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Glenn Beck on Why He's No Rush Limbaugh
Michael Caulfield / Getty Images
In a deeply personal interview, the Fox News star defends Michael Steele’s right to be pro-choice, AIG’s big bonuses, and crying on air like Tammy Faye Bakker.
Recovering alcoholic, staunch libertarian and—according to detractors—occasional wacko, Glenn Beck has become a bright star at Fox News since he launched his show two months ago and quickly doubled the ratings in the “Fair and Balanced” cable network’s sluggish 5 p.m. slot. Part raging populist, part “rodeo clown” (his own description), Beck regularly scorches President Barack Obama (whom he has accused of trying to remake America into a totalitarian state), has wondered if the government is plotting to use the Federal Emergency Management Agency to operate concentration camps for the politically incorrect, and is already the third most-watched cable-news personality, after Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity.
Beck averaged 2.2 million viewers in February—multiples of the audience he used to attract as a longtime host on CNN’s HLN channel. He also boasts a popular radio program (on 350 stations and growing), two best-selling books (one of them a novel), his own magazine, Fusion, and a fervent fan base in the disenfranchised precincts of the recession-battered heartland.
We’re headed toward statism where these gigantic corporations and government are in bed. That was one of my main problems with George W. Bush.
At 45, rich and successful beyond his wildest dreams, Beck has coped with more than his share of personal tragedies—the suicide of his mother when he was 13, the untimely deaths of other close relatives, and the cerebral palsy of a daughter, plus life-threatening addictions to alcohol and cocaine, and he has he lived to tell the tale. Lloyd Grove talked with Beck about Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele’s right to be pro-choice, AIG’s right to pay huge bonuses to undeserving executives, and his disturbing suicidal impulse while hospitalized last year.
A little over a year ago, you were recovering from serious surgery or, as you put it, “ass surgery.”
I believe I said “butt surgery.”
And you were on a mixture of painkillers, and you got to the point where you said that if someone had brought a handgun into the hospital room, you would’ve blown your brains out. And I’m just wondering what got you into that suicidal state, and what stopped you from following through?
Wow, this is going to be a long interview! What got me there is they had me on a cocktail of about five or six different medicines, one of them was a patch, and I’m trying to remember what kind of drug it is, it’s the heaviest painkiller they have, and on the box it said, “for end of life use only.” So it was a combination of a whole bunch of drugs and what stopped me from doing it is those drugs were really only in my system at that level while I was in the hospital, but it was just a horrible cocktail of medication that was torture.
Have you considered filing a malpractice suit?
No, I talked to the head of the hospital. I’ve never named the hospital—it’s somewhere up in Connecticut. But during the conversation I said, “Look, I’m not a suing kind of guy. I’m interested in making sure this doesn’t happen again to the next person.” He said, “Oh yes I know, we’ve looked into it, yada yada yada,” and at the end he said “Listen, if you ever need to use the hospital here again, here’s my phone number, my cellphone.” I said “Excuse me. Boy, I’m not the suing person but this conversation, if you continue, will make me a suing person. I don’t want your phone number. I want to be able to come into your hospital like everyone else and get good treatment. If you’re going to give your phone number to everybody that needs to come into your hospital, well, that’s a different story. You’ve got a problem, fix it--not for the celebrity, fix it for everyone.”
How do you feel now? Are you OK?
[Laughs.] Yes, I’m fine, totally fine. I just had a bad spell, with that medication there. For several reasons—you know my history—I couldn’t get away from that medication fast enough.
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Paul Schrodt is a writer living in New York City. He has contributed to New York magazine, Radar, and Esquire.com.
