Food shortage

Fox news is famous for fear mongering, Glenn Beck has been doing it for a year now. The new tactic, is the idea that there is a food shortage. The truth is that this "shortage" is nothing more than a play on the commodities market. The market creates what it wants in order to make money. So even though there is plenty of rice, they say there is a shortage and people begin to stockpile food. This talk serves to help members of the LDS church increase there amount of food storage, and feel justified in the belief that food storage is a good idea.
I am not here to say that food storage is bad, I actually think that if done in a state of calm, it can be a good idea. What I object to, is the idea of hoarding food. I also find it a bit frightening that the same people who hoard food, are hoarding guns. This seems backward to me. If the point is to take care of your family, and if we are all family, why would you need weapons.
Let's back up a bit.
If there is a situation where you are cut off from the food supply, would you really feel good sitting in your home full of food and guns, while your greater "family" is hungry?
It is essential that we take care of ourselves, so that we can take care of each other. That does not include the hoarding of food. If you come across someone who is in need, and you leave them there, knowing that you have a full pantry, what is the point?
I see the need for a 72hr kit, I even see the need for lots of water, and some freeze dried food. I do not see the point in stockpiling things like hamburger helper and mac and cheese. these items will be of no use if you do not have access to milk or meat, so you are saving this just to save it. That seems backwards and selfish.

Revolutions don't work-- Glenn Beck

I will not take up a lot of space on this.
I will just say, Glenn we had a revolution and we are doing okay. Maybe instead of digging in your founding father costume box you should read a little history.
I told you it was short.

And Lo Glenn Beck did speak in parables.

It has been awhile since I have spoken of our Lord Beck. The truth is I have discovered that not only does his logic defy reason, reason cannot be applied to him. I just happened to flip to Fox this afternoon and heard a lovely parable that Beck was preaching to the conservative, or is that converted?
Beck's story begins with a tree, and a very close neighborhood. See there is this cottonwood that grows near a river in the back yard of this family, and everyone in the neighborhood sits under this tree. See that is the first problem with the story, who is going to let all the people in town hang out in their back yard, but I digress.
I will skip the flowery language, no doubt it will be taken down in an illuminated manuscript for you to buy on his web site.
The end of the story is this; the tree falls down in a horrible storm because it lived by a river and the owners of the tree cared for it so it's roots were just beneath the surface of the earth.
As Glenn sums up, the tree didn't have to go far to find water, it had life to easy so when the storm came it died.
The tree is of coarse America and the roots are us the citizens and the water is "social programs"
So if we follow Glenn's logic, countries that take good care of their people fail because they have nothing to cling to.
Well lets see if this bears out. According to Beck countries that fell did so because their citizens had access to "life giving water". Yeah that sounds like Sierra Leon, oh wait it doesn't. Okay how about France, oh wait people were out of work and starving, well that doesn't make any sense. Beck said that if we have to struggle to survive we become stronger. I beg of you Beck, name one nation that has fallen as a direct result of taking care of it's people. Name one rebellion caused by people who had good jobs.
Aside from being a perfectly lovely story Becks parable simply does not make sense. If giving citizens access to food, shelter and health care causes collapse than why is Canada doing all right. The housing collapse of 2007 hurt many countries, but none of them are gone. Finland and Sweden are still here, and they(gasp) give workers lots of vacation time.
So sorry Beck Jesus you are not.

The disaster that is Glenn Beck

When I started this blog, a few weeks ago, I had the intention of writing about public policy and Beck. Well, I watched GB for a few weeks and sometimes he was coherent enough to critique. Last night and this afternoon he was just nuts.
Wednesday August 4TH
He began the program comparing Obama to Satan, yeah. Then he moved on to ranting about the progressive movement and how we needed term limits in the senate. Term limits by the way an idea that came during the progressive era.
Then he called our president ignorant, racist, a terrorist, and said that we were all in danger. Okay, my favorite (and by that I mean the part that I actually cried in horror) He said that we needed "peace" Apparently Glenn Beck feels that using incendiary language is okay if he tells people not to use violence when fighting our "terrorist" government.
Look he spent the whole show in a sort of vaudevillian act, complete with funny voices and props. Then he got offended when someone called him an "entertainer".
Thursday August 5TH
Today he began where he left off yesterday, calling our government terrorists.
Today he was a little more rational, his screaming rants seem to have a point today. So because he made actual statements that I can talk about, I will.
He talked about the white house plan to save teaching jobs, he thinks it's bad. Then he ranted about cities who have cut teaching jobs due to the budget. According to Beck these teaching jobs are being lost because of the governments plan to save them. Also yesterday was a monumental day for civil rights activists, it was also a good day for the gulf of Mexico. Glenn Beck was just furious that the news media covered these stories. Why is that, well because Missouri had a vote about one of the provisions in the health care bill, that wont effect them until 2014. That is bigger news I guess.
He then chose six cities to use as examples of wasteful spending. The waste all things hat have to do with culture and education. He was critical of cities that have had to trim back their police forces, but still had money for other projects.
What Beck is not understanding is that in a city or state money is set aside for very specific uses, you can't just rob Peter to pay Paul. What he is also ignorant of is that most city beautification projects were funded years before they are finished.
Yesterday he said it was stupid for stimulus money to go to a museum, because we all know that knowledge is over rated.
I am not giving up on this project, I feel it is important but for the sake of my sanity I will not watch Glenn Beck anymore.
I challenge those who do watch him, count how many inflammatory statements he uses against the government and tell me if it makes you feel peaceful.
If Glenn Beck were able to speak in a coherent fashion I wouldn't be so frustrated.
I will still talk about him of course, I just will not lower my humanity to watch him any more.

