Van Jones 57, Glenn Beck 1
… unfortunately, the “one” is Jones himself. Van Jones has resigned as President Obama’s “green jobs czar,” following a flurry of attacks by Glenn Beck and other right wingers, including members of Congress, who wanted him gone for everything from calling them assholes (hilariously, by the way), to signing a 9/11 truth petition (apparently, you can remain a member of Congress as a birther, but not in the executive branch if you might be a “truther“… oh, and calling Republicans names is a firing offense.) The administration accepted Jones’ resignation at around midnight Sunday.
But make no mistake: the real beef Beck has with Van Jones isn’t the job he has — it’ the job he had before joining the administration… Read more
Glenn Beck: Less cash, more zombies
So far, 46 advertisers have walked away from the Glenn Beck freak show. But his ratings are surging. People who are scratching their heads over this are forgetting the power of controversy to drive interest and intrigue (and ratings.) So why didn’t it work for Imus, you ask? Because Don Imus worked for CBS Radio and MSNBC, whose audiences and brands are more sensititve to rejection by the general population. Fox News has no such constraints, because its audience is made up almost entirely of millions of little Glenn Becks (and Sarah Palins), who are just as paranoid and insane as he is, and more of them are tuning in every day, to buck him up in his time of need.
Bottom line: as much as we normal people may be embarrassed by them (the gun nuts, the Taliban-like Christian extremists, militia people, racists and the just plain stupid,) we have to accept that there are at least 3, maybe even 4, million wack-jobs in America, who are still traumatized by the election, and who need, desperately, to hear Beck’s conspiracy theories to explain to their broken brains how 69 million of their fellow Americans voted a Black man into the White House. To paraphrase the wingers: Hitler drew big audiences, too.
Now, if Beck’s audiences swells from 3 million to, say, 30 million a night, it might be time to move to Canada.
More advertisers ditch Beck
Glenn Beck: Master of winger fear.
The number of advertisers who have deserted Glenn Beck’s show is now up to 20, making Color of Change the new king of boycotts. Soon, all that will exist between crazed, tearful Beck segments on FNC will be Gold! buying opportunities and promos … for Glenn Beck. The latest to go: Wal-Mart, Best Buy, CVS, Travelocity, Allergan (maker of Restasis), Ally Bank, Broadview Security, and Re-Bath. (Can’t you just see the wingers boycotting Wal-Mart??? Where will they get their shotguns?) They join ConAgra, Lawyers.com, Men’s Wearhouse, Procter & Gamble, Progressive Insurance, RadioShack, Roche, SC Johnson, Sanofi-Aventis, Sargento, State Farm Insurance and GEICO, who just saved a ton of money by not advertising with Lonesome Rhodes.
Meanwhile, the wingnuts confuse the free market decisions of advertisers for the government silencing free speech again. (Sigh) Let’s try this again, dummies: the First Amendment protects you from the government, by prohibiting Congress from passing any law abridging your free speech. It doesn’t bar advertisers from deciding not to pay Glenn Beck for his speech. I thought you guys believed in the free market? No? Not so much? The googoos even have their own website and are preparing their minions to target Clorox to convince them to keep advertising on the show (… I think they like it because it makes things white .. but I digress!) Hey, maybe they can get together an buy an ad in Glenn’s show, you know, so his segments don’t have to be twice as long…
GE, Fox News, and the other Glenn Beck boycott
So it’s a dozen lost advertisers and counting for Lonesome Roads, with advertisers who didn’t even buy Glenn Beck’s FNC show on purpose publicly running away from the crazy train. Fox News doesn’t seem to be too concerned; after all, most of the ad dollars are merely shifting to less controversial shows … like Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly … wait a minute…! But the Beck show may soon look a lot like a public access production, with nothing but promos running between segments. Of course, not every advertiser is uncomfortable advertising on a show that features nightly propaganda films and charts designed to frighten Fox’s geriatric viewers into thinking barack Obama is ushering in the next holocaust. In fact, some Beck advertisers have a high tolerance for “strong opinion” — although …
Turns out, some of these very same companies dropped advertising from the progressive talk radio station Air America back in 2006. Megan Carpentier on Air America Media writes:
Three years ago, a group of corporate advertisers informed ABC that they didn’t want their commercials run during Air America programming. Media Matters reports that those companies will run ads during conservative shows.
