ABC Obama health care special brings out Fox News' hypocrisy
In criticizing a former ABC News correspondent now working in the Obama White House and ABC's refusal to air an advocacy ad during a program to be broadcast from the White House, Fox News guests and hosts have ignored Fox's own history of refusal to air advocacy ads that criticized the Bush administration, or that Tony Snow left Fox News to be President Bush's press secretary.
Since news broke that ABC News plans to broadcast a June 24 prime-time special, "Questions for the President: Prescription for America," from the White House, Fox News guests and hosts have repeatedly ignored Fox's own history and blasted ABC News over its planned broadcast by claiming, among other things, that ABC News is excluding opposition voices both from appearing in and advertising during the special. Some Fox News hosts and guests have also suggested a "conflict of interest," pointing to the fact that former ABC News correspondent Linda Douglass is now communications director of the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Health Reform. Fox News' concern over the ABC News special is noteworthy given Fox's history.
As Media Matters for America noted, the network enjoyed "unprecedented access" during the Bush administration. But further reinforcing the hypocrisy of Fox's reaction to the ABC News broadcast are two other facts: Fox News itself has refused to air advertisements critical of Bush administration policies and appointees, and in 2006, Tony Snow, then-Fox News anchor and radio host, left Fox to serve as President Bush's White House press secretary.
On the June 17 edition of his show, Fox News' Sean Hannity described the ABC special as a "Mickey Mouse-sponsored infomercial," and said: "Now, it's bad enough that the White House is taking over a broadcast network for a full hour, but we were also reminded today that the White House director of communications for health care spin is none other than former ABC correspondent Linda Douglass." He added: "Now that cannot be a coincidence. We also learned that ABC has declined a request by a conservative health care group to buy ad time during the infomercial. Now, the group says that, at the very least, they had hoped that ABC would let the other side pay for airtime. But, no, apparently Mickey was not interested." Hannity hosted Karl Rove, former Bush adviser and current Fox News contributor, to discuss the issue.
Similarly, on the June 18 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, co-host Brian Kilmeade stated that ABC is "now refusing ... to air a paid TV ad representing the opposing conservative view when it comes to health care," and added that the special "sounds like it is going to be one big infomercial." Kilmeade went on to note that the "director of communications is Linda Douglass, former ABC News reporter," who is "now at the White House Office of Health Reform," and asked Fox News contributor Michelle Malkin: "You think there's a connection there?" Malkin replied, "It certainly seems like it, and, of course, these conflicts of interest don't matter to the liberal media and to the -- their government masters and overlords."
In criticizing ABC News, neither Hannity nor Kilmeade noted that Fox News previously refused to air an ad produced by the Center for Constitutional Rights that criticized the Bush administration for "destroying the Constitution" by the use of renditions, torture, and other tactics. In an email provided to Media Matters by the center, Fox News account executive Erin Kelly told Owen Henkel, the center's e-communications manager, that Fox would not run the ad, but said that "[i]f you have documentation that it [the constitution] is indeed being destroyed, we can look at that." Moreover, in 2005, Fox News refused to run an ad critical of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, who Bush had nominated to succeed retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Fox News does, however, repeatedly air anti-health care reform ads from the Conservatives for Patients' Rights, the group whose ad was reportedly rejected by ABC.
