is he setting up something on the left insane i'm not that bad, but this rally. >> no, you're correct that it was very different from his message, but it was for very practical reasons and that was the event was being run by a nonprofit that takes care of the families of wounded or fallen troops. so if he had gone out there and giving his usual message, that charity would have it status in jeopardy. sobek is -- and i think i mean this in a good way is really an opportunist. so here are the constraints he has. what could be due? and he turned it into this very powerful sort of religious moment where people were asking that question a few days after comment is glenn beck the new leader of the religious right? that's not going to happen because mormonism as we discussed, she was able to turn this limitation -- turning this

event into that sort of successful public revival meeting i think shows great he is. >> how about the tea party? with convergence between glenn beck and the tea party? >> well, i think they're one and the same. i mean, he is the unofficial leader of the tea party and you could argue that sarah palin is as important to that movement, but she has more ties to the republican party. interestingly with beck, he's had the sort of movement things going before and in the past they didn't catch on because he wasn't as big, but she'd have masochists with honoring the troops and not sort of things, so there was a minor at the complex. basically he took that model and pushed it ahead. so he very much was encouraging the original tax day protest in

2009 immediately went ahead ahead with his own nine, 12 movement which for my solace which it to the 828 movement and no doubt is coming in now, proceeding onto the next movement. so i think, you know, i was sort of snotty and the subtitle of this book. you know, i don't actually have a contempt for the tea party. and i don't use the term t. barriers. i'm saying the glenn beck is the one doing the tea bagging of america. i think beck has in many ways been able to use what is a genuine populist revolts to his benefit. >> is there a way to quantify the glenn beck affect on the midterm elections?

>> guest: not in any sort of an aggregate sense. think about this. glenn beck is intensively populist leader. it was a week or two before the election he saw the chamber of commerce was beating up on obama and obama was pushing back. he got nice radio show and said i'm writing a $10,000 check to the u.s. commerce. if you've got a dollar out there what you ought to send them in. and so glenn beck's radio listeners crash the servers at the u.s. chamber of commerce. while nothing says grass-roots populism like u.s. chamber of commerce. [laughter] and that's what they mean by how i think is in some ways misled the well-intentioned people who are justifiably upset i was going on in the country and the economy and the government. and here he is telling people who may only have their last dollar left to send it to the chamber of commerce. it shows the way they react. you know, there've been studies uppity about the the tea party

effect, you know, being very much responsible for the house victory and perhaps responsible for the failure of the republicans to take the senate. but we've seen it in individual ways since beck was very influential in getting senator bennett booted out in utah. the state of maine republican party has rewritten its platform to warn about the encroachment of one world government. this is maine. so, it very much is responding to that. >> host: >> we have time for one last question, sir. >> he talked about how some of the next followers are so extreme and the response is, what you hear from these people? i'm assuming they're not real crazy about it. >> well, beck himself has done me the courtesy of ignoring the book, which i think it's probably smart on his behalf.

so that has kept down the amount of animosity out there although i should say in the last 48 hours, the o'reilly has on their made jokes about my being he headed and suggested i might be turned into hummus. >> but no violent e-mails? >> so i assumed -- this was related to a column i'd written the paper, but i suspect he's doing some of beck's work for him. so yes, there's some anger on the right. but because beck himself has been quiet about it, it has muted anger on the right. the book was written hopefully so that it wasn't so that left-wingers could pick it up and say ha ha, this is why i knew i hated glenn beck and this is why. it's so that the vast majority of americans, the sensible people in the middle would say i know there's this phenomenon of beck and i don't really know what it is.

and i basically spent a lot of >> dana milbank is a syndicated columnist with the "washington post" where he writes the washington sketch column. he is the author of several books including politicos, the strange and scary tribes that run our government. for more information, visit dana milbank.com. >> you next, timothy nenninger president of the citadel for 20 years. timothy nenninger discusses his book at the annual association of the u.s. army meeting held at the washington convention center in washington d.c.. the program is about 35 minutes. >> i would like to speak a

little bit about the genesis of the manuscript and then give you summerall's career and buy a think he is an important figure in the history of the american army in the early 20th century and why i think is memoirs are worth reading. summerall wrote this in 1950. he was an octogenarian approaching retirement with a couple of years from the presidency of the said at all. he wrote it, hand coded on legal size paper. he had no, he had no intent to publish the manuscript. he did it at his grand said said for diversion and to enlighten his family about his career. and he died within three years of having completed the manuscript, at which point his son type the handwritten

manuscript, created a 185 singlespaced very dense pages and for many years this manuscript was in the possession of the archives of the citadel in charleston. in 1998, the general's grandson, charles p. summerall the third, still living in charleston, donated the rights to the division museum in wheaton illinois with the attempt that the manuscript would be published by the museum. museum in 1998 and paul was his successor, supported summerall's grandsons idea to get this manuscript published. they shopped around looking for someone who could edit it and they would see it through to publication. ausa books in kentucky so the process to its completion.

