The angry voice of a deluded American nation

The rise of Glenn Beck on Fox News is a fascinating American story. He has captured, channeled and created the fear and anger of a paranoid America (this sentiment is wonderfully detailed by Mondoweiss founder Phil Weiss in this New York Magazine essay.)

In Salon, Alexander Zaitchik captures Beck’s background:

Since launching his talk radio career in the late ’90s, Beck has constructed a persona anchored in a biography of struggle and redemption. It is a narrative with shades of another haunted Washingtonian who found entertainment fame, Kurt Cobain. Both men hailed from broken homes in the drizzly Pacific Northwest. Both men would find youthful fortune behind microphones while struggling with drugs, prescribed and recreational. Both would contemplate suicide before their tethers finally snapped in 1994. That year Cobain would wrap his mouth around a loaded shotgun. Beck, after contemplating doing the same while listening to a Nirvana album, would not.

Text and images ©2024 Antony Loewenstein. All rights reserved.

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