Glen Biegel: Dan Fagan, larger-than-life legacy

31
2148

By GLEN BIEGEL

Dan Fagan. What can I say? What would you like to know about my many years with Dan as a part of my life?

A couple of housekeeping items before we get started: We are all broken in our own way. Me, you, all of us. Nothing of what I write here is to say a person is perfect, or has a 1,000 batting average on every issue. If your measure for a public person is perfection, you should be prepared to be eternally disappointed, and probably a very bitter and lonely person.

First, I will admit to being biased about Dan Fagan. For probably a dozen reasons. Dan was a mentor, a bitter foil over Sarah Palin and many other issues, a business partner, and a supporter of mine for all my time on the radio. We had giant debates about the facts, we had small disagreements on faith and virtue. We discussed all parts of life with nothing held back. If there is any definition of what a friend is, Dan is a deep and abiding friend of mine.

Second, we have had a falling out, and it was largely my fault. I have asked for forgiveness, and I hope he will forgive me. It was over politics during the previous mayor’s race. I was friends with one candidate and I corrected some public things Dan was saying. I should have worked with Dan more closely on it before I went public, and that was poorly done on my part. We all have points of sorrow in our lives, and this is one example that I am still learning from. We learn more from our pain than anything else, so this continues to be an important lesson in my life.

Dan has several gifts that are superhuman. I’ll just talk through a few.

The first is that he feels a responsibility to the truth and hard-to-face issues more than anyone. The truth for Dan is a constant and irresistible force. If you think of the bond between a man and his wife. Constantly needing the other near, to know them, to hear what they think, to please them. The truth for Dan is like a person with whom he sought relationship with all his might.

The second is that Dan’s measure of success is impossibly high (or nearly so). For himself, for his friends, and for politicians. He is driven to an extent that I don’t think a normal person can understand, and certainly would not attempt. He never stops. He is always reaching out. News, facts, data, relationship. If you think about yourself waking at 3 am every single day of the year, or working late into the night, you should think that Dan is already up, or still working on something for his show, his writing. His public activities are his ministry. He is the eternal minister.

I also want to speak as someone who knows Dan personally. You have never met a person like Dan. At least I have not. In January 2014, I had reached my limit: 9 children, working 70 hours a week for 12 years, high pressure job, high pressure public life (as an avowed introvert, you can imagine what that took out of me), two to three hours of sleep a night for months on end; I just needed to stop. Stop working, stop radio, stop leaving the house, just stop.

Who saved me? Dan Fagan. He did my radio program on KBYR for six weeks while I healed. He wouldn’t take payment. He never pushed me to come back before I was ready. It’s hard to express the love present in that act. I can never adequately express my admiration, appreciation, and love for Dan for helping me when I needed it most. Underneath all the issues, the conflict, the difficult questions, and the public face, that is the face I know is the one Dan Fagan wears when the chips are down.

Finally, Dan finds a way to live his public life and include a vibrant testimony to faith. I’m sure there were many around him who counsel him to stop evangelizing. Dan saw that the evangelizing for political and civic truth should live harmoniously with the call to spiritual truth. It’s not really done in public life, and Dan broke new ground as a brave, clear, clarion for any who will listen. Just like the rest of his life.

Dan’s program was a presentation of the irresistible force meeting the immovable object, the play of conservative values within a system that denigrates, erodes and falsely attacks them. Dan was the ringmaster to help explain the political circus of our state, country and city. There will be no other like him. There never could be.

We will miss you here in Alaska, Dan Fagan.

Your friend, Glen.

Glen Biegel is a technology security professional, Catholic father of nine, husband to a saint, and politically active conservative.

31 COMMENTS

  1. Dan Fagan was a hard listen. He could be entertaining, but also maddeningly obstinate about the silliest things. I recall one afternoon conversation in which he was complimenting the effectiveness of the Israeli armed forces, and asserting that their prowess was largely due to their refusal to allow gays to serve. He became irate when an otherwise sympathetic caller (correctly) pointed out that gays serve openly there.

    Glen is correct; we are all broken. But Dan made a living out of focusing on how others were broken while ignoring or asking forgiveness for his own transgressions. He always struck me as tortured; perhaps giving up his bully pulpit will allow him to find some peace.