i was the editor but make no mistake, this isn't my book. this is general summerall's book. it mostly reads like i suspect his voice would sound. i basically copy-edited the manuscript. i reduced it via about 20% in length. there was a lot of family history in it. there were a lot of tangential comments, a lot of scores to settle with general summerall trying to use the memoirs as a vehicle for that. i also tried to standardize capitalization and corrections that sort of thing. in short i did what any commercial or academic press would have done in 1950, had the book been submitted to one of i also did a short biographical sketch of the general and a rather extensive timeline of his career. contribution was to add

identifications and annotations things and events that are mentioned in the text. attacks like, the regimental commander did does and so, but he wouldn't identify who the regimental commander was. so, my task was to using a variety of sources, figure out who he is talking about and i provided in a note basic graphical information about the individual. the result was about 30 pages of over 500 different knots and annotations. who was charles p. summerall and what was his contribution to the army, and why is his memoirs important? i suspect numbers of people in this room have heard the name of charles p. summerall if for no other reason than summerall field is where you have had a

change of command ceremonies or retirement ceremonies, but summerall field was named for the general i believe because charles p. summerall bliss chief of staff of the army from 1926 230. over the course of his career, which began in 1888, when he went to west point, to the time he retired from the army in 1930, the army had a fault considerably from a frontier constabulary to a colonial force that pacified, protected and governed newly acquired insular possessions. two during world war i a modern 20th century fighting force which was na coalition war in europe. summerall, summerall's career therefore sort of parallels the evolution of the army in the late 19th and early 20th century.

he was a poor boy from the rural south, born in 1867, went to west point in 1888 as i mentioned, graduated in 1892. when he graduated he was captain of the corps of cadets and graduated 20 out of 64 in his class, so he had made a mark on the army early on. initially he went into the infantry. he soon transferred to the field artillery. he was it general sayed and mobilization in 1898 during the spanish-american war and the next year, 1899 he went overseas to the philippines where we were our ready engaged in fighting an insurrection against filipino insurgents. he was under fire for the first time during the insurrection, and he was mentioned in orders, cited for his bravery and leading his artillery section

under fire, providing close support to the infantry of attacking insurrection is. the next year, he was in china during the chinese relief expedition and his section was very and sherman told during the action relating to the siege of the king where his gun section knockdown for successive gates to the inner-city that entered parts of the imperial city, allowing allied forces to go in and overturn the boxers who were sustaining the rebellion. after returning from china, he had a succession of truth and post commands in the pacific northwest and then in alaska. during this period, he also as

it were, married the boss's daughter. he met laura mordecai, who was the chief of ordinance's daughter while visiting some friends out in the northwest, and he courted ms. mordecai over a period of years and married her during this period. he then went on to, and an instructor in field artillery organization and tactics at the u.s. military academy, where he served from 1905 to 1911. in the early part of his career, he was very much known as an expert in field artillery matters. following duty at west point, he went to the war department where he served in the militia bureau as the assistant to the chief of the militia of hero, and he was

responsible for national guard field artillery training and one of the offense, or one of the duties that he performed airing this period was to go out and find large tracts of land that later became field artillery practice ranges, including the one at tobyhanna's pennsylvania. i had a couple of photographs on tobyhanna, tobyhanna or range. in july 1917, after the united states or june 1917 after the united states got into the war, summerall was still in the war department but buddy was sent overseas with the baker mission that was sent from the war department to consult with

officers on pershing's staff at ghq and begin summerall was the field artillery expert on this mission, which was supposed to discuss with the ghq staff organization doctrine and what's technical means were necessary to sustain the adf wanted god overseas in great numbers. in june 1917 of course the only forces that were there were a very small contingent from the first division which was the initial division oversees. summerall went overseas later in 1917, first commanding the 67th field artillery brigade which is part of the 42nd division, but in december of that year, he assumed command of the first field artillery brigade which was part of the first division and it began an

association of summerall with the first edition that continued . he commanded the field artillery brigade from december 1917 until july, 1918. on the 26th of june, 1918, he was promoted to major general buddy still commanded the field artillery brigade. but on the 15th of july, he assumed command of the first division. high points of his professional life. three days after he assumed command of the division, the division participated in a offensive and it was the first time that american troops in great numbers-- there was a core level attack. it was the first time u.s. troops in great numbers

participated offensively on the war on the western front. i think summerall was a unique commander in the adf and in that he successfully commanded a brigade, division and ultimately a core, which he took command of in the middle of october, 1918 during the moose argonne offensive. he assumed command of the fifth army corps. i think one can characterize particularly during this world war ii experience, that his style of command was very aggressive, reading from the front. he expect-- inspected most of his commanders and was a fairly difficult leader under home to serve, as a number of his troops would attest. he had successes, both with the first division and the fifth corps as a commander but he also had some black marks on his

slate during the war, particularly in the fading days of the war, before the 11 november armistice. there was some not very well drafted field orders that were issued that said that the commander-in-chief that pershing wanted the honor of capturing the first city of saddam to go to american troops in the field order issues were somewhat ambiguous and there was some berbers to the effect that the boundaries will not be binding, and summerall since the first division across the front of the corps that was on its last, much to the consternation of people at ghq and people in the first score that were on the left. there was a bad feeling that continued well into the post-war era as a result of this.

