Glenn Beck's long history of extremist rhetoric: When will he finally face the music?

As Glenn Beck succeeds in having Van Jones removed from the Obama administration for - irony alert - indulging in extremist rhetoric and ideas, Crooks and Liars have done wonderful job of amassing some examples of the kind of extremist rhetoric and insane ideas which Beck indulges in, almost on a daily basis.

-- He "war-gamed" out an apocalytpic American future in which society has completely crumbled, leaving behind a "Road Warrior" society in which militias remained the only defenders of the remnants of white society.

-- He told his audience for several weeks running that he "could not disprove" the existence of concentration camps run by FEMA in which conservatives were to be rounded up. After a few weeks of this, he finally ran a segment that in fact did debunk these claims, explaining that in reality all of the supposed "evidence" for these camps was the product of a long-running hoax that began in the 1990s with the "Patriot"/militia movement. (He then later claimed that he had done nothing to promote these theories.)

-- He ran several segments, including one on his radio show, in which he promoted the concept of the secession of Texas from the Union. A little later, he tried to pretend he didn't agree with the concept while in fact giving a secessionist the opportunity to promote his plans to Beck's audience.

-- He regularly promoted "one world government" paranoia. This included a supposed plot to put us all on a global currency controlled by the New World Order.

-- He tried to argue that the chief cause of the sour economy was the United States' reliance on a central banking system.

-- He hosted an entire hourlong segment devoted to promoting militia-derived constitutional theories about state sovereignty.

-- He expressed his admiration for Nazi admirer and renowned anti-Semite Henry Ford.

-- He warned his audience about Obama's supposed secret plot to grab our guns.

-- He also speculated that it is actually liberal "political correctness" that inspires right-wingers to go on murderous killing rampages.

-- Later, when a Beck fan named Richard Poplawski shot three Pittsburgh police officers because he believed the cops were going to take his guns away on behalf of President Obama -- and a number of other acts of right-wing violence occurred that were similarly inspired by Beck's kookery -- Beck attacked C&L and other blogs for having the audacity to point out the connection.

-- Then, after building up his audience's paranoia, anger, and fearfulness, he pleaded with them not to indulge in acts of violence.

-- He accused Al Gore of creating a new "Hitler youth" by promoting environmental awareness among young people.

-- Even before the election, he declared that Barack Obama was a Marxist. Then, after the election, he began calling Obama a communist and socialist. A few weeks later, he changed course and decided that Obama was actually leading us down the path to fascism.

-- He also called for kicking California out of the Union.

And, at a time when he has just had Van Jones removed from his post, primarily for signing a petition calling for investigation of the Bush regime's role in 9-11, it's impossible to believe that Beck got away without being fired after he said this:

Beck: You know, it took me about a year to start hating the 9/11 victims' families. It took me about a year. Um, and I had such compassion for them and I really, you know, I wanted to help them, and I was behind -- let's give them money, let's get them started, and all of this stuff. And I really didn't -- all the 3,000 victims' families, I don't hate all of them, I hate about, probably about ten of them. But when I see 9/11 victim family, you know, on television, or whatever, I'm just like, 'Oh, shut up.' I'm so sick of them. Because they're always complaining. And we did our best for them. And again, it's only about ten.

It's well worth working through the links to get some taste of how ridiculous it is that this man could have anyone else removed from their job because they indulged in extremist rhetoric and ideas.

Honestly, this must be the day that irony died.

Tags: Glenn Beck, Fox News, Van Jones, extremism