  2. Hello Glen; Good to read your piece and realize your friendship with Dan and I think we all know how tough a job radio is, day in and day out, I could not take on a job like that and not knowing who the caller is or what their position is on an issue. I called your show many times and enjoyed listening as I am a fiscal conservative.
    Sometime ago I called Dan, the topic was pebble so with my knowledge of mining and the creator of a pro mining documentary called ”Paydirt in Platinum” Alaska and Mrs. Crocket has a copy at AK Mining association, I went head to head with Dan knowing I had studied the pebble plan and he didn’t, he tried to end the conversation but Ortega was taking phone calls and I couldn’t be hung up on so I hammered away on why pebble was not a good idea., He never took my calls again but I still listened to the show almost everyday 😉

    • Joe,
      Your mining knowledge isn’t very deep. If your previous comments are any indication, you seem to think that Pebble will be an open pit dredge mine…this displays your ignorance. You claim that Pebble will be the worlds largest open pit mine by a factor of somewhere around 26 times larger than the worlds largest open pit mine, another display of your ignorance. The documentary you keep plugging isn’t recognized by any internet search engine, it’s certainly questionable if it even exists. I’m guessing your head to head with Dan wasn’t as you suggested also. While Dan was a mediocre talk show host and he often had a tendency to suffer fools as long as they supported his viewpoint, I doubt he’d suffer one as demonstrably wrong as you for any length of time.

      • Steve; You sound very bitter, not good going into the new year, cheer up.
        Do your research and study the pebble plan, did you know that Northern Dynasty has never developed a mine before? Northern Dynasty is the parent company of the pebble partnership of which mining partners Anglo American, First Quantum Minerals, Mitsubishi and Rio Tinto Abandoned, also major investors have now abandoned the prospect, did you know?

    • Yes to Pebble. We need mineral resources. And fishing can coexist. It’s not either/or. We can have both.

  3. I will miss him, hopefully someday while I am surfing my radio dial I will hear him again on a National radio program. He is too good to go silent

  4. “……. I just needed to stop. Stop working, stop radio, stop leaving the house, just stop………”
    Too bad. I much rathered you to Fagan. I hope your recovery has been complete.

  5. Right River,if Dan was fighting for truth and corruption.He would have never have left the show and the people who depeneded on him.

  6. I will always remember Dan losing touch with reality, the way many did, when covid hit. We’ve lost so much because people simply lost their minds and the ability to process information either because of covid or due to covid. I specifically remember a caller talking emphatically about how Ivermectin had cured his wife and himself. Dan took the bait asking about how Ivermectin cured him, the gentleman went on to say how his symptoms got worse after taking Ivermectin and how once he got the monoclonal DNA treatment his symptoms got better, but Ivermectin cured him. The gentleman’s wife was doing really good with the Ivermectin since she couldn’t get the monoclonal DNA treatment, it was working so well she was admitted to the hospital where he couldn’t see her. Dan wanted so much for Ivermectin to be the cure he couldn’t see the obvious. Covid broke so many, Dan included and sadly he’s never recovered from it.

    • You demonstrate you don’t understand Ivermectin hardly at all, if at all. Had the hospitals used it, they could have cured many. But there is no money in a drug that is now off-patent. They used ultra-expensive Remdesivir, which they know shuts down people’s kidneys, and hardly does anything positive for Covid. The ventilators were not the right treatment too. Many oxygen therapies would have worked far better, but there is no money in them.

      Just like there is no money in vitamin D, which has been the main solution to Covid, if people make sure their blood levels are above 50 ng/ml. A number of peer reviewed studies have proven that, but Zink and Dunleavy still won’t mention D, which also helps people overcome depression, helps us concentrate, etc., which used to be mentioned to Alaskans. But anything that can cure Covid they would not mention, or they couldn’t get authorization to fast track the jab that they made multiple $billions on, liability free — which ended up damaging many, including Dan, seriously. He could have died.

      Do you care? Do you have love in your heart? Do you work for “love of money” driven Big Pharma yourself?

      Dr.. Iona Farr cured 2,000 out of 2,001 Covid patients, losing only one. Compare that to Alaska’s hospitals, which lost a high percentage of patients, perhaps one third or one quarter. Dr. Farr lost 0%, statistically.

      Do you care about truth? Are you a lover of the truth, or are you pushing an agenda?

      Maybe you didn’t even listen to Dan’s show, or not enough to know where he was truly coming from.

      Dan’s show was one of the greatest things that happened in Alaska in recent years.

      • Fenske. Your conclusions are based on faulty reasoning and a diet of misinformation. Your ideology against government or uncomfortable facts make you willing to believe what you WANT to believe.

        • Lucinda, my conclusions are based on many peer reviewed studies published in reputable medical journals. Blood levels of vitamin D above 50 ng/ml would have kept most of those who died from Covid from dying, proven.

