One of my favorite comics (well, of the 80's anyway) was a fellow named Kelly Monteith. He was/is a funny guy, but one bit of his in particular has stuck with me. "Have you ever noticed that there are only two types of drivers on the road? Idiots and Assholes [1]. Assholes drive faster than you; Idiots drive slower." This is one of those great leaps of insight that astound me sometimes. There are two types of people in this world, and no, they're not Idiots and Assholes. One type identifies with the joke because they truly believe everyone else is an Idiot or an Asshole (which I'll refer to as Type A); the other recognizes that they've felt like that in the past, have on occasion been one or the other and finds the humor in the universality of the sentiment—Type B.

As with all truly great social commentary, Mr. Monteith's bit isn't directed at an individual or his race or her gender or at anyone in particular as a way of belittling them or elevating ourselves. It's a statement of fact. Correction—it's a factual statement. Fact is, after all, nothing but stated perception.

Ah, Nietzsche.

But I digress. We all have our thoughts on how things should work and it is our natural inclination to be defensive and assign ulterior motives to anyone that disagrees. We should fight these inclinations and try to be more accepting human beings. That said...

Glenn Beck is an Asshole. "And here's how I got there." I used to watch his CNN talk show religiously, mostly because I appreciated the persona he put forward: "I tell it like it is."  Any more, no, not so much. I've finally realized that what he's really saying is "I tell it as I perceive it, I know better than you, and you are stupid if you disagree with me."

I tended to agree with him on issues. I don't think we spend enough time worrying about Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran. I think that Congress, on both sides of the aisle, is so caught up in serving its own interests that you and I no longer matter. I agree we're too lenient on immigration. In this regard I was not the Type B I thought I was, though, but actually a Type A Enabler. In Beck's mind, you're an Asshole if you are a liberal and disagree with him out of hand, and you're an Idiot if, like me, you're a conservative that's not a born-again self-righteous sycophant.

It's one thing to state what you believe. It's another to condemn someone else for disagreeing with you. That was, in my belief system, what had always separated the Left from the Right. The Right wants to believe things, rightly (sic) or wrongly; the Left thinks the Right are a bunch of Idiots and...well, you know.

I don't want to believe that many Blacks are voting for Senator Obama simply because he's Black. Forget that he spent his youth in Hawaii and Indonesia, and that he is in truth only half-Black.

I don't want to believe that many women are voting for Senator Clinton simply because she's a woman. I'm going to scream if I hear one more snide comment about it being "time for a woman to be in charge," as though men were simply too testosterone-poisoned, stupid and incapable of doing so.

I don't want to believe that Beck was supporting Governor Romney simply because he's a Mormon. (Beck is also a Mormon.) I don't care how good a CEO Romney was, I don't like his character, his politics or how he handles conflict. And let's not forget his uncanny ability to judge character, so aptly demonstrated when he enlisted Larry "Fancy Pants" Craig to help lead his campaign.

I don't want to believe that there are millions of illegal aliens that are demanding changes to our culture and using up tax dollars without contributing themselves. We spend billions of dollars every year birthing, educating, feeding, protecting and burying these aliens that are only interested in themselves and not the common good.

I don't want to believe, but I have to. That's Reality, and I believe that the Politically-Correct Thought Police (You Know Who You Are) are missing the point. Going back to immigration reform, the Right is up in arms about illegal immigration, taking an all-or-nothing stance: Gather them all up, ship them home and lock the door behind them, or else you can't call yourself a Conservative. Huh? Idealistically, I guess that I agree. Realistically, it can't happen and You know it. Big business can't be weaned from all of its cheap labor and its notion of disposable employees without major market repercussions. We can't/won't spend the money it would take to round everybody up and ship them home, and build a couple of walls that would never keep them out anyway.

Senator McCain understood, I believe, the Reality of it all and tried to foster legislation to make the best of an admittedly out-of-control situation. The Right holds this up as an example of why McCain is not a Conservative. As though somehow the Conservatives had all gotten together one night to vote for who would get to join the club. There isn't a textbook definition. There are varying shades of gray, boys and girls. I'm for lower taxes, smaller government and fewer entitlements. I'm also pro-Choice, support the idea of a path to citizenship, and embrace the War on Terror (and quite a bit of its execution). I support same-sex "unions" and the rights that they should enjoy, but not the notion of same-sex "marriage." And so on. If someone tries to call me a Liberal because of these beliefs—well, I'd laugh first, and then I'd be tempted to kick their ass.

The labels themselves are worthless, aside from providing a too-convenient polarization of people with differing philosophies. Fine. On this past Friday's episode (sic) Glenn Beck's "threat" not to vote for a Republican come November came across as somewhat amusing and incredibly childish, given his oft-stated stance on Senators Obama and Clinton. Romney was supposedly the Republican Party's last hope. Gawd. Beck's point was that sometimes "you have to fall down before you can pick yourself up" and that we'd been propping up the Republican Party for too long, praying for another Ronald Reagan to come along. Beck compared the situation to his descent into alcoholism and how he never would have been the person he was today if he hadn't been given the opportunity to fall down. Again, Huh? Yeah, he might not have been himself if he'd run his car into a wall, or worse, someone else's car. That would have made him an incarcerated felon without a cable-television soapbox to stand on. No, his tantrum was akin to that of an 8-year old not getting his chocolate milk.

So the end result is that Glenn Beck is no longer in my TiVo rotation, and I'll snicker at the mention of his name in the same manner as when I hear the words "Rush Limbaugh." It's a shame too. I had high hopes for Beck. Given that my only outlets for conservative fundamentalism nowadays are Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and various and sundry preachers, as of today I'm a sad, sad boy.

[1]    I believe what Mr. Monteith actually said was "Idiots and Jerks", but this is the new millennium...