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Glenn Beck

Is Sharia Law Gaining a Foothold in the U.S.?; America`s Next Top Dead Models

Aired March 27, 2007 - 19:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

GLENN BECK, CNNHN HOST: Tonight, the war against radical Islam heats up overseas and at home. Could Sharia law be gaining a foothold in the U.S.?
And America`s next top dead models? Apparently you can also look beautiful in death.

Plus, Elton John celebrates his 60th birthday in a church. Wait a minute, didn`t Elton John just say that religion should be banned?

Welcome to religion in America. This and more tonight.

Well, tonight, while the rest of the world is focusing on Iran and Great Britain, as they need to, we also need to keep an eye on the homeland. Do you remember those innocent imams who got booted off a plane in Minnesota for reportedly shouting "Allah Ackbar" at the gate area, denouncing America and then changing their seats to the same ones the 9/11 hijackers used?

Well, it turns out they may not be quite as innocent after all. The media is afraid to tell you that, and in a way, so am I, but buckle up, you need to hear it.

Here is "The Point." Tonight, there is an extremist plot afoot here in America to silence dissenting voices. And here is how I got there.

Everybody in the media was so quick to point out that these poor imams were being horribly persecuted for peacefully expressing their freedom of religion at the airport. People were shocked, claiming that the imams were victims of bigotry. One of the imams, Omar Shahin, lashed out at Americans saying, quote, "If you don`t by now know about our prayers, this is a real problem."

The imams filed suit against the airline and, again, the media just ate it up. An anchor on MSNBC even compared them to civil rights icon Rosa Parks.

So Omar and MSNBC, I got news for you, you ain`t no Rosa Parks. You`re not even Bert Parks.

Here is the truth about Omar Shahin. This is the leader of the flying imams. No relation to the flying nuns. He has reportedly helped raise money for at least two charities that have been suspected of supporting terrorism.

For three years, he headed the Islamic Center of Tucson, which one terrorism expert described in "The Washington Post" as quote, "basically the first cell of al Qaeda in the United States.

He and the other five imams are being supported by the Muslim American Society. This is what the "Chicago Tribune" reports, a group that was formed from the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood which preaches, quote, "that governments eventually should be Islamic," end quote.

I don`t know about you, but I`m pretty sure Rosa Parks never said anything like that. To me, the most chilling part of this story is that you at home are probably hearing this for the first time. And you`re the informed part of America. Everybody else is getting their news from "The Daily Show" or they think the news is who got kicked off of "American Idol" this week.

The media has not told you the truth. I believe it`s several reasons. Apathy, ignorance, bias and fear. They are intimidated by some of these Muslim organizations and as a result, you are not getting the complete story.

The imams are trying to intimidate the airlines and persuade you, the passengers, to not notice things that could be dangerous or out of the ordinary.

Meanwhile, Sharia law is being shoved down the throats of Muslims here in America. You don`t believe me? You ask the Somali community in Minnesota. This is a dangerous combination. And unless bigger personalities than I start paying attention to this on TV, we won`t be worried about the separation of church and state anymore, we`ll be worried about the separation of mosque and state.

So, here`s what I know tonight. There are forces at work, not just in Tehran, but in Dearborn, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Norman, Oklahoma, Washington, DC, that are aggressively trying to get people to bury the truth.

Listen to me, America. No matter how afraid you are, Muslim and non- Muslim, you must speak out before it`s too late.

Here is what I don`t know. If what I`m saying is true, how come I`m only reading about it, about this imam in a story that was buried in the weekend edition of the "Wall Street Journal"?

Joining me now is Katherine Kersten, she is from the "Minneapolis Star-Tribune," who wrote the "Wall Street Journal" piece and Zuhdi Jasser. He is the president of the American-Islamic Forum for Democracy.

Katherine, let`s start with you. You believe Minnesota is becoming a window on America`s future that looks a lot like Europe. How did you get there?

KATHERINE KERSTEN, MINNEAPOLIS: That`s correct. Well, here, since 2001, we have had 5,000 instances of Muslim cab drivers at the Minneapolis- St. Paul Airport refusing to transport passengers carrying alcohol.

One woman was denied passage five times in a row before -- by cab drivers before she finally found someone who would tote her home. We have cab drivers .

BECK: Now are these people that are drunk or they just have alcohol with them?

KERSTEN: These are folks coming back from Napa Valley, from France, with a bottle of wine in a duty free bag.

BECK: OK.