          But there is no money in vitamin D for Big Pharma, or in off-patent Ivermectin. The American Medical Association is foremost “love of money” driven; was started by John D. Rockefeller to make medicine a business model, not a wellness model. Many doctors still call vitamins and minerals “expensive urine;” though, they’re dirt cheap compared to pharmaceuticals, which often don’t cure the root problem and often cause serious side effects, including vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

          And vitamin D is a hormone that modulates the immune systems. High enough D also virtually eliminates breast cancer (2019 peer reviewed study that Big Pharma won’t tell anyone).

          My article shows the studies which prove vitamin D has been the answer to Covid. You can find it by doing a search in the duckduckgo search engine if you include quotes around it. Google won’t link to it. They’re in cahoots with Big Pharma, and are in big trouble with God for their censorship of truth.

          “High Enough Vitamin D – Freedom From Covid Fear (for most) — Summary Info / Studies / How Much to Take / New Standards”
          __________

          Also, Dr. Farr’s 100% success rate, compared to our hospitals’ high death rate is proof that Ivermectin and vitamin D work.
          __________

          Dr. Pierre Kory testified before Congress on Ivermectin. His book will be out next month, showing all of the studies and the success data. He sees both vitamin D and Ivermectin the keys

          And if people’s vitamin D levels were above 50 ng/ml, most wouldn’t need Ivermectin. He stated:

          “If I were ever put in charge of the response to this, first thing I would have done: a national public service campaign telling all the doctors to check the vitamin D levels of all their patients, and put them on a replenishment protocol, getting those levels above 50 [ng/ml]. If you had just done that simple thing, the government knows, and they’ve known for decades that in some estimates, 90% of our population is vitamin D deficient. And that’s deficient even according to their very low levels of vitamin D. Had we done a national vitamin D replenishment campaign , that would have changed the face of this [sweeping his hands to his sides, palms down].”

          The link to this is in my article, which I show you how to find above.

          God bless.

    • Steve, are you STILL blindly believing in, and shilling for, the utterly discredited establishment story lines on the Covid panic-demic that wasn’t? Despite the vast amount of evidence demonstrating the lies inherent in EVERY establishment claim regarding Covid — including the unsafe, ineffective, experimental and dangerous so-called ‘vaccines’?
      How sad, and how pathetic.
      You can lead a conformist horse to water, but you can’t make him think.

    • It’s fitting that it’s two Jeff’s.

      Jeff’s,
      Were either of you cured by Ivermectin, or did you simply believe the snake oil salesmen when they said it would cure you? How much were you charged for your snake oil? While you two Jeff’s rail against modern pharma, you readily endorse modern pharma but you lack the ability to even see it! You will pay a doctor to tell you what you want to hear and give you a pill you want to take but you don’t actually do the research yourself to see if what you’re taking will cure you. You’ve been taken by snake oil salesmen.

      Ivermectin doesn’t cure covid.

      • Steve-O, the jury is still out on Ivermectin and the feds will only point you to studies that discredit its use. I don’t think any one story is proof and no doctor is saying that Ivermectin actually cures Covid, but it actually may reduce symptoms and death according to some studies, such as ‘https://journals.lww.com/americantherapeutics/fulltext/2021/08000/ivermectin_for_prevention_and_treatment_of.7.aspx

        Ivermectin is used with a couple of other meds, not alone, in treating Covid. They — the docs you discredit — also use hydroxy chloroquine and prednisone at different stages of the covid illness, and they use a z-pac, or an antibiotic to prevent secondary infections that compound the severity. Everyone talks about Ivermectin because it’s the anti-malarial and de-worming drug, so the discreditors like to call it the horse dewormer. But many drugs can be repurposed, and really, who are you going to believe, the feds?

        Big Pharma can’t make money on ivermectin like they can by pushing a new booster every few months — boosters that apparently have no real help with the virus that has since mutated beyond their reach.

        Covid is not to be toyed with but your big pharma friends have lost all credibility at this point. I’ll stick with “right to try,” and keep an open mind on it.

        • The last few tranches of Twitter files released document the Biden administration (CDC, HHS, WH) working closely with Twitter (and very likely) to suppress EVERYTHING that disagreed with what they were pushing. This included ALL therapeutics, which included ivermectin, HCQ, monoclonal antibodies, vitamin D, etc. They suppressed the obesity – COVID connection. They suppressed the link between exercise and better results. All they focused on was masking and the jab. And it is still going on today at the other Big Tech companies.

          Imagine how well we could have done dealing with COVID if the feds had simply tossed info out there and allowed us as Americans to figure it out for ourselves. Cheers –

        • ‘All the time,’ you make good points, but you didn’t mention vitamin D.

