‘I love St. George’: Talk radio’s Glenn Beck pays a visit to Canyon Media

ST. GEORGE — Glenn Beck, one of America’s best known conservative talk radio personalities, paid a visit to the Canyon Media studios in St. George Friday prior to attending a rally against human trafficking held later that day.

Talk radio host Glenn Beck pays a visit to Canyon Media while visiting St. George and hosted his show, The Glenn Beck Program, from the St. George News KZNU studio, St. George, Utah, July 30, 2021 | Photo by Mori Kessler, St. George News

While visiting Canyon Media, Beck was interviewed by fellow talk radio host Kate Dalley in the KZNU St. George News Radio studio, During the interview, Beck shared his thoughts on various topics including St. George, former President Donald Trump, what part of America history he felt the country hasn’t been able to overcome, as well as his thoughts on belief and certainty.

Beck flew into town for the day to headline a World Day Against Human Tracking event held in St. George with Tim Ballard, the founder of Operation Underground Railroad. The group works undercover to save child victims of human trafficking and aid law agencies in bringing traffickers to justice.

Prior to joining the event that afternoon, Beck spent the morning at Canyon Media where he aired his radio show, the Glenn Beck Program, from the St. George News Radio studio. Beck’s program is carried on KZNU Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. on 1450 AM and 93.1 FM.

Soon after Dalley, who hosts the Kate Dalley Show from St. George through the KZNU studio, sat down with Beck for an 18-minute long interview. Though Dalley’s program was previously carried on Beck’s Blaze radio network for over two years, it was the first time the two had met in person.

The Kate Dalley Show airs from 2-5 p.m. Monday through Friday on KZNU.

What follows are highlights from Dalley’s interview with Beck.

Thoughts on St. George

Talk radio host Glenn Beck spoke with fellow talk show host Kate Dalley during an interview for The Kate Dalley Show. Beck was paying a visit to the Canyon Media studios at the time while visiting St. George for an anti-human trafficking rally set to take place later that day, St. George, Utah, July 30, 2021 | Photo by Mori Kessler, St. George News

“I love St. George. I fear for St. George,” Beck said, adding he worries that some outside elements moving into the city could turn “a special place” into a nightmare as they had with places like Vail, Colorado and Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

“The first time we were here, my wife and I walked downtown,” he said. “There’s such a great feel and bones to this place – and it’s exactly what Californians do – they come in and wreck it.”

What time in American history has the country not quite been able to get past?

“Obviously slavery,” Beck said initially. He also mentioned the Trail of Tears, then looked to the 1830s with President Andrew Jackson and his promotion of Manifest Destiny.

Before Jackson’s election, he said America’s founders fostered a belief in divine providence – that God would open doors for America and its people if they simply lived their lives and let God be on their side. This changed under Jackson, he said.

Manifest Destiny under Jackson came with the belief and justification that, because God put them there, it meant it was their divine right to expand west and take the land they came across for their own.

“God sent me here (and) I have the right from God to take this land,” Beck said as he described his view of Manifest Destiny. “That’s not America.”

At that point – around 1830 – is when Beck said the American founders would look if given the chance and ask, “When did America end?”

Donald Trump

Talk radio host Glenn Beck pays a visit to Canyon Media while visiting St. George, Utah, July 30, 2021 | Photo by Mori Kessler, St. George News

Though initially not a supporter of Trump – and vocal about that fact early on – Beck said he was wrong about the former president when it came to his policies.

“I was wrong,” he said, yet also noted some reservation about how Trump acted at times. “He just kept shooting himself in the foot over and over again – but that is who he is to his core. I don’t think he can live without chaos. I think he performs his best in chaos and that’s a little scary at times.”

Despite Trump’s behavior, Beck said the former president delivered on the majority of his promises. No other president that he recalls – including President Joe Biden, he said – has done that.

How will this era be seen in history?

“This will be remembered, when historians are free to write the truth- and actually go back and examine what happened – this will be known as an age of delusion, an age of lies, and the biggest heist in all of human history,” Beck said.

Cognitive dissonance – beware of certainty

Dalley appeared to surprise Beck when she asked him if he had cognitive dissonance. Though Beck said he felt he didn’t, the conversation led to the talk show host recalling how he approached his personal beliefs. He also said there is a need to never be too certain of anything, because there was still a lot that he, and people in general, do not know or understand.

Talk show radio host Glenn Beck paid a the Canyon Media studios while visiting St. George for an event later that day. While at Canyon Media, he spoke to some of the employees, including a man whose son was a fan. Upon learning the man’s son had been diagnosed with childhood cancer a few years ago during an earlier conversation, he paused before leaving the studio to ask the man about his son’s current condition, which he was happy to learn was cancer-free, St. George, Utah, July 30, 2021 | Photo by Mori Kessler, St. George News

Over 30 years ago, Beck said he took what he thought he believed, wrote it all out and reviewed it piece by piece. He soon discovered that he didn’t believe any of it. Instead, his initial beliefs were built on what others had taught him.

“I believed things other people had taught me,” he said. “You don’t own that. You didn’t earn that. You didn’t know that. You know that somebody else knew that and they told you. You don’t know that.”

This resulted in Beck becoming “agnostic of everything,” he said, and it served as a foundation which he used to study what he could and could not believe and eventually come to terms with what he considers to be true and untrue.

“That’s given me a lot of peace. The only thing I think I struggle with is certainty,” Beck said, adding that after all the research he has done, the only thing he is really certain of is that he doesn’t know anything.

Dalley said the only thing she was certain of was God, to which Beck said he wasn’t entirely certain of his knowledge in that regard either.

“I don’t mean to offend peoples’ delicate sensibilities, but if I get up to heaven and God is a space octopus, I’m going to be like, ‘I did not see that one coming,’” he said. “But I have to accept the truth.”

People shouldn’t be so fixed on what they believe and know because there is way more out there than anyone truly understands, he said.

“I can guarantee you, we don’t have God nailed. We probably have him close, maybe. Maybe not at all. But when we face the truth, can you accept the truth?”

Dalley’s interview with Beck can be heard in its entirety here, courtesy of The Kate Dalley Show.

 

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2021, all rights reserved.

Free News Delivery by Email

Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? Enter your email below to start!