paranoid vision of America into the context of a thriller.
In “Overton,” political parties are tools of the same public relations machine and the threat of one world government is real. It asserts that citizens must fight against an oppressive government and closes with the line “we’re everywhere. . . . The fight starts tomorrow.” Beck himself described the book as “faction,” a fictional book that is based on fact.
Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin told the crowd the nation’s challenges might seem insurmountable, but would prove to be no match for her brand of ignorant but folksy non-remedies.
“It is so humbling to get to be here with you today, patriots — you who are motivated and engaged and concerned, knowing to never retreat. No, we must not fundamentally transform America as some would want, we must restore America and restore her honor,” Palin said. “We must be honorable and restoring, we must honor this country by restoring her with honor that we restore. That’s the honorable and restoring thing to do. I know that’s a bunch of nonspecific, meaningless platitudes but hopefully that’s enough to get you lemmings to put me into the White House.”
Beck told the crowd that the new book would just as delusional as his last book, “The Overton Window” in which Beck attempted to put his paranoid vision of America into the context of a thriller. In the book, political parties are tools of the same public relations machine and the threat of one world government is real. It asserts that citizens must fight against an oppressive government and closes with the line “we’re everywhere. . . . The fight starts tomorrow.” Beck himself described the book as “faction,” a fictional book that is based on fact.
Marcus Manfred is an enigma. A simple and complex man who was raised by wolves in the lower upper part of the eastern west. He is more than you think and less than you know. He is the solution to every question you have ever asked, as long as the answer is three. 
