From whom, or what, though?
Right now, it seems as if non-fringe Republicans are their main targets. In South Carolina, for example, U.S. Representative Bob Inglis recently lost his primary with a dismal 29% of the vote. Why did this happen? Quite simply, because he refused to kneel down and worship at the Altar of Beck. To put things in prospective, Inglis was one of the chief anti-Clinton forces during the ex-president's impeachment in the House of Representatives. He was about as "conservative" as one could possibly get. Strangely enough, this did not matter one iota to Beck's True Believers. For them, Inglis was either a member of their cult — er, crusade — or not. Seeing as he had the self respect not to submit his political agenda to the whims of an Elmer Gantry-level entertainer and his band of deluded cultists — er, fans — Inglis paid the price with his career. He was either One of Them or not, and at the end of the day, he was not. I often urge my readers to browse through the unfortunately popular far-right discussion forum Free Republic in order to attain a deeper understanding of extremists like Beck's True Believers. This thread is a prime example of how they think and perceive the world around them.
It is a sad combination of being both pathetic and scary (Did anybody else besides me notice how the FReepers' vitriolic responses to Mehlman's "coming out" make it seem as if they feel personally threatened by his decision? Perhaps the FReakshow is the unintended home of the Larry Craig Conservative Federation).
Even if the GOP takes control of both Houses of Congress in this November's midterm elections — which, thankfully, is looking more and more likely to be the case — that may not be enough to satisfy the yearnings of these whackjobs.
So, what is?
My guess is that even they could not answer that question.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Dave Nalle
The Beck crowd and the Freepers are two distinctly different brands of extremists. The Beck followers are not necessarily homophobic and pro-war, while the Freepers are much more so. The Beck crowd is more diverse and has more overlap with the Tea Party, while the Freepers are a small and shrinking group of hardcore partisan ideologues. Beck followers are less partisan and less focused.
That said, the defeat of Inglis had a lot more to do with his voting record and who he associates with than his unwillingness to court the 9/12 people or the Tea Parties. In South Carolina the libertarian-leaning Nikki Haley slate overturned the more moderate Lindsey Graham slate, and as a Graham ally with a particularly unimpressive voting record, that meant that Inglis was doomed.
Dave
2 - Dave Nalle
Oh, and let me add that it's an indication of how completely out of the GOP mainstream Freepers are that they were shocked and outraged about Mehlman. Everyone in the mainstream GOP has known he was gay for years. The fact that they didn't know this suggests that they have so little access and so little real involvement in the party that they are largely irrelevant.
Dave
3 - Anonymous
According to the basic tenets of the Christian faith. Glenn Beck is not a real Christian. Why are Conservative Evangelicals letting him flung mud at Pres. Obama's faith or lack of it when Mormons do have a different god, Jesus and doctrine.
Founder of the Mormon Religion Joseph Smith denounced authentic Christianity and the bible when he claimed an angel named Moroni appeared to him and gave him a different (married) Jesus! This is heresy according to true Christianity. Christian believe an unmarried Savior died on the cross, shed his blood as their sacrifice to pay for their sins. Mormons do not believe the cross or Jesus paid for their sin. You will never see a Cross over their Church or inside of one. Christian Pastors should be outraged when Beck speaks as if Mormons have the same God as the Christians yet they applaud him. Isn't the name doing that Judas?
4 - Al
Mormon Doctrine:
God has a physical body and so does his wife.
No Trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are three separate gods. People can become gods.
Jesus was created by sexual union between God and Mary.
Jesus was married.
Jesus' death does not atone for all sin.
Baptism for the dead.
Dark skinned people were not granted Mormon privileges until 1978.
Jesus and Satan were spirit brothers.
An angel named Moroni appeared to Founder Joseph Smith giving him this information contrary to what the 2,000 yr. of four Gospels Old and New Testament said.
Conservative Christians should be outraged at Mormon Glen Beck not assembling with him and allowing him to confuse people with this anti-Christian false doctrine!
Someone said Judas should among the enemies of Christ but what do you call people throwing stones at Pres. Obama for and saying his Christianity is pervert like Beck said. I think the word here for them is Hypocrites!
5 - Anonymous
Confessed Mormon Glen Beck said President Obama has a perverted view of Christianity and Conservative Christians give him the green light with Sarah Palin appearing at his Rally last Saturday!
No kidding? They say the same thing about Beck's Mormon religion!
6 - Anonymous
President Obama was elected as President of the USA rather you like him or not.
Obama is President of all of the people of every faith, race and religion, or no religion.
Stop bringing his religion (many Conservative Evangelical Christians believe he is Muslim while Obama has said he is a Christian) or lack of what you think his religion should be!
President Obama is not your Pastor!
7 - Ruvy
Interesting. The fact that Beck is a Mormon is really working against him on these pages. Looking at the disaster the American economy faces, my question is, what scapegoats are there for Americans to blame? Naturally, my attention would go to American Jews. But what if Mormons were scapegoated - either as well as Jews - or instead?
