Ainsley Approves Attack on Reagan?

Earhardt: “You kinda have to find a little humor in some sad things that happen in life.”  Actually, Ainsley, you don’t, especially when that humor is at the expense of the victims themselves, including those victims of dementia such as President Reagan.

Last Thursday (April 30), Fox & Friends co-host Ainsley Earhardt signaled her approval of Will Ferrell’s starring in and producing a comedic movie that purportedly would mock the now deceased former President Ronald Reagan in his final term as President as being addled by dementia although evidence suggests otherwise according to Reagan’s White House physicians (New Yorker). Ironically, Friday, after fallout from Reagan’s family and other Alzheimer’s victim advocates, the besieged flagging actor Ferrell announced through a spokesman that he would “not [be] pursing this project.”

Introducing F&F co-anchor Steve Doocey‘s man-on-the-street-interview segment (subtitled “A Laughing Matter? Will Ferrell to Star in Comedy about Reagan”), co-host Brian Kilmeade sarcastically said, “So, we told you earlier that Will Ferrell’s going to be producing and will be starring in a movie as Ronald Reagan….And, it’s going to be a comedy, Steve: And, it’s going to be a comedy because it’s so funny that Ronald Reagan lost his memory!”

As the segment concluded, Ainsley remarked, “Steve, I just think a lot of people will go see it because they like Will Ferrell: I think they expect it to be funny. Shaking her head “no” as if she did not believe a word that she was saying, she added, “And, you kinda have to find a little humor in some sad things that happen in life.”

But, Ainsley, that “little humor” should never be at the expense of the victim. And, if so, the heartless comedian becomes the real joke.

“Eagle” Eye: “TV’s Andy Levy” Nails Ann Coulter

Coulter’s Reagan slips: “Demonic” or ignorant? Oops! Conservative author and Mitt Romney backer Ann Coulter may be able to get away with GOP misinformation, artful or inadvertent, with Fox & Friends co-hosts Brian Kilmeade, Steve Doocy, and Gretchen Carlson but not with Red Eye‘s ombudsman “TV’s Andy Levy.” Rather, Levy nailed Coulter today and she knew it.

Three days ago, Coulter told the credulous F&F co-anchors that Ronald Reagan pulled out of his losing (1976) GOP Presidential campaign early a la Mitt Romney in 2008:* And, she indicated that Rick Santorum should follow suit now. Only problem: Ronald Reagan took his bid to the GOP convention where he narrowly lost on the first vote in a hard-fought floor fight.

Today, Coulter iterated her F&F argument to Red Eye anchor Greg Gutfeld, sidekick Bill Schulz, and RE panelists. Unfortunately, for Coulter, RE‘s fact checker Levy was listening. During Levy’s “Halftime Report,” he asked Coulter about Reagan’s taking his bid all the way to the convention.** Looking dumbfounded, Coulter obfuscated: Instead of vainly defending her erroneous assertion, she muttered that Reagan had convinced a conservative group (CPAC) not to back a third-party candidate and had campaigned for President Ford (and that Romney had exited early). Fortunately, for Coulter, Levy merely pressed her a mite more and compassionately moved on.

Catching Ann Coulter’s Reagan gaffes? Brickbats for Brian, Steve, and Gretch. But, bravo, Andy!

*Fox & Friends – 04/02/12 (@ 3:13 into Fox News Insider vid)

**Red Eye – 04/05/12 (@ 3:35 a.m. ET)

Update: For Red Eye “Halftime Report vid, link here.

Olbermann’s Racial Authority?

Believe it or not: Reagan’s Interior Secretary James Watt! Last night on Countdown, incredibly, MSNBC’s top dog Keith Olbermann cited Watt approvingly in his advice for President Obama to “be Obama” and “to stand up” to the “perpetual fraud machine that is Fox News” who “assassinated” Shirley Sherrod with their “complete perversion of journalism” in their “manipulation of reality to make the racist seem benevolent, and to convict the benevolent as racist.”

And just who is this James Watt that Olbermann accords approbation? He is the Reagan Interior Secretary who had to resign after cracking a joke insulting blacks, women, Jews, and the physically challenged. In reference to one of his advisory committees, he callously commented, “‘We have every kind of mixture you can have. I have a black, I have a woman, two Jews and a cripple. And we have talent.”

