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Fox host Alisyn Camerota made a deliberate point of linking firefighter flunkies to race when she reported that “as many as 30” New York City firefighter recruits are too obese for the job. Without bothering to point out that obesity rates among firefighters are causing concerns all over the country or that women are also part of the FDNY recruitment efforts, Camerota highlighted increased minority recruitment as the only factor to consider:

Well, they sued for the right to become New York City firefighters but now they’re flunking out. As many as 30 trainees have already dropped out because they’re too overweight to meet the physical demands of the job. And more are expected to go. The first recruited class since 2008 was formed after a judge ordered the department to become more racially diverse. But now veteran firefighters are fuming, saying the candidates are oversized and underperforming and need to be cut breaks to pass their tests.

Do you think anyone in the Fox audience failed to connect the dots?

Apparently, this “news” was based on a similar report from sister company NY Post that also linked the problem to minorities. However, the Post pointed out what Camerota didn’t: the class was not made up of applicants from the general population:

FDNY Commissioner Salvatore Cassano excluded applicants from the general population for this Academy class, limiting the pool to medics, whose ranks include a higher percentage of minorities than is found in firehouses.

…But they were rated only on a written exam. In years past, applicants had to score high on both a written and a physical test.

… The department’s own EMS Academy head, Lt. David Russell, admitted in a 2011 report that even when FDNY recruits from EMS got extra help, “the overall fitness of these recruits is still poor.”

In other words, it's quite likely that the population of medics, whose work, as the article also pointed out, is mostly sedentary, has a lower fitness rate than the general population. But Camerota misleadingly gave the impression that the same people who sued (a black fraternal firefighters organization) are the same people now flunking out.

By the way, those “fuming” “veteran firefighters” Camerota cited in her report seem to be anonymous ranters on a bulletin board not associated with the FDNY. The Post also wrote that “Veteran firefighters are fuming over the quality of the new recruits” and backed that up with comments from a few posters on a site called FDNY Rant.

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Colin Powell is not a perfect man, nor was he a perfect public servant. But as Republicans go, he is at least one of the more intellectually honest of the bunch, even when faced with Bill O'Reilly's bluster and nonsense. Billo has suddenly come down with a case of concern for African-Americans after Ailes sent the memo that they should pretend like they care (after spending four years spouting racist memes about vote-stealing).

Colin Powell was having none of it. He first called Bill O'Reilly out for presuming that his vote was race-based instead of decent judgment, asking simply, "Why do you think of me as only African-American? I'm American."

Try as he might, O'Reilly could not get Powell to play to his script, where Powell only voted for Obama based on his race.

O'Reilly's concern-trolling is nearly unbearable, given that he and his network did their level best to block all aspects of Obama's agenda that might actually have helped minorities and working people, black or otherwise, and Powell reminds him that in President Obama's first four years, many policies were put in place that will actually really help them, assuming Republican governors and representatives don't get too much in the way.

My favorite moment comes when Billo tries to snark Powell about voting for hope when things haven't improved all that much, and Powell takes him on point by point. Billo's memory must be failing him if he thinks things haven't improved since 2008. We haven't completely recovered, but there's no way we're anywhere near as desperate as we were four years ago.

After all the concern trolling, Billo's most cynical moment comes when he goes after the children of those same people he's so concerned about by bashing their school performance, and the money spent on their education. You see, Fox viewers, it's not at all about what poverty can do to crush a child's ability to learn, or what dangers they might face in their neighborhood. No, it's their moocher parents who can't stay married and have no family values and of course it's only minorities who fall under this judgment.

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He just can't help it. This is what a guy who is concerned with bottom lines thinks. Mitt Romney has no empathy for the very poor because in his mind the scaled-back food stamp, Medicaid and welfare programs will take care of them. No, no. He's concerned with the middle class. Of course he's concerned about the middle class! They're the biggest block of potential voters.

This is how Romney rolls. He is always looking for the bottom line, the way to get from point A to point B, whether or not he steamrolls people along the way. Since the 'very poor' are unlikely to be Romney voters, he's not concerned about them.

It's a classic gaffe on his part, nearly as bad as John McCain's remark that the "fundamentals of the economy are sound" in 2008, made at a time when the fundamentals were very, very badly broken.

Here's what he said:

This is a time people are worried. They're frightened. They want someone who they have confidence in. And I believe I will be able to instill that confidence in the American people. And, by the way, I'm in this race because I care about Americans. I'm not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs repair, I'll fix it.

If I were to stop there, it would make a wonderful ad. But Soledad O'Brien gave him a chance to fix what he just said. Here's the rest:

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