“It was an entirely political speech, right?” Carlson exclaimed. “It bore no resemblance to the Obama Administration we watched for the last three years. Where was mention of healthcare? Where was explanation of all the great things the president’s health care law has done? Wasn’t that supposed to change America forever?”

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“He mentioned health care!” interjected Colmes.

“Like parenthetically!” Carlson replied. “This was a speech designed to sound moderate but at its core, if you read it carefully he is making the case you are poor because some people are rich. right? That this small group of affluent people are keeping the rest of the country down. Even Bill Clinton wouldn’t have said that because he didn’t believe it. This is actually not in keeping with the moderate Democrat position at all. It is pretty left-wing position!”

Despite Carlson’s pleas, Colmes continued to heap praise on President Obama‘s speech, calling it “forward-looking.”

Watch Carlson and Colmes debate President Obama’s SOTU:

Host Rachel Maddow began the segment (you can watch the whole thing here) by detailing many of the questionable things that have yet to become the focus of Santorum coverage, including his involvement in the John Ensign scandal, and wondered if Santorum would be subjected to the same media vetting as the previous 73 GOP frontrunners from this year. Maddow then brought Robinson on, and asked him if any of his extreme social positions (banning contraception, banning abortion even in cases of rape and incest) might “hurt him among Republicans?”

Referencing an earlier clip from Greta Van Susteren‘s On The Record, Robinson said “we`ll see Greta was wrong. He’s not a little weird. He’s really weird.”

“Some of his positions he’s taken are just so weird,” he continued, “that I think some Republicans are going to be off-put. Not everybody is going to be down, for example, with the story of how he and his wife handled the stillborn child whose body they took home to kind of sleep with and introduce to the rest of the family. It’s a very weird story.”

To clarify, the Santorum’s baby was not “stillborn,” but rather, died two hours after being born. Here’s what happened:

The childbirth in 1996 was a source of terrible heartbreak — the couple were told by doctors early in the pregnancy that the baby Karen was carrying had a fatal defect and would survive only for a short time outside the womb. According to Karen Santorum’s book, ”Letters to Gabriel: The True Story of Gabriel Michael Santorum,” she later developed a life-threatening intrauterine infection and a fever that reached nearly 105 degrees. She went into labor when she was 20 weeks pregnant. After resisting at first, she allowed doctors to give her the drug Pitocin to speed the birth. Gabriel lived just two hours.

What happened after the death is a kind of snapshot of a cultural divide. Some would find it discomforting, strange, even ghoulish — others brave and deeply spiritual. Rick and Karen Santorum would not let the morgue take the corpse of their newborn; they slept that night in the hospital with their lifeless baby between them. The next day, they took him home. ”Your siblings could not have been more excited about you!” Karen writes in the book, which takes the form of letters to Gabriel, mostly while he is in utero. ”Elizabeth and Johnny held you with so much love and tenderness. Elizabeth proudly announced to everyone as she cuddled you, ‘This is my baby brother, Gabriel; he is an angel.’ ”

As I’ve said before, the fact that Karen Santorum publicized the event means that, to some extent, it is an appropriate subject for public discussion. For example, the notion that Gabriel’s story is relevant to the abortion rights debate is something that can be legitimately challenged, but even then, it should be handled in a delicate, respectful manner. I have heard liberals mock the Santorums’ expression of grief cruelly in the past, and while Eugene Robinson wasn’t necessarily cruel, there’s something seriously wrong with his premise.

While the Santorums’ actions were certainly different, to call them “weird” is to act as if there are ways of dealing with the dead that aren’t weird. We sew their eyes and lips shut, pump them full of chemicals, out them into elaborate boxes that we’ll never see again, and sometimes build little stone houses to keep them in.

I’m not a particularly religious person (you could call me agnostic), but when my father died, I stayed with his body in the hospital room for a good two hours, talking to him, holding him, and even freaking out a little every time he twitched, convinced the doctors might have screwed it up. After he was cremated, my brother and I scattered his ashes at Sandy Hook, and the wind there absolutely coated me, Big Lebowski-style, in his ashes. It was comical and horrifying, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to call it “weird.”

