And, tooting that racial dog whistle that Beck wears around his neck, he also compared President Obama to P.Diddy arriving with his “thugs.” From Glenn Beck’s November 4 radio show (emphasis added):

Glenn Beck: Is India not a hot bed for Islamic radicalism?

Mike Baker: I wouldn’t call it that. I would say it’s not an unfriendly environment for a variety of people who may not have our best interest at heart. How diplomatic am I being right there?

Beck: I’m not saying the government of India or the Indian people, but those forces are there that are hostile to India which are hostile to our interests

Baker: Sure, exactly.

Beck: The extremist world would love something to happen to the president of the United States in India. Would it not set the world on fire?

Baker: It wouldn’t have to be a direct harm to the president. It could be the disruption of the trip. It could be an operation, you know, planned during the course of his visit. Anything like that creates the profile they’re looking for.

Beck: A bomb going off near the president or near his entourage even would be a huge message.

Baker: It shows a win for them and it shows their ability to operate. Now the Indian Service, you can argue that the current Obama Administration has somewhat ignored the relationship with the Indian government during the two years so far, and certainly the Indian government certainly feels that way, but one of the good things about, you know, the work in the intelligence field and in security is regardless of who’s in power and regardless of what the administration is, there tend s to be a constant relationship between say, for instance, the CIA and its counterpart and a place like India. You just get the job done. You keep working and there’s a lot of work that goes on before this visit that never gets on the radar screen, and that work gets done and quite honestly, maintaining the security of the president or anybody else oftentimes is more reliant on that work, the work that you never see. It’s not the armored vehicles. It’s not the Secret Service standing There it’s not the warships. It’s all that collection and all of the maintenance of the liaison contacts, studying the actionable intelligence we’re picking up and the public doesn’t see that.

Beck: For somebody who lived some place where nobody knew who you were, if you have to get in the mind of the Indian people how does it appear to India, to the average person, when a president comes and he takes 34 warships to your country, 3,000 entourage, helicopters, jets, takes the biggest, you know, the most prestigious hotel and takes all of it over and disrupts, closes, holds portions of the gateway of India and people are losing their jobs. They’re not going to be able to feed their family. This is according to the India Times. How can I lose this business? They’re putting me in crisis. How does this appear? Is this P. Diddy arriving with 40 thugs?

P.Diddy? Really, Glenn Beck?

[Note: I'll post audio later in the day]

Utter nonsense aside, this is ironic coming from Glenn Beck who favorited a white power tweet from a white nationalist organization, tells Cory Booker “You got it going on. Word to your mommy,” seems to not understand the concept of slavery, and the list goes on and on….

Onward we go…

“Let me bring out the list of dirtbag cities I’m going to talk about again…

[...]

Newark, Democrat since 1928. Now, that’s quite a streak, Newark. I knew I like you for a reason.

Current mayor, Corey Booker [sic], prides himself on progressive programs. He’s working like this with the Center for American Progress on green jobs, because that’s what I think of when I think of Newark, New Jersey. Four years in office and Newark still ranks the 10th most poverty-stricken city in America.

You got it going on. Word to your mommy.”

[The Glenn Beck Program, Fox News Channel, August 5, 2010]

Sigh. Onward we go…

Update: On a related note, Joan Walsh has an excellent post up about Glenn Beck’s “It’s like the Planet of the Apes” comment that was made during the same show as the “your mommy” remark. It’s worth a read.

Aside from the recklessness involved in calling this President a racist and the blatant race-baiting displayed, Glenn Beck’s assertion does beg one question: What does Glenn Beck think White Culture is?  It’s a question that Glenn Beck has been repeatedly asked over the past year – and one that he has consistently refused to answer.

Well, a look at Glenn Beck’s favorite tweets raises questions related to Glenn Beck’s concern about “white culture.” First, a screenshot of Glenn Beck’s favorite tweets:

This Image Has Not Been Photoshopped

Notably: @MalevoFreedom‘s bio describes the account as “White Nationalist News And Forum.”

Now, to be clear, in order for the tweet to appear in Glenn Beck’s favorites either Glenn Beck or the operator of Glenn’s twitter account would have needed to mark the tweet as a “favorite.”

For a guy that connects anyone he doesn’t like to all kinds of nefarious imagined plots using the flimsiest connections, Glenn Beck favoriting a tweet from a self-described white supremacist group raises questions:

1. What’s the deal with Glenn Beck’s “white culture” obsession?  What does he think it is? And, why does he insist on asserting that it’s under attack?
2. Why is Glenn Beck associating himself with white nationalists and white supremacists?