Yikes! Ironic, though. Perhaps, Olbermann, too, will want to proofread his producer’s copy in the future.

Reagan, O’Reilly? Reality Check

FNC’s Bill O’Reilly, host of his eponymous O’Reilly Factor, needed his own “Reality Check” last night. During a segment on drug violence in Mexico, O’Reilly asked whether President Obama should send troops to help the Mexicans fight the drug cartels (in the wake of the killings of two Americans last weekend in Juarez). In his preface, O’Reilly remarked, “I want everybody to remember that Ronald Reagan invaded Panama for this very reason…that Panama was becoming a country run by drug cartels under Noriega who’s still in prison. Okay? And, Reagan sent in U.S. troops to prevent that.”*

Unfortunately, for O’Reilly, he himself did not remember. In fact, it was George H.W. Bush, not Reagan, who ordered the invasion of Panama on December 20, 1989. During this operation dubbed Just Cause, Bush sent in almost 30,000 troops, who quickly defeated the rogue regime and captured its leader, General Manuel Noriega.

An ironic twist: Later in the program during the “E-mail” segment, O’Reilly rebuffed a reader who defended Tom Hanks’ purported “believing racism was a prime motivator in World War II.” As he did, Factor producers put up a large photo of Hanks with the chyron, “Rewriting History?”** Indeed.

*O’Reilly Factor – 03/15/10 (@8:24 p.m. ET)

**O’Reilly Factor – 03/15/10 (@8:56 p.m. ET)

Hannity’s Twilight Zone

Glass houses! Sean Hannity’s favorite liberal Bob Beckel looked like a philandering Pharisee casting stones at the woman caught in adultery tonight. “Embarrassing, just embarrassing”: Those very words uttered by Beckel, 1984 Democratic nominee Walter Mondale’s campaign manager, after Reagan’s landslide victory (49 of 50 states) seemed to echo eerily tonight on Hannity.

In a Great American Panel segment, entitled “ACORN Exposed,” Hannity asked Beckel to defend the community activist organization in light of the recent expose by film maker James O’Keefe and his collaborator, Hannah Giles. (O’Keefe and Giles posed respectively as a pimp and prostitute seeking housing and tax advice from the organization to set up a bordello.). After defending ACORN generally, Beckel inexplicably went THERE. He pontificated, “You know what I really found interesting about that was Senator Vitter of Louisiana who went out with a whore and he sits there and starts complaining about it. He ought to shut his mouth. And he’s lucky he’s still in the United States Senate.”

Subsequently, Hannity panelist Heather Higgins, Independent Women’s Forum Chairperson, stated, “You’re desperate to be bringing Vitter into this.” In response, Beckel said, “I could bring a lot more in: I could bring in the governor of South Carolina, I could bring in Bill Clinton…. Not surprisingly, he conveniently forgot to bring himself in as well. (According to the Smoking Gun, Beckel is not unacquainted with such dalliances.)

Then, Hannity, perhaps, aware of his audience’s incredulity at Beckel’s chutzpah, pointed at Beckel and said, “I just saw you smile…I got you!” Sheepishly, Beckel replied, “Far be it from me to throw arrows at things like this.”

Far be it, indeed. Perhaps, a parallel universe? Tonight, close enough: Hannity‘s Twilight Zone.

FDR, Reagan, Obama?

On this first day after Martin Luther King Day 2009, President-elect Barack Obama ushered in a new era in civil rights history. As thousands streamed into the Washington Mall in the pre-dawn hours, American Morning’s Kiran Chetry called it “a day for the ages” and Fox & Friends Gretchen Carlson dubbed it a “very special day.” It is indeed historic: when President-elect Barrack Obama takes the oath of office, America will have it first black or biracial president.

According to a recent CNN poll (January 12-15, 2009), an overwhelming majority of blacks say that Martin Luther King’s vision has been fulfilled. Almost on schedule. In a recently released BBC interview, Dr. King foresaw the election of a black American president “in less than forty years”: he was only four years off.

To all of America’s citizens, like FDR and Reagan before him, a handsome, charismatic, eloquent, and optimistic Obama offers much needed hope in dire economic times. Will he similarly succeed? He appears confident and eager: Let us all hope that he and his experienced team are up to this momentous task.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/world_news_america/default.stm

Biden’s Bite: Puppy Pick Message?