In Rick Santorum’s case, his family was dealing with a gut-wrenching tragedy, and along with it, a heart-rending decision. They don’t deserve to be judged as “weird” for their actions here any more than anyone else. By the same token, Santorum probably shouldn’t judge others who are making gut-wrenching decisions, like whether to carry a child after a rape, or when a late-term complication could leave a mother’s other children orphaned, or even whether they can marry the person they love.

Here’s the clip, from MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show:

RELATED: Fox News’ Alan Colmes Flips Out When Called Out For ‘Cheap Shot’ About Rick Santorum Baby

Hannity brought up that Colmes had said he had apologized to Santorum and brought the audience to speed on his comments, or at least the subject matter therein. Santorum responded that “there’s a lot of nasty stuff out there on the internet, and I’m sure Alan Colmes reads a lot of that stuff from the left.” He then explained what he had done with the child– remain with him for the night and show him to his siblings after he had passed, as a way to “recognize the dignity of that life”– and added that “it was a tremendously healing experience,” though “I can understand why people may want to do something differently.”

As for his conversation with Colmes, Santorum explained that he accepted. “I know Alan is a very good person at heart,” he told Hannity, “He made a mistake, he admitted the mistake… we all say things and do stupid things.” He did note, however, that it was “part of the culture” for people to make mean comments and impossible to avoid them. “They do say those things, but please, don’t repeat them.”

The conversation with Hannity via Fox News below:

The segment was pegged to Santorum’s polling surge in Iowa, which Colmes argued wouldn’t last “once they get a load of some of the crazy things he’s said and done, like taking his two-hour-old baby who died after childbirth and played with it for a couple hours so his other children would know that the child was real…”

“That’s a cheap shot, Alan,” Lowry interrupted, the first of many interruptions that would leave Colmes sitting back in his chair, staring daggers at Lowry, and asking to be alerted when it was his turn to speak again.

The incident they’re referring to is the 1996 birth of a premature baby boy to Rick and Karen Santorum. The child only lived for two hours, and the Santorums dealt with the tragedy in an unusual way:

The childbirth in 1996 was a source of terrible heartbreak — the couple were told by doctors early in the pregnancy that the baby Karen was carrying had a fatal defect and would survive only for a short time outside the womb. According to Karen Santorum’s book, ”Letters to Gabriel: The True Story of Gabriel Michael Santorum,” she later developed a life-threatening intrauterine infection and a fever that reached nearly 105 degrees. She went into labor when she was 20 weeks pregnant. After resisting at first, she allowed doctors to give her the drug Pitocin to speed the birth. Gabriel lived just two hours.

What happened after the death is a kind of snapshot of a cultural divide. Some would find it discomforting, strange, even ghoulish — others brave and deeply spiritual. Rick and Karen Santorum would not let the morgue take the corpse of their newborn; they slept that night in the hospital with their lifeless baby between them. The next day, they took him home. ”Your siblings could not have been more excited about you!” Karen writes in the book, which takes the form of letters to Gabriel, mostly while he is in utero. ”Elizabeth and Johnny held you with so much love and tenderness. Elizabeth proudly announced to everyone as she cuddled you, ‘This is my baby brother, Gabriel; he is an angel.’ ”

It’s a story that I have heard mocked by many liberals (and mistold, by others, as having followed a miscarriage), and I agree with Lowry that the intensely personal arena of human grief ought not be cheapened into political fodder. Within reasonable limits, I don’t think anyone should be judged for things they say or do in the face of extreme grief.

The fact that Karen Santorum publicized the event means that, to some extent, it is an appropriate subject for public discussion, but then it should be handled in a delicate, respectful manner. While I think Lowry was taking a cheap shot of his own when he accused Colmes of “mocking” the Santorums (and with his deployment of the coded phrase “Manhattan liberals”), neither was Colmes’ characterization that they “played with” the dead child fair or particularly sensitive. He probably shouldn’t have brought it up at all, but his critique, while cold and lacking in relevance, fell well short of mockery.