KERSTEN: We`ve had cab drivers refuse to transport blind people with seeing eye dogs.

BECK: Is it true that the government, the local government said we should put little lights on top to say we`ll take alcohol, we`ll take blind dogs or not?

KERSTEN: That`s right. I should point out too that about three quarters of our cab drivers at the airport here are Somali Muslims. This is a large proportion of the people who drive cabs. There was an attempt by the Metropolitan Airports Commission to solve this problem, to accommodate these folks. And yes, they did suggest a pilot program involving two colors of top lights on cabs who would and who would not transport people with alcohol.

BECK: OK. Zuhdi, let me play devil`s advocate. Why not? Why do you have to be so hateful? Why not just allow people, if they don`t want to carry people with alcohol, they don`t want to carry blind dogs, why not?

ZUHDI JASSER, M.D., AMERICAN ISLAMIC FORUM FOR DEMOCRACY: Well, my perspective is that this is a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam, these are Wahabist Salafist interpretations of people that want to impose their beliefs on others. And I as a Muslim, a pious Muslim, I believe, I practice my faith regularly, I`m devout in my practice, I raise my children to be good Muslims as good Americans.

The reason my parents came here was to escape this type of imposition, this type of coercive force in our society. And that`s not Islam. Islam is a personal, spiritual faith.

BECK: All right. So, Katherine, who is pushing it? Because it`s really being jammed down the throats of the Somali community in Minnesota.

KERSTEN: That`s exactly right. That`s exactly right. From what I can tell, and I`ve interviewed a lot of ordinary Somalis about this and this is not at all a mainstream interpretation in the Somali community here.

BECK: So who is pushing it?

KERSTEN: The Muslim-American Society Minnesota Chapter issued a fatwa, oh gosh, in June of 2006 as I recall, claiming cab drivers who did transport people carrying alcohol were committing sin themselves.

And this is where the problem starts. There are hard-line activists here, very eloquent, highly organized, who are trying to exploit the Somali community for their own purposes.

BECK: OK. So, Zuhdi, you have this, and this creates a two-tier justice system. This is what we`re seeing over in Europe like crazy, a German judge just ruled that a woman couldn`t get divorced because she was Islamic and she was married in Morocco and should have known that in Morocco, according to Sharia law, apparently the way it was interpreted to her, a man has a right to beat a woman. So I`m sorry, the German judge couldn`t do anything and that`s what he ruled.

This is the kind of stuff that`s coming here, isn`t it?

JASSER: Exactly. I`m telling you this as a Muslim in that terrorism as a tactic, the ideology and the end that the terrorists seek is no different than this, which is Islamism, an inculcated process system into our society, whether it is parallel or separate, it doesn`t matter.

We need to fight this, because in order for Muslims to be free, liberated in our faith and America to be protected from that ideology, we cannot allow these types of processes and organizations like the Muslim American Society to seek this type of parallel society that I think is wrong for Muslims and wrong for America.

BECK: Why do you say they`re pushing it, though, Zuhdi? What is their intent? This is pretty .

JASSER: Well, their intent is Islamization. They feel that somehow their faith is their role to push that upon others and they don`t understand that actually religion is abrogated when you force anybody or you impose it on anybody else. So we need to have this debate. This is how we`re going to defeat Islamism is to open up the issue, allow Muslims to debate it publicly and tell the Muslim American Society their fatwa is wrong, there is no such a thing in the Sharia and that our Sharia should stay at home and not be imposed upon others.

BECK: Zuhdi, Katherine, thank you very much.

Now, I want you to watch something here that we found on Iranian TV. This is the real power in Iran. This is the Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Last week he was addressing a crowd in Tehran. Watch the subtitles at the bottom. This is not something you`re going to see on any other network in America.

But as everybody is paying attention to Iran, you need to see this in a segment we call "Missed by the Media."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AYATOLLAH ALI KHAMENEI, IRANIAN RULER: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Nothing better than "God is great, death to America."

Coming up, can the Democrats in Congress avoid the same mistakes that the Republicans made? I`ll ask former House majority leader Tom DeLay.

And Sir Elton John celebrated his 60th birthday party in a cathedral. Just more proof that our country is selling out religion. And I`ll explain that coming up.

Also the TV show "America`s Next Top Model" causing some controversy by posing their models as murder victims. Let me tell you, there`s nothing better for a society than mixing graphic sex and graphic death. Back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Well, Democrats have been in control of Congress for almost four months now and, wow, everything is fixed, isn`t it?

