Fox News Channel

This was just too delicious for words…but I’ll try. As many of you are aware, most conservatives who study the economy and the markets view the New York Times’ Paul Krugman as being one of the most disingenuous pols on the landscape. Krugman has regularly been shown to flat out lie about economic data in his articles to prove his specious points, and was accused by the Times’ former ombudsman Byron Calame of regularly doing exactly that.

Well, on Tuesday, Krugman got his well-deserved comeuppance as Fox News’ Neil Cavuto called him out for such errors in transmission, and actually called Krugman a liar (must-see video available here):

Here’s what I’m saying that you’re doing: You are lying to people. That’s what I think that you’re doing.

Krugman then actually had the nerve to respond: “I haven’t heard a lie yet.” He mustn’t proofread his work. Luckily, Neil was having none of this:

You know you're liberal if even a liberal media watchdog group calls you liberal -- that is, unless you're MSNBC's Keith Olbermann. While Olbermann denies displaying a liberal bias on his show, once describing himself politically as "correct" and "neutral," media analyst Paul Waldman of the far left Media Matters for America, a frequent source of material for Olbermann, sees it differently. On Tuesday's Scarborough Country on MSNBC, during a discussion of whether there is a "vast left-wing conspiracy" against Bill O'Reilly and Fox News, Waldman proclaimed that Olbermann's show is the "only liberal show" on cable news. Below is a complete transcript of Waldman's comment from the December 5 Scarborough Country:

Failing to report on the legal status has become a common practice of the mainstream media as was demonstrated by a recent report done by WPTV in West Palm Beach, Florida. On Tuesday’s Fox and Friends First, hosts Brian Kilmeade, Gretchen Carlson, and Tiki Barber covered the story. The transcript is below.

Brian Kilmeade: "Let's talk about what's happening with, with illegals and soliciting funds for illegals. For example, what's happening in West Palm Beach in Florida."

Gretchen Carlson: "Well, you know, this is a really unusual story, because the TV station there, one of the affiliates in West Palm Beach, apparently did a story about how these immigrants needed help and that they had been giving back to the community, so now it was time for the rest of the community to step up an help them out. The only problem is is that usually television reports are supposed to be objective and they forgot to mention one major part of the story, which was the fact that these immigrants were illegal."

How do you know when you've gone overboard with political correctness? When even the liberal panelists of Fox News Watch chide you for it. Host Eric Burns normally stays above the fray. But for some reason, on this evening's show he chose to criticize US Airways for removing from one of its flights six imams whose actions had made other passengers uneasy.

Said Burns, introducing the segment: "There were two stories in the news this week about religion. First, Pope Benedict in Turkey tried to encourage tolerance between Catholics and Muslims. Second, a story of tolerance of U.S. Airways and Muslims - there wasn't any - as six Muslim religious leaders, or imams, were recently yanked off a US Airways flight for no apparent reason other than that a passenger thought they were behaving strangely. Jane, I wonder if the moral of these two stories is first that the media are not at all captivated by this Pope . . but they are captivated by stories that seem to show that anti-terrorist policies sometimes go too far."

Thanks to former President Clinton and victories in the recent midterm elections, Democrats are now launching a full out attack on Fox News, the only television news outlet that holds them accountable. Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) appeared on Wednesday’s The O’Reilly Factor to explain his recent attack on Fox News and once again lashed out on Bill O’Reilly when he issued him challenging questions. O’Reilly asked Congressman Frank what his position is on income redistribution.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA): "Bill, will you please stop interrupting if you want a serious discussion?"

Bill O’Reilly: "No. I'm not going to interrupt. When you say something dopey, I'm going point it out. What do you think you are, the czar of the interview?"

Yesterday John Gibson, host of "The Big Story" on Fox News, wondered if a national TV network, NBC, should make the country's foreign policy.

Let me introduce you to somebody. His name is Robert Wright. He is the chairman of the NBC television network, which is actually a few networks including CNBC and MSNBC. In essence, he runs those networks.

Since I used to work over there and know Mr. Wright and know how things work somewhat, I am confident I am right when I say Bob Wright decided, or at least approved, NBC's policy to refer to whatever it is that is now going on in Iraq as a civil war.

The Pentagon doesn't think so. The White House doesn't think so. Even CBS Evening News Executive Producer Rome Hartman said he thought NBC's decision wasn't so much a news judgment as a political judgment.

"Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts" the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, something Congressman Charles Rangel seemingly never picked up. In the Fox News Sunday segment which featured Barney Frank attacking Fox News, host Chris Wallace presented to Congressman Rangel findings from a Heritage Foundation Study that the military are in fact from a healthier economic background and better educated than the general American public. Rangel, with the facts in front of him, reverted to his original talking points disputing those very facts. He even made a John Kerry-like claim implying those serving in the military are not particularly patriotic or even very smart. The question is, will the mainstream media pick up on it?

Putin's Russia poses a potentially serious threat to the United States. But America lacks the moral standing to confront it. That was the view expressed by Ellen Ratner on this morning's Fox & Friends. Ratner, the short, liberal side of 'The Long & the Short of It' duo [seen here in file photo], expressed little doubt that Putin's government was behind the murder of Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko.

Ratner: "I think that there's no question. If I were a betting woman it would be 100% Putin and Russia, it's just their operation and they have the means to do it."

She continued: "We have got to take a very good, careful look at Russia. We're in Iraq where you have sort of a ragtag group of insurgents. And we're not focusing on the Russians that have over 5,000 nukes [and other WMDs] . . . Unfortunately, we're in business with these guys, we need their oil."

That's when Ratner asserted that America's alleged moral failings limited its options:

"I don't know what we should do except that we are not in a great position because we don't have the moral standing given what we're doing in Iraq."

Fox News Watch led this week's show with Brent Bozell's condemnation of the press' coverage of the just-concluded congressional campaign. Host Eric Burns noted that Bozell is "head of an influential conservative media watchdog group called the Media Research Center" - which also happens to be the parent organization of NewsBusters.

FNW played a video clip of Bozell stating:

"In 25 years of looking at the national media I have never in my life seen a more one-sided, distorted, vicious presentation of news and non-news by the national press. The national press ought to be collectively ashamed of itself. They might as well take up membership in the Democratic national party. They were the simple microphones for the party. They need to be ashamed of themselves for what they did."

Wednesday’s Fox and Friends discussed the recent feud between Rosie O’Donnell and Kelly Ripa. Co-host Gretchen Carlson said what so many of us are thinking.

Kelly Ripa complaining about singer Clay Aiken covering her mouth on TV: "Regardless of whatever the sexual orientation is, it was outrageous, it was out of line, it was unprofessional, and he wouldn't have done it to you because there is respect there." (End Video)

Gretchen Carlson: "Maybe he should do it to Rosie O'Donnell. You know what? This really just upsets me. Just stay out of everyone else's business, Rosie. I mean, for goodness sake, Kelly Ripa is the host of this show. Clay Aiken made a mistake in putting his hand over her mouth. You just don't do that to the host of a show when you are a guest and by the way, according to Kelly Ripa, he did not even say thank you for being the co-host of her show that day. I don't think Kelly Ripa should get any blame for what she said. She says 'look, it's cold and flu season, when I said I don't know where that hand's been,' she did not mean-"

Attacking Fox News is not an unusual tactic of the mainstream media, but on Tuesday’s Today, Matt Lauer began the show with a false claim about Fox News.

Matt Lauer: "But we begin this morning with the controversial story out of Fox News: The O.J. Simpson case. Fox News Corporation deciding to cut its losses and cancel that highly controversial project where he speaks out about those notorious murders."

The problem here: the Fox broadcast network, not Fox News, almost aired the interview with O.J. Simpson. He did accurately call it Fox later in the broadcast but, never issued a correction. Meanwhile, on Fox and Friends, Brian Kilmeade, Steve Doocy, and Gretchen Carlson questioned Bill O’Reilly on whether the mainstream media will tie Fox News in with the O.J. Simpson interview.

The success of the left-wing Jon Stewart at capturing the young news viewer hasn't gone unnoticed in the television business. Fox News Channel is prepping a show with a similar format, and with a non-liberal perspective, according to the Hollywood Reporter:

Fox News Channel might air two episodes of a "Daily Show"-like program with a decidedly nonliberal bent on Saturday nights in late January, with the possibility that it could become a weekly show for the channel.

The half-hour show is executive produced by "24's" Joel Surnow and Manny Cota and creator Ned Rice, who previously wrote for "Politically Incorrect" and "Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson" through This Just In Prods. It would take aim at what Surnow calls "the sacred cows of the left" that don't get made as much fun of by other comedy shows.

