May '11 PR Rankings Issue - Odwyerpr.com

Glenn Beck, we hardly knew you
By Kevin Foley
On the same day Glenn Beck
announced he was phasing out of
his Fox News program, the right
wing’s favorite conspiracy
theorist
made some startling
pronouncements:
A summer of
insurrection is coming
tied to Israel’s
May 15th independence
day.
Kevin Foley is president
of KEF Media
Associates, an Atlantabased
producer and distributor
of sponsored
news content to television
and radio media.
The invisible hand
of George Soros
has replaced the
markets.
Union workers in
Wisconsin will rig
state supreme court
ballots.
Beck has lately warned his viewers that
communists, Islamic terrorists, white
supremacists, Marxists, Nazis, progressives
and President Obama are all colluding
to bring down America. They’re
led by the aforementioned financier
George Soros, the “head of the snake,”
according to Beck, with the Tides
Foundation, AFSCME, environmentalists,
ACLU, and healthcare reformers
providing the cover.
It’s easy to brand Beck a lunatic when
you review his body of work as categorized
by MediaMatters for America, the
liberal media watchdog group.
But I think Beck is crazy like a Fox.
Before he was discovered by Roger
Ailes, Beck embarked on a path of selfdiscovery
after drug and alcohol abuse
derailed his personal and professional
lives. He recovered and found success in
Tampa as an afternoon radio talk show
host. His program went national before
CNN picked Beck up to host a show that
took “an unconventional look at the
news of the day featuring his often amusing
perspective.”
In early 2009 Beck jumped to Fox
News at the same moment America inaugurated
its first African-American
president. Within weeks, the Tea Party
movement was created by conservative
lobbyists as a faux grassroots organization,
and Beck fertilized their lawn with
mostly baseless attacks on Obama and
his supporters. Each passing day since,
Beck’s accusations have become more
unhinged, more farfetched, and more
convoluted.
A rational person might conclude that
Beck’s TV career would quickly
implode. Instead, Beck created a monster
brand. Along with his daily radio show,
public rallies, books and speaking
engagements have generated tens of
millions for the former failed shock jock.
“Glenn Beck has managed to monetize
virtually everything that comes out of his
mouth,” cooed Forbes last April.
In Obama haters, Beck found legions
of conspiracy consumers ready to
convict the new president on most any
charge, no matter how wild or unfounded.
As healthcare reform moved forward,
for example, Beck saw an insidious
Obama plot to enslave all Americans.
So it was Beck taught us about “death
panels” and “Reichstag moments” and
mysterious FEMA concentration camps
on Long Island — sometimes all in one
show.
His TV show’s principle prop is a
blackboard on which Professor Beck
(who has only a high school diploma)
links brutal dictators of the past (Stalin)
and present (Ahmadinejad) with the
future (Harry Reid). Beck put on a puppet
show recently to help demonstrate
how Soros is pulling Obama’s strings
just in case the audience was missing his
point.
All of this silliness appears to have
been too much for Beck’s advertisers.
They started fleeing the program in
droves after Beck called President
Obama a “racist.” Meantime, Beck’s
numbers have been falling steadily,
perhaps because his audience has
finally had its fill of his smarmy disingenuousness
and kooky, unfulfilled
prognostications.
Beck’s on to bigger and better things,
anyway. Perhaps there will be Beck conspiracy
specials on Fox or even a 24hour
Glenn Beck cable network a la
Oprah Winfrey. In any event, the new
enterprises, like the old, will perpetuate
Beck’s true conviction.
“I could give a flying crap about the political
process,” Beck told Forbes last year.
“We’re an entertainment company.”
Guest Column
MAY 2011 WWW.ODWYERPR.COM 53