[h/t @luhgnut]

UPDATE: As of 11:58PM eastern, Glenn Beck deleted all of his favorites (meaning, he deleted after our original post went up):

Uh-oh.

Well, it’s a good thing I already have a screenshot of what Glenn Beck’s favorites looked like, including the “Embrace White Culture” tweet, before he scrubbed it.

Update 2: Oh, and just in case Glenn Beck tries to pull the ‘This must have just popped up on my Favorites’ excuse, here’s what his favorite page looked like on July 8 (and yes, the “White-Power” tweet was there).  So, you might want to try a different angle Glenn.

Update 3: Keith Olbermann mentioned this story on his show tonight (8/4/10).

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

On Friday, Glenn Beck did a show on “African-American founders.”  It was generally consistent with Glenn’s prior similar discussions: to downplay the institution of slavery.  It sounds utterly bizarre for someone to get on national TV and do this, but, so it goes.  Oh, and this burning drive to minimize slavery was another of Skousen’s oft repeated memes.

One clip from that show struck me for how demonstrably false Glenn Beck’s desperate attempt to minimize slavery was:

“How about the painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware? A bunch of white guys, right?

No. Look here. African-American helping row the boat across. You know what his name was? Prince Whipple. He fought alongside Washington during the revolution.”

Just one problem Glenny.  Prince Whipple was a slave, who reportedly wasn’t all that keen on fighting in a war for other people’s liberty while not having any of his own.  But, this didn’t matter much and his owner forced him to fight…you know because of the whole slavery thing.

Just another day of Glenn Beck’s willful deceit and reckless disregard for reality.

Partial transcript:

Mike Dunston (Anchor) Back in July of last year on Fox and Friends, you said you believed that the President is a racist. Do you still believe that?

Glenn Beck: I think the comments that I have made on this fully explain it. Uhm, and you can clearly go to my website and see the..I believe it was about a 20 minute monologue I did on that. That’s for each of…for each individual to do their own research and figure it out themselves.

Mike Dunston (Anchor) So is that a yes? Or, is that a no?

Glenn Beck: I think you have the answer now, don’t you?

Mike Dunston (Anchor) I’m not sure.

Glenn Beck urged people not to fill out the race question on the Census because it’s an attempt to increase modern day slavery (emphasis added):

Glenn Beck: Why were they asking the race question, you said when, in 1790? … Right, they want to know, do you count as three-fifths? Do you count at all? So, you have to know how many slaves did you have? People find that offensive today because the idea was, if we’re going to count, we want to know how many are here for services etc. etc. and slaves would get less. Well that’s not right. One. One. ‘I’m not three-fifths, I’m one. Whites are not worth than me.’ Now reverse it, why are they asking this question today?

Stu (Co-Host): Because minorities are worth more than whites.

Glenn Beck: Exactly right. So you will get more dollars if you are a minority. So you are worth more as a minority. Well there is no difference. The reason you don’t answer the race question is because one, everyone counts as one. All men are created equal. If you were offended back in 1790 about slavery and that everyone should count the same, do not answer the race question. How dare you. How dare you. At least in 1790, they were doing it to slow the South down on slavery. To try to stop it as much as they can. Today they are asking the race question to try to increase slavery. Your dependence on the master in Washington. No way, don’t answer that question.

The census is a target for many right-wing extremists, like Glenn Beck, because they are deeply concerned about the implications of an updated and accurate assessment of our nation’s diversity. Glenn Beck’s attacks on the census aren’t new. Neither is his willingness to prey on racial anxieties for political or personal reasons.

When a company chooses to supply Glenn Beck with advertising revenue, they are associating their brand with the aforementioned nonsense and vitriol.

And, this kind of talk is precisely why the StopBeck effort rolls along.

If you’re interested, ThinkProgress has more on this latest Glenn Beck census rant.

“You don’t take the name Barack to identify with America,” but with “your heritage,” “radical[s]“

First off, in a multicultural society like the United States – any name is and should be acceptable.  Second, why is he fear mongering about someone’s name? Can’t he come up with anything better?  And finally, he does realize that most babies don’t get to choose their names, right?

Today was not the first time that Glenn Beck has come down on the wrong side of the three-fifths clause or the institution of slavery.  In his most recent book, Glenn Beck seems to defend, whether knowingly or unknowingly, the institution of slavery.  Or, how about that on several occasions these past months, Glenn Beck portrayed Pres. Obama as a Constitution hater because Obama referred to the Constitution’s original support for slavery “imperfect.”  On face, this kind of criticism is hateful and disturbing.  Also disturbing is the degree to which Glenn Beck distorted Obama’s words in order to push the meme that the current President of the United States hates the Constitution because he criticized the document’s initial support for slavery.

