First Sean Hannity, while talking with Charles Grodin, agrees to be waterboarded. Then, Keith Olbermann takes him up on it and offers up $1,000 per second that Hannity can withstand the torture method. Now, Olbermann has found a willing participant in this game of chicken. Former Army interrogator and SERE school instructor, Mike Ritz, has come forward to administer the waterboarding for charity. A $30,000 bonus has been offered if Hannity admits that, after being waterboarded, it is torture.

Typically, Fox News personalities throw in one or two anti-Obama talking points into their rants, but guest Bill Cunningham, a talk show host in Cincinnati, put them all together in one extremely insanity filled pile of ignorant hate while talking to Sean Hannity and Geraldo Rivera:

“Sean, what we have here is this little boy who grew up in Jakarta, Indonesia, at the age of 6 to 10, rejected by his own father, rejected by his own mother, rejected by his stepfather, raised by his grandparents, bowing before the King of Saudi Arabia, kissing the behind of every European socialist, saying okay to people like Ahmenijad — we have the most dishonest, the most disreputable 100 days in American history, and this guy actually believes it’s good!”

Cunningham also goes off on rants about the Statue of Liberty belonging in Cuba and Venesuela, wanting the Panama Canal back and declaring himself and Sean Hannity as “normal” Americans. Geraldo actually came across as the voice of reason!

Original Story

Fox & Friends delved into the fear mongering world of Martial Law in the United States if we see an actual Swine Flu pandemic. They discussed losing rights, such as going to movies, mandatory vaccines, quarantines, closing schools, borders, etc. Was Outbreak on the Fox Network last night?

Original Story

The Beltway Boys, a Saturday evening political show with Fred Barnes and Mort Kondracke on Fox News, has been canceled. That is all.

Original Story

Well, true, Glenn Beck is a complainer. He seems to enjoy whining and crying, but this is is just petty. During Yesterday’s news conference, Barack Obama didn’t take a question from a Fox News reporter. Now Republicans, and Glenn Beck, are crying foul and making a big deal out of nothing. Here are a couple of Beck’s comments.

“What a surprise” he said sarcastically before asking, “I mean how can the guy face Ahmadinejad but he can’t face Fox?”

While we (including Beck) can’t say we know for certain whether or not Obama ignored a question from FNC, we do know that he has not in the past. He answered questions from FNC during the past two news conferences. Scared? Hardly.

Original Story

Ever since news broke about Obama’s criticism of Fox News and Tea Parties, Fox News, and Tea Baggers alike, have been up-in-arms calling Obama’s comments attacks or pot shots. The irony here is thick enough to cut with a knife… So, I make a little haiku that sums it up:

Fox can dish it out
Their attacks on Obama
But Fox can’t take it

At his Town Hall meeting in Missouri, Barack Obama responded to a direct question with some criticizing words of his own toward tea baggers and, a cable news channel that is, obviously, Fox News.

“When you see, you know, those of you that are watching certain news channels on which I’m not very popular, and you see folks waving tea bags around, let me just remind them that I am happy to have a serious conversation about how we are going to cut our health care costs down over the long term, how we are going to stabilize Social Security”

Original Story

This is becoming an increasingly important indication of global news audience ratings because more and more people get their news online. Nielsen Online has released their ratings for Top Global News Sites, by Unique Visitors for March 2009. FoxNews.com places sixth, behind MSNBC, CNN, Yahoo, AOL and the New York Times. Here are the top ten:

1. MSNBC Digital Network – 39,900,000
2. CNN Digital Network – 38,724,000
3. Yahoo! News – 37,902,000
4. AOL News – 23,604,000
5. NYTimes.com – 20,118,000
6. Fox News Digital Network – 16,791,000
7. Tribune Newspapers – 16,513,000
8. Google News – 13,668,000
9. McClatchy Newspaper Network – 12,508,000
10. ABCNEWS Digital Network – 12,189,000

In an article on the Fox News web site written by Glenn Beck, himself, he starts off with the fear mongering about a global Swine Flu pandemic. He asserts that the approximately 150 deaths are just the beginning, yet fails to mention that every year there are approximately 36,000 flu-related deaths in the U.S., according to the CDC.