In 2009, General Electric, Farmer’s Insurance and Office Depot have financially supported Glenn Beck’s racism and threats against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on the radio; Bayer, Chattem Pharmaceuticals and Wyeth have given Lou Dobbs money to continue his radio-based support for the Birther conspiracy theorists and his portrayal of the current Administration as alternately Socialist, Fascist and Communist; and Home Depot, JC Penney’s and Office Depot are helping provide Rush Limbaugh promote his racist, divisive commentary on a daily basis.
That doesn’t even include the companies that advertise during Glenn Beck’s or Lou Dobbs’ television shows, which additionally includes the likes of Bayer, Wal-Mart and Nestlé.
Wait, did she say … General Electric? Parent company of Fox News’ arch-nemesis, MSNBC? Do go on, madam…
Take General Electric, a supporter of both Glenn Beck’s radio and television programming. In the 2006 election cycle, when they first blacklisted Air America’s programming, their PAC’s political contributions were two-thirds in favor of Republicans. In 2008, after the takeover of the House by Democrats and while Barack Obama’s win was clearly telegraphed, GE continued to favor Republicans with contributions disproportionate to their power in Washington, giving them 48 percent of the PAC’s donations. Only now that GE has nowhere else to turn, their donations for the 2010 election cycle are going two-thirds of the time to Democrats. To the victors go the spoils, I guess–as long as they can spend at least an equal amount of money supporting media programming intended to derail the agenda.
So while Bill-o spends half his show savaging G.E., that same company is pouring money into the rival network? Huh??? Kind of shines a whole new light on those supposed “truce talks” between NBC and Fox a couple weeks ago, huh?
Next up: Beck hasn’t said much about the advertisers jumping ship — he’s no bitching Don Imus. But perhaps it’s because he’s no stranger to the boycott. Ironically, Color of Change may be the most successful Beck boycott promoter, but they’re hardly the first. Ron Paul supporters — some of whom have morphed into the very teabaggers, (sponsored by the professional astroturf class) that the sane among us are having so much fun mocking (gun-toting New Hampshire “blood of tyrants” spiller guy included — got there first. Check out this post from The Daily Paul, (the same site linked in the previous sentence,) circa November 2007:
On 11/12/2007, Glenn Back implied that any person who supports Ron Paul is a terrorist. Yes…that is a complete misrepresentation of the facts, but this just means we are now in the attack phase of the campaign. Given the current state of our media we will likely see alot more reporters purposefully attempting to misguide the public about the message of Ron Paul and his supporters just because we are a real threat now.
The best way to deal with this is not to attack Beck or CNN…we all know they are just trolling for attention. Beck’s show has been sliding in the ratings, and its time to put the final nail in the coffin. Take 5 minutes out of your day, and contact any of the following companies…and tell them you’ll boycott their products until they pull their advertisement from Beck’s program.
We need to make an example out of Beck, for all future talking heads that will dare call Americans terrorists just because they are supporting Ron Paul. Some posters have suggested Glenn Beck should be fired/forced to resign for his statements. I agree. Glenn Beck should be fired/forced to resign. You may demand this of CNN, and inform his advertisers of the same.
If you follow the link, the site even provides a handy phone list of Beck advertisers. Of course, the Paulites didn’t get very far, and Beck, who was then on CNN’s HLN channel, wound up jumping to Fox anyway. But the irony is pretty darned thick.
BTW, Jon Stewart flattened Beck tonight, reminding viewers of the guy who thought America’s helathcare system was crap, following a botched butt surgery. Do you remember the time? Video tomorrow.
Choosy advertisers lose Beck
From an email sent out yesterday by Color of Change:
Last week, after we told you about Glenn Beck calling the president a racist1 (and worse), more than 40,000 ColorOfChange members called on advertisers to drop their support for the show, and the advertisers are listening.
Lawyers.com was the first to drop their support for the show. Procter & Gamble and Progressive Insurance said their ads ran during Beck’s show without their authorization and that they’ll ensure that the same mistake does not happen again. And we’re in conversations with others.
And apparently, the advertisers aren’t walking away from Fox in some generic way, they’re specifically yanking their spots off Beck’s show. Couldn’t happen to a douchier guy. Get with the COC petition here.
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