johnny dollar's archive: mar-apr 2008

The Big Interview is now history and the reviews are in: a "friendly exchange" that Sen Obama handled "deftly" and artfully. Chris Wallace was "civil" and the post-game analysis "surprisingly moderate".

How can this be? Just yesterday the Fox haters and blue blog prognosticators were convinced that the sky was falling. Just stepping into the evil lair of Fox News would be the greatest political catastrophe since Nixon refused make-up. For your reading enjoyment, some of our favorite bits of problematic prescience:

• Obama should better be ready for the gotchas coming a mile a minute.  He better have quick sound bite answers, becuase [sic] you know Chris Wallace is going to ask another gotcha question before he lets Obama answer the last gotcha question. [Kos]
• Fox is interested in only one thing: taking down Obama, and they will literally stoop to anything to do it. Obama is nuts if he thinks he's going to get fair or impartial questions. All Fox needs is one line, one questionable syllable, and they will be talking about it and looping it for weeks. [TPM]
• FOX will distort this segment just like any other segment in reference to Obama. Murdough met with Bill Clinton prior to the outlandish "clips" aired about Rev. Wright. FOX will clip this interview as well. [TPM]
• This is nothing but a trap. [NewsCorpse]
• It smacks of capitulation and that's how they will spin it. [Kos]
• Obama's going to answer the bully. [Kos]
  
• It will be a hit job. They’ll pull out some crap he did in the 4th grade or something. [C&L]
• Fox has complete control over what viewers will see, and they'll edit it to make it into hit job on Obama regardless of what he says.... It makes no sense to expect that a Republican propaganda outlet will somehow produce something that helps Obama. [TPM]
• No matter what he says or does, there will be negative spin from it. [Kos]
• It's [sic] viewers will become even more convinced that Fox is fair and balanced, and come the GE when Fox is running the 10-second clip of Rev. Write [sic] nonstop, Americans, on a whole, will get dumber. That's the big picture, net consequence of this appearance by Obama on Fox -- that it's going further [sic] dumb down America. [Kos]
• This is gonna make the ABC debate look like a tea party. [C&L]
• He'll probably rip Wallace a new one and make him look stupid. [Kos]
• His responses will be cut up and edited and used against him in a million ways. [HuffPo]
• He goes on fox, makes a stand against the [expletive deleted] foxnews, looks like a democratic fighter, and doesn't have to attack hillary to do so. [TPM]
• Prepare to be sand-bagged. [C&L]
• I hope by, "take Fox on," they mean, "beat Chris Wallace around the head and neck with a sock full of ball bearings," but that's probably too much to hope for. [TPM]
• So wqho [sic] wants to bet that Wallace's first question(s) will be about why Obama hasn't appeared on Fox in so long? [TAP]
• He’s walking into a trap and Wallace will try to sandbag him. [C&L]
• The "questions" will be long narrative "opening statements" such as: "Sen. Obama, you have courted domestic terrorists like William Ayers for their political support. Ayers, of course, bombed American government builings, never repented, and on 9/11 said that the bombings did not go far enough. When questioned about Ayers in the last debate, you were very defensive and did not, in the eyes of many, renounce Ayers. In fact, you appeared to defend him by suggesting he was just a benign "English professor." Senator, do you regret your association with this domestic terrorist?" By asking this kind of loaded question, the answer is almost irrelevant. [TPM]
• Viewers will see it only after Fox gets done editing it into a smear job. [TPM]
• I'm sure Karl Rove at Fox News, will be burning up the Blackberry with zingers to Chris Wallace to get Barack Obama tripped up and agitated so as to get a sound bite to play over and over. [TPM]
• My guess, they go over the top on Rev Wright, and Obama has an answer ready. [TAP]
• Fox will spend the entire time focusing on the "manufactured issues" of the campaign — flag pins, "bitter"-gate, Weathermen, etc. Obama's going to get punched. [MoJo]

fox news obama chris

Yesterday we posted about Air America entertainer Rachel Maddow, who, on Keith Olbermann's Countdown show, railed at Democrats for daring to appear on Fox News and, even worse, say something nice about them. The money quote we focused on:

MADDOW: If you just think about the petty stuff that Fox News has done. The fact the last time they hosted a Democratic Presidential candidate campaign, they referred to all the candidates as Democrat candidates.

As we documented from the transcripts of not just one but three debates hosted by Fox, they never once referred to any of the contenders as a "Democrat" candidate. Maddow was making it up: currying favor with Olbermann, perhaps in the hope that she'll get another chance to guest-host his show.

