The above is not a paid ad, at least not for this site. It's something I saw on a website I just visited and I couldn't resist copying it here so we could discuss it.
I've watched Glenn Beck a few times. In fact, I tuned him in last week because I thought (wrongly) he was having Penn Jillette on his program on a certain night. I not only think Beck is kind of an on-air looney but he strikes me as being well aware of it. I sense this about a lot of on-air talk show hosts and pundits; that they're out there saying whatever they've learned will get ratings and that the thought process doesn't extend far beyond that. If they believe it at all, it's only because they've been so rewarded for saying it that it's seeped into their bloodstreams.
I once wrote a TV special with a whole bunch of wrestlers who were in what was then the World Wrestling Federation…Vince McMahon's outfit. One of them was a very smart guy and a great showman who wrestled under the name, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. He was a Bad Guy at the time but boy, was he good at it. Anyway, he said that it was often difficult to tell where the scenarios left off and reality might kick in. This is an approximate quote. He said, "You know, I'm up there in front of thousands of people and I'm kicking some guy in the crotch and bashing him over the head with a folding chair and everyone's cheering me on and I'm getting paid lots of money to do it…it's hard not to start really hating that guy."
So Glenn Beck may believe that nonsense he spouts, I don't know. What I do know is that if I were on CNN Headline News and they did that ad for me, I think I'd put in a call and ask them not to use my head as part of the word, "crap."