CNN Anchor Accuses Glenn Beck of 'Ugly History' of Comparing Obama to Satan...Using Selectively-Edited Sound Bites

Glenn Beck on Wednesday responded to CNN’s Erin Burnett’s charge that he has an “ugly history” of comparing President Obama to Satan, arguing that her claim relies solely on selectively edited sound bites. And Beck has the evidence to prove it.

“Do I really think that he is Satan?” he asked on Wednesday. “Absolutely not.”

Beck said that he wasn’t offended by the CNN segment, which was prompted by a lighthearted Tweet he sent out on Sunday:

Twitter.

Rather, Beck said he merely wants CNN to go on the record stating that this is the type of journalism that it wants to be known for.

“I don't want an apology. Here's what I want. I want a statement from CNN that says this is the kind of journalism that we believe is the future for CNN,” Beck said “I want them to go on the record. Is this their style of journalism?”

Beck and crew played the beginning of Burnett’s “Beck Thinks Obama Is Satan” segment.

“Beck took to Twitter again and not to clarify. He said this: ‘Media, relax. Actor has been in similar roles before,” Burnett can be heard saying.

"Funny. Nothing more. For different reasons The Bible is one of my fav shows. Keep watching," she continued, quoting Beck. "Actor has been in similar roles before. In the world of Glenn Beck, that means he's definitely a ringer for the president.”

Beck explained what he meant:

“Do we ‑‑ who is going to play Satan?  Do we have anybody to play Satan? Well, we've got a lot of people. This guy played, this guy played, this guy has played him like six times, he's really good in ‑‑ he's really spooky looking."

"Okay, let me ‑‑ go ahead.  Bring him on in."

That's what that means.

[…]

Nobody went out in the production team and said, "Who can we get to look just like the president?"

TheBlaze TV crew continued, playing all of Burnett’s montage of Beck's supposed "ugly history" of comparing President Obama to Satan – and they responded to each and every sound bite.

First, Burnett played clip of Beck saying, “Let me play devil's advocate, and may mean that literally, and argue for the president here.”

“That's clearly a joke,” Beck argued.

Next, Burnett played ​a whole flurry of Beck quotes [in order]:

• "Some of the book of Revelation crazies out there actually believe that Barack Obama is the Antichrist."
• "Is it possible that Barack Obama is the Antichrist?"
• "There are people and they said this about Bill Clinton, that actually believe he might be the Antichrist."
• "The government is acting in the role of Lucifer!"
• "Odds that Barack Obama is the Antichrist?"

“This is really incredible because first of all, all of these clips are from their archives. These are not ‑‑ these are their archived clips from my show that I was doing on CNN five years ago,” Beck joked on Wednesday.

“So to get these clips, they went to their archives. So they have full transcripts. They know exactly what it is.

“They also can just look through in my personnel file and see if I was ever, had a problem calling him the Antichrist, ever. Because I mean, if it was such a problem, you'd think CNN, who's now reporting on the problem, would have written me up for ‘the problem,” he added.

Now it’s important to note that the entire purpose of the Burnett segment was to prove that Beck supposedly has a troubling history of comparing the president to Satan.

But let's look at some of the sound bites in context, shall we?

1. "There are people, and they said this about Bill Clinton, that actually believe he might be the Antichrist."

“This is an interview ... with John Hagee who, at the time, was being accused of thinking the president was the Antichrist and they were trying to tie him to John McCain,” Stu Burguiere explained.

“The reason why I talked about this story,” Beck said, “is because this story was out that John McCain was trying to say that maybe he's the Antichrist and everything else. And so I had John Hagee on to answer it.”

Beck and crew played the full audio clip:

Let me ask you, because I got ‑‑ I get so much e‑mail on this and I think a lot of people do, and I've only got a couple of seconds. And they say, "Glenn, you in the media, you've got to wake up!  Barack Obama's making people faint and cry and everything else and he's drawing people in and..." there are people, and they said this about Bill Clinton, that actually believe he might be the Antichrist.

“No chance,” John Hagee responded to Beck the time, showing that the two clearly dismissed the idea as ludicrous.

2. “Odds that Barack Obama is the Antichrist.”

“You might recognize that as the direct next sentence that you said in the Hagee interview," Burguiere notes. "So what they did there is they took the same interview two consecutive sentences."

Yes, Burnett’s production team actually split a video in two to further the narrative that Beck has long and “ugly history” of obsessing over President Obama and Satan.

“If I'm not mistaken, they are two separate camera shots, too. So it looks like a different time.  But if you go back and look at it, you'll see I'm wearing the same tie and everything else because it's the next sentence, but they ‑‑ and this is why I say this is propaganda stuff,” Beck said.

“This is totally smear‑and‑slander. They are opening up and making it appear as something that it is absolutely not," he added.

3. “Some of the book of Revelation crazies out there actually believe that Barack Obama is the Antichrist.”

Here’s the full context:

I was speaking with evangelical pastor John Hagee, we were headed into a break and I asked the self‑professed end‑of‑days expert about the fact that some of the Book of Revelation crazies out there actually believe that Barack Obama is the Antichrist.

“I'm not bringing it up in a separate deal. I am relating the story the very next day,” Beck said on Wednesday.

“When news follows a story, and that's what this was at the time. This was a news story. It was in the news cycle, and CNN was reporting on it. CNN, not my show.

"I was on CNN Headline, but CNN proper was also reporting on this story. So the next day I'm recapping, I talked about it, and they make it look like again a separate time I'm bringing it up,” he explained.

Stu breaks it down:

• Clip 1 is a sentence about an interview where you're asking somebody about this.
• Clip 2 is the next sentence in that where they split it to make it look like they had more.
• Clip 3 is the next day. You're reviewing the same clip of Clip 1 and Clip 2. So they have three clips of this supposed pattern of behavior that are all the same exact interview.

Beck rounded out the debunking session with a little sympathy for Burnett.

“Erin, I know what it’s like to be on the verge of being fired,” he said.

“I know what it’s like to have horrible ratings,” adding that “I think your best ratings were my worst ratings.”

Watch via TheBlaze TV:

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Featured image Getty Images.