On Thursday, Fox and Friends blasted View host Joy Behar’s hypocrisy in calling conservative Vice President Mike Pence “mentally ill” for confessing he talked to God, while ignoring liberal Democrat Oprah Winfrey admitting she does so as well.
Fox and Friends and Fox and Friends First both noted the backlash against the network on their March 1 shows.
Host Heather Childers credited the MRC for holding ABC accountable for its host’s behavior, on Fox and Friends First :
Since those comments, media watchdog group Media Research Center started a campaign to hold the View co-host accountable for anti-Christian comments but it looks like the network isn't taking any action and Behar isn’t changing her tune. Just this week she said ‘conservatives have a penchant for Nazis.’
An hour later on Fox and Friends, host Steve Doocy wondered how Behar would react now that Oprah has come out several times in the past few weeks saying she was waiting on God to tell her if she should run for president.
“We're wondering how she is going to respond,” Doocy pointed out. Brian Kilmeade wondered if Behar would mock Oprah as well.
“Is Joy Behar, when her show goes live today, going to mock Oprah Winfrey the way she mocked and got a laugh from the entire panel and the audience when she made her comments a few weeks back?” he posed.
“Should we place bets?” Doocy joked before Ainsley Earhardt added, doubtfully, “She is not going to say anything.”
But Doocy added that ABC “has pretty much not responded.”
“She said once she was kidding. I don't think she is going to touch it with a 10-foot pole,” he agreed with Earhardt.
“Rush Limbaugh calls it a double standard,” Earhardt added, playing a segment from the radio host’s show yesterday.
Kilmeade then cited the MRC’s campaign against the show’s advertisers, noting the sheer number of calls ABC received, and wondering if combined with Oprah’s comments, Behar would come out and apologize:
She wasn't getting much love at the ABC switchboard. 30,000 calls came to complain about her comments, which made the next day, she came back and said ‘I was basically only kidding.’ So, here's the question: Oprah Winfrey will-- do you in fact feel as though she will be called out today by Joy Behar? Will she actually acknowledge it? Will Joy use this as an opportunity to say, you know, ‘The more I think about it, I really shouldn't have said that two weeks ago. I have a live show for an hour and, you know, we interact and sometimes things happen.’
“Will it be the same standard? Will she say that Oprah Winfrey is mentally ill as she said Mike Pence was mentally ill?” Doocy asked skeptically.
Click "expand" to read the full transcript below:
FNC Fox and Friends
3/1/2018
6:31:56-6:36:45 AM
STEVE DOOCY: Okay. So she is saying Mike Pence is mentally ill for talking to God.
BRIAN KILMEADE: And she is not correct.
AINSLEY EARHARDT: We talked to Mike Pence about it and he said basically I get criticized all the time. I'm used to that. But when you criticize the majority of America and you criticize my God for saying that, I stand up. I have to reprimand her for doing that.
DOOCY: Mike Pence is a conservative. She doesn't like conservatives. So it's ironic. We're wondering how she is going to respond to the new cover story in "People" magazine where Oprah Winfrey reveals she talks to God, too.
OPRAH WINFREY: Billionaires calling me up, saying, ‘I can get you a billion dollars. I can run your campaign.’ I actually went into prayer about it like, god, if you think I'm supposed to run, you have you got to tell me. And it has to be so clear that not even I could miss it.
KILMEADE: As clear as when George Burns played God that was obviously God. It’s got to be something as transparent and flagrant as that. Is Joy Behar when her show goes live today going to mock Oprah Winfrey the way she mocked and got a laugh from the entire panel and the audience when she made her comments a few weeks back.
DOOCY: Should we place bets?
EARHARDT: She is not going to say anything.
KILMEADE: I wonder if she will address it we are laying the groundwork here and we're powerful.
DOOCY: ABC has pretty much not responded. She said once she was kidding. I don't think she is going to touch it with a 10-foot pole.
EARHARDT: Rush Limbaugh calls it a double standard. Listen to this.
RUSH LIMBAUGH: A liberal Democrat is gonna talk to God and God is gonna talk back. Now, isn't that what they have been making fun of Mike Pence for for about a week?
It was Maud Behar on The View. Mike Pence is mentally ill because Jesus talks to him. That’s a big enough risk for Oprah as a Democrat to acknowledge God, number one, and then she says she will not move forward unless she hears from God in such a clear way that she couldn't miss it. So she's expecting God to talk to her. Anybody else see the contradictions here?
EARHARDT: Ok several things came to mind. When I heard Oprah say that I was like -- see, I love Oprah. I love that she is willing to talk about that and talk about her faith. And when you watched her show, she was always so generous and talked about her faith a lot and was giving away cars and everything.
DOOCY: You get a car. You get a car.
EARHARDT: She always talks about how she appreciates where she came and what her story has been. I think she is just a powerful woman. Clearly she has done a lot for other people and for herself for this country and has a great story. So, I thought that was wonderful. Joy Behar, as a Christian it makes me sad that she was making fun of him and doesn't have that experience. So, it's hard for me to criticize her because she just doesn't know -- she doesn't know the love of what it is like to have faith and to have a higher supreme being, it seems.
KILMEADE: She wasn't getting much love at the ABC switchboard. 30,000 calls came to complain about her comments which made the next day she came back and said I was basically only kidding. So, here's the question: Oprah Winfrey will-- do you in fact feel as though she will be called out today by Joy Behar? Will she actually acknowledge it? Will Joy use this as an opportunity to say, you know, ‘The more I think about it, I really shouldn't have said that two weeks ago. I have a live show for an hour and, you know, we interact and sometimes things happen.’
DOOCY: Will it be the same standard? Will she say that Oprah Winfrey is mentally ill as she said Mike Pence was mentally ill? Oh yeah I'm just kidding.
EARHARDT: There are a lot of people who are not sure about their faith and they would love to hear from God and they're very confused and they don't know what's happening. I have a good friend who talks to me about this all the time. She would love to have the assurance in Heaven and all of that I understanding maybe she hasn't gotten there yet. Maybe joy hasn't but to equate it to mental illness? That's what I had a problem with.