Nothing has changed except that Cindy Sheehan now is a welcomed guest in Washington.

Democrats have failed to pass even their bloodless non-binding resolution against the war and now they`re just playing politics as usually by loading the emergency funding bill with unrealistic timelines and $20 billion, with a B, in pork.

This morning on my radio show, I talked to Senator John McCain for his look and his solution to this problem.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, (R) AZ: I think we should call this legislation the "date certain for surrender act." If you believe, and I`ve watched you and I know you agree with me, that we ought to get out of Iraq, if you don`t think another penny or life should be put in danger or wasted, then by golly, then vote to cut of the funding. Vote to cut off the funding and stop it now.

Instead -- But they won`t do that, Glenn, because then they have responsibility for what happens.

Presidents don`t lose wars, political parties don`t lose wars, nations lose wars. And when nations lose wars, nations suffer the consequences and my friends have lost sight of that.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

BECK: Nobody is paying attention to the consequences of the game that they`re playing in Washington. And now another man who knows the unique challenges of getting work done in Congress is former House majority leader Tom DeLay, nicknamed "The Hammer" because he hits hard.

In his new book, "No Retreat, No Surrender," -- congressman, let me play "The Hammer" here for a second.

Republican Party sold Ronald Reagan for a dollar. Haven`t the Democrats done the same thing from the liberal point of view? I mean, you`ll have to admit that that`s what the Republicans did, right?

TOM DELAY, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: I don`t know what you mean sold Ronald Reagan for a dollar. If you look at our record over 11 years of the 12 years we were in the majority, we accomplished some amazing things.

BECK: You talk about 11 years. Let`s talk about the last few. You had -- the last few, the Republicans were -- let`s talk about the border. Where were you on the border?

DELAY: Well, on the House side, and all I can talk about is me as the majority leader up until the end of 2005. In 2005 alone, we sent three tort reform bills, the president signed. We did an energy bill, the president signed it.

BECK: I`m not going to give this break to a Democrat, I`m not going to give it to a Republican. I`m talking to you about -- you sold out on the border. There was no real border security.

DELAY: I`m sorry, Glenn .

BECK: Prescription drugs, my gosh, it`s the biggest program yet.

DELAY: Glenn, two things. The House took a very firm stand on border security and no amnesty.

BECK: Yes. You are right.

DELAY: And we are to get credit for that.

BECK: Yeah.

DELAY: Secondly, I`m very proud of the Medicare Reform Bill. We took a welfare state program, applied conservative principles of choice, competition, personal responsibility.

BECK: Ronald Reagan is spinning in his grave like a lathe.

DELAY: Guess what, Glenn?

BECK: Yeah?

DELAY: We`re saving billions of dollars on Medicare right now.

BECK: OK. Isn`t Nancy Pelosi doing exactly everything that she accused you of doing right now?

DELAY: No. I instituted a process called grow the vote. The Democrats and the liberal media thought in order for me to be effective, I had to act like they do. I instituted, and it`s all in the book, about how -- a brand-new process of getting the votes and being effective.

They`ve gone back to their old ways of doing things, bribing members, browbeating them, threatening them with committee assignments. I never did any of those kinds of things.

BECK: So hang on just a second. I just want to make sure I understand. Because this is the problem I had with a Democrat last night. I think both these parties are in real trouble.

I think the Republicans -- Look, I vote Republican usually. I have a hard time pulling an R lever right now because I am a conservative first. I`m an American first, a conservative second and Republican dead last and I feel like the Republicans sold me out. I mean, I believe in the things that I say. And so many in Congress didn`t.

And I think the whole thing is happening the same way with the Democrats right now. The Democrats went out there and these Blue Dog Democrats, they were the one who won it and they`re being sold it. And you have got Michael Moore, you`ve got Cindy Sheehan, you have got a Kennedy sitting with a Chavez and it doesn`t seem like either party will admit boy, we screwed up.

DELAY: We did screw up. In 2006, we didn`t have an agenda that we could to take to our base, number one, or to the American people to show where we were going to lead in the future.

We were lousy at communications of the accomplishments that we did have over time. There were a lot of mistakes. But now we need to push all that behind us and get back on the lean machine that we were in 1994 and that`s what my book does.

It lays out an agenda. It calls for unity amongst the conservatives. We`re into a new debate and it will be expressed in the next election.

