Ron Arnold's Left Tracking Library

Silencing
Glenn Beck

On July 28th, 2009, Fox talk-show host Glenn Beck appeared on the Fox & Friends morning show about Obama’s reaction to the arrest of Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr, a media flap known as “Professor-Gate.”

Beck saw the President’s past association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright as a prompt for Obama’s comment that Cambridge arresting police officer, Sgt. James Crowley, acted stupidly. And Beck was outraged that Obama was going to fix things up between the professor and the cop with a beer-fest at the White House. "That is unbelievable," said Beck. "As a teaching lesson? Who needs to learn what here?"

WHAT REALLY HAPPENED

The actual group conversation covered a number of things about the Gates controversy. Beck exclaimed that "This President has exposed himself over and over again a guy who has a deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture. I don't know what it is, but if you can't sit in a pew with a guy like Jeremiah Wright for twenty years and not hear some of that stuff, and not have it wash over you, what kind of President of the United States immediately jumps on the police? Just like, what kind of president would say, "Oh, well, yeah, he was black - of course he was breaking into the house." You'd never do that. You'd never do that. Obama wanted to address this. Now, they're going to have a beer? What does this mean? I don't think you learn anything new from Barack Obama, whether he planned to say that about the cop or it was off the cuff. This guy has a social justice agenda. He's going to set all of the wrongs of the past right."

Then Fox's Brian Kilmeadeon pointed out that many people in Obama's administration are white, so "you can't say he doesn't like white people," and Beck replied, "I'm not saying he doesn't like white people, I'm saying he has a problem. This guy is, I believe, a racist."

Beck explained, "Look at the things he has been surrounded by: Look at his new "Green Jobs Czar" [Van Jones]. The guy is, ah, black liberation theology, black nationalist, who is also an avowed communist. Obama comes in, and he puts that guy in. Well, wait a minute. How many people with this kind of philosophy do you need to have in your life before you start to say, "Show me your friends, and I'll show you your future."

It caused a huge media flap, and struck many of the left's most strategic thinkers as a perfect opportunity to raise money, get members, and gain a lot of publicity. The group that jumped on the issue first was Color of Change (technically ColorOfChange.org), and for a reason: it was co-founded by Van Jones, the "Green Jobs Czar" that Beck had used as an example.

TAKING OFFENSE

Van Jones created the sophisticated anti-corporate, anti-conservative attack group in response to the Bush Administration's handling of the Hurricane Katrina situation. Color Of Change also defended the "Jena Six" in a noose-hanging-from-a-tree incident that led to arrests of protesters. Obama picked Jones as "green jobs czar" for his work in the San Francisco Bay Area with "green jobs" for black youth.
Jones was later forced to resign when conservative talk show hosts, including Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, exposed his public comments disparaging congressional Republicans, his signing of the 911Truth.org petition, and Marxist associations during the 1990s. His board memberships in the Apollo Alliance, the Rainforest Action Network, and Free Press were also questioned. Upon leaving government, John Podesta gave him shelter as leader of the Green Opportunity Initiative of the Center for American Progress. The foundation-created Presidential Climate Action Project at the University of Colorado appointed Jones an advisor, a position he retains.

Co-founder James Rucker is a Stanford graduate, high-tech Silicon Valley entrepreneur who worked 2003-2005 for MoveOn Political Action and MoveOn Civic Action as fundraiser, technology expert, and campaign strategist. He brought those skills to ColorOfChange.org and is the real force behind its success. Rucker is the only officer of the group. Rucker is a clever and ruthless attack manager with a huge network of allies.

HIRED GUN

Rucker took no chances of muffing this opportunity and hired Hollywood’s high profile publicist Ken Sunshine to hustle a huge boycott of Beck's advertisers, demanding they stop sponsoring Beck. Sunshine did an outstanding job of attack management.

THE FEAR-HATE-REVENGE LETTER

Sunshine designed a great campaign letter based on the decades-old PR fundraising tactic: your appeal letter must lead your supporter from FEAR of your opponent, to HATE of your opponent, to offer a practical REVENGE against your opponent that will make them feel morally superior if they send  money to join with others in thwarting the opponent.

July 30th, 2009

Dear ColorOfChange.org member,

More and more, right-wing talk show hosts are bringing race-based fear mongering into the mainstream, but FOX's Glenn Beck just took it to another level. On Tuesday, Beck said:

This president has exposed himself as a guy over and over and over again who has a deep-seated hatred for white people... this guy is, I believe, a racist.

It's part of a larger argument Beck has been making: that President Obama is using the White House to serve the needs of Black communities at White people's expense. This kind of talk stirs up fear, hate, and it can lead to violence.

Together we can stop Glenn Beck. Starting today we're calling Beck's advertisers, asking them if they want to be associated with this kind of racist hate and fear-mongering. When they see tens of thousands of people signing on behind that question, we believe they'll move their advertising dollars elsewhere, damaging the viability of his show and possibly putting him out of business.

Of course, the bottom line was, "send money to Color Of Change."