Weatherman project

I will not devote a lot of time to this, because it is so stupid it is beneath me to talk about. If you don't watch Glenn Beck, he has dug up some old manifesto written in 1969, and is trying to tell America that our current government is implementing the ideals laid out therein.
It is in part his involvement with this manifesto that led bill airs to be imprisoned. Well I really am not surprised, it is close to election time so GB and Fox news have to amp up the paranoia to get people to vote for the "do nothing" Republican party. Telling the American people that doing things like extending unemployment benefits,and giving people access to health care is part of some conspiracy to over throw the government, makes all their inaction look heroic. "We are not doing nothing, our inaction is saving you."
I would hope that people have more common sense than that, why would someone join the government only to put himself out of a job?
The fact is, Glenn Beck is angry at the sate of this nation, he doesn't like the fact that a government would feel responsible for it's people. So he is calling everyone radicals and fascists. It is easy to do this when you don't know what those words mean.
Adolf Hitler didn't take care of the poor, he didn't take care of anyone. Starting in 1936 he was starving the mentally disabled to save money. He killed those who needed help, is GB suggesting that we should do the same thing.
In a way he is. He is saying that social programs are wrong and should be repealed. When he talks about "personal responsibility" he is saying that if you cannot pay for everything yourself, you need to work harder or don't eat.
But I digress, GB is addicted to the word communist, everyone is a communist to him. By Beck's way of thinking Martin Luther King was a communist. After all he wanted people to be treated as equals.
Beck would have you believe that Obama's father was a communist. He was highly educated and wanted to improve his home nation, there is no evidence that I can find that proves he was a communist. By the time Obama Sr. went back to Kenya it was already a republic. Obama Sr. spoke out against socialism.
I would be careful what you believe from GB, after all early on he was telling the American people that our president was a Muslim, which turned out to be not true at all.

Glenn Beck calls Obama terrorist (again)

Well watched GB today and his topic was William Airs. So Glenn points out that William Airs was an anti government activist in the 1970's and now works for the government. He said that there was no evidence that William Airs had changed, either in tactic or ideology. UM HELLO! A man who was anti government served time in prison for his crime, and is now working and has worked in the recent past to better his community. Gee Glenn I would like to say that I know a lot of domestic terrorists who help others, but I don't. How can you look at a man who has turned his life around and say there is no evidence of change. His whole life is evidence that he has changed.
The point Glenn was trying to make was that Obama ran for office so that he could bring the government down from the inside. The problem with this theory is that President Obama is not linked to any terrorist activity at all. He served one one committee with a man, who did bad things, served prison time and changed his life.
I said in my introduction that I would not insult the viewers of Glenn Beck, and I won't. But seriously! Are you really going to fall for the oldest trick in the book. Guilt by association.
If you are than here is something you might find interesting.
During the Vietnam war Jane Fonda became very friendly with the Vietcong she took pictures with them and gave them sensitive information. Jane Fonda was a member of the screen actors guild as was..........wait for it............Ronald Reagan. If I were to say that Reagan was anti American because he belonged to SAG along with Jane Fonda, I would be laughed at. Yet Glenn Beck is doing the same thing.
Glenn Beck may think that people who have ever done anything illegal should not be allowed to ever serve on committees, that is his right. What he should not do is mislead his viewers by twisting the truth to fit his agenda.

Glenn Beck vs Mormon doctrine

I have watched with horror as Glenn Beck has talked to his viewers about God and what God wants. I have also heard him talk about the LDS church, he is a member. What he preaches on his show is not LDS doctrine in fact some of what he says in in complete opposition to what the church teaches. I will go topic by topic.
Social Justice.
Social justice is an idea that has two parts to it. One, the idea that all people should be judged according to their merits not any thing else. Two, the idea that a community should divide resources equally. Now it should be noted that the United states does not ascribe to this second idea at all. It should be noted that the LDS church does. When a person goes through the temple they vow to live the law of consecration. That when the church asks members will give all of their goods to the bishop so that he can give to the people based on need. The church knows that this law is much to difficult for men to live here on earth so we do not live it now. The promise we make is to strive to be the type of people who will live this law in the millennium. So for Glenn Beck to tell his viewers that if they are part of a church that preaches this that they should find a new church, he is being a hypocrite. As far as I know he has not left his faith.
The gift of prophesy.
Glenn Beck has said that on Aug. 28th of this year he will reveal the plan that god has given him for America. That is not possible, God has one representative of the church at any given time and that is the prophet Thomas S Monson. Glenn Beck would have people believe that God would bypass his chosen prophet and speak directly to him. Both the Book of Mormon, and the Bible would call that the claim of an Anti Christ. For those who are not familiar with the term, it is not some son of the devil or anything like that simply a person who claims to have access to revelation that he would not be privy to.
"Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves". Mathew 7:15
Welfare, and the poor.
While on his program Glenn Beck talks of people being poor because they are lazy and how giving to the poor makes them weak, he belongs to a church that reaches out to those in need every day. The LDS church has education programs to help people become self reliant, and welfare programs for those who for whatever reason cannot do so. For Glenn Beck to tell people who need assistance that they are weak and lazy, is to go against the teachings of the LDS church.
"ye must visit the poor and the needy and administer to their relief" D&C 44:6
References
"True to the faith", The book of Mormon", "Gospel doctrine" The king James Bible"
Stay tuned for part II where I will discuss GB's gold and guns