BECK: In your book, you talk about Newt Gingrich. And I`ve heard a lot of people say I just can`t wait for New Gingrich. If Newt Gingrich -- I don`t think he can win because he just seems like old guard. I think he`s brilliant but I don`t think he can win.

DELAY: I think he`s brilliant, too. I was telling a story of the history of the Republican majority in my book and I laid out all our strengths and weaknesses. Newt is a brilliant guy. He has got a bunch of ideas. If he`s learned how to manage and be an administrator, he would make a great president.

BECK: Who do you think is the conservative candidate?

DELAY: There isn`t one. In fact, I`ve got to tell you. Glenn, I`m really tired of the national media picking our front-runners.

If you look at the polls that they picked the front-runners by, 50 to 60 percent of those going to vote in the Republican primary are what I`m doing, sitting back and waiting for a leader to emerge.

BECK: I`m with you. Congressman, I do have to tell you, I notice that the forward is by Rush Limbaugh, the preface is by Sean Hannity. You stop at number one and number two? Number three doesn`t -- I couldn`t get the back of the jacket or anything?

DELAY: I would love to have you, Glenn.

BECK: Congressman, thanks.

Coming up, the controversy surrounding the pictures models posed as murder victims. You`re not going to believe what you`ll see. We`ll look at the fallout from "America`s Next Top Model."

And later, the high priest of hypocrisy, Elton John, the guy who says religion should be banned, celebrates his birthday in a church. Coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: I`m going to be real honest with you. I`m a typical guy. I think hot women are just great. I really do.

It`s like I think that God has put some sort of steel in their butts and magnets in my eyes, because no matter how hard I try, don`t look there, with that being said, I at least try not to look at these things.

And now we`re doing as a society, we`re not only showing hot women all the time, we`re mixing it with death. "America`s Next Top Model," horrible, horrible pictures of beautiful models dead.

Kim Serafin, she is senior editor of "In Touch Weekly." Kim, what is the thinking behind these pictures?

KIM SERAFIN, "IN TOUCH WEEKLY": Well, I think if you watch the show, you would know the context they are in. If you just took a scene from "CSI" or "Law and Order" and just put it on the screen and said what`s that about, you don`t see it in the full context of the show.

America`s Next Top Model," every week they do a different theme to their photo shoot. Sometimes the girls have had to pose with a tarantula, sometimes they`ve had to jump on a trampoline.

This week it was "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," sort of like the TV show. So it was sort of in that theme, that is what they were doing.

BECK: All right. Let`s be honest. And if you have kids in the room, please ask them to leave for a second. I`m going to be real honest for a second.

This is, for a lot of sick people, this is masturbation to hot women who are dead. This is -- you don`t mix gruesome death with sex. You don`t do it. It`s not a good thing. How are they -- I know you can say that the show is justifying it with "CSI." It`s not the same thing.

SERAFIN: Well, again, I think it is when you look at some of the other shows on TV. If you look at this show compared to other shows and films that feature a lot of gratuitous violence, this really doesn`t rank very high.

In a lot of ways "America`s Next Top Model" in some ways is very empowering. They always feature plus-size models. Look at someone like .

BECK: Oh, yeah.

SERAFIN: She`s not only the host of it. She`s the producer of it. She does he own show, she`s the producer of that show. She`s always talking about image issues. I was watching the show today, Tyra`s show, and she was talking about meth addicts and all the problems that their meth addiction caused in their lives and in their families and in their careers.

BECK: Hang on .

SERAFIN: You have to look at someone like Tyra Banks, you have to look at the show as a whole and she does do a lot of empowering things.

BECK: I don`t -- Can you go back and show a shot of the woman in the thigh-highs with blood all over her. You tell me that is empowering for women? I`m sorry, I just don`t accept it. You know what this does?

SERAFIN: But, again, this .

BECK: This promotes violence in the sickest sense. You are taking beautiful, hot women in a society that loves violence, that many times condones violence against women, and shows them like this. This is not good.

SERAFIN: I think this is meant more in a campy way, such as a slasher film. You go back to slasher films even like "Halloween" or a lot of the slasher films that are out there now. It`s always about a hot woman getting murdered. I don`t think this is meant in any serious manner.

And again, you have to look at it -- a lot of "America`s Next Top Model" is showing that modeling is not just about posing and looking pretty and doing drugs, it`s about acting too.

And that`s what this show does, it sort of puts these girls through a series of vigorous things, like a photo shoot.

It promotes good health. Tyra is always talking to the girls about eating healthy and being healthy and again not sort of fitting into that waifish, anorexic, drugged up model look.