By why would she want to? Why does Rachel Maddow, enemy of using "Democrat" as an adjective and other "petty" insults, even allow herself to appear on MSNBC? We ask that question because of what we found during a brief excursion into the MSNBC transcript archives:

• CHRIS CILLIZZA: Then you look at polling where it says for president would you prefer a generic Democrat candidate or generic Republican candidate?
• CHRIS MATTHEWS: What is the fight between your party and the Democrat party, Democratic Party, over the Patriot Act?
• DANA MILBANK: Mark McKinnon is a Democrat strategist happened to have a man crush on George W. Bush.
• TIM RUSSERT: If you do not become chairman of the Democrat Party, might you consider running for president?
• CHUCK TODD: She was not seen as the—inside the Democrat Party as a rank and file liberal.
• CHRIS MATTHEWS: There isn‘t a unified Democrat Party, in all due respect.
• TUCKER CARLSON: And could his Joe-mentum be the death of the Democrat Party‘s hopes for the White House in 2008?
• KEITH OLBERMANN: Party leaders, superdelegates, not the pledged kind selected by the voters rearing up and taking command of the Democrat Party.
• TIM RUSSERT: Coming this fall, who will you vote for, the Democrat candidate, or Republican candidate?
• CHRIS MATTHEWS: I’m going to ask you about six or seven questions, they all deal with sensitive constituencies in the Democrat Party.
• JOHN HARWOOD: I talked to a top Democrat strategist yesterday.
• KEITH OLBERMANN: And our fifth story in the COUNTDOWN, the Democrat Party, not to mention the American democracy, should be all the better for it.
• CHRIS MATTHEWS: Kweisi Mfume, he is the former president of the NAACP and a former congressman. Until last week, he was the Democrat candidate for Senator in Maryland.
• DAN ABRAMS: My problem is with the Democrat Party establishment.
• TIM RUSSERT: There will be an uproar, an upheaval within the Democrat party.
• CHRIS MATTHEWS: And speaking of Pennsylvania, we‘ll also talk to the state‘s Democrat Party chair.
• CRAIG CRAWFORD: I actually think a big part of the problem in the leadership of the Democrat Party, Keith.
• KEITH OLBERMANN: Typically, this far into the primaries, the remaining Democrat candidate goes after the Republican.

Hey Rachel! Who's petty now? foxnews rachel cd

The last time Rachel Maddow, entertainer for the Air America radio network, guest-hosted MSNBC's Countdown, Keith Olbermann was forced to make a correction on the very next show. It turned out that Maddow had maligned a Republican Congressman based on an erroneous blog posting that she didn't bother to fact-check.

Tonight on Countdown, Maddow again shot from the lip, this time slandering not a Congressman but Fox News. While her phraseology is clumsy and garbled (perhaps if she slowed down a bit she could speak more coherently), she is trying to make a point that Terry McAuliffe should not praise Fox News, and cites FNC's final Democratic debate of 2004 as her evidence:

MADDOW: If you just think about the petty stuff that Fox News has done. The fact the last time they hosted a Democratic Presidential candidate campaign, they referred to all the candidates as Democrat candidates.

Where did Rachel Maddow get this idea from? She made it up! The Democratic debate hosted by Fox News, held in New Hampshire on January 22, 2004, was moderated by Brit Hume, and one of the questioners was Peter Jennings. Is Maddow trying to smear him too? Really, Rachel, that is pretty low. He is unable to defend himself. The transcript is clear: not once does Hume, or Jennings, or anyone else refer to "Democrat candidates". The same is true of the post-debate analysis. Uh oh. Has Rachel just been caught in another smear?

Well, maybe she was referring to the previous Fox debate, held October 26 2003 in Detroit. According to the transcript there was a use of "Democrat" as an adjective: by John Kerry!

Those aren't Bush Republican cuts, those are the Democrat cuts that we worked hard to put in place to protect the middle class.

But that was it. Nothing from the eeevil Fox News whatsoever. Things are starting to look really bad for mendacious Maddow but wait...maybe she was talking about the Fox debate before that one. The questioners included Juan Williams, Farai Chideya of ABC, and Ed Gordon of BET. And what do you know, there's a transcript online of this one too. Number of times "Democrat" was used as an adjective to describe any candidate? Zero. We even checked the Lexis/Nexis transcript of the post-debate analysis. Maddow flunked out there too.

