Glenn Beck Refers to the U.S. Military as Loiterers

Last updated on August 10th, 2014 at 05:02 pm

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Beck manages to insult the military

While discussing his plan for America on his Fox News program today, Glenn Beck was trying to improve his libertarian credibility, when he insulted the U.S. military by proclaiming that progressives had turned them into, “the world’s loiterers,” so according to Beck the men and women in the military are loitering around the globe. Way to support the troops there, Glenn.

Here is the video courtesy of Media Matters:

Beck said, “Japan, we love you. Thank you for holding all of our bonds, but we can’t be the world’s loiterers anymore…Here’s the deal. I’m tired of being world’s policeman. We can’t do it anymore, but in most cases we aren’t the world’s policemen. We are the world’s loiterers. We need to have a new no loitering policy, and that policy comes from the progressives. The Republicans, they say we are going to send the green helmets in and we’re going to nation build our way to global security, be more like us. The liberals, the Democratic progressives, they say we’ll do it through the United Nations. We’ll send in the blue helmets, which we pay for. This doesn’t work. The idea of let’s take our armies and eventually put blue helmets or green helmets on them doesn’t work. I don’t want a global government. I don’t want a global military force.”

Beck is claiming that progressives are trying to use the military to set up a global government, and that the Republicans have adopted this idea too, but they differ with the progressives on whether we should use US troops or international forces. Beck was trying to make a Libertarian argument about the need to reduce the United States military’s global footprint, but he got the facts all wrong.

I know that Beck was trying to say military expansion was a progressive idea and blame it on FDR, but the militarism of the United States actually goes back to the concept of Manifest Destiny. Republicans fueled record increases in defense spending under Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. Bill Clinton caught holy hell from Republicans for trying to reduce the size of the military during the 1990s. Beck’s of the blame for the rise of the military industrial complex is flat out wrong.

Beck’s intentions are clear. He is laying out his plan, as the next step in establishing a third party in the United States. This has been Beck’s dream all along. It is why he took the time to criticize both Republicans and Democrats on the growth of the military. He is plotting a fracture of the GOP. That is what this really about. Glenn Beck wants to take the fringe right and create the conservative theocracy of his dreams. Republicans should be very worried about the ambitions of Glenn Beck.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association