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Discovery Channel has brokered a deal with Sarah Palin to host an eight-part documentary about Alaska with the former governor as the central roving attraction. It will be appearing on Discovery's sister network TLC. It's certainly a lucrative arrangement. Palin will reportedly be getting $1 million an episode. The Guardian's Marina Hyde notes that her total take "will clock in at slightly more than it cost to buy the entire state from the Russians in 1867...".
Palin will be in the driver's seat in the sense that it will be a feel good travelogue... Alaska-as-seen-through-her-rimless-Kazuo Kawasakis. Perhaps those interested enough to watch will see Palin taking the opportunity to get in a few digs at her detractors and offer a boost for mining and related activities. But maybe not, TLC seems to be leery of making it political. A spokesperson said: “TLC is about strong characters and compelling narratives, and there is absolutely no intention of making a political program whatsoever”.

Hard to imagine Palin without a political opinion or two while doing the rounds of her home state. The former governor has a record to live down, especially on the environment. Professor Rick Steiner of the University of Alaska provides more detail on Palin's "abysmal" record - here.

Link to related articles - Huffington Post - NY Times - NRDC

It's kind of like one of those perfect match-ups touted by eHarmony. Sarah Palin will be joining Fox News as an analyst and special commentator.

Fox and Palin are in many ways made for each other. Like Fox, Palin is heavily biased, factually challenged, hype prone and not troubled by the occasional fast one. Like Fox she appeals to a brand of patriotism that is anti-intellectual, big on flag pins and that conjures an America of Joe sixpacks and hockey moms.

Maybe given her savaging at the hands of the evil "liberal media" Fox sees an opportunity to stick Palin in the face of liberal America like a middle finger. No doubt her detractors in 'not-real' America won't be able to resist sneaking a peek. It's free entertainment after all, and Sarah's always good for a laugh. This will be Fox's chance to show the world that Palin can pronounce complicated words like "Uzbekistan" and that she possesses in-depth knowledge about esoteric places like um... Russia. As she informed Katie Couric, she's an omnivorous reader. There isn't a magazine she hasn't scanned. She's read "all of 'em, any of 'em that have been in front of me all these years". Just don't ask her for a title.

Recently she was interviewed by Fox News jester Glenn Beck with the Statue of Liberty in the background (John Stewart took aim - here). Beck was his usual smarmy, oleaginous self as he talked about his Fox-nation-version-of-America... the one without too many brown people. Palin cranked out her thoughts in that mechanical, rehearsed voice... how grand America is... how it risks regressing to become European-like. You get the feeling when she talks that her mind and her delivery risk becoming unshackled. It adds to the suspense.

Palin has found her niche. It doesn't matter if she makes things up now and then, she'll fit right in on faux news. Making things up on Fox isn't a problem, Beck has made lying into a political art form. As long as you're singing from the right song sheet you can pretty much feel free to shoot the bull. And Palin does make things up. Last year in an effort to explain why as president she wouldn't be subjected to the types of ethics investigations that prompted her Alaska resignation, she referred to a non-existent "department" in the White House:

"I think on a national level your Department of Law there in the White House would look at some of the things that we've been charged with and automatically throw them out."

Given Palin's history of gaffes and meltdowns, Fox will likely try and showcase her dubious talents in a manner that isn't high risk. Going head-to-head with policy wonks and getting into it with hired liberals on a free-for-all basis could prove costly. Fact-challenged Palin is an easy target and could come off looking well... stupid. Emphasis will likely be on the "special" part of her designated commentator role. That would give her more control, make her look smarter and reduce the risk factor.

Palin's new gig has already gotten a few laughs. In reference to her Fox role she announced in all seriousness: "It's wonderful to be part of a place that so values fair and balanced news."

Related story - here

During an interview with Howard Kurtz on CNN's "Reliable Sources," Bill Maher said Sean Hannity of Fox News is "terribly sexually repressed." Maher made the comment after viewing a video clip, in the course of which Hannity described him (Maher) as being "an angry, bitter guy."

Here's how Maher responded during the Kurtz interview:

MAHER: No, he's an angry, bitter guy. That's called projecting.

That's called taking what you feel and giving it to somebody else. I'm a happy, single guy. He's a repressed, typical Republican.