So how about it, Ms Maddow? Are you going to retract your lie? Are you going to leave it to Keith Olbermann to clean up your mess again? Or are you and Keith going to let the lie stand, because deep down you believe that rules of honesty and journalism do not apply when it comes to smearing Fox News?

UPDATE: See 'Who's Petty Now'? foxnews rachel cd

So this Villanova student walks into a town meeting and asks John McCain a question. The crowd cheers and roars with laughter, and the exchange is featured on all the news channels. But the student happens to be the son of an FNC host, and that's enough to unleash the Fox haters' echo chamber. Here are "highlights" of the open-minded, tolerant reactions culled from three top hate sites.

From the newshounds:

• What's Doocy's son doing in Villanova, shouldn't he be in Iraq?
• Little Peter Douchey is as fatuous as Daddy Douchey!
• 7-to-2 that young Douchey is a binge drinker...
• He [little Doo] looks like a smug little [expletive deleted]
• Fox doesn't miss a beat -- it would be just like them to slither one of their own into the Hardball audience.
• Wonder if Doocy's son does bong hits for Jesus?
• Sounds like he's just another [expletive deleted] idiot just like his dad.
• is everyone associated with Fox [expletive deleted], even their children?
• If he had any intelligence he would have put a sack over his head.
• So when is Doocy's son going to Iraq?
• I'm sure Steve was prud [sic] of his stupid son.
• Why isn't that young punk in Iraq? I'd guess it's because of, "Don't Ask,Don't Tell!"
• Doocy has a son? I thought he was gay.

From Think Progress:

• The turd does not fall far from the propagandist’s ass.
• Ahh.. the hitler [sic] youth revisited.
• My sympathies to any future girlfriend of Peter’s. Don’t expect any moral high ground with this guy.
• Why isn’t he in Iraq?
• Doocy, squinty eyes, looks like hes [sic] drunk.
• The arrogant little [expletive deleted] has a big future in the Rupugnant Party. He’s got that Bush like [sic] smirk. He’s probably gay.
• I’m just surprised Doocy could find a partner gay or straight. What a tool.
• Why do the GOP, Fox News members and their sons have such a high representation of gays?

From the Huffington Post:

• The young fox puppet peter douchy [sic] they [sic] plant these sorry little scum every place they go.
• That kid shouldn't let it be known he's related to that blonde bimbo. he'll [sic] be run off any future in broadcasting...
• That boy looks like he is missing a chromosome
• Or has one too many...
• In a Progressive world such children would not come along. At the beginning of the Progressive reign retroactive actions would have to be taken against such spawn, regretfully not a pretty option but necessary. We can't allow the neocons to drag us down in the next generation as well.
• He Sure is what I would call One Butt Ugly Kid !! And Why Isn.t [sic] His Sorry Behind in Iraq Fightin ?
• I forget...are we still pretending that this born-to-privilege kid actually thought up this question on his own? Yeah...I"m sure Daddy didn"t [sic] tell the kid to ask it.
• What a weird looking kid,he [sic] remind [sic] me of one of the kids in the movie,Children [sic] of the corn [sic].
• Wish we could draft his ass and send him to Iraq. Doubt he would find that funny.
• Yeah, i [sic] doubt that little [expletive deleted] would be quite so smarmy if he was [sic] dodging bullets in Basra...
• Aren't kids like Peter Doocy the reason cousins aren't supposed to marry?
• I can't believe that troll queen actually bred with a woman(?). The son....ughhh....maybe Steve bred with something else.

fox news doocy

It's a beneficial rule of thumb to remember: Fox haters are not to be trusted. That's why we periodically check out their smears to keep track on how reckless and dishonest they really are. We didn't have to look very far. We found a pair of deceptive slanders posted just today from the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed gang).

Donna is upset because Obama and Hillary are attacking each other, but that's not happening to the McCain campaign. That pesky business of real-life, where McCain has secured the nomination but the Democrats haven't. Reporting on it is just so unfair:

John McCain Gets Free Commercial On Studio B
...Of course they spent a segment on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton battling each other with commercials, going after each other. But when it came to John McCain, there was nothing but good news. His guest was Jim LeCamp who has a radio show, Money Sense. They spoke about John McCain calling for a freeze on gas taxes from Memorial Day until Labor Day. (Comment: Did someone make McCain president so he could call for a tax freeze?)

Donna's insights are always deeply perceptive. Were you aware that nobody can call for a tax freeze unless they were elected President? Of course they weren't talking about a tax "freeze" in the first place. But we digress...