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As vice chairman of Public Strategies and president of Maverick Media, Mark McKinnon has helped meet strategic challenges for candidates, corporations and causes, including George W. Bush, John McCain, Governor Ann Richards, Charlie Wilson, Lance Armstrong, and Bono. McKinnon is co-chair of Arts & Labs, a collaboration between technology and creative communities that have embraced today's rich Internet environment to deliver innovative and creative digital products to consumers.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
roberta13
I love Glenn Beck, he has enough guts to tell you what he thinks.
woodnut
This guy just reads the newspapers and then goes out and repeats all the most outrageous stuff he reads. He's never had an original thought. He wants to be Rush Junior he just doesn't have the bulk yet.
jds8181
Glenn Beck is a buffoon. He argues based upon his own opinions and very rarely offers facts to back them up. For anyone who has not seen his interview with Rob Kampia of the Marijuana Policy Project please look it up for a prime example of how Beck conducts interviews.
Ritarita
Nancy Pelosi makes this guy cry in public.
The only thing that's missing is that
He doesn't do it in his underwear.
tnflyboy
@woodnut - that then would be the one silver lining in the midst of all these newspapers shutting down.
The one thing I like about Glenn Beck is that he provides an incredible amount of fodder for Stephen Colbert. The colonoscopy, the doom bunker, and all of the one liners are priceless.
sophia5
Over a year ago this guy was talking about an
upcoming economic crisis where the government
would start nationalizing private industry, there'd
be major layoffs, and a housing crisis.
This guy seemed nuts.
Look where we are today.
Isn't interesting that even though he's proven to be correct,
the media will still bash him as some raving lunatic.
He actually cares about this country, seeing it
as just that . . . a country with citizens,
BEFORE a marketplace with consumers.
The same can't be said for many in outsourcing Washington.
The guy was right. Glenn Beck is NOT nuts.
Silly-goofy-funny-blubbering cry baby . . . yes.
Nuts . . . No.
Banjo1
The left has identified Beck as an emerging threat. I expect the Journolist (see Politico today) will decide he has to be taken down or out.
Cforchange
Well there appears to be an emerging quality about political entertainers/influencers - chemical dependency. OOOOOOOO'Reilly please tell me ain't so.
rbegrnmt
Love ya, Beck!
Ritarita
@Sophia5
No. He's just nuts.
Response to your post will be entertaining.
I'll do a shot every time I read the word 'moron'.
debbieqd
"Look, I'm a libertarian. The problem is that we are so far away from being a society that understands self-regulation, it would be an absolute meltdown at this point. We're going in the wrong direction. We've got to wean ourselves off of government and start regulating ourselves. That's the same thing with the free-market system. You let people live with the results, good or bad. It'll fix itself."
_______________________________________________
And this ideology is exactly the problem. We don't live in UTOPIA. Does Glenn Beck, who says he loves his children, allow them to "self-regulate?" Or does he, as the head of his house, set boundaries and expectations? The government is no different. Get off the totalitarian bull****. It's uttery ridiculous.
Spanky267
Beck is not insane nor is he a lunatic. He does ramble and he does rant. To me he is more everyman than any other person on the talk radio circuit.
He truly cares about the country and wants us to get back to the founding principles of the nation. I like the guy and while he has been a bit of an alarmist he has been close to the mark on some of what we are facing now.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
Spanky267
Debbieqd you are stretching what he said to fit your view. Adults should be allowed to do what they want as long as they do not injury another or burden another. That is the libertarian mantra as I interpret it.
We govern our children simply because they have not matured enough to self regulate themselves. But as they grow we allow them more and more independence as long as they self regulate.
Your argument is that essentially we are all children and we need Daddy Government to keep us in line on all fronts. This is the incrementalism that will ultimately lead to the government controlling nearly ever aspect of your life for the "common good." The common good is best served when the goverment does not interfere with a free people. People who are free to associate, free to work, free to earn free to choose.
lastcookie
Between now and maybe 5 years ago, as a regular listener of his radio show, it is hard not to see him as a repackaged personality, modified to fit a broader, more conservative audience.
In those earlier shows I found him very funny-like no one else funny. But now it seems a little too contrived, and sadly, just not as funny.
Thank you.
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