Think Progress

An Irksome Arrangement: Glenn Beck Uses Charitable Donations To Pay For Restoring Honor Rally

This Saturday, the polarizing Fox News pundit Glenn Beck is hosting his Restoring Honor Rally in Washington, DC. Even though conservative celebrity and “potential 2012 presidential candidate” Sarah Palin will speak and Tea Party darling Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) will attend, Beck is pitching the rally as a “non-political, non-partisan event” to “honor the troops, unite the American people under the principles of integrity and truth, and make a pledge to restore honor within ourselves and our country.”

Beck’s newfound commitment to “absolutely no politics” is not just rhetoric, but a contractual matter for the non-profit foundation co-sponsoring the event, the Special Operations Warrior Foundation (SOWF). Founded in 1980, SOWF is a successful charity that provides college scholarships for children of special operations personnel killed in action or in training. Any fundraiser, including the Restoring Honor Rally, cannot be political and SOWF has required that speakers at the rally, including Palin, sign an agreement to that effect. SOWF guidelines also insist that “money needed for expenses (space rental, deposits, etc) must be supplied by the party” sponsoring the event. While the costs of such the rally, slated to approximate $2 million, were initially daunting, Beck found an easy answer: pay for it with the donations.

According to Beck’s rally website, “all contributions made” to SOWF “will first be applied to the costs of the Restoring Honor Rally taking place on August 28, 2010. All contributions in excess of these costs will then be retained by the SOWF.” As Mother Jones first reported, this arrangement was enough to irk ABC’s George Stephanopoulos to pull his donation to Beck’s rally earlier this month:

Cathie Levine, vice president for media relations at ABC News explained, “We get hundreds of these solicitations from charities every year and try as much as possible to fulfill them as long as they are meet our standards including that the proceeds go to charity.” A few days later, she reported back that, “We sought assurance that the auction money would go directly to charity and while we were told the rally costs were covered and that funds raised from our specific item would go to Special Operations Warrior Foundation, it didn’t sufficiently meet our standards. So we withdrew our auction item and George will make a personal donation directly to the SOWF.”

As SOWF spokeswoman Edie Rosenthal told Time’s Kate Pickeret, they have “never had an event that cost this much.” While Beck’s promotion brought in more than enough to pay for the “non-political” rally, he raised the money by auctioning off distinctly political prizes last month, including an autographed copy of tea party leader Sen. Jim DeMint’s (R-SC) book “Saving Freedom,” a lunch with Karl Rove for $7,500, or a Capitol tour with Bachmann for up to $13,000. When asked whether SOWF is concerned that associating with such right-wing politicos like the “divisive Beck” will tarnish their non-political reputation, Rosenthal said Beck is doing “something for the fallen” despite “whatever else he does” and “as crazy as he gets.”

Beck’s efforts have certainly raised an unprecedented amount for SOWF. But the financing arrangement behind the event colors it less as a charitable endeavor and more as a “symbiotic relationship.” As Pickeret notes, while SOWF “gets the largest influx of donations in its history,” Beck “gets to headline a donor-funded $1 million rally in Washington, DC.”

Half Of The Spending Cuts In Blunt’s Jobs Plan Aren’t Actually Spending Cuts

Last week, Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO), who is running for his state’s open Senate seat, proposed a “jobs plan” that included what he has claimed is $2 trillion in spending cuts. “In this plan, Roy identified over two trillion dollars in cuts right off the bat that can be taken out of government,” said former Missouri treasurer Sarah Steelman, who has endorsed Blunt’s campaign. But in what he charitably calls an “accounting error,” the Kansas City Star’s Dave Helling notes that fully one half of Blunt’s spending cuts aren’t actually spending cuts at all:

A look at that plan shows half of those savings — $1 trillion — would come from Blunt’s proposal to repeal the health care reform package…Repealing health care reform would eliminate $1 trillion in spending, but it would also eliminate the $1 trillion in tax and fee increases and Medicare reductions that are in the law as well. The net effect of health care repeal on the federal deficit is, roughly, zero.

