Glenn Beck Rally "Blatantly Political," Says Top Democrat

Chris Van Hollen.

/ house.gov

Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, today panned Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally set for tomorrow and questioned the popular Fox News host's claim that the event is not political.

"It's blatantly political. I mean, come on," Van Hollen said at an event on House midterm elections at the National Press Club in Washington.

Van Hollen predicted that Americans will be turned off by the "outrageous rhetoric on the right."

"Conspiracy theories, rants -- there's certainly an element of the electorate that's charged up by that," Van Hollen said. "But, again, I think it's a turnoff to the sensible center and the people who constitute the key independent voters in the swing districts."

Democrats are depending on that theory in their fight against GOP candidates running against incumbent Democrats this year, calling many way out of the mainstream.

"The Republican candidates that are emerging from primaries across the country are on the far right of the political spectrum," Van Hollen said. "In many cases being driven by the tea party movement. In many cases being the nominee of the tea party movement. And they are not a good fit for what are moderate, centrist districts."

The ideological bent of Republicans is one of three reasons Van Hollen predicted that Democrats will keep control of the House of Representatives come November. The second is that Americans want to continue to move forward and don't want to return to the "failed Bush policies" of the past that ended with the near economic collapse in 2008. And the third is that Democrats are running strong campaigns. Members knew 2010 would be a tough year for Democrats, he said, and started preparing for that reality right after President Obama's election.

"Congressional Republicans inside the beltway are already popping the champagne bottles saying that they're going to seize control of the United States Congress" Van Hollen said. "It is a premature celebration."

Van Hollen pointed to recent polls finding that while Americans aren't crazy about either party right now, they "consistently have greater confidence in the Democrats than the Republicans."

Political pundits and prognosticators suggest that the "enthusiasm gap" could be Democrats biggest problem in November. The Republican base, polls suggest, is energized and more likely to turn out to vote while Democrats might just stay home.

"There's no doubt that there's political energy that will boost turnout," Van Hollen said, referring to voters coming out for Republicans. "The mistake that they're making is to conclude that by the end of the day you will not have a strong Democratic turnout."

Van Hollen pointed to the special election in Pennsylvania's 12th district where a Democrat won despite predictions that the party faithful would not show up to vote.

Van Hollen also said Democrats are already knocking on doors to get voters out, with a big push this weekend where DCCC and Organizing for America volunteers plan to canvas neighborhoods across the country and knock on 400,000 doors.

Not surprisingly, the National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee did not buy Van Hollen's relatively rosy outlook for November 2010.

"Chris Van Hollen can try to spin it all he wants," NRCC spokesman Ken Spain said in a statement. "But the fact remains that now even senior strategists within his own party are openly admitting that Nancy Pelosi's grip on the Speaker's gavel is loosening by the day. Democrats are right that knocking on doors is an important aspect of grassroots campaigning, but a fatally flawed message and an unpopular agenda won't keep the Ghost of Democrat Majorities Lost from knocking on theirs."

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Jill Jackson is a CBS News Capitol Hill Producer. You can read more of her posts in Hotsheet here. You can also follow her on Twitter.

[pegw]

Obama & his administration along with Pelosi & Reid & the Unions & the Czars are in the bunch of fat cats more so then anyone else. The idiot brown nose Chris Van Hollen who follows Pelosi has turned his Pinocchio
Nose a very brown color everytime something comes out of his lying mouth.
He needs to be reminded in God we Trust, in him (Van Hollen) we don't. He has helped Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Biden & so many more bring America & Americans to their knees. The people that elected him better take a better look at him. He is an insulting, unqualified pile of BS.

[010sonny]