On September 17, 2009, Glenn Beck was ranting about what he believed to be Obama revealing disdain for the Constitution.  In support of his rant, he played a clip from an interview that Obama gave back in 2001. This is what Glenn Beck aired:

OBAMA: The original Constitution [edit] I think it is an imperfect document, and I think it is a document that reflects some deep flaws in American culture — the colonial culture nascent at that time. [edit] I think we can say that the Constitution reflected a enormous blind spot in this culture [edit] and that the framers had that same blind spot. [edit] It also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that continues to this day.

And this is what Barack Obama actually said in the interview (lines indicate what Glenn Beck cut out):

HOST: Barack Obama, what are your thoughts on the Declaration and Constitution?

OBAMA: Well, you know, I think it’s a remarkable document. I think –

HOST: Which one?

OBAMA: The original Constitution, as well as — as well as the Civil War amendments, but I think it is an imperfect document, and I think it is a document that reflects some deep flaws in American culture — the colonial culture nascent at that time.

African-Americans were not — first of all, they weren’t African-Americans. The Africans at the time were not considered as part of the polity that was of concern to the framers. I think that, as [program co-panelist] Richard [John] said, it was a nagging problem in the same way that, these days, we might think of environmental issues or some other problem that, where you have to balance, you know, cost-benefits, as opposed to seeing it as a moral problem involving persons of moral worth.

And, in that sense, I think we can say that the Constitution reflected a enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day, and that the framers had that same blind spot. I don’t think the two views are contradictory to say that it was a remarkable political document that paved the way for where we are now, and to say that it also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that continues to this day.

There you have it.  Glenn Beck heavily edited an interview in order to portray Obama as a Constitution hater.

Does Glenn Beck like the institution of slavery, or does it just seem that way from the things he says?

Thus, within the span of a few minutes, Beck implied that there are no quality medical schools in India; implied that medical care in India is a shoddy imitation of real health care; implied that the entire nation is an undeveloped backwater without even so much as indoor plumbing; and compared the Ganges River, a holy body of water for one of the world’s oldest and largest religions, to a disease.

What does this say about Beck’s respect for the millions of Indian-Americans living in the United States, let alone the Indian people? What does it say about his respect for the faith traditions of others?

For those sponsors that remain, this is the kind of bigotry that they are subsidizing and freely associating their brands with.

Explaining why American healthcare costs so much, Glenn Beck offered his thoughts:

The best I can figure is all that money goes to high-tech hospitals and doctors who studied at Harvard rather than Gajra Raja medical school. Oh sure, yeah, you know, it’s weird. You can buy a Gucci bag on any New York street corner for like four bucks. No different than the 3,000 dollar real thing. They’re identical!

Never mind that Gajra Raja was de-recognized by the Medical College of India. This fact would only get in the way of Glenn Beck’s insult to an entire country’s medical system by reducing it down to a school that it already de-recognized.  Ironically, Glenn Beck cites his “research” as he carried on his bigoted attack, saying:

And also, in our research that it took us, oh about 40 seconds, we figured out that some of that money here in America winds up in the pocket of a skilled doctor that helps off-set the 20 years of schooling that he endured and the loans he took out. And – you’re not going to believe this one, Karlyn – some of that money seems to go to the 1 million SEIU workers in the healthcare industry that make slightly more here than in India. Because, you know, they have an American lifestyle, maybe a couple of cars, great union benefits, and homes with something that we in America like to call flush toilets.

When sponsors hide behind the ‘we don’t like to get involved in politics’ line, I remind them that this isn’t about politics – it’s about decency.  There is absolutely nothing political in Glenn Beck’s suggestion that India is uncivilized.  Nor was there anything political in Glenn Beck’s parting shot at the Hindu religion, where he said (emphasis added):

I don’t want a discounted doctor. I don’t want discounted wages. I don’t want any of this stuff. If I wanted to live in India, I’d live in India. I want not the Indian lifestyle, I want the American lifestyle. I’m sure, no offense to India, I’m sure it’s beautiful and everything. I’ve heard especially this time of year, especially by the - you know that one big river they have there that sounds like a disease? Come on, it does. I mean, if somebody said, ‘I’m sorry, you have a really bad case of Ganges,’ you’d want Cipro.“

I wonder how Glenn Beck would feel about a Mormon holy site (his religion) being compared to a disease.  I imagine he wouldn’t appreciate it, but that certainly doesn’t stop Beck from denigrating other faiths.

Video of Glenn Beck’s bigoted attack: