Glenn Beck goes home to face - what else? - controversy
His hometown is giving Beck the key to the city. Before that, his fans paid up to $500 to see and hear the conservative commentator at Safeco Field in Seattle. Did we mention that he has a new book out?
In this 1973 photo provided by Bruce Wersen, Werson, left, is shown with his childhood friend Glenn Beck, right, as they get ready to perform at the Puyallup Fair in Puyallup, Wash., 1973. Beck, now a personality on the Fox News Channel, has drawn protests as he prepares to return to Mount Vernon, Wash., where he spent part of his childhood, to accept a key to the city.
Courtesy of Bruce Wersen/AP
If Glenn Beck were a soldier, he鈥檇 be General Patton. If an athlete, Roger Federer four days of the week and Michael Phelps the other three. If a rock musician, the Beatles -- all four of them.
The guy is everywhere, getting more ink than that other media star, Barack Obama. Cover of (giving the world a Bronx cheer). Three-part series in . Sit-down network interview.
All he has to do is pretend to drop a frog in a pot of boiling water (something about contrasting the dangers of John McCain versus President Obama), and the blogosphere goes nuts. Just ask the Monitor鈥檚 resident political humorist Jimmy Orr. The response to his Beck/frog blog this week had Jimmy hopping all day.
Today, conservative commentator and Fox News wunderkind Beck is going home to Mt. Vernon, Washington, for 鈥�Glenn Beck Day.鈥� Before that, he鈥檚 speaking at Safeco Field in nearby Seattle at an event sponsored by the , a private non-profit whose mission is 鈥渢o advance individual liberty, free enterprise, and limited, accountable government.鈥�
It may be about freedom, but the 鈥淭ake the Field鈥� event is not free: $500 to attend a private reception and have your photo taken with The Man; private reception without a photo for $250; seats with a catered lunch on the field for $100. Those are all sold out, but some of the cheap seats were still available Saturday morning for $10-$25.
Naturally, the arrival of Beck is stirring up people in the normally laid-back Pacific Northwest -- the country鈥檚 largely-liberal quadrant known by those of a more conservative stripe as the 鈥淯pper Left Coast.鈥�
Writing at seattlepi.com, longtime Seattle columnist : 鈥淭he Emerald City is hosting a man who calls Barack Obama a 鈥榬acist,鈥� sees a back-to-school presidential speech as 鈥榠ndoctrinating鈥� children and defends an obscure 18th Century constitutional provision that set in place the slave trade and capped taxes at $10 a slave.鈥� That was one of Connelly鈥檚 more polite comments.
Anti-Beck protesters claim to have gathered 16,000 signatures in opposition to Beck鈥檚 being given the key to his hometown. His fans fought back with signatures and radio call-ins of their own.
Mt. Vernon Mayor Bud Norris thought it was a good idea to honor a wildly successful hometown boy who got his start in radio there when he was still in high school.
City Council members disagreed. They stating: "Mount Vernon City Council is in no way sponsoring the Mayor's event on Sept. 26, 2009, and is not connected to the Glenn Beck event in any manner."
The mayor of nearby Bellingham has to Jon Stewart, liberal satirist and host of Comedy Central鈥檚 鈥�The Daily Show.鈥�
Beck gets challenged all the time by what his fans deride as the 鈥渕ainstream media.鈥�
Sitting for a recent interview with Katie Couric of CBS News, as he spent three minutes not answering her question about what he means by 鈥渨hite culture.鈥�
Writing in the New York Times this week, Nobel economist Paul Krugman observed that Beck 鈥渋nformed his audience of a 鈥榖uried鈥� Obama administration study showing that Waxman-Markey [the House-passed cap-and-trade climate bill] would actually cost the average family $1,787 per year.鈥�
鈥淣eedless to say, no such study exists,鈥�
If you couldn鈥檛 make it to the events in Washington State Saturday, you can see a pretty funny impression on
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