"It's a satirical news format that would play more to the Fox News audience than the Michael Moore channel," Surnow said. "It would tip more right as 'The Daily Show' tips left."

The show was pitched as "This Just In" when it first got life as a 20-minute pilot presentation for Fox Broadcasting Co.'s late-night division. But when that network passed, Surnow said it attracted the attention of Fox News Channel chief Roger Ailes.

"I showed it to Roger, and he really liked it and thought it could work on Fox News if we could make it conform to some of the restraints" of a cable news channel. Fox News Channel confirmed that talks were going on.

In a rare edition of our “Friday Night Fights” feature, the well-known duo from the Fox News hit “Hannity & Colmes” teamed together on Thursday to take on Rev. Al Sharpton (hat tip to our friend at Ms Underestimated). To set this melee up, a radio ad was played in Atlanta, Georgia, just before Election Day suggesting that a Republican-run America is like the United States before the civil rights movement (as reported by NewsBusters here):

You think fighting off dogs and water hoses in the Sixties was bad, imagine if we sit idly by and let the right-wing Republicans take control of the Fulton County Commission.

Rev. Al Sharpton was invited on H&C to discuss this outrage, and was met with punches from both sides when he didn’t condemn the message. Colmes began (video and full transcript follow): “I'll tell you, Reverend, I'm glad Democrats won, but I don't like ads that compare Republicans to Bill Connor. And you don't really believe that if Republicans got re-elected there that Bull Connor would -- his spirit would live on.”

Sharpton predictably didn't agree, and countered:

A real barnburner occurred on Fox News Wednesday. Yet, strangely, the competitors were on the same side of the aisle. As “Hannity and Colmes” welcomed Tennessee Senatorial-hopeful Congressman Harold Ford (D-Tennessee), one would have expected the fireworks to be lit when Sean was doing the questioning. However, the liberal-minded Alan Colmes showed America the lack of tolerance the media and the left have for moderate members of their club. As a result, Colmes gave Ford the full Lieberman treatment, beginning by listing positions Ford holds which are verboten for the current Democrat party:

But, you say, in addition to the issues Sean brought up, the Ten Commandments should be posted in courtrooms around the state. You favor school prayer. You say you’re pro-life. You want an anti-flag burning constitutional amendment. Are you going to vote with the Democratic caucus if you get into the Senate?

Effectively toeing the “principles and issues are irrelevant” line of his party, Colmes tried banging into the head of his opponent the fact that voting with the caucus is all that matters. Ford tried placating his hostile host with issues that should have appealed to him:

At the MRC's Business & Media Institute (BMI), we've tracked CNN's war on the economy. Today, Fox News's Brenda Buttner took on the media's negative slant with some cold hard facts:

“If you listen to the Democrats or listen to much of our media, our economy is in dire straights, but pay attention just to the numbers, well they tell a very different story... Number one, Americans employed, there's essentially full employment in the U.S..."

Buttner added that despite media talk of the housing slowdown, the "bottom line [is that] more and more of us today are fortunate enough to enjoy a piece of the American Dream" as 70 percent of Americans own their home.

Vice President Dick Cheney was Neil Cavuto’s guest on Fox News Monday, and he responded to his wife’s stellar performance on CNN’s the Situation Room last week (hat tip to Ian at Hot Air). Cheney told Cavuto that they refer to the interview “around the house as the ‘slapdown.’” The Vice President said his wife “was very tough, but she was very accurate and very aggressive.” After she was done, Cheney told his wife he “thought it was a sterling performance.”

What follows is a full transcript of this segment. Those interested can watch the video here.

It's not just Chris Matthews who sees racial bogeymen behind the RNC's now-famous ad [view here] with a Playboy bunny inviting Harold Ford, Jr. to "call me."

On last evening's "Beltway Boys," normally-kindly moderate Mort Kondracke claimed the Republicans designed the ad to "stir up rednecks."

Mort's fellow "Boy," Fred Barnes, was having none of it:

"You have to be living in the 50's or 60's to think it is racist. . . There is absolutely nothing wrong. It amounts to the way Democrats play the race card and you fall for it."

A month or so ago I would have said that Neal Gabler and I inhabit different planets, but his apparent home has recently been demoted from planetary status. While I'm off searching for another metaphor, let me pass along the latest comment from the decidedly liberal denizen of Fox News Watch that made me reflect on just how distinct a world view we have. In the course of discussing on this evening's show the controversy that erupted this past week over Rush Limbaugh's comments about Michael Fox, Gabler had this to say:

"The media has tread lightly on Rush and his criticism of [Michael J.] Fox. To my mind, Rush is a cancer to America and hatemongers are marginalized, and why the media does not marginalize Rush, I don't know."