UPDATE: Colmes has tweeted that he called Santorum and his wife and apologized for the comment, an apology which was accepted.

just spoke to @ricksantorum. He and Karen graciously accepted my apology for a hurtful comment

Here’s the clip, from Fox News:

Unfortunately, that clear choice (characters from Ken Burns’ prohibition documentary) was shot down by our editors, so we’re moving on to our second choice; The Muppets!

So gather round, pull your favorite chicken or pig close, and make sure all your Wakka’s are Wakked, because it’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights, it’s time to meet the Muppets on Muppet Mediaite!

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Colmes stated that all the members of the tea party were “dregs,” so capturing them in such a way may be unavoidable. Greg Gutfeld chimed in to ask how many tea partiers were arrested compared to OWS people. And to Gutfeld’s point, a recent infographic released comparing the two movement found less than 50 tea partiers were arrested over the last three years, contrasted with over 1500 OWS protestors in just thirty days.

Colmes argued the more important point was one of civil disobedience, and pointed out that “every civil liberties person in the world has been arrested.” Gutfeld brought up the several instances of protestors accused of rape, and Levy took the opportunity to explain to Colmes why the less respectable members of Occupy Wall Street need to be acknowledged and reported on.

“Obviously they’re not all rapists, and they’re not whatever, but it’s getting to be a large enough sample that you’ve got to start wondering about what’s going on there. And I’m not, it’s not, it’s obviously not the whole movement, it’s not even close to the whole movement.”

Colmes interjected to suggest they weren’t even part of the movement, but Levy completely dismissed that notion.

“You can’t say that. That’s the easy way out, when you say, ‘Oh, they’re not part of the movement.’ Guess what? You’re the 99 percent. They are part of the fucking movement.”

Watch the whole segment below, courtesy of Fox News:

At issue are reports of violence, sexual assaults, arrests, and attention-getting moments of silence at OWS protests, which Gallagher says prove that “these occupy wall street dregs are a bunch of anarchists, they’re lawless thugs, and it’s been nice to see the entire country turn against them.”

While he’s right that the movement has waned in popularity, Colmes points out that this is more a function of the media’s “if it bleeds, it leads” fixation on conflict. “The media, of course, wants to focus on the small group of people that are causing disruption,” Colmes says, “but I think it’s also important to urge them to peacefully demonstrate, to take the lead of what Gandhi and Martin Luther King talked about, the whole list of things you can do not to lose sight of the larger message, which I think is a good one.”

Gallagher predicted that the Democrats would pay a price for their support of Occupy Wall Street. “Democrats have stepped in it in a big way,” he said, “and the big picture you raised, Megyn, is to wonder about the support, the unfettered support that Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and all the rest of them, I haven’t heard a single democrat denounce these lawless thugs.”

His characterization is an oversell (everyone from President Obama to Mitt Romney has expressed some sort of sympathy for the movement’s underlying frustrations, hardly “unfettered support”), but he’s right that Democrats are more closely associated with the Occupy movement than Republicans, and if the movement becomes identified with the peripheral violence, Democrats could pay a price. However, there’s no indication that public support for proposals like those contained in the President’s American Jobs Act has been affected at all.

Things really got heated, though, when Colmes suggested that the Occupy and Tea Party movements “have a lot in common,” eliciting a comical, “How DARE you!” from Gallagher.

“You are utterly disingenuous,” Gallagher said, prompting an objection from Colmes over the personal attack. “Zip it for a moment,” Gallagher shouted, “and let me respond to your scurrilous comparison to the Tea Party movement, a bunch of patriots who love the Constitution, who aren’t breaking the law. Are you kidding me, Alan?”

Much has been made over the difference in the way the media covered the Tea Party and the Occupy protests, and while there are some fair gripes to be made, the assumption that it’s ideological is, in my opinion, a mistake. It’s true that the media was quick to publicize the flaws and the misbehavior of some in the Tea Party movement, and that coverage of the Occupy movement has been, in many ways, more favorable.

