Glenn Beck may be too toxic for Fox News, but he’s a regular on The O’Reilly Factor. Last night, Bill O’Reilly called on him to help advance his ridiculous justification for attacking Alan Colmes last week, that it was all part of “looking out for you.” Unfortunately for O’Reilly, Beck didn’t do much to help.

If you ask me, it smacked of desperation that O'Reilly likened himself to Beck in order to make his case. But that's exactly what O'Reilly did: You may recall that in his opening segments, O'Reilly likened the budget crisis to Al Qaeda. Now he was suggesting that he was only trying to warn Americans of some kind of looming Armageddon, Beck-style:

You and I are on the same wavelength on the fiscal chaos issue… Beck and I see the danger here… It’s hard to convince people who don’t pay attention that there is a danger because you can’t really see it…

How do we sell this? …(Americans are) in denial which is why I had to get Alan Colmes’ attention.

Beck answered by clowning around. But underneath his mugging was the suggestion that his kind of act is not the winningest of strategies. Beck’s voice was dripping with sarcasm as he said:

And what I saw you do to that poor man… Bill, I was shocked. I saw this and I thought to myself, ‘Now, that is a broadcaster who isn’t in control of his feelings.’

I thought the way that you personally handled it, Bill. You don’t get excited like that on television. People don’t like that. It doesn’t work. …The next thing you know, you’re crying, whatever. …And Bill, I was a little disappointed in you.

However, while Beck also called Colmes “a nice guy” whom he likes, he also said, “I will tell you that some might say that I was in the other room cheering. But nobody that you can trust.”

Colmes will be on The Factor tonight for his regular Tuesday night gig. It should be interesting.