President Barack Obama is making all the media rounds this weekend, going on five Sunday news programs to drum up support for his health care reform. One network not included in his very busy schedule? Fox News. Last night Bill O’Reilly had the host of “Fox News Sunday” Chris Wallace on to discuss the White House’s decision to exclude FNC from Obama’s Sunday tour, and while Wallace seemed to want to take the high road, it got a little juvenile.Politics is not just about preaching to the choir. Obama has done that time and again and look what it's getting him - falling poll numbers and the collapse of his major policy initiatives.
Oh the irony. Just after saying just “how petty” this White House is and how it’s nothing like the Reagan Administration, Fox’s Wallace called the Obama administration “the biggest bunch of crybabies I have dealt with in my 30 years in Washington.” So much for the high road.
Later in the segment O’Reilly repeatedly made the point (made here before) that Obama is making a big mistake by snubbing Fox News. As we’ve said before, the real debate on health care is between the White House and Fox News.
Attacks on the Obama administration are not uncommon on Fox News, but accusations of bias are often rebutted with the claim that FNC’s primetime hosts are “analysts” or “commenters”, not journalists, and hold themselves to a different standard. It’s worth noting that Chris Wallace is regarded as one of the premier television journalists, not just for Fox, but across the industry. Which makes his comment all the more stunning.
The piece wrapped up with Wallace and O’Reilly agreeing, nay, pleading with the White House to “let Fox Help them.” And they have a point. While the techniques of Fox News are certainly up for debate, it is difficult to argue with the net result — they appear to have more influence in the political discourse right now than any other outlet. Perhaps the Obama administration would be better served engaging with FNC instead of fighting them, because it appears to be a battle that the White House is losing right now.
If he really wants to pass health care, card check, cap-and-tax, or any of this other lefty plans, he's going to have to do more than hold lofty speeches and speak to the lapdog media. He needs to reach out to those who oppose him and try and persuade them to at least reconsider their positions. Given Fox's dominance in the cable ratings world, going on that network would seem to be a natural thing for a professional politician to do.
Heck, the head of ACORN will be Wallace's exclusive guest on Sunday, and Fox is the only one really reporting the ACORN scandal. You'd think that's the last place she'd want to be, and it probably is, but at least she's willing to try and spin things back in her favor.
Obama is notoriously thin-skinned. After a campaign in which he was treated with fawning press and fainting women, the realities of being president haven't been nearly so much fun. That's why he's on the road campaigning as much as he is. He knows how to campaign - he just doesn't know how to govern and criticism to him is like kryptonite to Superman. He just shrinks in the face of it before lashing out with ill-thought out responses.
The appearances on Sunday may satisfy Obama's need to be on TV, but they won't move the debate in his direction.
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3 comments:
Chris Wallace is like Tim Russert if he was alive. He, for the most part, does not allow his personal biases or politics to dictate how hard he hammers an interview subject. He does not throw softball questions at anyone, ANYONE, and will challenge people.
That is the thing; people keep looking at Fox News Channel as some sort of monolithic right-wing Leviathan, out to challenge their Lord and Savior.
The Fact of the matter is that while the President of the United States is visiting his Five Favorite Altar Boys he proves nothing. If he can actually stand up to Chris Wallace's Russert-type wall charge then he has something. Of course he knows he has no substance so he is going where his style is enough to carry the day.
Our president and his dministration are nothing more than pure Platic. Obama feels like he can exert pressure on "the people" and make them do whatever he wants. Well, he is wrong, dead wrong. "We The People" will be the one's who are going to control what we want and God help him if he tries to force something down the neck of the American Citizens.
Chris reminds me of his dad, Mike Wallace, who (with producer George Crile) did a hatchet job on Gen Westmoreland.
Anyone remember watching the outtakes from Wallace's interviews with the General. They were made available due to the General's defamation suit against CBS.
Westmoreland still looked bad, but Mike Wallace came across as combative and ignorant. And you could easy see how the interviews were manipulated to make Crile's and Wallace's point.
Chris was on the local WTOP-NEWS (1500 AM Washington, DC) and compared FOX to NBC when Reagan was president.
Oh yeah, Chris, I remember NBC putting on idiots who claimed the president wasn't a citizen or wishing terrorists had killed more Americans, things FOX has done.
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