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Fox Mogul Rupert Murdoch Echoes Glenn Beck, Calls Obama a Racist
Posted by Steve Benen, Washington Monthly on November 10, 2009 at 3:10 PM.
MURDOCH FANS THE FLAMES.... It seemed, for a while, like the political world was prepared to move beyond the animosity between Fox News and the White House. Presidential aides seemed to cut back on noticing the Republican network's partisan efforts, and Fox News returned to more routine, everyday bashing of Democrats.
Indeed, just 13 days ago, we learned that White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs met personally with Fox News SVP Michael Clemente. There was talk of a "truce." It was time to move on.
Or so we thought. just four days after the reported "truce," Chris Wallace gave Rush Limbaugh a half-hour of airtime on "Fox News Sunday," which the right-wing radio host used to make one ridiculous attack against the president after another. There was no obvious reason for the interview.
And just a few days after Wallace's love-fest with Limbaugh, Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch told Sky News Australia that Glenn Beck's infamous anti-Obama tirade -- Beck called the president a "racist" with "a deep-seated hatred for white people or white culture" -- was accurate.
SKY NEWS: The Glenn Beck, who you mentioned, has called Barack Obama a racist and he helped organize a protest against him. Others on Fox have likened him to Stalin. Is that defensible?
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Woops! Bill O'Reilly Doesn't Remember What the Public Option Is Called, or That It's Pretty Popular (Video)
Posted by Ben Armbruster, Think Progress on November 10, 2009 at 12:14 PM.
Last night on Fox News, host Bill O’Reilly and analyst Brit Hume discussed the prospects for the Senate passing a health care reform bill. After struggling with the terminology for the “public option,” O’Reilly ultimately concluded that “all the polls say” that “the folks don’t want it.”
Hume, a regular Fox News misinformer, surprisingly corrected O’Reilly, noting that Americans actually support the public option:
O’REILLY: They call it, you know, the public sector. What is the –
HUME: Public option, you mean?
O’REILLY: Public option, whatever. The folks don’t want it. … But it looks to me like they have maybe 55 votes to pass it. And that means they could be filibustered and never come up for a vote.
HUME: That’s what it looks like right now. The public option, actually some polls show that the public option standing by itself is not at all unpopular, but it is kind of popular. But that depends on how the poll question is raised. … We don’t need to go into all that right now.
Watch it:
Those trying to derail reform with a public option try to claim that Americans don’t support it. “All the polls now indicate substantial opposition to this particular type of health care reform,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said last night on Fox. But Hume is right. Americans do support the public option, as recent polling shows:
– CNN/Opinion Research, Oct. 30 – Nov. 1: 55 percent support “creating a public health insurance option administered by the federal government that would compete with plans offered by private health insurance companies.”
– Ipsos/McClatchy, Oct. 30 – Nov. 1: 51 percent support the “creation of a public entity to directly compete with existing health insurance companies.”
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Bill O'Reilly Goes After Sesame Street: ‘We May Have To Ambush Oscar’
Posted by Ben Armbruster, Think Progress on November 10, 2009 at 4:30 AM.
During an episode of Sesame Street that was originally broadcast two years ago, a character tells Oscar the Grouch, who happens to be reporting for "GNN" (Grouchy News Network), that she is switching her news viewing loyalties to "Pox News," adding, "Now there is a trashy news show."
Right winger Andrew Breitbart's "Big Hollywood" blog took on the Sesame Street menace last week proclaiming: "Add one more soldier to the Left's war on Fox News: Oscar the Grouch":
If Mom and Dad watch cable news, it's better than 50/50 they watch "POX News." So what gives? PBS -- a network partially funded with my tax dollars -- has the right to tell my kids that their parents watch "trashy" news? The message is clear, I can't even sit my kids in front of "Sesame Street" without having to worry about the Left attempting to undermine my authority.
Thursday night on Fox News, host Bill O'Reilly picked up on Big Hollywood's rant and couldn't resist defending his network against the smear merchants at Sesame Street. "Say it ain't so. Sesame Street trashing Fox News!" O'Reilly complained. After airing the segment in question, O'Reilly said wryly, "We may have to ambush Oscar." Watch it:
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