So again, I think if you look at this in the context of the show and also look at a reason to talk about an issue like female violence, I mean it brings it out to light.

BECK: Thank you.

Coming up, Elton John wants to ban religion but celebrates his birthday in a church. The hypocrisy police in tonight`s "Real Story." Stick around.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Welcome to "The Real Story." And I want to give a big happy birthday shout out to Sir Elton John. No, honestly, Elt, if I may, you don`t look a day over 78.

I guess my invitation was lost in the mail, but Elton threw himself a little party last weekend inside the cathedral of St. John the divine right here in Manhattan. Now, unfortunately, there were so many people that they had to remove all of the pews in the church, turn the altar into a stage, and bring over a thousand bottles of champagne to keep over 400 guests, including Rod Stewart, Donatella Versace, Elizabeth Hurley, all nice and liquored up.

But Elton wasn`t satisfied with just one night of sacrilege. On Sunday, he performed -- it`s the lord`s day -- at Madison Square Garden with this image running behind him. Yes, that would be a burning church. Now, I know you`re at home thinking, "Gee, Glenn, isn`t Elton John the guy who said he`d ban all religion because it turns people into hateful lemmings?" Yes, same guy.

But he`s got a lot of cash, have you forgotten? You know, if he wants to drop a few mill to desecrate your church, then, hey, who am I to judge, right? Wrong!

The real story is, if you don`t start standing up and saying enough is enough, our religions will continue to rip themselves apart until there is nothing left. If I were a member of St. John the Divine, I would be outraged. How dare you sell my sanctuary out for money? Jesus tipping the tables over comes to mind.

There is an epic battle being fought inside our churches right now. It is the traditional versus the new. It`s the "Bible is the literal word of God" people versus the "Bible, schmibel, I can pray from my Lazy Boy" people.

In just over a decade, weekly church attendance has dropped over 12 percent. That represents millions of newly un-churched people. In the last 25 years, the number of people who say they have no religious preference has doubled.

Churches feel those numbers every Sunday, as they look out there into their empty pews and, like any business, they`re trying to adjust. But church isn`t really business, is it? When you try to make religion fun for everybody, you end up making it spiritually fulfilling for no one.

Andrea Lafferty, she is the executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition. Andrea, what was this church even thinking?

ANDREA LAFFERTY, TRADITIONAL VALUES COALITION: Well, Glenn, you hit it. There are millions of the people leaving the church. They`re leaving the Episcopal Church and becoming Anglicans, such as myself. But there are a lot of churches that are becoming stronger and stronger, because people are seeing that these churches are no longer orthodox and no longer teaching the word of God.

BECK: You know, I was talking to Bill Donohue last week, and I`m Mormon, he`s Catholic. You`re a former Episcopalian.

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: Anglican, and he said, you know, I`ve got more in common with Mormons or Muslims that really believe in their faith than I do with a lot of Catholics.

LAFFERTY: Well, that`s right. And what you`ve seen with the Elton John birthday bash is that the Episcopal Church is strapped for money because people are fleeing the church by the millions, and they needed cash.

BECK: Tell me about the burning of the church on stage.

LAFFERTY: Well, you know, that`s against the law in America. That is a hate crime, a so-called hate crime. And, you know, although they want to use this upcoming hate crime law to silence pastors and Christians, but Elton doesn`t get it.

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: Hang on. There has got to be an attorney out there that says, "Oh, I`d like to file that as a hate crime." There`s got to be somebody out there that wants to take that on.

LAFFERTY: It`s hateful. But, you know, Glenn, a lot of us grew up liking Elton John.

BECK: I love him.

LAFFERTY: He`s no longer the Elton John that we knew. He`s a guy who has a personal agenda, who hates God, who hates Christians, who hates people of faith, and he`s going to use his money to spout this.

BECK: I have -- he`s the only -- well, him and Billy Joel are the only guys that I have every thing they`ve ever recorded. Love Elton John`s music.

LAFFERTY: Maybe you and I were at the concerts together.

BECK: Can`t even listen to him anymore. When I was out in Philadelphia two years ago, he did the Fourth of July celebration right there in front of the art museum in Philadelphia. He didn`t even once mention Fourth of July. There were no flags anywhere. And he came out and he said, "I want to thank you for coming to America`s biggest AIDS celebration. For you to come out to help fight AIDS is such a big deal." We all looked at each other, we went, "We come here every year. It`s the Fourth of July, Elton." He`s really hijacking everything.

