The left turns on its own, but it's for a good cause: The War on Fox!

Fresh off one "victory" , the Fox haters are setting their sights on the upcoming debate to be cosponsored by FNC and the Congressional Black Caucus. It is not coincidental that it was at this moment that Salon.com chose to unleash another attack on FNC. Salon has already been caught lying about Fox; is their latest piece more of the same?

This time the topic is "Fox News Democrats" (uh-oh), and the author one Alex Koppelman. He has all the necessary credentials for this assignment. He claims FNC is part of the "right wing echo chamber", and for good measure he writes at the Huffington Post. After conceding that many Democrats appear on Fox News, Koppelman gets to his main thesis:

But Fox also has a stable of regular commentators, some under contract to the network, who pop up frequently as representatives of the Democratic or progressive viewpoint.... the in-house Democrats don't come off as effective evangelists for their party or for liberal politics in general. It sounds harsh, but think of most of the Fox Democrats, at least those who appear on the opinion shows, which take up half the network's airtime, as one of three types. They are either scary liberals, losers or enablers.

First Koppelman tackles the "scary" liberals, whom he claims are chosen to make the party look bad to Fox's audience. (He says the median age of viewers is over 60; the Pew center reports the average age at 48.7.) Koppelman cites: Al Sharpton, Charlie Rangel, and Dennis Kucinich. But not one of them is a Fox News "in-house Democrat"; they are not FNC contributors or analysts or pundits. All three have appeared on Fox multiple times, but they appear on MSNBC and CNN as well.

Koppelman's next category is:

...the losers, the strategists and politicians who are no longer players in the Democratic Party, at least partially because of their electoral failures.

At least this time he cites people who actually work for Fox: Geraldine Ferraro, Susan Estrich, and Bob Beckel. Koppelman rattles off their political losses as if that were proof that their commentary is worthless. He doesn't even address the fact that every news channel looks to hire politicos who are well-spoken and confident in front of a tv camera. Why did MSNBC hire Joe Trippi (Dean campaign mastermind and loser), or Pat Buchanan (loser)? Why does CNN listen to Bay Buchanan (loser)? And didn't "loser" Bob Beckel work at both CBS and CNN for years?

Finally Koppelman gets to the meat of his argument: the "enablers". They're not sufficiently left for his taste. His first example: Lanny Davis. Lanny is not a Fox "in-house Democrat". He appears on Fox maybe five times a year (as well as on CNN and MSNBC). At least with Susan Estrich he found someone who does work for Fox, both on air and with a regular website column. His complaint is that she "frequently comes under criticism" and once criticized an Al Gore speech. Therefore, she is an "enabler" of right-wing propaganda. Koppelman dismisses her with one sentence, all the better not to give his readers the full story. Ms Estrich, who actually calls to get Democratic talking points before going on the air, is a conservative enabler? Like when she confronted Ann Coulter? Or when she rose to the defense of Barbara Boxer? Did Koppelman ever look at her blog, or did he check it out and decide that it didn't fit his spin?

Koppelman has more "enablers" to crucify. Pat Caddell, a quirky Democrat to be sure, is trotted out. If Caddell appears on Fox once every three months that's a lot--but he gets an entire paragraph. Mr Koppelman asserts that Tammy Bruce is billed on Fox as a "progressive Democrat", but a Lexis/Nexis search of FNC for her name and that phrase turns up zero hits. In truth, when Ms Bruce (who is eclectic in her viewpoints) has squared off against another pundit on FNC, most of the time it was not a right-winger but liberal Jim Warren. Kirsten Powers is criticized--because she didn't defend the comments of William Arkin (our troops get obscene amenities and are lucky they don't get spit on). Koppelman does not point out the "real" Democrats who opine on other news channels and rose to defend Arkin's statement. Just who would those be, sir? Even Harold Ford Jr is demeaned; he's another squish with "politics just left of George Will's". Of course, Koppelman doesn't mention his rating from Americans for Democratic Action: 80%.

So there are the three categories of "Fox News Democrats". But wait, is there something missing? Well yes, there usually is with Fox haters. The fourth category: the people that Mr Koppelman leaves out. And we're not just talking about, say, P.J. Crowley, or Joe Cirincione of the Center for American Progress--who often appears on Fox more in one month than Pat Caddell does over an entire year. We'll stick with people who have been hired by FNC as pundits. Why no mention of Eleanor Clift? David Corn? Laura Schwartz? Martin Frost? Ellen Ratner? Is Koppelman ready to write off Gen Wesley Clark (on air just yesterday) as a worthless "loser"? When exactly did Ellis Hennican play his Fox-mandated role as an "enabler"? Does Juan Williams grovel before Brit Hume? This sort of selective analysis, where names and persons inconvenient to the argument are simply omitted, is a standard propaganda practice.

There's lots more to be said about this hit piece. Koppelman included a fistful of factoids that are favorites of the blue blogs. He cites a tongue-in-cheek, joking comment by a Fox bureau chief and pretends it's dogma. And there's the "study" by Mark Mellman (John Kerry's pollster) that proves "Fox viewers" supported Bush over Kerry 88% to 7%. That result, based on A.C. Nielsen ratings diaries, doesn't pass the smell test. And it's inconsistent with scientific polling that tells us that only 38% of the Fox audience is conservative--the majority are independent or liberal. The Pew Center's extensive polling on The O'Reilly Factor is another case in point: 37% of Republicans surveyed watched regularly or sometimes, but so do 21% of Democrats and 25% of independents.

You had to know something was up when Mr Koppelman's "research" included interviews with outfits like Daily Kos and MyDD. The latter, in its zeal to deep-six the Nevada debate, flat-out lied about Fox. Still, Mr Koppelman's piece did contain an unexpected Easter egg. He asked the two blue bloggers about Bob Beckel:

When they spoke with Salon for this story, neither Matt Stoller of MyDD nor Markos Moulitsas Zúniga of DailyKos, one of the leading liberal blogs, had ever heard of him.

This is the same Bob Beckel who usually appears on Fox News a minimum of once a week, and often more. The same Bob Beckel who offers his opinions on Fox & Friends, Fox News Live, Studio B, Your World, The Big Story, The O'Reilly Factor, Hannity & Colmes, On the Record, and a host of other programs. But Daily Kos and MyDD, who rail incessantly about the "right-wing" bias and "propaganda" on FNC, never heard of him? Of course not--they don't watch. It's so much easier to slander an "enemy" when you aren't hamstrung by knowledge or facts. The most virulent Fox haters are the ones who spout their vitriol from a perch of ignorance, and Mr Koppelman has performed at least one service by inadvertently exposing them.