National Review Online Goes To Bat For Glenn Beck

Stephen Spruiell points out that at leat two of Rep. Weiner's political allies are taking the U.S. government to task using language that Glenn Beck and other conservative commentators have been using. One of them is George Soros, who could also be descibed as a man who "profit[s] on people's fear." Spruiell also points out, in regard to the mark-up question, the Weiner report is a little incoherent.

Rather than cast it merely as a vendetta against Glenn Beck and talk radio, Spruiell offers this take:

One way to look at this is as a typical liberal nanny-state intervention. Busybody Democrat with too much free time wants to tell you what to buy — news at eleven. But there is a darker possibility here, one foreshadowed by government bans on short-selling and denunciations of those seeking insurance policies against widespread sovereign defaults as greedy “wolf packs” bent on destroying the global economy. Weiner’s report is a tinny echo of these broader crackdowns, an attempt to delegitimize dissent by painting it as something motivated by profits instead of patriotism. Glenn Beck and others are trying to sound, for the nation’s small-dollar savers (what few we have left), the same alarm bell that the nation’s large-dollar money managers have evidently heard loud and clear. That’s not against the law — yet.