"Leadership is not hitting somebody over the head. It's not taking up arms at this point. That's not leadership -- that's assault," explains the former Alaska governor.
Ari MelberGlenn Beck invited Sarah Palin on his Thursday broadcast to discuss the prospect of potential violence by right wing extremist groups.
Both commentators, who are two of the most visible conservative personalities on Fox News and within the G.O.P. at large, took pains to condemn any violent acts.
The segment opens with Beck, flanked by large pictures of several founding fathers painted in Shepard Fairey’s stylized “Obama Hope” motif, citing a recent gathering of the “Second Amendment Constitutional Task Force” rallying for “armed resistance” in Alaska. While saying he appreciated the protester’s “passion,” Beck describes the effort as “fringe” and intones that “violence is not the answer,” twice.
Palin repeated that line, and then discussed the distinction between assault and voting. “Leadership is not hitting somebody over the head. It’s not taking up arms at this point. That’s not leadership — that’s assault,” Palin said. “We need to make sure that the tool that we use in taking up arms, if you will, is our vote.”
The whole segment, titled “Using faith, hope and charity to bring about change,” is surreal.
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Ari MelberTwitterAri Melber is The Nation's Net movement correspondent, covering politics, law, public policy and new media, and a regular contributor to the magazine's blog. He received a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and a J.D. from Cornell Law School, where he was an editor of the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy. Contact Ari: on Facebook, on Twitter, and at amelber@hotmail.com. Melber is also an attorney, a columnist for Politico and a contributing editor at techPresident, a nonpartisan website covering technology’s impact on democracy. During the 2008 general election, he traveled with the Obama Campaign on special assignment for The Washington Independent. He previously served as a Legislative Aide in the US Senate and as a national staff member of the 2004 John Kerry Presidential Campaign. As a commentator on public affairs, Melber frequently speaks on national television and radio, including including appearances on NBC, CNBC, CNN, CNN Headline News, C-SPAN, MSNBC, Bloomberg News, FOX News, and NPR, on programs such as “The Today Show,” “American Morning,” “Washington Journal,” “Power Lunch,” "The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell," "The Joy Behar Show," “The Dylan Ratigan Show,” and “The Daily Rundown,” among others. Melber has also been a featured speaker at Harvard, Oxford, Yale, Columbia, NYU, The Center for American Progress and many other institutions. He has contributed chapters or essays to the books “America Now,” (St. Martins, 2009), “At Issue: Affirmative Action,” (Cengage, 2009), and “MoveOn’s 50 Ways to Love Your Country,” (Inner Ocean Publishing, 2004). His reporting has been cited by a wide range of news organizations, academic journals and nonfiction books, including the The Washington Post, The New York Times, ABC News, NBC News, CNN, FOX News, National Review Online, The New England Journal of Medicine and Boston University Law Review. He is a member of the American Constitution Society, he serves on the advisory board of the Roosevelt Institute and lives in Manhattan.