following the armistice, summerall served in a number of troops were being too mobilized and sent back to the united states. but, in july and august of 1919, he became a diplomatic khaki. he had a position on the american commission to negotiate peace, which was negotiating the peace treaty in paris with the other allies and the central powers, but most importantly, he was the u.s. representative on the inter-allied commission of inquiry on fee on which is an area of trieste in this inter-allied military commission was supposed to settle disputes among a number of warring countries down in that area as to who have the ultimate right to occupy, to occupy the city. he returned to the united states

with general pershing and urging's party on the leviathan and september of 1919. he at this time again was commanding the first division. it is during this period from 1919 to 1921 when he commanded the first division that summerall spearheaded the creation of the first division association, erecting the first division memorial which is behind the old executive office building on the ellipse and adjacent to the white house. he also supported the publication of the first division history during world compilation of the world war records of the first division. so, this activity of summerall in the wake of the war is one of the reasons why the first division museum was interested in publishing his memoir.

in 192121926 period, he was commanding the hawaiian department, then the eighth core area and in then the second core area. these were all major administrative commands during the army, the post-world war i army of that era, but the army officer came in 192621930 when he was chief of staff of the army. at the time, at the time he was couple of general officers on duty who were senior to him in rank. probably none senior to him in experience as a leader, particularly as a combat commander in the adf, so he became chief of staff of the army and late teen 1926 and

served until 1930. during his period, when you think about it, this would probably fairly dark days for the army and terms of understrength units, skeleton eyes formations, two battalion regiments, to company battalions, that sort of thing. on top of that, at that point there was no obvious military threat from overseas to the united states, so it was a very difficult time to be a senior leader in a force under pressure from various sorts of angles. but, he dealt with a couple of issues, and i think that related to the emerging technology at the time. he was very instrumental in pushing military aviation so long as it did not come at the

expense of other combat arms, which it sometimes did. they would demobilize combat arms units to increase the size of the army air service at the time. the other issue that he dealt with very adeptly was mechanization. during his watch watch as chief of staff, the first experimental mechanized force in the u.s. army was created and tested, equipment, doctrine and organization at the time. summerall retired, steps down as chief of staff and in late 1930 he did not retire until march, 1931. he had a number of job offers, several politically oriented, which he declined to take part in, but he did accept a position as president of the citadel and 1930.

and-- or in 1931 and he remained at the citadel until he retired from there in 1953. there are a number of aspects about the memoir that i find interesting and revealing of the man and his times. i mention that he was the president of this educational organization, the citadel, but one gets the impression at least from the memoirs, summerall learned, seem to learn a lot from his relationships with people much more than from her relationships with books. and he seemed to be very adept at developing long-term friendships from brief encounters. there are several instances in the memoir where he meets somebody on a train trip

somewhere and they would become lifelong friends. when he was at the citadel, he was very frequently would bring other educators, to help him build up the quality of the education and the physical plant that institution. and i think when he was there, the citadel became at least one of the three principle nonfederal military universities in the united states. this being the ausa, of course norwich was premier among those. general sullivan-- summerall was a graduate of norwich. developed with civilians but i think perhaps as importantly

were some of the relationships he had with fellow officers. he had early in his career had two very strong mentors, henry j. reilly who was a battery commander in the fifth artillery went summerall was in the fifth artillery, and robert l. uhler, who later became a fellow commander of the first division and also a corps commander in the aef. both of these were very strong influences on summerall's early career. unfortunately reilly was killed during the siege of peking, but very interestingly and somewhat touchingly, henry j. reilly junior became a field artillery regimental commander and in the summerall's brigade and division during world war i and summerall became a mentor to reilly junior. he was also very close to junior

officers like alvin butler, who was his aid during the war. butler was an emergency officer, not a regular. became an oil field executives in oklahoma after the war, but again remained a lifelong friend of summerall. his memoir is always candid i think, sometimes self-serving, but generally candid articulately about the people that he associated with, those he liked like riley and bullard and butler and those that he didn't get along with so well, including joseph t. dickman and mailing craig who commanded, who were the commander in chief of staff respectively of the first corps in the aef and his troops class-- clash with summerall's in the first division's troops

during the incident that i mentioned earlier. went summerall, another individual with whom he clashed, and he has very interesting things to say about this was billy mitchell. went summerall was commander of the hawaiian department from 1921 to 24, or 1923 to 26, mitchell comes to ie in late 1923. he is assistant chief of the air corps and he is doing a survey of military aviation installations in the pacific basin. and he writes a report that is very critical of the affairs in the hawaiian department and particularly of summerall's leadership in that department, so that didn't sit very well with general summerall. ironically, couple of years later when mitchell is brought before a court-martial board, summerall is one of the officer sitting on the cou-m