‘The Bold and Fresh Tour’: Beck, O’Reilly Team Up to Perform
Critics of Fox News’ Glenn Beck might be stunned that he can speak for more than an hour without spouting even one juicy conspiracy theory.
“I think we’re gonna make it,” said Beck in his own State of the Union address, beamed into movie theaters nationwide Saturday night. Beck shared his newfound optimism during a telecast of “The Bold and Fresh Tour” over the weekend. The show, which Beck co-headlined with his Fox News colleague Bill O’Reilly, let two of the country’s most polarizing pundits analyze President Barack Obama’s SOTU speech and the continued fallout from Scott Brown’s election shocker in Massachusetts.
O’Reilly may still be the news channel’s ratings czar, but the crowd squeezed into South Florida’s Sun Dome (where the show was performed live Friday night) clearly favored Beck’s red-meat theatrics. The show proved as partisan as expected, with both Beck and O’Reilly hammering the likes of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Barney Frank. But while Beck had no compunction about taunting President Barack Obama, O’Reilly took a softer approach with the commander-in-chief. That might work on the small screen, but audiences were hoping O’Reilly would take the gloves off.
Beck’s portion of the show featured his trademark blend of political chatter and shameless mugging. And no tears were shed in the process.
On the State of the Union address: “Lemme start with something nice … gimme a minute,” he deadpanned. “He’s just one of the most humble men I’ve ever seen.”
“How does anybody take this guy seriously?” he asked to sustained applause, shifting gears — awkwardly at times — from humor to more sober fare.
Beck also slammed MSNBC’s Chris Matthews for his recent comment following Obama’s SOTU speech: “I forgot he was black for an hour.” Beck dug in for the satirical kill, offering up several scenarios in which a person might say such a line. Each time, it sounded worse — a comic approach as sharp as anything on The Daily Show.
Beck also played to his populist roots, decrying those who insist our national leaders have elite colleges on their resumes. “Harvard and Yale is what got us here. Whaddaya say we try a community college?” he asked, referencing part of Gov. Sarah Palin’s maligned educational history.
Beck is ok, O’Reilley is more RINO than conservative from where I sit. I recall he was pro-amnesty for illegals–more confrontantion than substance. Also, I can never take him seriously since I read the phone transcripts from when he told one of his producers of his self-abuse fantasies…
#1 P T Bull – Beck is a big ‘L’ Libertarian, which makes him to the Right of Conservatives.
O’Reilly’s great success lies in the fact that he is truly a Centrist. Sometimes he appears cleuless about what is going on, a;ways wanting to give the benefit of the doubt to Obama and Co. Slowly but surely, he drifts to the Right, as the ugly reality smacks him in the face.
Then he shales his head and is confused. He just cannot understand why anyone would do such a thing… or act in such a matter… or why they wouldn’t do X. Even when hit by a big cluebat, He just cannot seem to wrap his head around the real problem.
He exactly reflects the average American. Exactly. He is a perfect windgauge for America… thus, his tremendous ratings success. I watch his show, because it lets me know exactly where the 40$ of Indies are right now in their thinking.
As informed as O’Reilly is, he is still clueless. The same goes for much of America. Slowly, they are getting a clue, being dragged from their somnolence, trying confusedly to rub the sleep from their eyes in the middle of their night. Slowly, ever so slowly, the zombies are returning to life. It’s the resurrection of America.
The question is, can they waken and regain full control of their faculties, before the sneak-thief who has broken into their house, steals all from them, including their Liberty and even their lives?
#2 so right.
We really like Beck. Everyone we know, likes Beck. We gave his book out for Christmas and everyone loved it!!
O’Reilly is different. I think his tour was not going too good..and he was teamed with Beck to save face..just my opinion, no proof. I would not pay to see O’Reilly, but with Beck I would. It’s not because I am Dem/Repub, it is because I find O’Reilly wishywashy and leaning to Obama, when there is not doubt where Obama stands.
If not for Beck ,in particular, we would not have know half of what is going on with the Obama administration. It is a blot on America when we have to learn the truth of our nation from a tv personality.
Slowly but surely the worm turns..
While I like Bill O’Reilly and watch him when I can, he makes too many excuses for Obama and he is most definitely NOT a conservative (which he never claimed to be anyway) I like Beck’s seemingly open and effusive shtick, albeit I can take him in small doses only. I wish we had people Glenn and Bill in Canada. Of course, if they broadcast them during a hockey game, the country would not tune in.
when i first saw Glen Beck on CNN, i thought he isn’t going to last there and what the heck is he doing on CNN? he reminds me of the kid on Christmas Story.