          Are you familiar with Dr. Pierre Kory, perhaps the foremost expert on Ivermectin. He testified to Congress the high success rate of Ivermectin, and his book will be out in February, entitled: War on Ivermectin: “The Medicine that Saved Millions and Could Have Ended the COVID Pandemic.” (I was glad to see you included a link and were still able to post your comment, so I’ll try to do the same.)

          ‘https://www.amazon.com/War-Ivermectin-Medicine-Millions-Pandemic/dp/151077386X/ref=sr_1_2?

          Dr. Kory and Dr. Iona Farr would probably say the case is closed as to how effective Ivermectin was and is; though, they also used vitamin D, which is a hormone that modulates the immune system, helping to keep the cytokine storm from happening Many Alaskans died in our hospitals on ventilators. They couldn’t breathe because of the cytokine storm, largely because their D levels were too low.

          The FLCCC’s protocols (which Dr. Iona Farr recommends) include vitamin D (blood levels to 50 ng/ml), and in their late treatment protocol they also include calcifediol (fast acting D), or huge doses of D3. ‘https://covid19criticalcare.com/treatment-protocols/i-care

          When people are in late stage Covid, digestion shuts down, so it’s hard to absorb D3. Some peer reviewed studies show that fact acting D, calcifediol could have cured most. The links are in my fact sheet for Alaskans:

          High Enough Vitamin D – Freedom From Covid Fear (for most) — Summary Info / Studies / How Much to Take / New Standards

          ‘https://tobefree.press/2021/10/30/vitamin-d-key-to-freedom-from-covid-fear

          Dr. Pierre Kory, probably the foremost expert on Ivermectin still publicly says that high enough vitamin D levels (above 50 ng/ml) would have solved Covid.

          The truth is that when people’s D levels are high enough hardly any will then need Ivermectin, because most cannot then get the serious lung issue, the cytokine storm.

          And vitamin D3 can be purchased anywhere, and does not need a prescription that drug stores have to be willing to fill.

          Dr. Kory testified at Sen. Ron Johnson’s forum last month this about high enough D levels being the main key. I transcribed the full quote, posted here:

          Dr. Pierre Kory @ Sen. Johnson’s forum: A national VITAMIN D campaign could have protected us from Covid mortality. The only thing they recommended was Tylenol

          ‘http://tobefree.press/2022/12/26/dr-pierre-kory-sen-johnsons-forum

          And in another forum in July of last year, Dr. Kory specifically said this:

          “If I were ever put in charge of the response to this, first thing I would have done: a national public service campaign telling all the doctors to check the vitamin D levels of all their patients, and put them on a replenishment protocol, getting those levels above 50 [ng/ml]. If you had just done that simple thing, the government knows, and they’ve known for decades that in some estimates, 90% of our population is vitamin D deficient. And that’s deficient even according to their very low levels of vitamin D. Had we done a national vitamin D replenishment campaign , that would have changed the face of this [sweeping his hands to his sides, palms down].”

          Dr. Pierre Kory: A national VITAMIN D campaign to get levels above 50 would have changed the face of Covid!

          ‘http://tobefree.press/2022/10/12/dr-pierre-kory-a-national-vitamin-d-campaign

          Charlie Kirk talked about the German study on his show:

          Charlie Kirk Show: High Vitamin D Could Have Prevented Nearly ALL COVID Deaths and No One’s Talking About It

          ‘https://tobefree.press/2021/12/23/charlie-kirk-high-vitamin-d-could-have-prevented-nearly-all-covid-deaths

          In Alaska, every winter the media would say something about vitamin D to help us overcome SAD, seasonal affective disorder, but they didn’t during Covid, apparently because it’s “vaccine hesitancy.” They were told by Big Pharma not to.

          We have a serious deficiency of love and truth right now, which is rapidly destroying Alaska and America.

          All doctors should have been pushing high enough D levels from day one, but hardly any have said anything about D for Covid, including Dr. Anne Zink. What a shame!

          And we need high enough D levels to not be depressed and to function normally anyway, including the school children who are having trouble learning to read. Vitamin D helps children concentrate, a peer reviewed article on adolescents shows.

          Nobody is talking about D in Alaska, where almost everyone isn’t even at the beginning of normal blood levels (30-100 ng/ml). Most are at 10-20, instead, which is a low information travesty.

          TRUTH MATTERS!

      • FYI Steve-0,
        Ivermectin doesn’t cure covid, about as well as your mRNA jab doesn’t prevent it……..