Both Smith and LeCamp agreed that this was a wonderful bumper sticker for McCain. They said that everytime that someone went to put $70 in their SUV's they would be thinking about McCain's plan. They did point out, however, that McCain was one Senator and this bill was unlikely to pass. Comment: It's amazing that McCain gets all the good news and Barack and Hillary get all the bad press on Fox.... Another unfair and unbalanced piece on Studio B.

Donna claims that the segment on McCain was "nothing but good news". A helpful tip: when you read one of Donna's "reports", have a tivo handy, or access to instant transcripts. Let's look at what leCamp actually said:

LeCAMP: The problem is, he can't make this happen, because he's only one member of Congress. It's got to go through all of Congress, and it has to be approved by the President. I don't think any of those things are going to happen. The other problem with this plan is, I don't think it's going to fix anything. When you look at the average savings, and let's say you have an SUV and you fill it up, and you spend $70, you're going to save $3.68. Well monthly that's going to be $15-$20. That's not going to change the economy. That's not going to change anybody's balance sheet. So it sounds really good, and it's going to be like a bumper sticker for McCain every time you go to the pump, but it's probably not going to get passed. And even if it did get passed, it's probably not going to mean very much for the economy.... John McCain had it right when he said he probably didn't understand economics well enough. But he should've broadened that to say all of Congress doesn't undersatnd economics well enough.

Did Mr LeCamp praise McCain's plan as "a wonderful bumper sticker"? Were his comments nothing but good news for McCain, a "free commercial" as Donna put it? Obviously not. So she lied about what he said.

Chrish was no more honest, and considerably slicker, in her little libel of Fox & Friends. How dare they put on Bill Sammon, reporter for the Washington Examiner, to analyze the electoral campaign? And what's worse, it was so horribly unbalanced, because:

Sammon was the sole political guest for the hour. The swiftboating has begun in aernest [sic].

What hour was this? The 6:00 am hour of Fox & Friends First. Another good rule of thumb: when Fox haters cherry-pick something from the schedule, always ask the question, what are they hiding? Why did the newspoodles zone in on the lowest-rated hour of the program, and ignore the rest? Who were the guests who came afterward that Chrish doesn't want you to know about? We are happy to answer that question; see for yourself who else was on Fox & Friends, and let it serve as another object lesson into why the biased bassets are the premier fabulists in the Fox haters echo chamber:

What do you do when you can't find anything to smear Fox News with? Make something up! That works for the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed syndicate).

Serial liar Donna added to her string this morning:

Today on Fox and Friends they kept up the 'some people say' gimmick that they have used so often in the past and continued to use it today. Alyson [sic] Camerota started it by saying, "A lot of top Democrats want Hillary to drop out of the race, but can they force her to quit?" The Banner [sic] said, 'Stay or Go? Force Hillary Out' [sic] Later on in the segment they had Kilmeade saying, "Democrats were really turning up the heat on Hillary but could they really get her out of the race as they wish?"... So, in two segments of Fox and Friends they had 'top Democrats', 'they', who wanted to Hillary to drop out (no names mentioned).... You would think by now that Fox would stop using the 'some people say' tactic since they've been called on it so many times.

Just as an aside, how many years has Donna been writing about Fox? And she still doesn't know how to spell the names? Talk about shoddy. But we digress. The kennel-dwellers took these scribblings as gospel, and naturally barked their slavish approval:

• If fox didn't use made up news or opinion's [sic] they wouldn't have anything to air for like half the day.
• While Morning Joe spent much of the morning discussing the "should she stay or should she go" meme, the [sic] actually referenced the names of the those who are saying it (and they are Obama supporters)...
• "A close friend" or "a reliable source" isn't offering any credibility. But what else can we expect from the unprofessional jackasses at [fox]?

It was apparently a great journalistic outrage not to name the people calling for Sen Clinton to quit the campaign. As if viewers (except for the perpetually clueless Donna of course) didn't already know. But the outrage should be directed not at Fox but at the newspoodles. Once again, they've been caught red-pawed in another blatant lie. Let's go to the transcript:

CAMEROTA: So many people are calling for her to drop out of the race. KILMEADE: Like Sen Dodd, Sen Leahy--Democrats. CAMEROTA: Right, but Barack Obama supporters.

Um, "no names mentioned", Donna? But wait, we've got more:

KILMEADE: Howard Dean, who's running the Democratic National Committee, comes out and says I am dumbfounded Sen Leahy would call on Sen Clinton would [sic] step aside. Sen Dodd said something similar. Who do I believe here?