What critics like Gallagher ignore, though, is the fact that the Occupy movement gained momentum with the press, and sympathy from the public, based on early images of police attacking non-violent protesters, a pattern that has continued. There’s no way to know how the media would have covered Tea Partiers clashing with police, but it’s a safe bet that pepper-spraying a little old lady makes the news, either way. To reverse the equation, how would the media react if Occupiers were bringing firearms to protests, as some Tea Partiers did?

Here’s the clip of Colmes’ and Gallagher’s battle, from America Live:

After openly questioning why Romney hasn’t made more of an effort in including an energized side of potential GOP voters sympathetic with the Tea Party movement, Carlson boldly stated what he felt to be an under-told story in the evolution of conservative politics, saying of the Tea Party:

Well I think the explanation is a little broader. Leaderless movements don’t endure because they can’t. This is basically a leaderless movement. But I think it’s had a huge effect, and its biggest effect that almost no one ever mentions is that the Tea Party destroyed the Republican establishment. All the people Republicans and conservatives have looked to for guidance have been basically discredited by the Tea Party, which has alllowed this current chaos to flower. That may be a good thing, it might be a bad thing. I don’t even know. But that is the legacy of the Tea Party. No more Washington establishment on the right.

One of the leitmotifs of the 2010 midterm election was what we called the GOP Civil War, and was perhaps best evidenced by the ongoing rhetorical battle between GOP operative Karl Rove and Tea Party Senatorial candidate Christine O’Donnell. Carlson makes the astute point that business as usual inside the D.C. beltway is a thing of the past, which is evidence of a Tea Party victory in the battle for the soul of the conservative movement.

Given that Carlson has a lengthy resume of defending the GOP and conservative movement, it’s not difficult to imagine that when he says that he isn’t sure if this is a “good thing or bad thing,” he really is shooting a cannonball across the bow of the USS Tea Party, especially when Tea Party endorsed candidates like Herman Cain (and Sharron Angle of last fall) brought embarrassment to some in the GOP ranks. Perhaps the Tea Party has won the GOP battle, but some might suggest that they will lose the eventual war against their Democratic foes.

Watch the clip below, courtesy of Fox News:

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“Do you want children to have drinking water that’s polluted?” Colmes fired back at the conservative radio host.

“It’s offending these greenies! These kooks who are very important to the Obama re-election chances,” Gallagher exclaimed. “So this is a brilliant timing on his part. Let’s wait until after the election, we’ll deal with all of this later, but in the meantime, as Megyn points out, 20,000 jobs may be sacrificed in the name of political expediency.”

“The fact is that everything the president does by his detractors will be looked upon as some kind of political maneuver ,” Colmes observed. “You have to consider the fact that this would harm the environment and they’re now talking about re-routeing it, finding another place to go, another pipeline to use, and this may be just delayed, not permanently canceled.”

The Obama Administration earlier explained the delay reasoning that “this permit decision could affect the health and safety of the American people as well as the environment, and because a number of concerns have been raised through a public process we should take the time to ensure that all questions are properly addressed and all the potential impacts are properly understood.”

It will be interesting to see if Gallagher’s snarky trashing of environmentalists will become the standard bearer of pro-pollution talking points on the cable news shows.

Watch the two radio hosts battle it out over the Keystone XL pipeline below via Fox News:

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Discussing who could potentially benefit from Cain falling in the polls, the panel turned to Rick Perry, but O’Reilly saw something lacking in his support as the campaign went on. To contrast, he argued that “the two candidates that have the most emotional support are Ron Paul and Herman Cain,” and gave as an example the response on a radio poll to Rep. Paul yesterday that he saw: “Ron Paul’s support is almost a cult– we did this presidential forum last night on the radio– they were like bees.”

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Colmes agreed, adding that Rep. Paul was a “great candidate to have in the debates because he has so much to say that isn’t said by other Republicans,” a point on which O’Reilly also agreed, praising Rep. Paul for bringing “pizzazz” to the debates. Compare that to Perry or Mitt Romney, argued O’Reilly, and it difficult to find similar passion.

