Congratulations to Fox’s Sandra Smith and Howard Kurtz for promoting what may be the biggest Fox News hypocrisy of the week as the two complained about (mostly liberal) reactions to the Orlando shooting while “forgetting” Donald Trump’s hideous response – much of it right there on Fox.
In case you have forgotten, Trump came up a jaw-dropping exploitation of Orlando - in which he suggested that President Obama is a secret radical Muslim sympathizer - on Fox & Friends and which each of the three cohosts aided and abetted. That’s not counting how he banned The Washington Post after the paper called him out on it nor his self-congratulatory tweets about the tragedy.
Yet none of that was mentioned in this segment of finger-pointing at others, mostly liberals, of course.
The segment began with guest host Smith complaining about “extreme reactions from all sides.” Then she emphasized what she considered liberal reactions. She complained that “two of the more controversial moments” came from the NY Daily News and the Boston Globe “which both took the opportunity to blame the NRA rather than radical Islam.” She also complained about a New York Times editorial that, she claimed, suggested “Republican bigotry” was to blame.
“But one of the most dramatic claims this week came from Joy Behar on The View,” Smith said. We saw Behar calling Trump the “recruiter-in chief.” Behard also said, “He is basically working with ISIS to kill us. They are working together.”
OK, not a comment I approve of. But its significance pales in the face of the statements that Trump – the presumptive Republican nominee for president and quite possibly the next president – who basically said the same thing about President Obama. Although while Behar, I’m sure, did not mean that Trump is deliberately working with ISIS, Trump meant that Obama is doing so.
Guest Howard Kurtz helped the self-serving, hypocritical charade. “It makes me really angry when pundits and politicians seize on a horrifying tragedy like what happened in Orlando to score cheap political points, to point fingers,” he said. “Trump’s the ‘recruiter in chief,’ ‘President Obama’s fault.’”
Wait a minute. Notice how he emphasized Behar’s comment while whitewashing Trump’s? He didn't just blame Obama, Trump suggested without having the guts to come right out and say so, that Obama was deliberately helping ISIS.
Kurtz continued his lopsided outrage by holding up the Daily News cover saying, “Thanks, NRA,” and complained that the paper “has become like a propaganda sheet.” He added that even if the paper disagrees with the NRA’s policies, “That’s ugly stuff.” Got irony, Howard?
Kurtz continued by saying, “Let me be fair and balanced and point to a couple of examples on the right.” He named John McCain for blaming President Obama for the Orlando shooting. But, Kurtz helpfully noted, “To the senator’s credit, he came out, he said, ‘I misspoke, I was talking about the president’s national security policies,’ which, of course, are fair game.”
Kurtz did not spare Pat Robertson who, Kurtz explained, “is a former presidential candidate” and who said the left is having a “dilemma of major proportions” because of its love for both gays and Islam. “For those of us who disagree with some of their policies, the best thing to do is to sit on the sidelines and let ‘em kill themselves,” Robertson intoned.
Again, a terrible comment. But Pat Robertson is hardly as prominent a conservative voice as Trump.’s.
“Can you imagine if somebody had placed blame on President Obama in that way?” Smith asked, her voice full of outrage. Why, yes, Sandra, we can. Why can’t you?
Kurtz agreed. And he concluded with some respectable remarks.
KURTZ: What does all this do? It adds to polarization in our country. It doesn’t do a thing to stop the problem of terror attacks and these mass shootings that, unfortunately for journalists and the rest of the country, have become so routine that we now know the drill. …And there are all these pieces of the puzzle, whether it’s assault weapons, whether it’s attacks on gays, whether it’s terror, whether it’s radicalized Muslims, and if everybody’s gonna point fingers and the media are exacerbating this, then I think we are doing a disservice to the country at a time when we should at least be asking tough questions, yes, but playing a unifying role as well.
I totally agree, Howie. It’s just too bad you can’t see how your own network is a machine designed to do everything you just clamed to abhor.
Watch it above, from the June 17 The Kelly File.
Crossposted at Newshounds.us