An interesting thought....
8 - Anonymous #2
There is a little known point that is being missed in this latest episode of Glen Beck and the Rally with his Christian supporters The hypocrisy of it all when Mormons and Christians are opposed to each others doctrine. It is not the same and anyone can google it or go into a Christian bookstore and see where Mormons are placed in their Christian bookstores with cults and other Religions!
9 - Anonymous
Ruvy Beck introduced religion into this!
10 - Anonymous
It was Glenn Beck who trashed Pres. Obama's religion shouldn't someone be asking him that question of why?
NO one is saying scapegoat Mormons just stating the facts that have another doctrine.
Speaking of scapegoating Mormon Joseph Smith said blacks were equal to animals and could not inherit Heaven. Read it for yourselves!
11 - Anonymous
Blacks were not even allowed to be Mormons until Civil Rights laws made it against the Law to discriminate.
12 - Anonymous
Speaking of scapegoating what do are they saying about our decent mainstream Muslims US citizens lately on Fox?
13 - Anonymous
I am not sure but it sounds like some people are lumping them all into the same type, is that scapegoating enough?
14 - Al
If they continually trash Pres. Obama over his religious views, or lack thereof then they opened the Religious Pandora's box on the subject!
15 - Anonymous2
We have a vote in our campus dorm who started this religious stuff. Take a guess!
16 - Anonymous
Oh the irony of life within the Religious Right, this could be Will Bunch's next book!
17 - SJ
To address the irony of the Religious Right Jesus said Jimmy Swaggart and Ted Haggard are forgiven not perfect! There is only one perfect man and he walked on water according to the Christian perspective.
18 - Ruvy
I would never dream of scapegoating Mormons - whoever you anonymous guys are. But knowing how Jews have been scapegoated in the past, I could see the hostility towards Mormons in the other comments - and it had the look and feel of Jew-hatred to me. But it was not directed at Jews....
19 - jeannie danna
Joe,
The Tea Party is not a grassroots organization.
Please look into Freedom Works and Dick Army's involvement with this *party* from the onset.
Now, granted people are falling in formation like lemmings, but the march was not their idea!
and then look at this,
The following organizations have gained attention on the national stage for their involvement with the Tea Party movement. All have the potential to play an instrumental role in turning the loose network of activists into effective agents of change.
Americans For Limited Government
American Majority
Americans For Prosperity And Americans For Prosperity Foundation
FreedomWorks
Independence Caucus
Liberty First
Our Country Deserves Better PAC
Smart Girl Politics, Inc.
Tea Party Nation
Tea Party Patriots
The 912 Project
The Patriot Caucus
:O That's not the rising up of the individual.
20 - handyguy
Joseph Cotto and Bob Inglis: two conservatives I can actually stomach. The short-sightedness of the extremists on the right may end up reducing the number of elections the GOP wins this fall.
21 - Tommy Mack
The concept of “separation of church and state” comes from Thomas Jefferson. However, as close as it comes to the Constitution is found in Clause 3,(Oath of Office)Article VI.
“The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”
Beck is big on platitudes, not concepts.
22 - jeannie danna
Thank you, Tommy-the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
:)We are a secular nation.
23 - Bill B
"Some estimates put the total number of participants at nearly 1 million"
Who? Michelle Bachman??? Puleeze. The page you linked to has a link to this guy.
One of the guys who calculated the CBS estimate from the photo's from the tethered ballons. Guy sounds real level headed. I'm more convinced than I was before that there weren't more than 100k. Still a lot of people though. Impressively sad.
24 - Bill B
Joseph -
I think some of the assumptions you make are a bit presumptuous. About the only thing you can say about this 'group' is that they're by and large pretty conservative. Beyond that it's very difficult to generalize - except the big money backing behind them like Koch et al.
* Lower middle to middle working class
* More likely from small towns or rural areas - (this probably isn't far off)
* Relatively ambivalent about the fiscal aspects of the political process
* They care not about supply-side economics or a vigorous national defense, but about waging yet another culture war
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Even if the GOP takes control of both Houses of Congress in this November's midterm elections " which, thankfully, is looking more and more likely to be the case " that may not be enough to satisfy the yearnings of these whackjobs.
Historically the party in power doesn't do well when things aren't going swimmingly in the country, especially economically, in off year elections. But it's quite possible that the number of "new" voters that are generated by the tea party movement will be offset by independents continuing to move toward the democrats as they become more and more freaked out by the further movement to the right of the republicans. Loony right at that. If nothing else it will be interesting but they're not likely to take the Senate. They really don't have to as the wuss democrats can't seem to get anything done w/o 60 votes anyway. What friggin pansies.
25 - Christopher Rose
Comments made by Anonymous, Al and SJ are coming from the same IP address, so there is either one over-enthusiastic person commenting or at least three people hunched around one computer.