Actually, contrary to Helling’s assertion, repealing the Affordable Care Act wouldn’t have zero effect on the deficit: it would actively increase it. According to the Congressional Budget Office, repealing the bill would increase the deficit by $455 billion over the next ten years. But the point remains that the only way Blunt’s push for repeal works as a deficit reduction measure is if he plans to keep all of the tax increases and Medicare savings, without actually giving anyone any additional health care. And as The Wonk Room explains, Blunt’s other deficit reduction plans are equally unimpressive.

Grassley Tries To Whitewash Hateful Opposition To NY Mosque: No One Is Saying There Is ‘Any Ill Intent’

In their attempt to stop the construction of an Islamic center near Ground Zero in New York City, right-wing opponents of the mosque have voraciously attacked the motives of Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam behind the project, demonizing him as a radical and a terrorist sympathizer.

But in an interview with the editorial board of the Sioux City Journal, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) — who supports moving the mosque to a new location — attempted to ignore the ugly attacks against Rauf and his supporters, saying none of the mosque’s critics have suggested there is “any ill intent” behind the proposed center:

Said Grassley: “I doubt there was any ill intent by Muslims in wanting to place that there. I don’t have any evidence, I don’t think any of the critics have said there was any ill intent, and constitutionally you can’t question their right to do it. But I hope, on second thought — and we also sometimes have to have second thoughts about initial decisions, even well-thought-out initial decisions — that it is insensitive and unwise to do it.”

In fact, the right-wing echo chamber has done little else but smear Rauf and question his “intent” in recent days. In a campaign ad, New York Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Lazio warned, “Now a terrorist-sympathizing imam wants to build a $100 million mosque near Ground Zero. Where is this money coming from? Who’s really behind it?” Fox News host Bill O’Reilly said Rauf “is no friend to America,” because his “radical” views are “very disturbing.” Fellow Fox host Glenn Beck falsely claimed Rauf is “connected to” Hamas, and that Rauf employs an antisemitic imam.

Meanwhile, Pamella Geller, a key organizer of the mosque opposition, has completely dedicated her blog Atlas Shrugs to pumping out smear campaigns against Rauf. She’s argued that the mosque is all about “stealth Jihad,” that Rauf is a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, that Rauf “supports homicide bombers,” and that he has even “prais[ed] Hitler’s antisemitism.”

Of course, Rauf is no radical — he and his wife “are actually the kind of Muslim leaders right-wing commentators fantasize about: modernists and moderates who openly condemn the death cult of al-Qaeda and its adherent.” The Bush administration understood this, sending Rauf on a diplomatic mission, and having him work with the FBI on counter-terrorism efforts. Even Beck understood this in 2006, suggesting Rauf was a “good Muslim,” like those who make up the “vast majority” of Islam’s believers.

Daniels To Accept $434 Million In State Aid That He Requested But Then Opposed

In an interview this week, Gov. Mitch Daniels (R-IN) asserted that “only a blind zealot” would say that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the stimulus) “has done any good.” “It hasn’t worked,” he said. “It’s trickle down government is the best way I can describe it.” Daniels’ rhetoric hid the fact that he not only trumpets stimulus investments on his state’s website, but he also signed a letter in February asking that some stimulus provisions be extended.

Now that an additional $26 billion in state aid has been approved by the Congress, Daniels has his hands open for $434 million, “even though he opposed the legislation”:

“Whether it’s wise from a national standpoint, whether it’s really doing anything about the private economy where we need the jobs, that’s an open question to say the least,” Daniels said…“But they’re going to send it so we’ll be very cautious with it. … The most likely event is that it helps us maintain our position in the black with a little more room to spare.”

“If they send a check, we’ll cash it,” said the governor’s press secretary, Jane Jankowski. So, for the record, Daniels requested the money in February, opposed it this month, but now plans to accept it, just like all the other governors who have grandstanded against stimulus funding before gladly taking it. Daniels says that the additional funding “helps us maintain our position in the black” without noting that he is only in the black because of the Recovery Act.

