Stay classy, Glenn Beck listeners

[Skjellyfetti]

Glenn Beck calls her one of the most dangerous people in the world.

"I'm about 5-foot-6," Frances Fox Piven tells Weekends on All Things Considered host Guy Raz. "I'm 78 years old. My hair is partly grey. I'm quite thin."

Piven is a professor at the City College of New York. In 1966, she and her late husband, Richard Cloward, wrote an article for The Nation outlining a plan to help the poor of New York and other big cities to get on welfare.

In their research, they found that not all the poor who were eligible to receive welfare actually did. They advocated that all the nation's eligible poor should apply. They felt such a strain to city budgets would force Washington to address the poverty problem.

Forty-five years later, Beck took to the airwaves of Fox News and his own radio program, warning the public about the obscure article.

"Let me introduce you to the people who you would say are fundamentally responsible for the unsustainability and possible collapse of our economic system. They're really two people," he said, "Cloward and Piven."

For about the last three months, week after week, Beck's been hammering away at Piven and her husband. From their 45-year-old article, he sees a vast conspiracy to overthrow the American financial system.

Theirs, he says, is a plan to "overwhelm the system and bring about the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with impossible demands and bring on economic collapse."

Beck says their approach is the main strategy employed by the far left ever since, applying it to everything from the Wall Street collapse to the health care law to climate change.

Soon after Beck made her infamous, Piven says hundreds of death threats poured into her e-mail account and conservative blogs. Things like, "'May cancer overtake you soon!'" Piven says. She ended up asking the FBI and state police for help.

While Piven acknowledges that Beck has never advocated violence against her, she still feels Beck's screeds led directly to the threats against her life.

"It's a lunatic story, but it's a story that nevertheless is clear," she says. "You can get your hands around it. This woman is somehow responsible for the upsetting changes in your small town where the factory closed down. I don't blame them for being upset. It is upsetting. But I blame Glenn Beck for telling them a factually untrue, crazy story about why those changes occurred."

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[Grizalltheway]

Dude is a virus to society.

[kalm]

[Vidav]

Dude is a virus to society.

[Baldy]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to bet Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

[Grizalltheway]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

But of course you don't have any evidence to back that up..

[Vidav]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

But of course you don't have any evidence to back that up..

The difference is Beck puts himself in that position by being in the spotlight constantly saying the crazy shit he does. This woman wrote an article 45 years ago and hardly anyone even knew who she was.

[Grizalltheway]

But of course you don't have any evidence to back that up..

The difference is Beck puts himself in that position by being in the spotlight constantly saying the crazy shit he does. This woman wrote an article 45 years ago and hardly anyone even knew who she was.

No doubt. Says a lot about his character, or lack thereof, that he would pick on someone so obscure and harmless.

[Ursus A. Horribilis]

I've seen Beck do some stupid shit like that before. He broke down Bruce Springsteens "Born In The USA" a year of so ago and finally realized that it wasn't a glowing cheer along song I guess...25 years later...one of the bigger songs in the time frame...25 years later, whay to be on top of it man.

[kalm]

I've seen Beck do some stupid shit like that before. He broke down Bruce Springsteens "Born In The USA" a year of so ago and finally realized that it wasn't a glowing cheer along song I guess...25 years later...one of the bigger songs in the time frame...25 years later, whay to be on top of it man.

Conks, long term-temporary blinding by the Stars, Stripes, and "USA".

[uofmman1122]

I honestly believe Glenn Beck is the best IRL troll in history.

He cooks up these batshit insane stories, pitches them to a HUGE, ignorant fanbase that adores him, who in turn get flamed by pretty much everyone else, and everything becomes a huge bickering shit storm.

At the end of the day, he goes home, settles down, and laughs at EVERYONE who thought he was remotely sincere in any of it.

Then he rolls around in his diamond jacuzzi filled with Benjamins.

[houndawg]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

...I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck too......

[Grizalltheway]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

...I'd be willing to beat Glenn Beck too......

Preferably over the head, with the Book of Moron.

[YoUDeeMan]

Anyoner else find it odd that a person with an avatar depicting an old, whack-job looking dude with an angry face giving someone the middle finger would post a thread title starting with "stay classy"?

As for the woman...meh...she wrote a book wanting her 15 minutes of fame...and probably still craves more...and it didn't turn out as she liked. Another person looking for his fame used another person who looked for fame...big deal.

Seriously, she was/is a university professor (she probably still has tenure ) and is bothered by someone saying, "May cancer overtake you soon"? Really?

She's writing another book as we type.

[Skjellyfetti]

I honestly believe Glenn Beck is the best IRL troll in history.

He cooks up these batshit insane stories, pitches them to a HUGE, ignorant fanbase that adores him, who in turn get flamed by pretty much everyone else, and everything becomes a huge bickering **** storm.

At the end of the day, he goes home, settles down, and laughs at EVERYONE who thought he was remotely sincere in any of it.

Then he rolls around in his diamond jacuzzi filled with Benjamins.

You're right about that.

Beck insists he's not political, even after leading the charge against health care reform, feeding the frenzy of the Tea Party members, and telling his loyalists President Obama has "a deep-seated hatred for white people."

"I could give a flying crap about the political process," Beck tells the new issue of Forbes magazine (Forbes.com).

"We're an entertainment company."