Vice President-elect Joe Biden appeared to send a subliminal message to Obama bashers: smiling, kissing Joe still has his bark and his bite. Picking a purebred German shepherd pup for himself before Barack Obama gets his children’s canine, seemed a subtle reminder that no matter how cuddly and gentle Obama may be, that Biting Biden will be on guard.

Opining on Biden’s buy, Fox & Friends co-hosts Aly, Dave, and Clayton seemed to agree that it was a bid to get back in the public eye. Ironically, in the next show, America’s News HQ, FNC displayed a similarly colored German shepherd watching over JFK, Jackie, Little John, and Caroline apparently at the Kennedy compound. The author began to wonder if Biden’s selection was a part of a larger play: remember, the Obama team has patterned itself after Reagan’s resonance, Kennedy’s Camelot, and Clinton’s politics.

In the new Obama administration, Biden will play a role. He may agree to a shrinking Veep script but he’ll be no shrinking violet.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/08/28/biden_comes_out_punching?mode=PF

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081214/pl_politico/16558;_ylt=AlqTra8FRD75tve5AoaK33myFz4D

Cane Careless Clayton

Fox & Friends co-host Clayton Morris, a self-professed history buff, displayed a wanton disregard for historical facts. As to Andrew Jackson, in each of the “Bad Hair Club for Men” segments, he accused “Old Hickory” of caning someone in the Senate. However, the only caning incident in the Senate was that of Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner by South Carolina’s irate Representative Preston Brooks for some injudicious comments concerning Brook’s ill kinsman South Carolina’s Senator Butler. The author had hoped that a producer fact check would rectify Clayton’s historical mistake: unfortunately, no one, including colleagues, Alisyn Camerota, Dave Briggs, or Rick Reichmuth called him on it.

Furthermore, ironically, in a “48 Liberal Lies…” segment, Clayton committed a more egregious error with his assertion that both Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev ended the war: no, Ronald Reagan, Maggie Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II won that war.

http://us-civil-war.suite101.com/article.cfm/brooks_canes_sumner

CNN’s Rollins: MN Voters “Dead Indians”

Ironically, American Morning’s John Roberts and Kiran Chetry had politically incorrect lusty laughs after a segment entitled, “America Divided: Concern about GOP Tactic.” Beforehand, Roberts and Kiran had interviewed Ed Rollins, Ronald Reagan’s 1984 National Campaign Director and current CNN contributor, about questionable tactics by GOP candidates that seemed to draw a conservative America/liberal un-America divide and about the divisive Pennsylvania presidential race. At the close of the segment, Roberts jokingly asked Rollins, “How did you screw up on Minnesota?” (In 1984 Rollins helped Reagan win all the U.S. states except Minnesota.)

In answer to Roberts unexpected query, Rollins ad libbed, “They voted a lot of dead Indians along the border: 1620 votes. I’m not bitter.” Roberts and Kiran joined Rollins in a genial guffaw.

“America Divided”: Still Cowboys and “Indians” (Native Americans)?

William F. Buckley, Jr. R.I.P.

Today the inimitable William Frank Buckley, Jr. died, less than a year after his beloved wife, Patricia A. A. Taylor Buckley. The right’s premier philosopher laid the intellectual foundation for the Reagan Revolution which engendered the recrudescence of America economically, militarily, and morally. In 1951 the “Scull & Bones” Eli published his seminal work, “God and Man at Yale,” and served notice that he was more than ready to compete and prevail against the then reigning liberal intellectual elites. This extraordinary polymath founded the National Review, authored over 50 books, hosted Firing Line (from 1966-1999), ran for mayor of New York, served in the U.S. army, worked in the C.I.A., and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. President George W. Bush praised Buckley today, saying that he “brought conservative thought into the political mainstream, and helped lay the intellectual foundation for America’s victory in the Cold War.” At his death, Buckley was working on a memoir of President Ronald Reagan. (Buckley’s book on Barry Goldwater is scheduled to come out this spring.) R.I.P. Great Philosoper/Warrior Bon Vivant!

Cf. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/27/business/media/27cnd-buckley.html?ref=arts