This week, Glenn Beck displayed both his most brilliant and his most pathetic qualities. The brilliant is the most important by far, but we must also note the pathetic (which he can easily correct, but never does).

Today’s show was a must-watch. If you didn’t see it, watch or tape the late night re-run.

THE PATHETIC (FOUNDERS’ MISQUOTATIONS)
I seem to be the only person who knows this (I’m a quotations scholar and a contributor to the Yale Book of Quotations), but must Glenn Beck continue to misquote every founder of our American Republic, from George Washington to Thomas Jefferson to (now) Sam Adams?

I tried to offer my services to Glenn Beck (who made $32 million last year) for free last Thanksgiving. There was no response. Twitter Glenn Beck. Fake quotes must never be used.

For example, Glenn Beck will tell you that George Washington said “It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible.” Washington never said it. The first Google search result is a site: Religious quotes that never were.

Guest host and “American Revival” lecturer Judge Andrew Andrew Napolitano always recites this fake Thomas Jefferson quote: “When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.” Jefferson never said it. John Basil Barnhill first said it in the 1910s. The Judge will never get this one right.

Friday’s show is “Founders’ Friday,” profiling Sam Adams (the “Faith” of Beck’s “Hope, Faith and Charity” paintings). Although Beck has stopped putting bogus daily quotations on the blackboard, he put this on his twitter and also at the end of yesterday’s tv show, telling everyone to twitter the quotation their friends:

“The public cannot be too curious concerning the characters of public men.” Samuel Adams, learn more this Founding Father’s Friday
8:53 AM Apr 28th via web

Yes, Sam Adams did write this is a letter to James Warren on November 4, 1775. It was IN QUOTES.

Why the quotes? Because Sam Adams was quoting directly from the popular Political DIsquisitions by James Burgh. Sam Adams did not take credit for the quotation. If we’re going to go this route, I’ll take credit for some great passages from Shakespeare that I may use from time to time.

The amateurism with quotations is maddening. Google takes just a few seconds. I volunteer my services for free. Why does Beck continue to screw up?

If he screws up things this simple, what else is he screwing up?

THE BRILLIANT (CAP & TRADE SCAM)
Today’s Glenn Beck show was brilliant, the Obama connect-the-dots scandal that comes together beautifully. It’s stuff you won’t see almost anywhere else. Beck’s dramatics worked perfectly. (White House phone, won’t you ring and tell me where I’m wrong?) It’s almost enough to make you forget all the other shows that repeat the same material over and over.

We all know that Cap & Trade is a scam. We know it won’t “save the planet.” We know that it’s all about adding some green police and enriching a select few (Al Gore, laugh all the way to the bank).

I live in Round Rock (a suburb of Austin). Austin (a blue city in red Texas) has incredibly expensive recycling and energy contracts. You can’t sell your house until the green police give the OK. It’s almost ground zero for crazy Cap & Trade, but perhaps I’ll discuss “Keep Austin Weird” at another time. See the brand new book, Emerald Cities: Urban Sustainability and Economic Development by Joan Fitzgerald.

Beck first exposed the Chicago Climate Exchange. A founder hoped that the CCX could be a ten trillion dollar business. The CCX was started with the help of Barack Obama and Valerie Jarrett and is partly owned by Goldman Sachs. Franklin Raines (wh