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Glenn Beck Watch, Monday, April 05, 2010
Keeping Track of the Neo-Birchist Rhetoric
Today, our beloved so-called "Libertarian conservative" Glenn Beck decided to tell us
about the latest threat to our liberties.
So, what's destroying America now? Net Neutrality.
Now, Net Neutrality is both a principle of the internet as well as a proposed regulation.
As a principle, it's been that way since the Internet,
the way the Internet has worked for, well, since when it was created.
When you buy Internet service, you get equal access to all of the Internet
at the same bandwidth that you purchased from your provider.
Your provider isn't allowed to say, "Oh, you can go on Bing at full speed,
but if you go on Google,
we're gonna add on a couple seconds of latency and make it time out and stuff.
Now, I am a free-market supporting libertarian with a slight mutualist bent.
I don't exactly like regulation, especially in the long term,
but even then I can understand the principle behind Net Neutrality.
At least for now.
Why? At least, in America, we don't have a free market for internet access.
In my little suburb on Long Island, if you want high-speed internet access,
you have to go with either Cablevision or Fios. That's it.
You can't enter the market and challenge these two companies
if they decide to inflate their profits above market rates because that's illegal.
You see, this little thing called "franchise agreements",
whereby incumbent telephone and cable companies will go and establish monopoly control over
government by literally signing an agreement
with your town or city government which says that they have a monopoly over a particular
type of service,
and they are the only one allowed to use the poles.
That's why ***, Cablevision, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, I think there's another one...
All these cable companies, they don't compete against each other,
even though the FCC has tried to encourage overbuilding.
These cable companies, thanks to government interference, have pretty much
established their own little fiefdoms.
Government essentially says, "No, you can't compete at a market rate,
we're gonna make you compete at a much higher monopoly rate."
So, even though I'm normally opposed to regulation, I at least understand Net Neutrality.
Glenn Beck doesn't.
He doesn't understand the Internet.
That's why he calls us a bunch of guys typing on our computer in our underwear in our mom's
basement.
Excuse me, Mr. Beck!
I'm recording this thing...
in my upstairs bedroom...
And I'm wearing Spongebob pajamas, I'm not in my underwear.
That being said, if he used the internet for more than five minutes, he'd find,
he'd prbably find actual libertarians.
He say's he's a "libertarian", whatever that means.
Well now it doesn't mean nothing except what he wants it to mean.
Where do you think Ron Paul got all his campaign funding?
Oh wait, he doesn't care about that, Glenn beck still thinks Ron Paul is a domestic terrorist!
Now, Glenn's entire critique of Net Neutrality, if it can be called this,
isn't really related to Net Neutrality.
He doesn't even explain what it is. He just says it's a 'government takeover of the media'.
It's not a takeover, because the media is already government run.
What do you think the FCC is?
He doesn't seem to understand this.
Instead he, uh, takes his whole segment and does nothing but complain about Free Press.
This is just one of the organizations that's fighting for Net Neutrality.
It's not just Free Press. There's the EFF, and the FSF,
I'm pretty sure the OSI has something to say about it.
Everyone wants a neutral Internet.
Because, when they buy Internet service, they expect INTERNET service.
Not Google service, not Yahoo service, not YouTube service, Internet service.
[pause]
Instead, Glenn Beck doesn't understand this, he just, he points out Free Press,
has one guy who's apparantly a Marxist. And says some very Marxist things.
About how he wants to shut up capitalist rhetoric or something.
And how...
[sarcastic] how this whole Net Neutrality thing is really a Marxist plot to shut up
the media!
Here's a hint, Glenn Beck.
The reason why liberals hate and fear you is that they legitimately think you're Hitler.
When you say, when you get up there and you say your nice little neo-Birchist rhetoric,
people see that.
And what they see, some people actually act on that.
Like that guy who threw a plane into an IRS building and actually killed a guy.
Yeah, I know, you don't want that, because you yourself are for peaceful...
s-something.
Um, uh, but... [huh]
If- if they see you saying this,
this Tea Party rhetoric,
and this neo-John Birch Society rhetoric,
and they see people act on that.
And you gotta realize, your words have actions.
Now, going back to that Marxist angle, a while ago, Glenn Beck said,
that anyone who's in a church that preaches Social Justice,
needs to get out of that church because it's filled with Marxists.
Apparantly Social Justice means that you're a Marxist.
Now I seem to remember a, uh, certain messianic figure,
born about 2 to 7 AD,
preached something that sounded like this,
violently attacked some bankers in Jewish temples at least once,
told a bunch of people to stop stoning a *** because they were also imperfect,
um, uh, I believe He's, uh,
His name was something...
Joshua of Nazareth?
I think we just call Him Jesus now.
And He preached a lot about Social Justice.
And we thanked Him for this by nailing him to a cross.
Now, I- I bring this up, because Glenn Beck is, apparantly, a Mormon.
He's a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
I am too. So this personally affects me when he's going around, saying this,
cause, well, what do you think about your own church?
The way I see my church,
is that we have our own voluntary welfare system.
And we talk about Social Justice.
[condesending] Unlike you, Glenn Beck, who says it's Marxist,
to be, a Christian.
You go to any Christian church,
they're gonna have their own voluntary, voluntary socialist schemes,
they're gonna have their own voluntary redistributist schemes,
because, guess what?
You're Christian.
You're supposed to care about the poor.
You're not supposed to go around, RED-BAITING the poor.
Now, he mentioned this a bit in the episode,
and by "a bit", and "a mention",
I mean he found the first guy he could find who's a Marxist
who said this, and said we're all a bunch of Marxists
for complaining about his Social Justice comment.
[sigh]
Glenn, Glenn B-... Glenn, you don't understand this.
So-Sojourners is complaining about this, I'm complaining about this.
Everyone thinks you're RETARDED when you say this.
BYU scholars are going on MSNBC, and saying you're RETARDED.
Well, they're not saying "retarded", they're saying this in much nicer language,
but they're saying that the words that are coming out of your mouth
do not correspond with the actions of the church that you think
is representing you.
Otherwise, why would you be in the Mormon church, if you think they're a bunch of Marxists.
You don't, obviously.
I've see you talk...
In, uh, you talked once about addiction, and you were much better,
talking about addiction, then you were doing talking about politics.
[deep breath]
So...
Instead of red-baiting Christians,
you might wanna, y'know...
actually, uh, read the bible.
This has been Glenn Beck Watch, for April 5th, 2010.
Keeping Track of the Neo-Birchist Rhetoric.