Sunday, August 29, 2010

I watched Beck vs Sharpton

Thanks to C-SPAN, yesterday I watched a few minutes of the Glenn Beck’s ‘Restoring Honor’ rally and all of the Al Sharpton’s ‘Reclaim the Dream’ rally.
Beck was at the Lincoln Memorial and Sharpton was on a high school football field. Clearly, the Beck fans trounced the Sharpton fans in attendance by a large margin (unofficially 87,000 vs 3,000). 
Beck had a few speakers with a lot to say. Sharpton had a lot of speakers with little to say. In fact, Sharpton gave all speakers 3 minutes. Rudely, when that magic moment came, the keyboardist started playing loud music drowning out the person on the mic. You could tell that some of the later speakers didn’t want that embarrassment and got off quickly. 
I wish Sharpton had left well enough alone and let Beck do his thing without trying to counter it with a rushed and questionably planned rally. History will be quick to compare one event to the other and the results overwhelmingly conclude which group can rally their troops best.
The only part that really disappointed me is that Glenn Beck had a much better gospel choir than Al Sharpton. 
What’s up with that?

3 comments:

  1. I just seems to me that whoever wrote this dont know what the hell you are talking about. If you believe for one moment that Glen Beck, who is a Mormon, and is backed by FixNews have our best interest at heart I will sell you some Nevada sand. Beck have called MLK, the President and other prominant leaders names that are completely undeserved and speaks of his hypocritical agenda.

    Sharpton's rally has been conducted on the same weekend each year for the past 42 years. It is quite interesting that Beck chose this weekend to "recover honor"...honor is something that is valuable and easy to when it is always maintained. Honor, however, is something that is difficult to regain once you lose it. Beck have no honor, never have never will. He is nothing more than a loud mouth without any base of fact, who do not know history and seek to do shock jock standup...and interestingly enough people like you fall for it.

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  2. I may not know what I am talking about but I know what I saw. That is all my post says.

    Sorry to say that I did not know Sharpton has had this rally for 42 years. It is troubling that his event is not more significant and better attended considering what it represents. Like me, most folks would have never known about Sharpton's event if it wasn't for the attention Beck's event received.

    Didn't I say that I watched a few minutes of Beck and all of Sharpton. Doesn't that imply where my interest was? I saw the Beck folks talking their talk at length and Sharpton folks with hardly enough time to get beyond a few sound bites. I wish Sharpton had far fewer speakers who would deliver meaningful speeches. I don't think shuffling a bunch of people on stage for a few sentences is a good way to get a clear, pointed message across.

    I never listen to Beck and could care less about his message. He's a very well paid successful entertainer with a bunch of loyal listeners. He is manipulating a niche political and social movement based on what listeners want to hear. Unfortunately, most of them are dangerously misinformed and with such great numbers will definitely shape policy in America.

    Sharpton doesn't have an audience close to the size of Beck. Outside of New York, most of us don't know what Sharpton is up to. Recently, his syndicated radio show started broadcasting on WURD 900am in the afternoon.

    As each year passes it becomes more clear that the only black that can rally the masses is Louis Farrakhan.

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  3. More and more colored folks are seeing Al Sharpton for the fraud that he is and always has been....I was at a huge rally on this date nearly 50 years ago and the message then was much closer to what Beck's followers had to say than the race baiting retoric of Al Sharpton and his people...If MLK were alive today he would cross the street to avoid Al Sharpton.

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