Donna built an entire smear article on the "fact" that Fox referenced unnamed Democrats. In fact they were named, repeatedly, throughout the program. Another Hound Lie. You would think by now that Donna would stop using this tactic since she's been called on it so many times.

You can't teach an old dog new tricks. That goes double for the Fox haters. Their armamentarium of artifice ranges from recklessly sloppy research to outright deception. And that D-word brings us directly to Deborah of the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed mafia).

Deb is an enthusiastic devotee of the "invisible man" technique. A brief explanation for new readers: this is a propaganda device pioneered in the smear video Outfoxed, which famously documented bias on FNC by zooming in on a Republican and cropping the Democrat out of the shot. Just cherry-pick what you want people to see, and pretend like anyone else who was on the channel wasn't there at all. They become "insivible men".

Deb's current mission in life is to use this tactic on Fox's 5:00 pm Election HQ hour. And she is reaching new heights of dishonesty:

FOX Drags Hillary Clinton Through Gutter Today on America's Election HQ... Viewers got non stop speculation about the damage done by Clinton's Bosnia comment but also made sure to keep the conflict between Democratic candidates red hot while Republican guests rejoiced. Tammy Bruce gets the gold star... Then they added a Monica Lewinsky reminder reporting on a question Chelsea Clinton got today while campaigning.... They showed a clip of Chelsea's response without even commenting that the reporter may have stepped over the line.... Douglas Kennedy added a story about the new governor of New York, David Paterson, admitting to cocaine and marijuana...

What "reporter" was this that asked Chelsea a question, given that reporters aren't allowed to question her? Don't take it seriously; that's just another example of Fox hater "research". And is Deb upset that FNC dared to report on the mayor's admitted drug use, or objecting to that radical right-winger Douglas Kennedy?

More to the point, Debbie insists that the hour was "non-stop" Clinton bashing engaged in by a parade of "Republican guests". Well, she did mention Tammy Bruce, who is a registered Democrat--oops, more of that rigorous newsmutt fact-checking. But what is Debbie not telling us? Who are the invisible men who were part of the coverage but erased by Deb?

• Hillary Clinton supporter Lanny Davis
• Democratic strategist Bob Beckel
• Democratic political analyst Kirsten Powers
• Democratic talk show host Bill Press

Oh and as if that weren't enough, the entire final segment of the program was an interview with that well-known Democrat-basher and "Republican guest": Obama girl! Five people made invisible, all to protect Deb's lie of "non-stop Republican rejoicing".

We mentioned bad research above. This is a gem from Melanie:

Two hours ago (March 23, 2008) the Associated Press reported that 4,000 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq. I don't see anything about it on the flag-on-every-lapel, support our troops, we're-more-patriotic-than-you-are website.

Websites have lapels? Never mind that. Just know that even as Mel published those words, this report (the same AP report Mel cited) was not only sitting on the fox news website, but was linked to by a headline on the main page!

But for once someone finally trumps the newspoodles for incompetent analysis. For this we turn to the Huffington Post, where one Toby Barlow writes about the corruption of Kwame Kilpatrick and manages to work in a smear of FNC:

Somewhat predictably, Fox News is lovin' it too, because this timely story is right up their alley. In a move torn from their very own insidious playbook, they're intensely covering the story, thereby pouring even more racial overtones into a highly charged political landscape...

Never mind that every cable channel has covered this story--MSNBC more "intensely" than FNC, if Mr Barlow had bothered to pay attention. But Barlow is a writer, a columnist, maybe even in his mind a reporter. And he isn't just making this up out of whole cloth. He's gone the extra mile to nail it down. He's done research:

...and if you think I'm being paranoid, note that a Google search of "fox news" and "kwame" pulls up 124,000 results, while the next closest - "ABC News" and "kwame" - brings in just 25,000.

No, we aren't making this up. Barlow's "research" consisted of counting the hits in a Google search. There may be a more patently fallacious method of documenting his claim, but if there is, we can't imagine what it would be. And just to complete the fraudulence, Barlow didn't even tell the truth about it! A Google search of CNN and Kwame turned up 277,000 results, more than twice as many as Fox:
It's not often that someone surpasses the biased bassets in sheer irresponsible guile. For this week at least, we have a new champion.

It's the return of Stupid Hound Tricks, wherein we document the subterfuge, deceit, and outright lying of the ultimate Fox hater website, the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed mob). With no further ado, let's get right to the list.

