Reviews for Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government

The average rating for Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government based on 2 reviews is 1.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-01-31 00:00:00 Susan Glatczak I'll avoid beginning this review with a silly pun like "the only real idiot is Beck" or something like that because he clearly is not an idiot, but I will begin with a joke I heard in one of my Finance classes back in college. The premise of Beck's book is how to argue with idiots. His answer to this is -use the facts, here is the problem with that. A man is interviewing some people for a job and asking a basic question, "what is 2 + 2" the Statistician interviewing for the job says "Well, 2 + 2 could be anywhere from 3.75 to 4.25 with a standard deviation of .25" The financier interviewing for the job says, "Well, it depends on inflation, and what you are rounding closest to, but you could round to the nearest 5, so I'd say $5.00". The accountant who is interviewing walks in and says, "What is 2+2, well, what do you want it to be?" My point is that facts, even the most basic, can mean ANYTHING! It's people's interpretations of said facts that matter. And no one skews the facts better than Glenn Beck. For example, in chapter 2 he rales against Congress women Carolyn McCarthy for not knowing what a "barrel shroud" on a gun was but fails to mention anywhere in the book that what she really targets is what is called the "gun show loophole" a gap in the law that allows vendors at gun shows to sell assault weapons and explosives without background checks, and to people on the federal watch list! So currently people who are deemed unsafe to fly on our planes can now walk into a gun show and purchase an assault weapon, thank you Glenn Beck, thank you NRA. Your gun fetishism mystifies me. Another one-sided "fact" he gives is in Chapter 1 on Capitalism. He ever so loosely gives an explanation of "trickle-down" economics in a metaphor of snow at the top of a mountain and I think I am supposed to be the poor villager lucky enough to "bathe in the fresh water" from wealthy, so give all the tax breaks to the rich I think was his point, I'm not quite sure? But, no explanation of trickle-up economics. But, that's o.k., I took a year of Econ in college, enough to know that his version of trickle-down is WAY OFF. But aside from the content of Becks book the bigger problem I have with him is his tone. He is hostile, condescending, divisive, and snarky. I enjoy a good conservative commentator as much an the next guy, I like George F Will and several writers for TIME Magazine, but Beck is just way over the line of civility. By the way, I'll probably have to erase this post because I fully expect to get hate responses because of it. He has a cult like following.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-10-29 00:00:00 Sheila R Desranleau Book on CD read by the author, Steve (Stu) Bergiere, and Pat Gray 1* I'd never heard of Glenn Beck, but apparently, he has a popular radio show. Now that I've heard of him, I'll be sure to never listen to his show. My major problem with this was that, while Beck may have some coherent and well-researched responses to many issues, he chose to over-exaggerate the opposing viewpoint - i.e. calling anyone who voices an opposing viewpoint an idiot. In some cases he didn't even argue the point. Painting the opposition with such a wide brush just reduces the effectiveness of his arguments rather than strengthen them. Beck voices the audio along with two talented performers. However, I was really irritated with the "voice" of the "idiots" and wished I could speed up the delivery. I wound up reading the last two chapters in text format. I'd give the audio ZERO stars.