In fact, the Indiana budget includes more than $1 billion in stimulus money. The Wonk Room warns that Indianans should keep an eye on this money, as Daniels used education funding from the Recovery Act not on students and teachers but to boost his state’s Rainy Day Fund.

Paterson Says Muslim Stabbing Is One Reason We Need A ‘Unifying Conversation’ About Moving Park 51

The stabbing of a Muslim cab driver by a 21-year-old man who attacked him once he learned of his Islamic faith has made headlines across the country, with the city of New York already charging the young man with committing a hate crime.

The cab driver, Ahmed Sharif, told the New York Post that he believed tension surrounding the proposed Park 51 Islamic community center being built near the site of Ground Zero “may have played a role in the horrifying attack.” “Right now, the public sentiment is very serious. All drivers should be more careful,” Sharif said.

However, instead of simply condemning the attack and defending the rights of Muslim Americans to live freely and safely, Gov. David Paterson (D) took the opportunity to respond to the attack by plugging his plans to try to convince the developers of Park 51 to choose a different location. He said in a statement that “this kind of violence is one of the reasons” he called for a “respectful and unifying conversation about the Park 51 project”:

“In the wake of the alleged hate crime against a New York City taxi driver, I must take this opportunity to remind New Yorkers that we cannot and will not allow bias and ignorance to infect our communities and deny our hard working, innocent residents the respect they deserve.

“The potential for this kind of violence is one of the reasons why I have called publicly for a respectful and unifying conversation about the Park51 project. I continue to offer my assistance for an open dialogue that I believe will help to bring New Yorkers together.

It is difficult to imagine how it would be “respectful and unifying” to respond to a hate crime by imploring those targeted to consider giving in to the hate and relocating the Islamic center. To do so would be the equivalent of asking the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to consider giving into white racism by ending its drive to register black voters following the incineration of the 16th Street Baptist Church by a white extremist, or requesting that the Freedom Riders end their quest for desegregation following the firebombing of one their buses in Anniston, Alabama.

When Asked What, Besides Tax Cuts, Would Help The Economy, Pence Says Tax Cuts

Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) went on Fox News last night to back up House Minority Leader John Boehner’s (R-OH) over-the-top call for President Obama to sack his entire economic team, including Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and top adviser Larry Summers. “The President ought to ask for and accept the resignation of the Secretary of the Treasury and Larry Summers, and he ought to bring a new team,” Pence said.

But beyond that, Pence, like the rest of his GOP colleagues, didn’t offer any ideas of his own that would help the ailing economy. When host Greta Van Susteren asked what, besides tax cuts, he would do to turn the economy around, Pence at first dodged, but then said tax cuts for the rich would be the way to go:

VAN SUSTEREN: What — besides the sort of the usual — the — you know, the tax program, extending the Bush tax cuts that I know the Republican Party want, what is it that you could do to turn it around?

PENCE: Yes, look, the enemy of our prosperity is uncertainty. … the greatest uncertainty right now is — and you just heard — you heard the Vice President again kind of defend it in passing, their tax cuts — their tax increases on the rich — is this administration actually thinks that it would be a good idea to allow a tax increase on job creators on January 1st, 2011. You know, higher taxes never got anybody hired.

Watch it:

In addition to creating massive deficits, extending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans would do little to help the economy and create jobs. In fact, the evidence suggests that if the GOP got their tax cuts for the rich, the economy could get worse. After the Bush tax cuts were enacted, the country “registered the weakest jobs and income growth in the post-war period.” And as the Wonk Room’s Pat Garofalo noted, GDP increased faster following the tax increases of 1993 than it did following either the Bush or Reagan tax cuts.

It’s clear that Pence and his GOP colleagues just don’t have much to offer. Given that Pence has been asked repeatedly for new ideas on the economy — and hasn’t been able to offer any — one would imagine that he could think of something other than “tax cuts,” but apparently not.