  7. I always enjoyed listening to Dan’s show, whether I agreed with him or not. He was entertaining, funny, sometimes maddening, but overall did a good job. I wish him well in whatever his new endeavors may be.

  8. Wonderful article, Glen! Thanks for sharing that, and for admitting where you were wrong.

    Reconciliation is one of the main keys to spiritual revivals of the past, and will be one of the main keys to the coming Greatest Awakening.

    I hope someone like you will take Dan’s spot, since you also love truth, and are so honest.

    God bless!

  9. Glen: I appreciate your comments and they move the needle a bit. That said, I was not a Fagan fan. I have been here many decades now and remember when he arrived at Channel 2. Too often he opined on Alaska matters that he did not know much about. That created errors and compromised his credibility. I guess he has lived and done his show from New Orleans for several years. I cannot believe that this works well. My son lives in a New Orleans suburb. It is a different world. I wish Mr. Fagan well. I look forward to his replacement, assuming the replacement is more knowledgeable.

    • JMARK,

      Dan did a much better job from New Orleans than what most locals do, because he believed that truth matters, which is often not the case with the others, especially Tom Anderson. Mike Porcaro pushes everything Big Pharma too; wouldn’t even let Dr. Iona Farr even speak at all to tell us the truth. Dr. Kiessling is in big trouble for misleading so many, with Porcaro’s blessing.

      Mike Porcaro helped convince Alaskans that ranked choice voting was the way to go too (which just barely passed), helping Lisa Murkowski win.

      Dan stayed in touch with ‘awake but not woke’ Alaskans, daily, so he was well informed, and he read a lot of our articles, watched videos.

      He was amazing!!! I listened every day.

      There were a few issues that I think he didn’t understand as well as I’d like him to, since he wasn’t here. One was Dunleavy’s lockdowns, and ridiculous continued mandates, like forced masking of state workers, jab requirements from visitors. I think it was harder for him to relate to Sen. Lora Reinbold’s complaints about Dunleavy, because he hadn’t experienced what we did first hand.

      Dan said he was going to visit us on two occasions in the past two years, but then never did. That would have been wonderful, but he’s talked about not liking confined spaces, and rightly so hated the mask mandates on the planes, which only he told the truth about. No study shows they worked. He let me talk about the vitamin D solution, when people’s levels are above 50 ng/ml, peer reviewed studies proven.

      Dan also didn’t experience our wet July and August last year, so remembers more sun during summers. But that’s no big deal.

      All-in-all, Dan’s show was AMAZING! Those who listened learned a lot of keys to be able to navigate the Matrix we’re all living in now.

      Also, it was clear that Dan’s heat was here. He loves Alaska and Alaskans! We’re so blessed he was on air during this time!

      TRUTH MATTERS!

  10. Glen, 34 times either I, Me , My, Mine, is used in your ” larger – than – life – legacy ” to Dan! 22 times ” Dan ” was typed into your Love of and “greatness ” of him! A ” legacy ” in my opinion should be used only upon one’s death.
    Dan is still with us & I believe he can’t & will not resist, listening in, on his past dedicated/employed Dan Fagan Show.
    Thank you, Dan.
    Regardless of my health I will be listening & contributing as best I can to the ” ” Show, whomever puts their name on it ! Welcome, to the hot seat.
    Glen your heart felt honest accounting is clear in your admittance of ” bias” toward him after this statement
    ” We are all broken in our own way. Me, you, all of us. Nothing of what I write here is to say a person is perfect, or has a 1,000 batting average on every issue. If your measure for a public person is perfection, you should be prepared to be eternally disappointed, and probably a very bitter and lonely person. ”

    “Eternally disappointed ” is the best way to excuse every opinion of most all of our Public , elected ,appointed, officials, & private individuals responsible of the influence of the body public ” we the people” !
    Admittedly I am included . but I don’t do it for a job!

    Please everyone, my self recognition by me has only been used to express what many of We The People play in a part of in or not in media today.
    That being said, my hope is that a “truthful real conservative ” host, take’s Dan job starting Monday in this new year 2023.
    This job shouldn’t go to anyone that doesn’t recognize the ” reality ” of today & into our future in our Great State of Alaska & Nation ! I hope our first subject I believe should be Leadership & our economic survival in a nation biased by those in power toward ” digital control of our Labor, Wealth, Health and most of all our God given RIGHTS of Freedom , beginning with the First Amendment …… Happy New Year to all. !

  11. Great article & tribute to Dan’s contributions to the under-represented Alaskan conservatives. I learned a lot listening to his program! His voice will be missed.

Comments are closed.