Stupid Hound Trick: Quote-cropping.
There's no easier way to misrepresent someone than by chopping a quote in half, a technique the newsmutts have mastered. This time it's deceitful Deborah, who writes:

Bill O'Reilly Claims He's Skeptical About Barack Obama... O'Reilly said, "I"m skeptical about Obama." He complained that Obama wants to be president for all the people but wouldn't debate on FOX News because he folded to Moveon funded by George Soros.

The Gullible:

• Gee, no kidding?! BOR has always been skeptical of Obama
• Was O'Reilly that skeptical when he was begging Obama to appear on his crappy program?
• This whole Obama bashing is at its full swing with these radio talk show rejects.

The Reveal:
Deb has hoodwinked her readers once again. That's what happens when you quote half a statement, and leave off the other half. The full quote paints a much different picture:

I'm skeptical, and others here at Fox News are skeptical of Barack Obama, as we should be. We should be skeptical of all the Presidential candidates. That's our job.

Stupid Hound Trick: The Invisible Man
This works by cherry-picking certain people who appeared on a program and leaving out others, to paint a false picture of what was broadcast. And--surprise!--once again it's Deb:

It's been a little more than twenty-four hours since Barack Obama's speech and the non stop attacks on FOX News continue with the same intensity. Today on America's Election HQ with Megyn Kelly and Bill Hemmer clips of Obama condemning Don Imus for his racist remark were introduced to portray Senator Obama as a hypocrite while attacks on his judgment and patriotism remained in the mix. The parade of critics included Jane Hall, Juan Williams, Michael Reagan and Tammy Bruce.... These attacks continue on FOX everyday and the message seeps into everyone's minds.

The Gullible:

• The slime from [Fox] News just keeps coming.
• Fox viewers are dying off. Thats one consolation.
• Fox doesn't want to mention non stop the anniversary of this 5 years of illegal war and the cost in trillions of dollars due to the 935 lies told by the Bush administration... It's easier to keep thier [sic] stupid viewer stupid by bashing Obama non stop.

The Reveal:
Leaving aside that far-right-winger Juan Williams, let's turn to Obama "critic" Jane Hall, who actually stated:

I think that it is sad that a man who tried to transcend race is being dragged into this. I do think that's regrettable. And I don't think he started this conversation.

Quite a searing criticism there. But what else is Deb not telling us? Who was the invisible man? Actually there were two on this program, both speaking in defense of Senator Obama and Rev Wright: Al Sharpton and Rev David Barber:


Why do you suppose Deb didn't want her readers to know about them? Because it might expose her claim of "non stop attacks" as a flat-out lie? Ya think?

Stupid Hound Trick: Blind reviewing.
This is something like using psychic powers. It's best to let you see for yourself, as Melanie begins her smear:

I happened to catch the last few minutes of Studio B w/Shepard Smith today (March 19, 2008) while waiting for Your World w/Neil Cavuto to begin.

We know what you're thinking. She's going to review a show based on the last three minutes? Considering that the newspoodles have admitted to reviewing programs they didn't watch at all, three minutes is at least a step up. In any event, Mel wails over an interview about Frosted Flakes, and ticks off all the important stories that weren't being covered, like the Dow, the economy, the 5th anniversary of Iraq. Then she moves in for the Big Finish:

I suppose it is when so much of the real news points to what a disaster the reign of George W. Bush has been. I imagine segments about Illinois-shaped Frosted Flakes take on real significance when your goal is to make the Republicans look as good as you possibly can. No news is good news.

The Gullible:

• Fox either doesn't want to remind their viewers about the war or they think their viewers are just too stupid to understand.
• Don't you think that that time would have been better spent covering something that actually matters?
• Five years of war - so much to talk about - so little of it discussed on Fox. War, what war?????
• Unlike [Fox], the fluff is NEVER the main story on CNN nor MSNBC. The fluff is usually last thing reported unless there is some breaking news.

The Reveal: That last one is really insightful. Doesn't reporting something in the last three minutes of the program mean it was "the last thing reported"? We stand in awe of the intellect of the Fox haters. Be that as it may, in truth Mel was just making it up as she went along--she had no idea what was on the other 57 minutes of Studio-B. Like the several segments on election issues, or rising gas prices. Or two of the things she specifically whined about: the Iraq anniversary and the stock market:


Of course, when we posted a comment pointing out how these were covered during the hour, Mel immediately deleted it. That's how much she cares about telling the truth.