I'm sure just terribly sexually repressed and it comes out in all their sorts of hatred and vile and bile -- why would I be bitter? First of all, our side won. You know, their side is in a wilderness like there's been before.

So --

Sexual repression is just part of a more complex condition in Hannity's case, that might best be described as a form of arrested development.

He is typical of a certain type of right wing pundit... loud, driven, smug, dogmatic, intellectually challenged and programmed to repeat the same key talking points ad nauseum. It doesn't matter if he is out-to-lunch and factually incorrect on some issue, the ideological hype and will-to-coerce never wavers - you have at least to give him an 'A' for effort.

Watching Hannity doing his thing can be funny as hell, but also disturbing.

The other night he had guests on his show who also lean to the right, but when Hannity started banging on even they looked at him as though he had a screw loose. He hammered home objections to everything Obama is about with such thinly disguised contempt or possibly hatred, it seemed badly off-base.

Notwithstanding Hannity's often proclaimed regard for conservative African American justice Clarence Thomas, his attacks on Obama at times come off as nasty and personal in a manner that goes beyond the White House policies under discussion. There is an undertone to Hannity's commentary on Obama that says as much about prejudice as it does about politics.

He doggedly referred to the president in the third person... "he" and "him"... you half expected him to start throwing in the occasional "it."

On a recent show, with reference to the Cairo visit he said in all seriousness that Obama was now referring to America as "a Muslim nation."

What president Obama in fact said is that millions of Muslims live in America. We're not talking some big secret here. Any reference to America being a 'Muslim nation' has to be kept in the context of the overall remarks. But leave it to Hannity to wrench Obama's comments out of context and present them in a manner that completely distorts what the president was saying.

Obama's precise words were:

We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation, or a Jewish nation, or a Muslim nation. We consider ourselves a nation of citizens, who are bound by ideals.

If you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we'd be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.

This is the spin Hannity put on it:

He honors the national day of prayer behind closed doors. Now, on his Middle East apology tour, the President calls the U.S. a "Muslim nation."

The same president who insists the U.S. is not a Christian nation is now calling us a Muslim nation.

When Bill Maher, who has a good eye for these things, says Hannity is sexually repressed there is no doubt he has hit on one of Hannity's chief features... yet another right-wing Irish-American Catholic with the hang-ups that go with it. It's pretty evident who the "angry, bitter guy" is.

Sean Hannity really shouldn't go after Bill Maher. They're badly mismatched. Maher is just way too sharp for the Fox News shill.

Dr George Tiller was gunned down Sunday in the Reformation Lutheran Church, Wichita Kansas, where he was serving as an usher.

Dr Tiller performed abortions and was a champion of women's reproductive freedom despite the risk to his own life. He had long been vilified by anti-abortion activists who made him a target of ongoing threats.

No detractor's voice was louder than that of Fox News' inquisitor-in-chief, Bill O'Reilly.

O'Reilly first got Tiller in his sights back in 2005. According to Salon, the doctor's name surfaced on O'Reilly's show, The Factor, on 28 subsequent episodes - most recently on April 27 of this year.

The on-air attacks on Dr Tiller included O'Reilly's usual brand of hardline rhetoric - the type of inflammatory stuff guaranteed to rile up most anti-abortion activists.

Dr Tiller was crudely caricatured as "Tiller the Baby Killer." Other characterizations were a variation on that theme. The doctor was likened to the Nazis... his work was described as the moral equivalent of NAMBLA and Al Qaeda... comparisons were also made with Mao's China, Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Soviet Union in the course of the broad brush smear job that is part of O'Reilly's on-air attack style.

O'Reilly deliberately associated Dr Tiller with child molestation and rape and without evidence accused his clinic of covering up for 'child rapists.' He claimed the doctor was being enabled by amoral cultural elites and scofflaw journalists. Tiller's clinic was described as a "death mill."

O'Reilly's attacks on George Tiller weren't just on-air targeting. He dispatched producers Jesse Watters and Porter Barry to ambush the doctor. The ambush 'interviews' also extended to Tiller's attorney, Pedro Irigonegaray and Kansas governor, Kathleen Sebelius.

O'Reilly presented the doctor as a murderer-on-the-loose running a "business of destruction". He described him as having "blood on his hands" and used terms such as "Judgment Day."