LAFFERTY: Well, it`s -- the people that used to listen to him are older, wiser, more mature now. You know, they`re not that interested in his music. They don`t like his agenda, and it`s a hateful agenda. Church burning at a concert? You know, saying that Christians are hateful, we should get rid of religion? And then he goes and has his big birthday bash at a church that was built many years ago, established by people of faith with a strong conservative Christian doctrine.

BECK: Well, I`ve got to tell you: Churches don`t make you hateful. Hate comes in all forms, and you don`t have to go to a church to get it. Some do; some don`t. Andrea, thanks.

LAFFERTY: Thank you.

BECK: Next, you`ve probably heard about the subprime loans that are, you know, people are foreclosing on their house. And it`s because people with poor credit didn`t understand how you can, you know, pay $500 a month for 30 years and own a million-dollar home. Here`s the solution: You can`t.

Now we find out that a particular group of Americans has emerged as the first real casualty of these foreclosures. They are Hispanic immigrants.

According to the Center for Responsible Lending, 375,000 subprime loans were made to Hispanics in 2005 alone. And 20 percent of those are going to end up in foreclosure.

"The Washington Post" summed it up like this, quote: "They`re unfamiliar with the U.S. mortgage market, they`re unable to speak or read English well, and vulnerable to the blandishments of real estate professionals. Many immigrants are struggling."

Now, I want you to take those exact problems, you multiply them by 100, and you start to get a sense of what illegal immigrants are up against this country. So here`s the "Real Story" tonight. It`s that this is not the land of opportunity when you come here without knowing the language, our culture, and, yes, even how the mortgage market works, even though I`m not really sure I understand that one.

The bleeding hearts who say that we shouldn`t enforce our laws because these poor Mexicans are just trying to help their families, they`re ignoring the reality of what these people are coming in and they`re going to be up against. You don`t get a golden ticket from Willy Wonka and go up the glass elevator at the border that gets you the job and the four-bedroom McMansion. You`ve got to work for it.

You have to compete against millions of other people who want the same thing and who are actually equipped to get it. Here`s what the compassionate, bleeding heart nincompoops never tell you. Mr. Potential Illegal Alien, the competition here is not fair. The playing field is not level. The truth is, the easiest part of being an illegal alien is getting here.

Steve Camarota, he is from the Center of Immigration Studies. Steve, how do they see that the immigration policy is so screwed up, that this sort of thing has happened? How are people missing that?

STEVE CAMAROTA, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: Well, you`re right. I think this is a huge problem. Look, more than half of all Hispanic immigrants in the United States haven`t even graduated high school. So obviously, regardless of legal status, they`re going to have low incomes. They`re going to have a heck of a time trying to understand a mortgage, and so they`re very susceptible to being oversold a mortgage, to being convinced that, yes, you can afford this place. And then, of course, when the interest rates go up, lo and behold, they find that they can`t.

BECK: OK, I was reading an article, and it was a bleeding heart article. I think it was in "Connecticut" magazine or something. And this is a few months ago. And it talked about Westchester County, which is just outside of New York City. And it`s where the Clintons live, very expensive.

The average illegal alien that works in Westchester County makes no more than $16,000 a year. You cannot survive in Westchester County on that. It`s so bad that people are renting beds eight hours at a time. And, yet, I`m the hateful one. I`m the one saying let`s not put people through this. Let`s shut down the borders. How is it that compassion has been flipped upside down?

CAMAROTA: Yes, I agree with you, Glenn. This is an important. You`ve got people like (INAUDIBLE) Martinez in Congress who just introduced their massive, 12-million-person amnesty. They want to dramatically increase the number of people allowed in with very little education. It just doesn`t make sense.

What we`ve got, really, is a 21st-century economy and a 19th-century or 18th-century immigration policy that brings in people who aren`t really equipped to function well in a modern, industrial society.

BECK: And yet, for the almighty dollar, you`ve got banks like Bank of America who are saying, "We`ve just got to help these people." You`ve got these subprime loans, and you know it`s for the buck. There is a huge market out there, and there are businesses here in America that will rape these people, and they don`t care.

CAMAROTA: No, really, you`re right. No one`s thinking, does this policy of letting in so many people with very little education make sense? Instead, they see the dollar signs, and the consequences for the immigrants themselves or American society at large just doesn`t figure on their radar screen.

