Here’s something you don’t see every day.
Conservative radio host Glenn Beck came to Melissa Harris-Perry’s defense on Monday—saying that she didn’t do anything bad and he didn’t believe her to be a bad person—in response to the flak the MSNBC host has been getting over comments made on her show last week. During the segment, she and some panelists joked about the latest Romney family photo, in which Mitt Romney’s adopted African-American grandchild, Kieran, sits on the former presidential candidate's knee. After some outcry, Perry apologized via Twitter before again expressing her tearful regret on a subsequent show.
"I don’t know Melissa Harris-Perry, but I don’t believe that she’s a bad person. I disagree with her on everything, but I don’t believe, I’ve never gotten the impression, she’s just a bad human being," Beck said on his show before he launched into a letter he had written for Harris-Perry.
In his letter, Beck expressed confusion over why she had to apologize. "She apologizes for what? It was a break with comedians. Yes, it wasn’t nice; yes, it was hurtful and divisive, if that was the intent. But it clearly was not. There are many dishonest, arrogant and destructive people on MSNBC, but I really don’t think that this by any means was an example of a person like that," Beck read. "When I saw her apologize on air, I knew it was real, and I have been there. I don’t apologize for my opinion or my political views. No one should be forced to."
Beck calls out conservatives for engaging in the "worst kind of political destruction" in their attacks of Perry.
"Going after children, as she said, is not fair game. But that wasn’t her intent. I truly believe that our side now is refusing to see her for who she is. And we’re engaging now in the worst kind of political destruction," he said. "I want her to know that while we may and should meet on the battlefield of ideas, the politics of destruction has got to stop. I fear this time our side sees blood in the water and is going after her and MSNBC. It’s more wrong than anything she said here, especially since their intent is to hurt and destroy and hers was not … She needs to know that there are people that don’t hate her and do have reason.
"We do have a right to speak our mind; we do have the right to tell a joke. But as citizens, as a free society, we also must recognize that because we share those rights with a very diverse society, we are going to hear many bad jokes, many crazy opinions and many wrong theories. We need to celebrate the fact and recognize that those theories, those crazy opinions and those stumbles will make us stronger as individuals," Beck continued. "She’s wrong on many things, but I don’t believe she’s a bad person, and even the best of us screw up. And in the grand scheme of things, if this is her big screwup, she’s way ahead of me as a human being."