He's Baaack - Jones V. Beck - Round 2

Van Jones accepted an award from the NAACP over the weekend.  At the end of his acceptance speech he said:

“I see you, and I love you, brother. I love you and you cannot do anything about it. I love you and you cannot do anything about it … Let’s be one country. Let’s be one country. Let’s get the job done.”

Beck tweeted about it over the weekend and as expected he talked about it today on his radio program.  Politico has an article about the exchange and the headline reads:

Glenn Beck Won't Let Go of Van Jones. 

Hmm, lets see here.  I watched the Beck show on Thursday and Friday.  He didn't bring up Van Jones.  Beck made the tweet after the statement by Jones, not the other way around.  The article also uses some other strong language:



Glenn Beck fired back at former White House official Van Jones Monday, accusing President Barack Obama’s former “Green Jobs Czar” of “play(ing) the victim here” and trying “to make … a personal issue” out of Beck’s crusade against him.

and it continues:



On his radio show Monday, Beck reciprocated Jones’ affection – kind of – before launching into a blistering attack on Jones and, by extension, Obama, alleging both concealed Jones’ alleged ideologies as part of a devious plan carried out “in the cover of darkness.”

This is what Beck actually said:

“Van Jones, you love me, I love you, we're not on an episode of Barney,” Beck said. “Now, it's never been a personal thing and I don't know why you are wanting to make it a personal issue, but it's not a personal thing. Never has been. I was somebody who didn't want you fired.”

In fact, Beck said “I didn't get you fired”



“I do want to talk about one country,” Beck said. “The question is which country do we want? The country that you're looking for is very different than the country I understand. It's a country that is very different than the country that most people understand. You, sir, are a self-avowed communist. You are somebody that wants to fundamentally transform America, and you're doing it through the guise of green jobs.”


Highlighting Jones’ assertion that his past associations were fully vetted by the White House, Beck demanded of Obama “What is your radical end, Mr. President? We know now what Van Jones' radical end is. What is yours?”

Now, I have blogged a bit about Van Jones.  I also had a run in with a reporter at the 9/12 March about Van Jones.  The march was very shortly after Jones' resignation.  There was a reporter from the local CBS station talking to people in the crowd.  I happen to overhear her say to her camera man that she was sick of being verbally attacked by the people in the crowd.  I was in the mood to cause a little a trouble, so I went up to her and tried to explain to her what the main issue was as far as the people in the crowd were concerned.  Van Jones was one of the things that I brought up. 

I asked her:

As an American, how can you not be appalled that the President of the United States put a self avowed communist in a high level position in the white house?  Why was this not being reported on?  This is the type of thing that we are upset about.  We believe that you are in the tank with the President, that is why no one here trusts people in your profession. 

It seems like the people at Politico don't understand it either.  It wasn't Van Jones himself.  It was the fact that President of the United States put someone with his belief systems into a high level job.  Someone in that administration knew his background.  We want to know who that person was and a explanation of why they felt it was ok to hire him. 

The issue was never Van Jones, it was about the President.  By him leaving in the dead of night over a holiday weekend we will never get the answer to that question.