Each one of these is a shopworn, oft-used fraud employed by the biased bassets to bamboozle the credulous kennel-dwellers. The fact that the newsmutts believe they can continue to lie about broadcasts seen by millions of people and expect to get away with it, well, that might be the stupidest hound trick of them all.

Maybe it's because we are approaching a full moon. Or perhaps someone is spiking the Alpo. For whatever reason, things have gotten increasingly surreal over at the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed gang).

We noted the increasing lunacy when the newspoodles came up with a shocking revelation: Fox News is using crypto-Christian symbolism to bamboozle its viewers!

FOX borrows Huckabee's flying cross for latest promotion... FOX has apparently borrowed the premise, with some tweaking, for their latest false advertising campaign.... Subtle as a Mack truck, as my dear old mom would say.

Most of the kennel-dwellers lapped it up, but some are starting to get wise:

• After four years of watching FOX I can safely say I'm wise to their tricks, large and small. This is classic.
• wait for fox to float muslim symbols everytime they speak of Sen Obama.
• I think you're looking for patterns where none exist.
• Wow, someone's paranoid. This blog entry reminds me of the Saudi authorities banning the letter X because it too strongly resembles the Christian cross.
• Wow, you all are that paranoid about the use of + instead of &? This is the most pathetic rant i have seen in some time.

What exactly was the fuss all about? The Fox slogan being written as "fair + balanced", and using the plus sign in the manner of a cursor. No, we're not making this up. Oh and the cover shot the mutts used as "proof" of this scurrilous Christian propaganda? The plus sign next to Alan Colmes...who is Jewish!

If you think that's off-the-wall, then try to diagram the impenetrable "logic" behind this:

Neil Cavuto, Fox's "Business News" Guru, Ignores an "Emergency Move" by the Federal Reserve... The Federal Reserve cut rates in an EMERGENCY DECISION on a Sunday?! What the hay? So, what did Neil Cavuto, the managing editor of business news for the FOX News Channel say about that big, breaking (this is a FOX NEWS ALERT) news? Nothing.

Where to begin? Neil Cavuto is not on Sundays. His next broadcast is Monday afternoon. (Hey, Lou Dobbs and Jon Stewart were silent too!) So what in the wide world of sports is Melanie talking about? Oh wait, maybe this is it: she links the word "nothing" to the Your World web page. Meaning what? That's not a news page. It's a promotional page for a television show. They don't do breaking news on a promotional page. Is Mel trying to hoodwink her readers into believing Fox didn't report this story (which would be a lie), or is she just incurably dense? After all, how hard could it be for her to to find Fox's coverage when her own page sports a huge ad for foxbusiness.com with an invitation to "click here"?


But for our big finish: a gem from Ellen, feigning outrage over a comment in a forum at Sean Hannity's website. A poster was ruminating about the grim possibility of an assassination attept on Barack Obama, noting that "I hope for it not to happen". That was all the biased bassets needed:

Hannity's Website Speculates About Assassination Of Obama... the next time Hannity goes on one of his Hanctimonious rants about the hate-filled leftwing blogs, we can pull this one up quicker than he can say, "Louis Farrakhan."

Of course Ellen has to adopt the facade of being shocked that the topic would even come up, even though it has been raised thousands of times, by people ranging from a nobel prize winner to CBS News. Our comment to that effect was swiftly deleted. In doing so, Ellen again threatened to shut down J$P by complaining to our ISP (whose identity she published) about "harrassment" (i.e. posting comments on a public thread). We responded thusly:

• Ellen, I have kept a record of the "harrassing" posts I have made. I also have a copy of your "rules" for posting, as well as the haloscan operating procedures which, of course, permit you to block any poster you choose. Not to mention all the times I have posted and nobody at all told me to stop.... I know the law. If you attempt to tortiously interfere with my access to the internet based on nothing more than your "request" that I not post comments...if that's your game plan, I am ready.

With that, Ellen erased her earlier threat, but made sure to erase our statement as well. For whatever reason, she replaced the comments quoted above with these words now appearing above the name "johnny dollar":

• I have been repeatedly asked to leave and refuse to do so. This speaks volumes about my character.

The irony is rich. Last month youtube suspended the newshounds account. The doggies insisted youtube would "correct this mistake immediately". But that hasn't happened. So what did the anti-Fox terriers do? Signed up again under a different name! Yes, after having been asked to leave they refuse to do so. This speaks volumes about their character.