BECK: All right. Steve, thank you. More on this. That is the "Real Story" tonight. You`ll find more on the Web site at glennbeck.com.

Next, I talked to Susan Lucci. Don`t miss this.

But first, an update on the men I believe are America`s first political prisoners. Gilmer Hernandez, Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos, they were all border agents for the U.S. who have been in prison for doing their jobs. Compean, Ramos locked up for shooting a drug smuggler in the butt, and Hernandez for firing at a car full of illegal aliens that tried to run him down.

I believe the Mexican government pressured our government into putting these guys behind bars, and it is time, America, that we demand the release of America`s first political prisoners. Back in a minute.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I don`t want to give Rosie O`Donnell more credit. I know she`s a stupid comedienne. I know who Rosie O`Donnell is. My question is, do you know who Rosie O`Donnell is?

She is somebody that connects with millions of Americans every day. She is known as funny and crazy. Danger, warning, Will Robinson, warning. You might as well put Osama bin Laden on the set of "The View" every single day. By the way, guest host next week on "The View," President Ahmadinejad. Don`t miss it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: She`s been playing the same role for 35 years. I`ve been on TV for a year, and she`s only one Emmy ahead. I`m just saying.

Susan Lucci, hi. How are you?

SUSAN LUCCI, ACTRESS: Hi. Great, Glenn. How are you?

BECK: Very good.

LUCCI: Good.

BECK: So 35 years as the same person, drive you nuts or do you like it?

LUCCI: Love it. Love it. Actually, there was some progression in that time, because I started playing her as a 15-year-old high school girl. Now she`s grown up, been a lot of stuff happening in between.

BECK: No, I`ve just -- I have the -- tell me if this is right. If you were hyphened, your character`s name would be Erica Kane-Martin-Brent- Cuddihy-Chandler-Montgomery-Montgomery-Chandler-Merrick-Merrick-Montgomery (ph)?

LUCCI: Yes, that`s right. And there were a couple of Roy Roys (ph). They were both illegal, those marriages.

BECK: Are you marrying in the family? Is that what happens?

LUCCI: Brothers. Brothers. And some are repeats, yes.

BECK: OK. I`m sorry, I don`t watch daytime television.

LUCCI: That`s OK.

BECK: Small town?

LUCCI: Small town, low budget. Marry all the men in one town.

BECK: "Oh, I was married to her for a while. She`s great." And your story lines have been attacked by a grizzly bear, not mauled.

LUCCI: Well, not mauled, because we fought, and I won.

BECK: And that happens all the time. I read about that all the time. You have survived a plane crash. Have you ever looked at a script and went, "OK, come on"?

LUCCI: Well, you can tell from the things you just read off, they`ve taken this character pretty far.

BECK: No.

LUCCI: And the grizzly bear thing, I have to say, we were shooting in northern Canada, hot summer day, a grizzly bear who really wanted to swim. He was hot. He did not want to go to work that day. And apart from that, I said to the producer, "As you know, I will try anything in rehearsal. You know, if it`s there on the page, I want to give it a good shot, so I`ll try it in rehearsal." But Erica Kane fighting a grizzly bear and winning, do you think we`ve gone too far?

BECK: And yet it went.

LUCCI: Yes. And she said, no, just try it. And I did, and it turned out to be a classic.

BECK: What did you win the Emmy for? When you win the Emmy, is it for like for a whole year or a certain episode?

LUCCI: Well, it`s a year`s worth of work, but you`re only entitled to put in one or two episodes, depending on the roles that year.

BECK: Did you frame all of the nominations?

LUCCI: All of the nominations.

BECK: Seriously?

LUCCI: Oh, yes.

BECK: You`re sick of answering this question?

LUCCI: I am not sick at all. I`m delighted to be able to have those nominations. And, yes, I have been framing them.

BECK: People who say it`s an honor to be nominated are full of crap, aren`t they?

LUCCI: Well, no, because if it`s all you have, that`s all you have. I can tell you, I`ve had it before I won and have the nomination since I won. Winning is the best. Winning is much better. But I do really feel honored by the nomination.

BECK: We`re really clear that we`re never going to win an Emmy. But if we do, but if we do, it would really take the luster off of yours, wouldn`t it?

LUCCI: If you win?

BECK: Yes. You would look at it and say, "Gosh, and I wanted it for so long."

LUCCI: Doesn`t mean much. Not at all.

BECK: Is it true that -- I mean, this stupid personal stuff that matters to me, I`m an ice cream man myself. Is it Graeter`s ice cream that you have shipped in to you?