Thanks, Marc. I consider myself a libertarian. I like Beck’s delivery more than solely a matter of ideological purity. There are other conservative radio personalities that I agree with but don’t like due to their grating delivery. In fairness, I only hear these guys when I am driving in the car, so I am only getting small doses anyway.
I do recall, though, that on the amnesty for illegal immigrants, considered during the bush administration, both Republicans and Democrats were in favor of it, and more than half americans opposed it.
I consider many co-called conservative commentators to be republican apologists who don’t have a bedrock of principle that causes them to part company with the repubican establishment very often. As an anti-war fiscal conservative, I often find myself on the opposite side of issues from them.
You people are too willing to excuse the character of these lunatics. O’Reilly a centrist? Nonsense. Anything he says that sounds even-handed is merely a marker for people like you to point to and say, “See, he’s a centrist” while he spews his right wing extremism.
Irrespective of the relative merits of this tour, I am among those who’ve grown weary of Bill O’Reilly’s never-ending attempts at promoting his “Bold, Fresh..” book. (The best way to get an e-mail message read on his Fox News program, for example, is to make a favorable reference to it.)
After all these months — which now stretch to well beyond a year since initial publication — “Bold, Fresh…” has turned into “Bold, Stale.”
And then there’s this: O’Reilly, himself, seems diminished. I don’t know what Obama has on him, but it must be something substantial. Because the so-called “no-spin zone” is lately a joke. Billy Boy has for some time now been going REALLY easy on the prez. (Some nights, he seems like Barack’s press secretary.)
Which leads me to offer this joke: Question: Why can O’Reilly never be put out to stud? Answer: Because Obama has turned him into a gelding.
I think we all agree O’Reiley is trying to appease the Obama adm for some reason.
His program has gone down as he panders to the Adm, and “pretends” not to.
Beck’s the best! Then Hannity.
Beck is for neither party, and I like that.
If anything sums up the absolute pathological idiocy of Skeeziks it is this moronic sentence that he wrote in post # 7 “Anything he says that sounds even-handed is merely a marker for people like you to point to and say, “See, he’s a centrist” while he spews his right wing extremism.” The ‘YOU PEOPLE” is such a standard libtard moonbats epithet too.
Beck, regardless of all his nuttiness (which actually makes him more fun and endearing) has done a great service to this country.
For one — at the minimum — he’s educating about history — from a point of view in fact (but not falsely) — but it’s the only widely available answer and alternative to the fractured history as taught by our — also deliberately and deeply biased (and deeply disparaging of this nation) — “academians.”
He’s the only one doing this.
Thank you, you nut, Glenn Beck! Where would we be without you!
Wouldn’t you just love to hear what O’Reilly cut out of the Jon Stewart interview?
O’Reilly’s endless self promotion of himself, his book, and the Fox ratings is increasingly tedious. On the other hand, because he does NOT drink the ODS Koolaid and endlessly bash Obama, that is a GOOD thing. Yes, he is a centrist, of sorts, but knows that the Foxie demographic is to the right, so his subtext almost always tilts right. Maybe I have sold my sold to the devil, but O’Reilly is the one guy I watch consistently. I am curious to see which side he will come down on, whereas with Beck or Hannity, there never will be any doubt; no dramatic tension. I may often yell at O’Reilly on the screen, but should I ever go back to watching Hannity, shoot me, please. His ratings may be higher than when Colmes was on board, but to listen to 60 minutes of Hannity’s completely predictable Obama bashing is inanity.
With O’Reilly, my wife will at least stay in the room and snipe; but with Hannity, she’s outta there.
#12 “Wouldn’t you just love to hear what O’Reilly cut out of the Jon Stewart interview?”
No. No I wouldn’t.
#12
Nope, can’t stand Stewart.
The hippie bilge rat:
““See, he’s a centrist” while he spews his right wing extremism.”
Being in favor of freedom and not of tyranny make you
an “extremist” in the eyes of the Pol Pot apologists…
Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.
And moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
Beck has no vice and O’Reilly no virtue…
posters 4 and 9 are right about O’Reilly. It is kind of funny, liberals think he is a raging rightwinger, but to us, he is too mealy mouthed regarding the administratin. Sometimes I think that he is desparate to get Obama on his show.
Wonder how successful a Bath Tub Boy and Rachel Madcow duo would go over? Kind of a scary thought….