He called Van Jones a "radical communist" and "revolutionary." Using the same incendiary language of Joe McCarthy 55 years ago, Glenn Beck brought down one of our nation's most visionary, passionate, and principled young leaders.
Emboldened by his success, Mr. Beck, along with Lou Dobbs, Rush Limbaugh and their extremist cohorts are moving on to their next progressive targets. Beck "tweeted" last week to his followers, "Find everything you can on Cass Sunstein, Mark Lloyd and Carol Browner." He blogged, "...[J]udging by the other radicals in this administration, I expect that questioning to continue for the foreseeable future."
Lloyd, the Federal Communication Commission's Chief Diversity Officer, is squarely in Beck's sights. And the claims being made against him are laughable: Localism, diversity and competition have been the cornerstones of U.S. media policy and the mandate of the FCC for decades. They have nothing to do with content, and no one is in danger of being censored. (And, for the record, Lloyd is against reinstating the Fairness Doctrine.) But, of course, Beck and his gang aren't interested in the truth.
Enough is enough. President Obama and our leaders in Washington need to stand up to the fear-mongering, stand behind Mark Lloyd, and not let the noise machine distract them from the work that needs to be done on these crucial media issues to make sure we have more speech in the marketplace of ideas - not less.