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainmen ... orbes.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Bronco]

Beck is good at finding and shining a light on these rat progressive organizers so all can see what they’re like. What a jerk to use their own words against them.



Piven: Fiery and fearful: Socialist advocate for mob violence complains she is target
Washington Times ^ | Feb. 2, 2011 (print version) | Matthew Vadum

If you promote violent leftist insurrection for a living, should you be surprised when anonymous members of the public threaten you with violence?

Apparently.

Take the case of Marxist professor and community organizer Frances Fox Piven, a frequent target of conservative talk-show host Glenn Beck.

In the Nation magazine just last month, Ms. Piven expressed outrage that Wall Street bankers weren't being dragged from their homes and led to the guillotine because of the country's high unemployment rates and an anemic economy. "So where are the angry crowds, the demonstrations, sit-ins and unruly mobs? After all, the injustice is apparent," she wrote.

Ms. Piven's next words ought to send a chill down the spine of every American.

"Local protests have to accumulate and spread - and become more disruptive - to create serious pressures on national politicians. An effective movement of the unemployed will have to look something like the strikes and riots that have spread across Greece in response to the austerity measures forced on the Greek government by the European Union, or like the student protests that recently spread with lightning speed across England in response to the prospect of greatly increased school fees."

Shocked staffers at the Nation report that the publication's website has been flooded with angry comments, expletives and unprintable threats against Ms. Piven's person.

But instead of recognizing the root causes of this backlash, Occidental College professor and activist Peter Dreier points his finger at Mr. Beck, Ms. Piven's most persistent critic. Mr. Beck has railed against Ms. Piven almost daily on his cable TV show for the past two years, calling her "an enemy of the Constitution."

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...

[Skjellyfetti]

Anyoner else find it odd that a person with an avatar depicting an old, whack-job looking dude with an angry face giving someone the middle finger would post a thread title starting with "stay classy"?

You obviously haven't seen the movie and don't get the reference.

And, an avatar on a message board isn't in the same stratosphere as flooding an elderly woman's voice mail and inbox with death threats over an article she wrote 40+ years ago.

[Ursus A. Horribilis]

Anyoner else find it odd that a person with an avatar depicting an old, whack-job looking dude with an angry face giving someone the middle finger would post a thread title starting with "stay classy"?

You obviously haven't seen the movie and don't get the reference.

And, an avatar on a message board isn't in the same stratosphere as flooding an elderly woman's voice mail and inbox with death threats.

Fantastically entertaining group those Whites.

[Ursus A. Horribilis]

I honestly believe Glenn Beck is the best IRL troll in history.

He cooks up these batshit insane stories, pitches them to a HUGE, ignorant fanbase that adores him, who in turn get flamed by pretty much everyone else, and everything becomes a huge bickering **** storm.

At the end of the day, he goes home, settles down, and laughs at EVERYONE who thought he was remotely sincere in any of it.

Then he rolls around in his diamond jacuzzi filled with Benjamins.

You're right about that.

Beck insists he's not political, even after leading the charge against health care reform, feeding the frenzy of the Tea Party members, and telling his loyalists President Obama has "a deep-seated hatred for white people."

"I could give a flying crap about the political process," Beck tells the new issue of Forbes magazine (Forbes.com).

"We're an entertainment company."

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainmen ... orbes.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Good, that proves it, I've got one right then.

[JohnStOnge]

While jumping on the "Glenn Beck is distorting things" bandwagon you guys are assuming that author of the NPR article presented an unbiased, balanced full perspective. To me all you have to do is look at the picture at the top of the NPR article to realize that's a questionable assumption. It's a picture clearly chosen for effect.

I think we ought to read the actual article they wrote. Then maybe we should find out if it had any effect; whether or not anybody uses it as "guidance." To start, here is a link to the article:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/03/24-4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I've only scanned it so far, but I already think the NPR author was a little disingenuous in describing their article. He talked about creating a "strain." The authors talked about creating a crisis. Yes, the word "strain" was used. But the overall objective was a bit more comprehensive than that. At least that's how it looks from the first scan.

Of course the big question is one of whether or not there are people out there trying to foster the strategy.

[Skjellyfetti]

List of things John St. Onge worries about:
1. out of control liberal cell phone reviews
2. obscure articles written 40+ years ago

[Baldy]

Anyone who issues a death threat is way beyond the other side of ignorant.

With that said, I'd be willing to bet Glenn Beck receives 20X more death threats than Piven.

But of course you don't have any evidence to back that up..

Which is exactly why I didn't say Glenn Beck receives 20X the number of death threats than Priven.

Pay better attention, grasshopper.

[∞∞∞]

Glenn Beck:

[Grizalltheway]

But of course you don't have any evidence to back that up..

Which is exactly why I didn't say Glenn Beck receives 20X the number of death threats than Priven.

Pay better attention, grasshopper.

But you'd be willing to bet on something for which you have no evidence.

Keep spinning, you're really quite good at it.

[Baldy]

Which is exactly why I didn't say Glenn Beck receives 20X the number of death threats than Priven.

Pay better attention, grasshopper.

But you'd be willing to bet on something for which you have no evidence.

Keep spinning, you're really quite good at it.

Seriously?

Ummm, that is why it's called a bet. You're putting something at risk on an uncertain outcome or event.
If you have evidence (also known as proof) of said outcome or event, you don't have a legal or fair bet.

Gotta do better than that, Griz fan. You get two dunce caps for that shameful response.