BECK ADVERTISERS CHANGED TO OTHER FOX SHOWS
BUT HIS RATINGS WENT UP

Sunshine's boycott resulted in at least 57 advertisers requesting their ads be removed from Beck's programming, to avoid associating their brands with content that could be considered offensive by potential customers. Color of Change and Rucker's allied groups claimed that more than 100 companies stopped advertising on Beck's show or stipulated that their advertising not be aired there. Sunshine carefully hid the fact that many Fox advertisers had no idea which shows their ads appeared on, because they simply bought blocks of time, and some had no problem with sponsoring Beck, offensive or not. Beck's show kept its high ratings, so broadcast industry observers believe his earnings were unharmed. The boycott certainly made a big publicity splash for Color of Change.

BUY GLENN BECK STUFF AND RAZZ KEN SUNSHINE

In September 2009, DefendGlenn.com, a website launched in response to the boycott campaign, posted a video on YouTube of a February 2009 event at which Jones called Congressional Republicans "assholes". Jones didn't last long after. He resigned his Obama Czar job September 5, 2009.

THE COMPLAINTS CAME FROM A BIG NETWORK

Color Of Change had a lot of friends who wanted to shoot down Glenn Beck. Without them, nothing much would have happened - and as far as Glenn Beck's ratings went, nothing did. Here are some allies of Color Of Change:

GO TO SAVING MARK LLOYD TO SEE MORE MEDIA ATTACK CAMPAIGNERS!

Josh Silver Free Press $2,702,303	Wade Henderson Leadership Conference on Civil Rights $1,073,950	Winnie Stachelberg Center for American Progress $26,638,475	Herb Sandler Pro Publica $8,572,220	Stephanie Jones National Urban League Policy Institute $47,145,386
Brent Wilkes League of United Latin American Citizens (Income Secret)	Larry Cohen Communications Workers of America $176,856,960	Alex Nogales National Hispanic Media Coalition $559,071	Bernie Lunzer The Newspaper Guild $3,816,429	No Photo Kimberly Marcus Rainbow PUSH Coalition's Public Policy Institute(Income secret)
Malkia Cyril Center for Media Justice   $60,000+	Andrew Schwartzman Media Access Project $619,284	John Kosinski Writers Guild of America West $23,196,986	Sandy Close New America Media  (Project of Pacific News Service) $6,593,313	Amalia Deloney Media Action Grassroots Network (Project of Center for Media Justice)
Angelo Falcon National Institute for Latino Policy $2,325	Michael Calabrese New America Foundation $14,193,707	Melanie Campbell National Coalition on Black Civic Participation $2,089,992	Gigi Sohn Public Knowledge $687,720	Rinku Sen Applied Research Center $2,555,600
John Clark National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians  $424,306	Graciela Sanchez Esperanza Peace and Justice Center $596,597	Mimi Pickering Appalshop $1,526,372	Steven Renderos Main Street Project $557,880	Hal Ponder American Federation of Musicians $12,210,236
Tracy Rosenberg Media Alliance $139,150	Terry O'Neill National Organization for Women $3,680,200	Roger Hickey Campaign for America's Future $1,301,395	Andrea Quijada New Mexico Media Literacy Project (Southwestern Alternate Media Projects, Inc.) $345,812	Jonathan Lawson Reclaim the Media (Center for Social Justice - Seattle) $32,572
DeAnne Cuellar Texas Media Empowerment Project (Esperanza Peace and Justice Center) $596,597	Chris Rabb Afro-Netizen (Bread & Roses Community Fund) $721,296	Loris Ann Taylor Center for Native American Public Radio (National Federation of Community Broadcasters) $776,940	Lisa Fager Bediako Industry Ears (Form 990 not available)	O. Ricardo Pimentel National Association of Hispanic Journalists $1,159,872
Todd Wolfson Media Mobilizing Project $257,528	Erica Williams Campus Progress (Center for American Progress)	Gary Flowers Black Leadership Forum $297,181	Eva Paterson Equal Justice Society $878,118	Rev. Lennox Yearwood, Jr. Hip Hop Caucus Peace Action Education Fund  $871,694
Cheryl Contee Jack and Jill Politics (BLOGGERPOWER ORG)   $902,822	Dr. E. Faye Williams National Congress of Black Women $496,705	Emily Sheketoff American Library Association $57,224,984	Ari Rabin-Havt Media Matters Action Network(Form 990 not available)	Kathryn Galan National Association of Latino Independent Producers $1,021,182
Roberto Lovato Presente (writer, blogger)	Joshua Breitbart People's Production House (fiscal sponsor: Fund for the City of New York)$34,682,290	No Photo Karen Bond National Black Coalition for Media Justice (no record of incorporation or exempt status)	Tracy Van Slyke Media Consortium (fiscal sponsor: National Training & Information Center) $1,367,648	Shireen Mitchell Digital Sisters, Inc (fiscal sponsor: National Council of Women's Organizations) $371,153
Tessie Guillermo ZeroDivide: $1,286,208	Ariel Dougherty Media Equity Collaborative (fiscal sponsor: International Media Project)  $280,376	Helen Soule Alliance for Community Media $580,812	Helen De Michiel National Alliance for Media Arts & Culture (a non-exempt professional network)	Carol Pierson National Federation of Community Broadcasters $776,940

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