The national press corps is justifiably looked upon with suspicion by conservatives and in dire need of reform if it wishes to regain their confidence, especially since that's a sound business strategy.

Those are the words of ABC News political director Mark Halperin who on last night's "O'Reilly Factor" provided a resounding endorsement of the idea that the elite American media needs to stop being liberally biased. (Video available in WMV or Real. MP3 audio also available, transcript is after the jump.)

In a followup to an Oct. 19 internet posting in which he sarcastically implied that reporters take their cues from Democrats and liberal activists, Halperin stated that the press should use the 2006 elections as an opportunity to regain the public trust:

"In this country, we've got these old news organizations, the major networks, ABC, where you [O'Reilly] used to work, the New York Times, the Washington Post. These organizations have been around a long time, and for 40 years conservatives have looked with suspicion at them. I think we've got a chance in these last two weeks to prove to conservatives that we understand their grievances, we're going to try to do better, but these organizations still have incredible sway, and conservatives are certain that we're going to be out to get them. We've got to fix that."

On last night's Fox News Watch, Cal Thomas offered assessments of the way in which the independence of two of his fellow conservative commentators is viewed. While acknowledging that the two top-rated talkers have recently chided the administration, he suggested there is a perception that, by and large, the pair lack political autonomy.

In the context of a discussion of President Bush's efforts to shore up support among conservative radio talk show personalities, Thomas stated:

"Even Rush Limbaugh, who is seen as being in the pocket of the administration, has been critical of Republicans not being more like Republicans."

As reported Friday, a Democrat staffer was suspended last week over possibly being the source of the recently leaked National Intelligence Estimate to the New York Times. New reports from the Los Angeles Times and Fox News identified the name of the staffer in question, and that he has ties to Rep. Jane Harman (D-California) who expressed such outrage over the incident (hat tip to Michelle Malkin):

The aide was identified by other congressional officials as Larry Hanauer. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of a pending investigation into the leak, said Hanauer had held positions with the departments of Defense and Homeland Security before joining the professional staff of Democrats on the House intelligence panel about two years ago.

The Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Peter Hoekstra (R-Michigan) is apparently fed up with all the leaks coming out of Congress, and sent a letter to Harman’s office addressing such concerns:

Air America is grasping for straws in some mighty odd places. A mass email from Air America host Thom Hartmann today touts the parallels between the plight of the bankrupt left-wing radio network and, of all things, Fox News Channel [FNC] and the Washington Times.

Excerpts:

• "There are times when doing the profitable thing is also doing the right thing. That's certainly what Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch thought when they lost an average of $90 million a year for about five years before the Fox News Channel became profitable."

Cindy Sheehan became an instant liberal-media celebrity when she held a vigil outside President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas and demanded to meet with him (a second time) over the death of her son Casey in Iraq. But is the liberal media only about creating the legend and leaving the negative details out? MRC's Justin McCarthy reported that on Wednesday's "Fox and Friends," Melanie Morgan and Catherine Moy, authors of the book American Mourning, said they found Sheehan was paid by John Kerry's campaign in 2004 to speak out against President Bush. Said Morgan:

"We have Federal Election Commission documents. I mean we went to an extensive research, we followed the money, that's how you always figure out what's going on...We found that John Kerry and Michael Moore personally recruited Gold Star family members just within days and sometimes even at the funerals of their sons to come and work for the campaign in order to undermine the candidacy of George W. Bush at the time. It was shocking and, and really offensive behavior and that's exactly what happened to Cindy Sheehan who we tracked down. She went on the payroll of John Kerry's campaign within days after her son's death as well as her daughter Carly. Ultimately, there was a split between the two because she felt that John Kerry wasn't radical enough and didn't have an anti-war agenda that matched hers."

I don’t know about you, but I love it when a liberal member of Congress tries to talk tough about terrorism. It’s kind of like watching my 13-year-old daughter try to bully my 18-year-old son. Such was the case on the “O’Reilly Factor” last night when Congressman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) tried to look tough in front of Our Boy Bill – sorry for the “Carousel” pun to those who caught it (hat tip to Hot Air with video link to follow).