All three tycoons are the latest incarnation of what the historian Kim Phillips-Fein labeled ?Invisible Hands? in her prescient 2009 book of that title: those corporate players who have financed the far right ever since the du Pont brothers spawned the American Liberty League in 1934 to bring down F.D.R. You can draw a straight line from the Liberty League?s crusade against the New Deal ?socialism? of Social Security, the Securities and Exchange Commission and child labor laws to the John Birch Society-Barry Goldwater assault on J.F.K. and Medicare to the Koch-Murdoch-backed juggernaut against our ?socialist? president.
Only the fat cats change ? not their methods and not their pet bugaboos (taxes, corporate regulation, organized labor, and government ?handouts? to the poor, unemployed, ill and elderly). Even the sources of their fortunes remain fairly constant. Koch Industries began with oil in the 1930s and now also spews an array of industrial products, from Dixie cups to Lycra, not unlike DuPont?s portfolio of paint and plastics. Sometimes the biological DNA persists as well. The Koch brothers? father, Fred, was among the select group chosen to serve on the Birch Society?s top governing body. In a recorded 1963 speech that survives in a University of Michigan archive, he can be heard warning of ?a takeover? of America in which Communists would ?infiltrate the highest offices of government in the U.S. until the president is a Communist, unknown to the rest of us.? That rant could be delivered as is at any Tea Party rally today.
Frank Price
Now does Miller and these candidates of the flavored TEA republicans start to come into vision and their direction of how their polices will be forming. Again redundant past failed polices that have brought shame and disgrace to our Nation. Observe their followers and those that advocate their support. Similar to those of the archive failures that followed these PAST strategies. Weak minded individuals as now. History repeating as is the republicans proposed polices. No forward leadership. Retarded progressive conservative agendas to produce a greater laggard position in the advancing world.

[nmrabbit]

I feel so saw for old John Brown. He would turn over in his grave; because someone like you would usurp his name. People who call others racist are themselves racist by reverse racism. If you ever get the time away from MSNBC(Mathews and Obermann) and watch a couple hours of Beck's show starting at 5 CT you might just learn a little of American History. 1. Beck is an Independant/Libertarian. If you had hear him castrarate Bush and Cheney you would know that. But, people who broadcast their IQ of 10 to the people on the internet can't be expected to really understand the common man's thinking. I'v been around for over 70 years, voted in every election city, county state federal you name it. Never met a liberal who didn't know more than me and always thought his (philosophy) was more important than mine. Even thogh he was always proven wrong 90% of the time-he in his cocoon of his mind couldn't care less.

[sunflowerpipes]

I think the point about the Koch Brothers is that their companies release toxins into the air to improve their profit margins, They structure their companies so that most of their taxes are sent overseas, They pay their employees as little as possible and cut corners on safety, They regularly violate US law as long as the fines don?t exceed the profit motive. They have hidden their political activities from the public and from the Tea Party itself. They promote studies that will manufacture false results that will save their company money. In short they are exploiting the environment, American law and the American people, sending money abroad and creating a false political and environmental reality.
<a href="www.sunflowerpipes.com">Sunflowerpipes.com</a>

[speedy7201]

To ALL of you LEFTIST Dumbazzes, not that I believe that you care, but DO YOU realize that Obama spent more in 6 month's, then Bush did in 8 year's. With 9/11. with Katrina and ALL of the theft/scam's there, w/ 2 War's!!!!!
Obama keep's blaming Bush for the situation we are in. Barney Frank, a DEMOCRAT, was the one 4 month's before the housing market crash, that came on TV and assured everyone that Fannie May and Freddie were TIGHT, No PROBLEM;s at ALL. PLEASE Invest and 4 month's later it crashed and NOW everyone want's to blame Bush.
Please, Don't get me wrong. I blame Bush for many of the problem's we have, but the problem's the country has financially right now, can and should be put on Barney Frank.
No, we should have never went to Iraq, however, Iraq did not cause the mess we are in. BF did.

[iamproteus]

Just keep laying your ignorance out there for all to see, Speedy. We will try to bear the embarrassment we feel for you. Maybe it would help if you would find a source of information that doesn't have FOX or Beck or Limbaugh in it's name.

[speedy7201]

To iamproteus August 30- Trust when I state that my ONLY ignorance, is believing that ANY of you Left winger's would have the Common Sense to even understand what I am saying.
Look, I have NO idea what to tell you because I KNOW that YOU will keep believing what you DO NOT see on any other network, hmmmm. Is that something like hiding YOUR gead in the sand so that YOU do NOT have to learn the mistake's of your party. Look, I watch AKK of the network's, just so that I can see what is happening and WHO is reporting it. IF, YOU are dense enough, with the trouble's that we have and the debt the we are in, to ONLY watch Liberal network's, that's fine with me. Tha just show's me truly how closed minded you are about learning the political state that we are in. Also, kust like when I watch the liberal network's, I research anything and everything they report, but I ALSO do the same for Fox New's. My point, IF you are TRULY interested in the state our country is in, WATCH EVERYTHING that is reported and then do your owwn research. However, just by your comment, I see that you are NOT educated enough to do that. So please, just grab the coat tale's, the are going to lead you into oblivion.
Me ignorant, you are the one that has shown YOUR ignorance.

