August 26, 2007
FNS: Bill Moyers gets spanked
Chris Wallace just delivered a world-class verbal beating to taxpayer-supported windbag Bill Moyers, the likes of which I've never seen on a Sunday morning news show.
Wallace was responding to a letter from Moyers, who was unhappy with last week's interview with Karl Rove.
Here's how it went down. Rove, the political strategist widely credited with Pres. Bush's early successes and the surprise GOP congressional victories in 2004, announced his resignation from the president's administration earlier this month.
He sat down for an interview with the Wallace on August 19, one that took up half Fox News Sunday's airtime; Rove answered a variety of questions, but also refused some, citing executive privilege.
Wallace moved to Rove's status as the Boogeyman of the political Left.
WALLACE: When you disclosed on Monday to the Wall Street Journal your plans to leave, you said the following, "I'm not going to stay or leave based on whether it pleases the mob." Question: Who's the mob?
ROVE: Well, we were — this particular context, we were talking about — Paul Gigot asked me, "Well, you know, don't you think the people on Capitol Hill who are after you are — you know, are you leaving because of them?" And so I was referring to this gaggle of politicians on the Hill who seem to be after me. It's interesting. A week or two ago, there was an article in one of these Hill publications where they quoted the Democrat staffers as saying, "Rove is the big fish." You know, I feel like I'm Moby Dick and we've got a couple people on Capitol Hill auditioning for the role of Captain Ahab. But look. I'm going to make a decision and made a decision a year ago on what's best for my family, not on the basis of any consideration about what they will do. They'll keep after me. Let's face it. I mean, I'm a myth, and they're — you know, I'm Beowulf. You know, I'm Grendel. I don't know who I am. But they're after me.
WALLACE: I'm going to get to that in a second. After you resigned, Bill Moyers — some would say he's part of the mob — went after you as an agnostic who flim-flammed the Christian right. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL MOYERS, JOURNALIST: You have to wonder how all those folks on the Christian right must feel discovering they were used for partisan reasons by a skeptic, a secular manipulator.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WALLACE: Your response.
ROVE: I'm a Christian. I go to church. I'm an Episcopalian. I think he may have taken a comment that I made where I was talking about how — I have had colleagues at the White House — Mike Gerson, Pete Wayner (ph), Leslie Drune (ph), Josh Bolten and others — who I'm really impressed about how their faith has informed their lives and made them really better people. And it took a comment where I acknowledged my shortcomings in living up to the beliefs of my faith and contrasted it with how these extraordinary people have made their faith a part of their fiber. And somehow or another he goes from taking it from me being an Episcopalian wishing I was a better Christian to somehow making me into a agnostic. You know, Mr. Moyers ought to do a little bit better research before he does another drive-by slander.
At the the end of today's show, Wallace devoted the entire viewer-mail segment to Moyers' letter. He spoke to the camera, reading the liberal broadcaster's response, as a graphic of the text appeared on screen.
Wallace responded in part, "Of course, you never called Rove. That's reporting 101, but it would have gotten in the way of a tasty story line about a non-believer flimflamming the Christian right. I guess Bill, reporting is easy when you don't worry about the facts."
Take a look at the video:
Ouch! That was a pundit beatdown, something Moyers -- who cultivates a thoughtful, sweater-clad image, sort of a Mr. Rogers of the Left (when he's not hurling invective-filled broadsides at conservatives he loathes) -- isn't used to.
PBS took some flak, too, for Moyers' comments on his taxpayer-funded program.
Rove called the PBS ombudsman to complain.
“If someone says he is a believer, why is that not accepted? He (Moyers) has decided he will be the judge and the jury about whether I’m a believer. He attributes this to unknown parties and then defends it in a letter to Chris Wallace, with no personal interface with me at all. How does the San Antonio Express know? They don’t. They don’t know me well. He (Moyers) then relies on a blogger who says ‘I could be wrong here.’ Well, he is wrong.”…
My faith is my business. This is just beyond the pale.”
The PBS ombudsman noted that most of the mail to him was anti-Moyers.
Will someone remind me why I -- and millions of other taxpayers -- pay Moyers' salary, when there are hundreds of channels available to TV viewers, many (read, "most") only too happy to air anti-BushChaneyRoveHalliburton propaganda masquerading as impartial reporting?
Moyers could easily find a home for his attacks on a variety of nets sympathetic to his world-view: ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN are all buying what Moyers is selling. And it lets the taxpayers off the hook, too.
Sounds like a win-win.
Posted by Mike Lief at August 26, 2007 09:35 AM
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