The scrum started early when O’Reilly brought up the Military Commissions Act just signed by the President, and the fact that Rangel voted against it. Charlie weakly replied: “Not only is the bill unconstitutional, but it was brought up on the eve of an election to give some type of feeling that Republicans were tough on terrorism.”

Rangel stepped into an uppercut with that offering, and O’Reilly didn’t miss the opportunity:

As reported by NewsBusters last Friday, famed television talk show host Oprah Winfrey recently had the New York Times’ Frank Rich on her program to hawk his new Bush-bashing book. On Monday’s “O’Reilly Factor,” the host and one of his guests, conservative writer and blogger Michelle Malkin, took Oprah to task for the amount of time Rich was given to spew his vitriol, and for the fact that Oprah rarely has conservatives on to push their books (hat tip to Hot Air). O’Reilly began (video link and full transcript to follow):

Her daytime talk program is a launch pad for books, movies, TV shows, and records. Most who appear on Ms. Winfrey's show benefit from the experience greatly. But an analysis of the programs shows that liberal guests far outnumber conservatives and traditionalists in the arena. We can only find four traditional guests in the past four years. Four. President Bush, Rudy Giuliani, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Mel Gibson.

On the other side, there are literally dozens of liberal people who have been given a forum on Oprah's program. Just last week, Bush hater Frank Rich was given an hour to pontificate, one hour. I had no idea Mr. Rich was so popular among daytime viewers. Also on Oprah's show, Michael Moore, Jane Fonda, Susan Sarandon, Al Gore, Barbara Streisand, Sean Penn, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Jon Stewart, George Clooney, Jim McGreevey, on and on and on. You got three weeks? I can keep listing them.

O’Reilly continued, and then brought Malkin into the discussion:

Today's starter: A former Arabic translator for ABC and FNC has been charged with helping a terrorist leader communicate with his followers.

Fox News correspondent Steve Centanni logged his first report Wednesday after having been kidnapped and held hostage by Palestinians in Gaza back in August. Please join me in giving hearty congratulations and warmest wishes to Steve and his family.

Here is a video of Centanni's first report since being released by his captors on August 27 courtesy of our friend at Ms Underestimated.

Welcome Back, Steve!

Howard Kurtz profiled White House press secretary Tony Snow for Thursday's Washington Post. He emphasized his talk-radio style of combat with reporters, and his availablity for GOP fundraisers: "It's Gloves Off (and Pass the Hat) for Bush Spokesman." That sounds a little like he's taking a collection for his personal use. White House reporters asked for comment in the piece come across as, surprise, hard-bitten and cynical:

"He definitely likes the combat," says Martha Raddatz, ABC's White House correspondent. "One of his devices is he stops and smiles at you. The megawatt smile is supposed to punctuate his sentences, but it hasn't worked as well for him lately. It's a pretty tight-lipped administration, and that hasn't changed."

Asked at the National Press Club's luncheon on Monday “what do you see as the future vision for CNN now that Fox is gaining in market share and popularity?”, CNN founder Ted Turner leaned into the microphone and, prompting laughter and applause, produced a loud sputtering sound as he blew air through his lips with his tongue sticking out slightly -- aka "blowing a raspberry" or issuing a "Bronx cheer." Then, seemingly retreating from his apparent disparagement of CNN, Turner confusingly tried to clarify: “It's not the same. Fox is a different animal [pause]. Listen, you know, the right-wingers have every right to have a network of their own and they've got one.”

Video clip (35 seconds): Real (1 MB) or Windows Media (1.2 MB), plus MP3 audio (200 KB)

On FNC's two-hour Sunday special (8-10pm EDT) to mark the channel's tenth anniversary, former CBS News and MSNBC executive Erik Sorenson articulated what the AP's David Bauder last week paraphrased him as acknowledging: How New York-based news media executives were so out of touch that they did not recognize the depth of belief in liberal media bias into which FNC tapped. “There was a full-on commitment” to the “fair and balanced” premise, Sorenson proposed during FNC's special, Fox News at 10: Thank You America, in explaining FNC's success: “There were far more people in America who seemed to hold that opinion of the liberal media bias than anyone in New York City -- the media capital of the world -- had estimated."

As detailed in an October 2 NewsBusters posting, Bauder had reported: “Before Fox, many in the media scoffed at the notion of a liberal bias and figured only a handful of people really believed that, said Erik Sorenson, former MSNBC President. 'Fox proved it's a much larger group than anybody realized,' he said.”