Rachel v. Glenn

Glenn Beck

Glenn Beck was born in February, 1964 in Everett, Washington. His parents, William and Mary, lived in Mountlake Terrace, Washington at the time of Beck's birth[3] and sometime later moved their family to the Skagit County town of Mount Vernon, Washington.[4] There, his parents owned and operated City Bakery in downtown Mount Vernon.[5] Beck was raised as a Roman Catholic and attended Mount Vernon's private Immaculate Conception Catholic school. At 13, Beck won a contest that landed him his first broadcast gig as a deejay for his hometown radio station, KBRC.[6]

Beck's parents were divorced in 1977 and the 13 year-old Beck moved with his mother to Sumner, Washington, attending school in Puyallup. In 1979, his mother died in a boating accident in Puget Sound waters, just west of Tacoma. The man who had taken her fishing also drowned in the boating incident. A Tacoma police report filed after the drowning stated that Mary Beck "appeared to be a classic drowning victim".[7] A Coast Guard investigator, referencing Mary's heart and psychiatric conditions, speculated she could have either fallen or jumped overboard.[7]

After his mother's death, Beck and his older sister moved to their father’s home in Bellingham,[6] where Beck graduated from Sehome High School in 1982.[8] In the aftermath of his mother's death and subsequent suicide of his stepbrother, Beck has said he used "Dr. Jack Daniel's" to cope. At 18, following high-school graduation, Beck relocated to Provo, Utah and worked at radio station KAYK, but stayed in Utah for only six months. Feeling he "didn't fit in", Beck left Utah,[9] taking a job at Washington D.C.'s WPGC in February, 1983.[10]

It was while working at WPGC that Beck met his first wife, Claire.[11] The couple married and subsequently had two daughters, Mary and Hannah; daughter Mary was born in 1988 with cerebral palsy, the result of a series of strokes at birth.[11] The couple divorced in 1994 amid Beck's struggles with substance abuse. Along with being a recovering alcoholic and drug addict[12], Beck has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.[13] He cites the help of Alcoholics Anonymous in his sobriety and attended his first AA meeting in November 1994, the month he states he stopped drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana.[14]

In 1996, while working for a New Haven-area radio station, Beck was admitted to Yale University through a special program for non-traditional students. One of his recommendations for admittance came from Senator Joe Lieberman. Beck took one theology class, "Early Christology," and then dropped out.[14][15]

In 1999, Beck married his second wife, Tania.[14] They joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in October 1999, partly at the urging of his daughter Mary.[16][17] The couple have two children, Raphe and Cheyenne, and currently live in New Canaan, Connecticut.

Rachel Maddow


Maddow was born in Castro Valley, California to Robert B. "Bob" Maddow, a former Air Force captain and an attorney for the East Bay Municipal Utility District, and Elaine Maddow (née Gosse), a school program administrator from Newfoundland, Canada.[7][8][9] She has one older brother, David. Maddow was raised a strict Roman Catholic in a community that her mother has described as "very conservative."[10][11] Maddow always excelled in academics and athletics. Referencing John Hughes films, she describes herself in high school as "a cross between the jock and the antisocial girl."[11]

A graduate of Castro Valley High School in Castro Valley, California, Maddow earned a degree in public policy from Stanford University in 1994.[12] At graduation she was awarded the John Gardner Fellowship. She was also the recipient of a Rhodes Scholarship and began her postgraduate study in 1995 at Lincoln College, Oxford. In 2001, she completed her Doctor of Philosophy degree (styled a DPhil) in politics from the University of Oxford.[13] Her doctoral thesis is titled HIV/AIDS and Health Care Reform in British and American Prisons. She was the first openly gay American to win a Rhodes scholarship.[14][15]

Okay, so I ask of ye, which of these people do you think has the better perspective on what's better for us as a society? The Rhodes Scholar or the guy who has worked in radio his entire adult life?