Oh, and so does this. Spotted in the comments at newshounds.us, this gem, on the occasion of Bush's visit to Iraq:

• Here is the chance for your soldiers to put some of that "friendly fire" that we brits have suffered at their hands to some good.

Not enough? Just hours after Ellen's "outrage" over the Hannity forum comment, this from the hounds' own forum, encouraging violence against Republicans:

• At what point in time does a violent assault against these unAmerican [sic] neo-fascist rats become patriotic?

Even a full moon isn't sufficient explanation for such diseased derangement.

Whatever you do, don't you dare tell a Fox hater that they got something wrong. It doesn't matter if the issue is a minor matter that could easily have been resolved by just admitting to a mistake. That is too much to ask.

Case in point: the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed cabal). Desperate for something--anything--to slander Fox with, Melanie decides to jump on a comment aired on FNC. By one of its anchors? No. A Fox reporter? Uh-uh. Oh, then it must have been a Fox contributor? Wrong again. It was an opinion expressed by an interview guest! That's really scraping the bottom of the smear barrel, but it was good enough for the newspoodles:

Oil Set to Drop by $80.00!...
Echoing Fox's the-liberal-media-only-reports-the-bad-news theme, Kerr proclaimed that oil is "set to drop $80.00 by mid-May." Cool, huh? $25.00 for a barrel of oil come May! I made a note in my calendar. I'll be back with an update. Meanwhile, don't worry. Be happy. My comment and prediction? Oil will never, ever, in the history of the planet, fall to $25.00 a barrel again.

Mel's smugness just makes what follows that much sweeter. As the comments started to trickle in, the unthinkable happened. Some of the kennel-dwellers had the temerity to suggest that Melanie might be--gasp!--wrong:

• Not to rain on the parade, but are you sure he didn't mean that oil would drop to $80.00 a barrel by May...
• I too suspect that's what he meant.
• I was under the impression taht's [sic] what he meant. That it would drop "to" $80 a barrel.

Uh-oh. Melanie didn't like that one bit. So less than two hours after the comments were opened, with barely over a dozen posts in the thread, this appeared:

UPDATE: 9:20 p.m. ET - This post is closed to comments.

So much for that! And just to nail it down, Melanie brandished her eraser and made the 13 posted comments disappear. Poof! (Of course, the anti-Fox terriers never have learned how to do that properly, so they can still be found at the secret URL).

Why did she close the thread and try to erase everything? What was Melanie hiding? Possibly the fact that, once again, she was caught not telling the truth:

Lies about FNC sprout up like dandelions all over the internet. We spotted this one Saturday, on a gay activist site with a penchant for highighting negative John McCain stories. They put a little anti-Fox twist on the reportage of the incident with a New York Times reporter:

Fox News, which initially reported the incident, has since removed the video from its site...

The claim quickly spread to other sites. But is it the truth? Go onto the foxnews website and you will find this. Or, for a lengthier clip, this. The Fox video can even be embedded, to wit:



We emailed the originating site with this information but of course no correction was made. Admitting mistakes is not a common practice among Fox haters, and that goes double for the newshounds (another fine product of the Outfoxed syndicate). When Fox & Friends discussed comments by Gloria Steinem and others that disparaged John McCain's military service, Donna was outraged:

Where was the fair and balanced on this segment? Were there any Democrats or Gloria Steinman [sic], Hillary or Obama asked about this? Fair and balanced, Fox is not.

Recall that not that long ago we caught Donna lying about "no Democrat" on F&F. We thought that after being exposed, she might mend her ways. Not so. Instead, Donna doubled down and pulled the same trick again. Meet Liz Chadderdon, as Democratic a Democratic strategist as one could ask for. She was on Fox & Friends that morning and discussed that very issue. But her appearance was a tad inconvenient for the newspoodles, so they just pretended she didn't exist and counted on the gullibility of the kennel-dwellers to swallow it without question.

And just today, Donna was at it again, claiming that in a discussion about water impurities Fox "seems to go with the government and say it is just a miniscule amount". Donns'a proof: "Brian Kilmeade said it only affected 4 million people". Why does Donna have a problem telling the truth? Kilmeade cited the study and noted that "they say it only affects 41 million [not "4 million"] people", to which Alysin Camerota replied: "How do they know?", adding that even small amounts can be harmful. Does that sound like Fox "going with the government", or does it sound like Another Hound Lie?

As a postscript, we want to note how Donna brings professionalism to the dog house with every word she writes. That's why we could not resist presenting her latest literary achievement, just as published (did we miss anything?):