Countering the 'Glenn Beck Effect'

April 12, 2010 -- Fox News host Glenn Beck has been targeting liberals for years but labor unions and other progressive groups are beginning to fight back.

"We are working to counter the Glenn Beck effect and turn anger into action for real change," said AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka during a Wednesday speech at Harvard University.

Trumka's speech, which was delivered to Harvard's Institute of Politics, suggested that Beck was one of the forces in the country who is working to "convert justifiable anger about an economy that only seems to work for a few of us into racist and homophobic hate and violence directed at our President and heroes like Congressman John Lewis."

The head of the AFL-CIO is not alone in trying to counter Beck.

Last month, the 2.2-million member Service Employees International Union began pressuring Beck's advertisers to "stop supporting his dangerous brand of crazy."

"Beck's irresponsible comparisons of progressive leaders to Stalin, Mao and Nazi Germany cannot be dismissed as merely silly or stupid," wrote SEIU Director of Strategic Affairs Michelle Ringuette in an e-mail to the union's supporters. "This kind of rhetoric can instigate unbalanced individuals into committing rash and violent acts. And if Fox News wants to continue giving him a platform to spread hate, they should not profit from it."

The SEIU e-mail asked its supporters to add their names to the letter being sent to Beck's advertisers.

Media Matters for America, a liberal media watchdog group, also is applying pressure to Fox News.

On Thursday, after the mother of Gregory Giusti -- the man arrested for allegedly threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's, D-Calif., life over health care reform -- said that Fox News was a factor in her son's alleged actions, Eric Burns, the president of Media Matters, issued a statement denouncing that the tactics of Fox News.

"The violent language and scare tactics we see on Fox News every day have real consequences," Burns said. "This is a network that ran a 14-month campaign against health care reform, which left their viewers confused and angry. The question is, now that one of those viewers has allegedly threatened Speaker Pelosi's life over health care reform, is Fox News going to do anything about it?"