Crowley agreed, but didn’t think emotion was so much of a factor when people go to the primary polls this year as it has been in the past. The question voters will ask themselves, she proposed, was, “Which one of these people can stand up to Barack Obama in a debate and in the general election one year from today?” If that is the question, Colmes concluded, Republicans “may have to go for a technocrat like Romney.”

The segment via Fox News below:

President Obama and President Sarkozy were overheard discussing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Here’s the exchange that’s getting all the attention:

The conversation apparently began with President Obama criticizing Sarkozy for not having warned him that France would be voting in favor of the Palestinian membership bid in UNESCO despite Washington’s strong objection to the move.

The conversation then drifted to Netanyahu, at which time Sarkozy declared: “I cannot stand him. He is a liar.” According to the report, Obama replied: “You’re fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!”

There’s no doubt that remarks intended to be private were broadcast to French journalists via translation headsets. The Associated Press confirmed this, and explained why they didn’t report on the incident:

Several French-speaking journalists, including one from The Associated Press, overheard the comments but did not initially report them because Sarkozy’s office had asked the journalists not to turn on the headsets until the press conference began, and the comments were deemed private under French media traditions.

What’s not so clear, from available reporting, is who transcribed these two quotes, how they were transcribed, and when. The original report suggests that the active headsets took the French journalists by surprise, and that they ”did not have a chance to take advantage of this fluke.”

All of this goes to the reliability of the specific quotes reported, especially the one attributed to President Obama. Slight quirks in translation, inflection, and context can dramatically alter the meaning of what he is alleged to have said. The fact that these quotes could very well have been transcribed later, from memory, out of context, and through two different translators, is significant in allowing the reader to judge their accuracy.

That’s not to say that, once the report was made, that they shouldn’t have been reported, but they should have been reported in a much more critical fashion, rather than as the opening volley in a playground fight between world leaders.

Fox’s Jon Scott touched on this idea as he moderated a discussion of the story between Newsmax’s Judith Miller and Fox News’ Alan Colmes.

Colmes pointed out the underreported fact that President Obama was standing up for Israel in his discussion with Sarkozy. “The context of this conversation was how can we get the Palestinians to not go to the U.N. to ask for state recognition,” Colmes pointed out. “This is actually favoring Israel.”

But it was Scott who cut to the heart of the matter when he asked Miller, “We do hear, judy, that there were only fragments of the conversation reported, are we jumping to conclusions here?”

That’s a question that should have been embedded in all of the reporting of this incident.

He is, of course, correct. All of the available reporting on this suggests that these were fragments of a conversation, leaked to unsuspecting journalists who weren’t prepared for it, through two different translators. For all we know, President Obama did say “You’re fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day,” and went on to say, “so don’t f**king talk about him like that, Nicky!”

Here’s the clip, from Fox News:

There has also been little, if any, attention paid to the murky ethical questions about reporting these remarks. While it doesn’t meet the legal definition of eavesdropping, reporting on these remarks definitely falls outside the code of conduct expected of beat journalists. In the US, there are explicit rules against reporting on overheard conversations, even in areas where there’s no expectation of privacy.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney addressed the controversy earlier today, during a gaggle aboard Air Force One. Here’s a transcript of that exchange:(via email from The White House)

Q Jay, there’s a report out of Paris that Sarkozy told the President that he couldn’t stand Netanyahu. Do you think this kind of bad relations may have any impact on the peace process?

MR. CARNEY: Well, I don’t have any comment on the reported conversation that took place apparently in a bilateral. But, again, I don’t have any comment on the conversation specifically. I mean, stepping back, I will say that it’s well known that the President and that the U.S. and France did not agree on the UNESCO vote regarding the Palestinians and that we — the President’s position, very firm position, has been that efforts to achieve U.N. membership or membership in U.N. agencies by the Palestinians were premature and counterproductive to the ultimate goal here, which is a negotiated peace between the two parties.

Q Do you think, though, this reflects a growing frustration with world leaders with Netanyahu?

MR. CARNEY: I don’t have any comment on the specific conversation.

