Rev. Wright: 'Paranoid... madman... more dangerous' (than Holocaust Museum shooter)

Keith Ablow, M.D., 47, is a psychiatrist with a medical degree from Johns Hopkins and clinical practices in New York City and Massachusetts, a New York Times bestselling author, and a frequent guest in the mainstream media.


Recently, Ablow has been appearing during short Q & A segments on Glenn Beck's daily show on the Fox News channel (M-F 5-6 PM ET), discussing events in the news from his perspective as a psychiatrist.

Some of his past appearances have seemed to me to be unusually on the mark, but the one on June 11, 2009 really caught my attention. In a segment that lasted six minutes, Beck and Ablow discussed anti-Semitic statements  made by the alleged Holocaust museum shooter James von Brunn (according to the complaint against von Brunn filed by the U.S. government in federal court on June 11) and the recent interview with President Obama's former minister, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, by David Squires of the Daily Press in Hampton Roads, Virginia in which Wright made his "them Jews" comment.

The transcript of the opening part of the June 11 Beck broadcast is online here, and the Beck-Ablow segment starts about two-thirds of the way down the page. A streaming video of the segment is currently posted at this URL.

From the transcript (I have made minor corrections based on a comparison with the actual video):

GLENN BECK: All right. Listen to this quote: "Them Jews ain't going to let him talk to me." Are those the words of the Holocaust Museum shooter or President Obama's former reverend, Jeremiah Wright? Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, the pot is boiling when it comes to hate in America. I thought all of this was supposed to be -- I thought we were supposed to be living in a Disney movie where all the animals were talking to each other now.

The words of Reverend Wright to the actions of yesterday's Holocaust Museum gunman, things are starting to bubble. It's happening more and more.

Psychiatrist and FOX News contributor, Dr. Keith Ablow, is here with us now.

Keith, I want to -- I want to show you two sets of words here.

First, this is the gunman yesterday, the Holocaust -- this is one thing he said at the Holocaust Museum [sic; a caption on the screen above the words said "James von Brunn's Notebook"]. He said, "The Holocaust is a lie. Obama was created by the Jews. Obama does what his Jew owners tell him to do. Jews captured America's money. Jews control the mass media."

OK, that's the killer yesterday.

Here's what Jeremiah Wright said this weekend. This is the pastor of or former pastor of Barack Obama. "Them Jews ain't going to let him talk to me. I told my baby daughter, he'll talk to me in five years when he's a lame duck, or in eight years when he's out of office."

What -- I know one killed and the other didn't, but what is the difference here? How do we know who's a danger and who's not?

DR. KEITH ABLOW, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I was just going there, Glenn. You usually lead me where I need to go.

And the more dangerous person is the reverend, because the shooter, after all, ends up being taken down by police, he's been arrested once before. He's not the brightest guy in the world. He tried to enter. . .

BECK: He killed somebody.

ABLOW: . . .and take people captive at the Federal Reserve years ago and got arrested before he could do that, but he's obvious. He's out to shoot somebody. That's a terrible thing, by the way. It's awful. Think of the victims and their families.

But when you deal with the Reverend Wright, you're dealing with somebody who has just as much violence in his heart, but is cagier, right? He is just as impaired and paranoid.

BECK: Hang on just a second.

ABLOW: But he's cagier.

BECK: Keith, I don't think he's more dangerous. I think the only thing that's changed here is we paid attention to one of these guys and we dismissed the other. See, nobody dismissed -- if somebody says, you know, "the Holocaust is a lie, Obama was created by the Jews." Nobody listens to that person and takes them -- nobody listens to that. Only crazy people listen to that.

But Obama. . .

ABLOW: That's the problem.

BECK: Reverend Wright, everybody -- nobody is like, Oh, no big deal.

ABLOW: You know, and I think that's the problem. Nobody listens except those people who have the desire to project their hatred, who have experiences in life that perhaps have broken them. They don't want to deal those experiences. They'd rather hate a whole group of people.

And you can fill a congregation with those people. You can fill a church. Unfortunately, you can. It's just the nature of that congregation or church.

Reverend Wright ought to be called what he is, right? I recognize it as a psychiatrist. He has fixed and false beliefs, we call those delusions. He's paranoid, and people are following him.

BECK: OK.

ABLOW: And that's a pretty dangerous situation, as I see it.

BECK: All right. Keith, here's the thing, because I think we are like -- we're zombies. I don't know what it is about us right now as a nation. I think it's -- you know, you don't want to believe the worst, you know? You just don't want to believe it.

But let me -- let me take you here. Nobody wanted to believe that the people who are avowed Marxists in Obama's life could influence him in any way. I mean, "he's not a Marxist."

Look where we're headed. We are headed toward -- we've got czars coming out the nose. We've got companies being controlled. We've got pay czars coming. We've got socialized health care. We're lucky to get out of this as France.

Nobody wanted to admit that. Now we've got hatred -- just vile, vile anti-Semitic hatred happening all over the world; and a president who is -- you're not really sure where he is on the whole Israel thing. And a guy who married him, baptized his children -- they hung out together saying these things. What conclusions should we draw?

ABLOW: The conclusion we should draw is that we need a real reality check. We need a 9/12 mentality, "Dr." Beck, that would encourage us to look to our own intuition and to what we know and to the facts, and take the conclusions as they come.

BECK: So -

ABLOW: How does someone -- look, he's the president of the United States -- but how does someone stay in a congregation run by a madman for years. . .

BECK: How do I -

ABLOW: . . .and then be president? I don't know.

BECK:  I'm with you on this. I'm with you on this, don't get me wrong.

Let me ask you this, Keith. It's really not about the president anymore. It's about us. How do we wake people up? How do we get people. . .

ABLOW: Yes.

BECK: . . .out of their coma and say, "What are you doing, stop, just please, look at common sense facts here?"

ABLOW: Look, I think it's a global thing. We have to encourage one individual at a time to say go to the facts and don't be afraid. Don't be afraid of the pain that might be involved in taking the country back to where it needs to be, and don't be lulled into a false sense of security.

It's the same thing I'd tell somebody who's in a family in which they are being abused and told that they are loved. Don't believe it. It doesn't feel like love, does it?

Believe your intuitions. Take your own counsel. And now, you have to separate yourself from the mother ship and look at it askance.

BECK: OK. Thank you very much, Keith. I appreciate it.

ABLOW: Thanks, Glenn.

BECK: You know, America, we have to stop being afraid. I don't care. I don't care what they call me. You don't care what they call you, either.

You know the truth. You know the truth. Just stand up for what you believe, and you know what? The truth shall set you free.

On Friday, June 12, 2009, a segment on the primetime ABC News program 20/20 will feature Glenn Beck, reported by John Stossel.
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