[speedy7201]

Johnbrownbh- Just making statement's like that, w/o even listening to or watching his program, just show's how big of a fool you are, and a leftist fool at that.
If ANY of you had ANY common sense, you would at the VERY least understand what you are talking about. And by YOUR statement's, I already know that you have not watched more then 2 minute's of Glenn Beck's show.
His show is PROBABLY the MOST sensible show for politic's today. You CANNOT learn the truth watching ABC,NBC,CBS,MSNBS or CNN today. They DO NOT and WILL NOT report any negative's related to Obama. And honestly, to me that IS SO SAD.
I am 51 y/o and until the past few year's was it that I finally realized how BIASED reporter's and NETWORK'S really are. I HONESTLY grew up believing that NO MATTER what, our New's station's, would give US, the PEOPLE, the real new's as they knew it.
I felt like such a ******* once I realized that just IS NOT true. IF, you want the truth concerning a democrat or any possibly negative story concerning a democrat, You CANNOT count on the above mentioned station's to receive TRUE and FAIR New's.
Sadly, the upper echeleon of the democratic party have reported that Fox new's is totally conservative and that IS NOT the TRUTH.
Fox New's IS the ONLY real New's station on air today, The ONLY REAL Reporter's work for Fox New's.
Fox New's is the ONLY station that will dog a Republican, however, they WILL ALSO dog a Democrat, SORRY!!!!!!
Sadly, YOU Dumbazzes DO NOT want to know the truth. Which as far as what I know, mean's that MORE then likely, YOU are one of the one's living OFF of the tax payer money and afraid of losing it. I say that from experience. Every friend of mine tha is a democrat, is doing what???? What DO YOU think????? EVERYONE of them that I know, I dippng in the til and afraid of losing their FREEBIE'S and I have let everyone of them, that know how sad I feel that it is, to be THEM. b/c I am not talking about people that ARE NOT capable of working or earning more money, EACH one is but Chose's NOT to.
So Please, get a life, Get a Job would be even better.

[iamproteus]

51 years old and still an idiot. Is there NO hope for you? It doesn't look likely. My condolences. So sad. Too bad.

[speedy7201]

iamproteus - I would match what FEW wit's YOU have any day. At 51, I would feel regenerated, you poor little idiot. After matching wit's with YOU, I could probably take on another 100 Liberal's just like you and still not be tired, mentally or physically. It would seem like going into a boxing match w/ a 2 y/o, except in your case, 2 y/o diaper's would not fit, they would be to large.

[longdrycreek]

Chris is afraid the truth of the Nation's decline will get out. He is the same fellow who said Friday that the so-called Bush tax cuts benefitted only 2% of taxpayer. No so. Though modest, because of our pensions, the tax cuts benefitted my wife and me.
Chris is a Maryland schrill in the category of Bumbling Joe Biden. Apparently to win an election with Chris in charge, one has to be ignorant.
Democrats do not have a lock on ignorant but there most ignorant rise to leadership postions: Nancy P, Stony Hoyer, Chris, etc. And the Repubicans have some who find it hard to get in and out of the rain, too.

[akcoyote]

by redfish1911 August 28, 2010 4:54 PM EDT
Forgot to mention Beck has to wear a bullet proof vest, Obama doesn't.
==================================
That's because LIBERALS are VIOLENT, conservatives aren't.

[iamproteus]

akcoyote......you cons are are SO FUNNY!! You would be hilarious if you weren't so dangerous.

[speedy7201]

iamproteus- what is sad, is that you talk about Con's being so dangerour and violent, however, you cannot make reference to ANY con's violence. However, I can send you probably a hundred stories or the reverse.
However, read into that what you want. B/c I will tell you here and now. Overall, we ARE NOT violent, UNTIL pushed to our limit. We, just like anyone else, can ONLY take so much BEFORE we bite. Trust when I say, that we ARE NOT poodle's like Liberal's, WE are Pit Bull's. It will be the worst bite in the azz YOU have EVER had, and Yes, I said bite in the azz, so play your little school boy game's with that ok.

[Heathergreeneyes]

And rallies Democrtas hold are what?

[thebob-bob]

Just because my head exploded when a Black man was elected the POTUS doesn't mean I'm a racist!
Just because I believe that Obama is a Muslim who wasn't born in America doesn't mean I'm a bigot!
Just because I believe everything I see on FOX doesn't mean I'm a total idiot!

It just means I'm still a Republican.