Further on, in the same article, Beck tears into the media, of which he is part, for focusing on the Swine Flu on one hand, while not paying attention to what the other hand is doing. He mentions the Air Force 1 fly over of New York and the teleprompter operator error, both of which he blames on Obama, as examples of what the media should be reporting.

And there you have the hypocrisy of Glenn Beck. He begins his rant about the Swine Flu, which he later states is getting too much coverage. Keep in mind that Fox News is covering it non stop, and on other networks I’ve seen fairly even coverage. Glenn Beck is not only a danger to others, but shows that he’s a danger to himself.

The Fox Nation web site incorrectly reported that a group had given Barack Obama a C+ grade for his first 100 days in office. The article linked to the orinator of the rating, NationalJournal.com, which shows that the grade was, in fact, for the White House web site, WhiteHouse.gov, rather than Barack Obama himself. The group also gave Recovery.gov a C grade. Fox Nation, please stay after class…

Original Story

While the rest of the world is reporting that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times, Fox News plays another game of semantics and claims that that number is misleading. Here’s how it plays out… Fox News obviously supports the use of torture, so they find a source that tells them that a waterboarding “session” can include numerous “pours,” so Fox News can then say that there was only a small number of waterboarding “sessions” and everyone else is wrong. Tricky isn’t it?

The problem with their reasoning, if you can call it that, is that Waterboarding is defined as a torture method where water is poured into breathing passages, or on a rag covering the breating passages, thus suffocating the victim. They did that 183 times. Fox News admits that there were breaks between pours where the victim can catch their breath. To use their terminology, that break would constitute the end of one “session” and the beginning of another. Nowhere in the definition of waterboarding is there a mention of “sessions.”

Fox News reports that a Swedish man was nearly killed by a rock-lifting robot, but the robot will not be prosecuted. This is from the Fox News article:

A Swedish robot nearly killed a man — but won’t be prosecuted… This week, Johansson decided not to prosecute either the company that owned the factory or its robot.

Apparently, whoever wrote that piece for Fox News has watched iRobot too many times… The article that Fox News got its information from is TheLocal.se, which mentions nothing about prosecuting the robot. So, it looks like it’s a case of Fox News publishing fiction. Again.

A video clip used by Wendell Goler of Fox News shows President Obama supposedly supporting a European style universal health care system. The problem is that Obama doesn’t. The quote was the President paraphrasing a question during an online Town Hall event and was taken out of context. Here is the full actual quote from Obama:

I actually want a universal health care system; that is our goal…whether we do it exactly the way European countries do or Canada does is a different question, because there are a variety of ways to get to universal health care coverage… I don’t think the best way to fix our health care system is to suddenly completely scrap what everybody is accustomed to and the vast majority of people already have. Rather, what I think we should do is to build on the system that we have and fill some of these gaps.

Original Story

Another site has popped up, this time with a petition, encouraging Sean Hannity to keep his word and be waterboarded for charity. WaterboardForFreedom.org states, “Support Your Troops! Waterboard Sean Hannity!” Sign their petition here. The site appears to be a few days old and the petition has nearly 500 comments. There is also a page for tracking proposed charitable contributions, such as the $1000 per second from Keith Olbermann.

One of the often used talking points about Obama repeated, ad nauseum, by his critics is his use of teleprompters. A look into an article on the Fox News web site titled “Off-script Obama” shows us a glimpse at the facts behind the rhetoric. Yes, Obama uses a teleprompter, but is it his fault if the teleprompter operator doesn’t keep up? So, the Fox News writer is taking the focus off of what really happened, and placing the blame on Obama.

After noticing the same names he had just uttered on his teleprompter screen, President Obama stopped midsentence, paused awkwardly and told the crowd “I just noticed I jumped the gun here.” Then after a second, Obama spoke directly to the unseen teleprompter operator,” Go ahead move it up. I already introduced those guys.”