While O'Reilly never went so far as advocating violence, the act of targeting George Tiller in this highly sensationalist fashion offered the doctor up as a hate-target - intentional or not. This was playing with fire since elements in the anti-abortion movement have a history of violence - including shootings and bombings directed against abortion providers.

Authorities have detained a suspect, 51-year-old Scott Roeder in connection with the killing of Dr Tiller. Roeder was reportedly a one-time member of a Shawnee County-based Freemen group called One Supreme Court.

Suzanne James, a former director of victim's services for Shawnee County remembers Roeder and described him as "dangerous."

A person using the name Scott Roeder was responsible for posting anti-Tiller comments on various internet sites. A posting from September 3, 2007, on a site sponsored by Operation Rescue, said that Tiller needed to be "stopped."

Was O'Reilly's campaign against George Tiller a factor in the final tragic outcome? No doubt O'Reilly will condemn the murder and express sympathy for Tiller's family - but the fact remains, he contributed to the climate of hate that resulted in Tiller being made into enemy number-one in the minds of some people. In that type of climate a shooter might not only feel empowered, but justified.

For details on the suspect Scott Roeder here.

Salon article on O'Reilly's attacks on Tiller here.

Conservative "tea party" protests across the US need to attract crowds. Bodies are essential if you hope to draw media attention.

No problem. Fox News is on the case.

The News organization that claims to be "fair and balanced" and that urges viewers to "say 'no' to biased media" has made no effort to disguise its biases when it comes to anti-Obama tea party protests. Fox blatantly airs segments urging viewers to get involved in protests across the country.

Fox goes beyond merely calling on viewers to turn out. It provides organizing information for the events ... dates, locations, related website info. It has even gone so far as to post publicity for the events on its own website. Tea-party planners list Fox News contributors as "Tea Party Sponsors".

Fox personalities will be broadcasting live at tea party events across the country.

Beck has been working overtime getting out the message. He encouraged his viewers to show up at "FNC Tax Day Tea Parties". Cavuto announced on his show that "... we are going to be broadcasting live from one of the biggest of these rallies on April 15, Tax Day. We are at California's state capitol in Sacramento. This is the epicenter of this tax revolt beast, if you will."

Fox News' claim to be fair and balanced is a joke.

It's one thing for FOX news bully boy Bill O'Reilly to take flack from the left, he's used to that. But when criticism comes from the boardroom of News Corp., and from upper echelons of FOX itself, it's another matter.

Politico received a pre-publication copy of Michael Wolff's upcoming biography of Rupert Murdoch, titled The Man Who Owns the News. Turns out that Murdoch is embarrassed by his ownership of FOX news. In addition, he "absolutely despises" Bill O'Reilly.

According to Wolff, Murdoch's purchase of the Wall Street Journal was motivated in part by a desire to distance himself from the "the belligerent, the vulgar, the menacing, the unsubtle ... for the better-heeled, the more magnanimous, the further nuanced."

O'Reilly epitomizes a certain type of macho bravado with his almost pathological control needs and intimidation tactics. He's a journalistic thug with a big following. When he brings on comedian-of-sorts Dennis Miller it's kind of like watching two middle-aged self-congratulatory smart asses pleasuring each other and it's not pretty.

O'Reilly appeals to people out there who like his authoritarian ways. They get off on watching him savage liberals or jumping all over people he loves to hate, such as Barney Frank.

Bill O'Reilly is an old dog who will never learn new tricks and he's reaching his expiry date fast. It's ironical though that Murdoch of all people, is embarrassed by the Factor host. Perhaps advancing years have a way of mellowing out even cynical and hard nosed news hustlers.

The Wolff revelations create a perception problem for O'Reilly because it's not just liberals doing the dissing.

FOX's Greta Van Susteren recently made the trip to Alaska to interview Sarah Palin. During the interview in Anchorage, Van Susteren might as well have been a paid partisan hired to make Palin look good, while enjoying some moose chili and snowmobiling on the side.

To hear Palin tell it during the interview, she barely set a foot wrong during the campaign.

When she was strutting her stuff on the trail controversy erupted about her pricey new outfits. She announced that the clothes were RNC property, but that didn't prevent some of the clothing ending up on the plane back to Alaska.

According to Palin the controversial wardrobe just kind of 'appeared.' She never asked for a single thread. In fact she and Todd would have been happy just to have worn their regular outfits on the campaign trail because they like nothing more than being their authentic Alaskan selves.

