First it was the “Obama was raised as a Muslim and educated in a madrassa” banter on Fox and Friends which CNN subsequently debunked as a total fabrication.
Then it was Fox News “personality” John Gibson’s allegation that “Hillary’s people” were behind the Obama madrassa story, so it wasn’t Fox News’ fault that they repeated what those bad old Clintons told them about Obama, a claim even Fox New executives later admitted had no basis in fact.
Then there was the non-apology apology by a Fox executive for the Obama/Clinton smears, even as Fox News host Sean Hannity continued to feature the Obama/madrassa story on his personal website, Hannity.com.
Clearly Fox News is a just a tad selective about who it reports upon, and what it says about them. Not that I don’t think for a minute that their coverage isn’t “balanced.” For every good thing one of their on air talents says about a Republican or conservative, I’m certain they have a negative item to report about a Democrat or liberal. What could be more balanced than that?
Still, over the past few weeks it does seem like their Whack-a-Lib gear has been stuck in overdrive, if you know what I mean. Here’s just a few more examples of what I’m talking about:
(cont.)
Let’s start with Bill O’Reilly and his recent nationally broadcast thoughts about an abducted child, Shawn Hornbeck a boy who was in all probability sexually abused by his captor for over 3 years:
O’REILLY: And the question is, why didn’t he escape when he could have? […]
All right, you know, the Stockholm syndrome thing, I don’t buy it. I’ve never bought it. I didn’t think it happened in the Patty Hearst case. I don’t think it happened here. […]
I’m not buying this. If you’re 11 years old or 12 years old, 13, and you have a strong bond with your family, OK, even if the guy threatens you, this and that, you’re riding your bike around, you got friends. The kid didn’t go to school. There’s all kinds of stuff. If you can get away, you get away. All right? If you’re 11.
The situation here for this kid looks to me to be a lot more fun than what he had under his old parents. He didn’t have to go to school. He could run around and do whatever he wanted. […]
… And I think when it all comes down, what’s going to happen is, there was an element here that this kid liked about his circumstances.
Of course, Bill is an expert on knowing what the effect of sexual abuse and harassment can have on a person, especially a young adolescent boy. Still, that seems a little harsh to me, considering there is no indication that Shawn Hornbeck was a liberal or a Democrat.
Nor was Shawn known to be a war critic like Sunsara Taylor who was told to her face and on the air by Mr. O’Reilly that she was a “lunatic” when she tried to tell him that a majority of Americans oppose the war in Iraq. Three times, in fact.
” You’re a lunatic, You’re a lunatic. 8% agree with you. Majority thinks you’re a lunatic.”
And what about Jane Fonda, who had the gall to speak out against war (the war in Iraq this time) for the first in 34 years? Here’s John Gibson airing his guest, Danny Bonaduce, calling for Ms. Fonda’s execution on Gibson’s show, the Big Story yesterday:
Bonaduce: ” She should have been tried for treason and the punishment at that time, you were taken out and shot and that’s what I think should have happened to her.”
Gibson looked pleased and amused but said nothing about Bonaduce’s casual call for Fonda’s execution.
And let’s not forget our deeply patriotic friend, Sean Hannity, who had this to say about Democrats on the January 25th edition of Hannity and Colmes:
HANNITY: The president reaches across the line. Nancy Pelosi, the day after election, had promised that she’d be — quote — “civil, bipartisan.” Seems to go out the window pretty quickly here.
You know, and a Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll recently showed that most Democrats don’t even want the president’s plan to succeed in Iraq.
Too bad that was, to put it gently, absolutely untrue. Though to be fair, most of us don’t think it has a snowball’s chance in hell of working.
Speaking of which, Guess who thinks the New York Times sympathizes with notorious mass murderers in Iraq? If you said Neil Cavuto, you’d be right:
CAVUTO: Is The New York Times in mourning again because murderers in Iraq face justice? Now, you remember the daily headlines that were whining about Saddam’s hanging. It didn’t end there, apparently. Now I read today’s New York Times, it says that the hanging of two others, including Saddam’s half brother, went awry because that half brother, well, he was decapitated in the hanging, which is generally not good for the person who is hanged.
My next two guests want to know why The New York Times is such a big advocate for convicted mass murderers in Iraq anyway. […]
And lastly, there’s this little item: Sean Hannity has a new show on Fox News on Sundays, Hannity’s America, where he gets to name who he considers America’s “Enemy of the Week.” Jane Fonda was this week’s honoree:
The F.B.I.’s anonymous tip line must have been ringing off the hook when Mr. Hannity introduced a regular feature, “Enemy of the State,” on his first show, and named the actor Sean Penn as that week’s winner. The idea looked like a copycat version of the MSNBC talk show host Keith Olbermann’s “Worst Person in the World,” but the title sounded more like Stalinist code aimed at fellow travelers.
Mr. Hannity has since changed it to “Enemy of the Week” (Jane Fonda won the honor on Sunday) …
All of which got me to thinking that Fox News’ (in)famous motto, “We report, you decide” is getting stale, outdated. Maybe it’s time for a change. So here’s my suggestion for a new one, which has the benefit of being easy to remember because of it’s alliteration and rhyme, not to mention it’s far more descriptive regarding the content of their programming:
FOX NEWS: “We Decide Who You Deride”
Whaddaya think?
Hat tips to Newshounds and Media Matters for doing my research for me.
