The title of this diary is not a joke. Olbermann & others have publicized Beck's lie that he held George Washington's inaugural address in his hands. But there were two much more embarrassing "bloopers" in Beck's speech/sermon. And Beck should be confronted with them.
During a part of his speech last Saturday, Beck talked about how God sends us "wake up calls". He went on to say "and you can send two kinds of wake up calls, one through fear like 9/11 . . ." I think that this is clearly a statement that 9/11 was a message from God. You can see that part of the speech here: http://www.youtube.com/...
In another part of his speech, Beck started talking about "the black robe regiment" of preachers, and his group of 240 clergy marched up on to the stage. Beck said that it was a preacher who first said that "all men are created equal" and "that rights come from God -- no government, no king". He went on to say that "our churches have fallen asleep" and that "the eternal principles of God" have "been absent from the American landscape" for 240 years." You can find this part of the speech at http://www.youtube.com/...
Apparently, Beck missed a critical lesson in civics class, i.e., that the powers and rights enumerated in the Constitution come from the People -- not God. And I suspect that the phrase "all men are created equal" was not coined by a clergyman.
But the biggest problem with this part of Beck's speech is his statement that the "principles of God" have been absent from America for 240 years. That would mean that the American people turned their backs on God in 1770. I suspect that Beck used 240 years because he had 240 religious leaders coming on stage, but his error is still egregious and shows how flippant he is with facts and arguments.
I don't know about the rest of you, but I would love to see Glenn Beck try to explain how the US could possibly have been founded as a "Christian nation" when the people founding it had abandoned "the eternal principles of God" nineteen years before the Constitution was ratified.