Palin was unprepared for the big stage. She lacked knowledge in key areas. But she doesn't see it that way, and instead blames the mean liberal media and faceless "jerks" associated with the McCain campaign.

Then of course there is the God factor. In the interview there was lots of false humility, but she made it clear that come 2012 the decision is in God's hands. If she gets the nod from the big guy, she will open the door. God only has to signal that it's her time.

At various points during the interview Palin put herself forward as a uniter, someone with the good of her country at heart. Strange to hear considering the vicious attacks she launched against Barack Obama and the hatred she whipped up at her rallies. When she talked about the virtues of "getting along," Van Susteren asked her how she proposed to do that.

She replied:

“You start by not discrediting or invalidating someone because of a position that maybe they take that you are in disagreement with. You learn from them and you're able to find middle ground on so many of these issues... There is always a way to work with another person... Maybe we disagree on some of the particulars on an issue. We don't have to be screamin' at each other, though. Let's find a way to work together and solve a problem.”

Aspects of the governor's track record give the lie to this, but Van Susteren didn't challenge Palin on her assertions.

The interview was more of a 'feel good' exercise than any genuine effort to challenge Palin on the facts. For the most part Van Susteren took what the governor had to say at face value, and at times almost offered her an open mike. With the exception of a few questions designed to appear tough, the interview was softball journalism.

John Cleese of Monty Python's Flying Circus, has turned his talents to poetry. Recently he penned an 'Ode to Sean Hannity.' It perfectly captures the essential inanity of the right wing motormouth.

The show Hannity and Colmes seems designed to perpetuate Fox's fairness fiction. The unbalanced Hannity being counterbalanced by the more liberal-leaning and balanced Colmes. Colmes is by far the brighter light, which isn't hard given the competition.

The balance proves elusive though because Colmes can barely get a word in edgeways. Hannity routinely hogs the camera and assaults viewers with his dogged line of commentary - working every topic to death like a dog with a bone.

The Cleese poem captures the essence of Hannity with a few well chosen words.

by John Cleese

Aping urbanity
Oozing with vanity
Plump as a manatee
Faking humanity
Journalistic calamity
Intellectual inanity
Fox Noise insanity
You’re a profanity
Hannity

Fox News recently saw fit to solicit the opinions of far-right extremist Paul Fromm when airing a segment on Mark Steyn's Human Rights Tribunal drama in Canada.

Former US Vice-President, Al Gore, showed up last Saturday at the Netroots Nation convention in Austin, Texas. Netroots is a political convention for progressive political activists. It is organized by Daily Kos, and was previously known as Yearly Kos.

In referring to Netroots Nation, Gore described it as: "The beginning of an effort ... to reclaim the integrity of American democracy.”

The presence of Gore at the convention tripped the wire of Fox News Bill O'Reilly, who went off on one of his tirades. He described Netroots Nation as the most "hateful group in the country." He went on to say: “And I’m including the Nazis and the Klan in here.”

Last year he described the Yearly Kos conference as "a David Duke convention." Hate is something O'Reilly understands. He routinely demonizes his opponents while pretending to be fair and balanced.

A cursory read of Kos will yield passionate arguments, informed commentary. Daily Kos is a huge site and hosts a massive number of comments. O'Reilly has no way of proving that any "hateful" remarks have any connection to Netroots Nation members. They could well have been planted by malicious trolls in an effort to blacken the site's reputation.

O'Reilly has said that 'whatever is on your site represents you,' He conveniently overlooks hate comments on his own site, that can get as bad as anything you will ever find on Kos.

In one case on O'Reilly's site there were not-so-veiled threats against the life of Hillary Clinton. One comment included the remark "keeping my guns loaded" - in reference to the possible election of Hillary Clinton as president.

John Aravosis discovered that the person who made this comment had written 1,062 posts on O'Reilly's site - so he/she was a regular and not a passing troll.

O'Reilly's self-righteous pomposity knows no bounds. He said:

"Al Gore now is done. He’s done. Ok. He is not a man of respect, he doesn’t have any judgment. The fact that he went to this thing is the same as if he stepped into the Klan gathering. It’s the same. No difference. None. K, he loses all credibility with me. All credibility."

Someone who thinks Netroots Nation is more hateful than the Nazis and the Klu Klux Klan clearly has a screw loose... not exactly a drawback on Fox News.