LUCCI: Actually, a friend had Graeter`s ice cream shipped into -- you know Graeter`s ice cream?

BECK: I have it shipped in.

LUCCI: From Cincinnati? You have it shipped in?

BECK: From Columbus.

LUCCI: OK, yes, because it`s Ohio, Buckeye Blitz?

BECK: Oh, yes.

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: I`m telling you, there`s no better ice cream.

LUCCI: No better ice cream.

BECK: I always thought I was weird, and now I know for sure. Now, and the beauty line, you started that just in case the TV thing didn`t work out or -- you know, I just want to make sure I have a little extra in case this career doesn`t work out.

LUCCI: Listen, I hope it`s there for me, but I do love it. And it did come, you know...

BECK: Because Social Security is not going to cover it.

LUCCI: It`s not going to be there.

BECK: It`s not going to be there when you retire, so you need a little something-something off to the side.

LUCCI: Actually, two things happened. I was in the middle of analyzing my fan mail. My husband had just -- I couldn`t answer it fast enough, and I wanted to. And that sounds so pretentious, and I don`t mean it that way. It`s just lucky me, people responded to Erica Kane. And I got all this mail.

And my husband at that time was working with a friend. We were going to make a menu. Remember menus on telephones to answer the questions. And we were in the middle of that. And someone came to me with this opportunity to go on electronic shopping. I didn`t even know about the possibility of home shopping.

And it was for hair care to begin with. And I looked into electronic shopping. Most importantly, I had to love these products. I was not going to talk to an audience I had a great relationship with and tell them I used it if I didn`t.

BECK: Unless you did it as Erica Kane, then you could screw the life out of them.

LUCCI: Screw the life out of them, and they`d know I was lying.

(CROSSTALK)

(LAUGHTER)

LUCCI: It`s going to be me with my name, and it became a way to answer their questions. I indeed loved the products, and I began that way. And since them, I`m on HSN, and I`ve been asked to expand and have to fragrances and to lingerie, and clothing, and jewelry, and shoes. And I do love it.

BECK: Good for you.

LUCCI: I do. It`s a whole other creative process.

BECK: And if this is smell-o-vision, you`d know she smells delicious.

LUCCI: Thank you.

BECK: Thank you. What a pleasure.

LUCCI: Really great talking to you. Thank you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Oh, "The New York Times," they`re always there for us. When they`re not just fabricating news or passing notes to terrorists about how we`re monitoring them, we get all the news that`s fit to print.

Now, to me, the international incident brewing with Iran, kind of a big story. Call me crazy. But does that story even muster more than a day or two on the front page? Here`s today`s "New York Times." Let me show you this.

First of all, this story here is about the British and the Irish relations. Here is -- this is a -- Chinese woman lives in a crazy place. This is Guantanamo guilty plea. Here we have really sad economic news. Gonzales` aide won`t testify here. Look at this, creepy, crawly robots. Global warming, insect attack, attack.

And this box right here, this is just to say, by the way, something is going on with Iran and stuff. And this box here, this is just an outline to the corrections box on page two.

Now, I know they`re not -- you know, they`re not really picking the stories with me in mind, but what happened with their magazine is shocking, even to a professional "Times"-basher like me. They printed a story, including a woman who said she served in Iraq and was sexually assaulted. I read it. I`m like, "Oh, my gosh." The only problem? According to the Navy, she never served in Iraq.

"Air Force Times" said, quote, "The Navy, while expressing sympathy to this woman, believes she is suffering from stress, is annoyed that the `Times` did so little to check the woman`s story," end quote. But hey, everybody makes a mistake or a hundred, right? Except for the fact that they apparently found out about this mistake six days before the magazine came out and, instead of reprinting the magazine, they ran the story anyway, and they didn`t even print a correction in the news section until a full week later. I mean, why worry about the truth?

You know, I tell you all the time I`m not a journalist, but I don`t think you need to be to realize how ridiculous of a decision that is. A few years back, "Time" ran a critique of themselves title "Is New York Times liberal?" Is it a liberal newspaper? The first line in the first column was, of course it is. But liberal or not, this is just bad.

By the way, I want to take a quick moment to ask you to keep Tony Snow in your prayers. His cancer has spread to his liver, and we wish him the best on this program. No matter what you think of the president, Tony Snow is really one of the good guys, and you know how difficult that is to find in Washington.

From New York, good night.

END