Q The President said, “You’re fed up with him; I have to deal with him every day.” So clearly there’s something that the President said, there’s dislike there. What are we supposed to take away from that message?

MR. CARNEY: Well, again, I don’t have any comment on the specific conversation. What I can say more broadly is that this President’s position has been quite clear on the issue of efforts by the Palestinians to achieve through the United Nations what can only be achieved effectively through direct negotiations. And the President believes very firmly that both sides, the Israelis and the Palestinians, need to take those steps that bring them closer together to direct negotiations and not ones that make it harder to have that happen.

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The conversation began with a look at the number of articles published about Cain’s sexual harassment scandal compared to those of Bill Clinton and other politicians. Miller noted that she did see that the Cain campaign was partly to blame, as “there are rules to how this is handled and the cover up is always or usually worse than the crime.” Colmes agreed, and defended Politico, as “all [they] did was report something that actually happened,” and then Cain “bungled the whole thing.” Andrea Tantaros agreed, but added that the reason the Clinton stories didn’t get the same volume of coverage was that “they said it was a private matter, and the media obliged.” She also added that she was extremely skeptical of the Cain charges, as “there are no details yet, and I believe that if Politico had the details, and they would’ve been salacious, they would’ve used them.”

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Host Jon Scott then turned to Coulter’s comments over the week, beginning with suggestion that the media would not have covered the Cain story if he were white. “That’s just not true!” Miller exclaimed, “Look at John Edwards! It’s because of all who have come before him that sexual harassment is now an issue that is on the table.” Colmes wasn’t equally surprised, but did joke about the comment, “I didn’t know we owned blacks!” Miller laughed at the outrageous comment and adamantly declared that the investigation was not a “high-tech lynching,” as Coulter and others had claimed, and that it was “splitting the conservatives down the middle,” between those that refused to support any investigation and those who did not want to opine on the matter until all the facts were out in the open.

The segment via Fox News below:

Here’s the clip from Bachmann’s speech: (via CNN)

Granted, “extremist group” and “bad guys” aren’t quite as PG-13 as Hoffa’s “sonofabitches” description, but the sentiments are at least equal, and the fulcrum of right-wing outrage has been the “taking out” part. However, in both cases, and in the case of Hoffa’s remarks on Morning Joe two weeks ago, these remarks were all made within the clear context of electoral action.

This effort to set up a “Hoffa standard” ignores the fact that not all crazytalk is created equal. Phrases like “take them out,” or metaphors like a “war on workers,” have clear meanings in the context of electoral politics. On the other hand, phrases like “Second Amendment remedies, or suggestions that a non-elected official is “treasonous” and would be “treated pretty ugly,” don’t have such obvious metaphorical connections. Judging them all by some “Hoffa Standard” apple-orange marmalade is foolish.

Be that as it may, if people want to take this “Hoffa Standard” as a license to initiate explosive crazytalk diarrhea, so much the better. The less inhibited our political dialog is, the truer the picture we get is. Voters can decide for themselves if Jimmy Hoffa is correct when he says there’s a “war on workers,” or if taxes are really as bad as slavery.

Here’s the full video of Bachmann’s Tax Day Tea Party 2010 speech:

Colmes began to respond to the comment with the above disclaimer, though adding that there was plenty of language on the right to justify the type of distrust it represented, citing in particular a public official calling President Obama a “tar baby” on a radio program– an example O’Reilly appeared unacquainted with. Nonetheless, O’Reilly argued that “you’ve had racist rhetoric in the United States since Columbus discovered America,” returning to the original question: “What good does this do to have a sitting Congressman say the Tea Party wants to see us hanging from a tree?”

Bruce countered that it is “indicative of the chaos and panic in Congress,” and of polls showing that Democrats’ approval ratings are falling, and argued that it demonstrated an attitude that went all the way up to the White House. “I’m not going to blame the administration for Andre Carson,” O’Reilly replied, arguing that he does not “set the tone for anybody.” That said, he was still grasping to see any justification for his language, which Colmes did not attempt to give, but only tried to contextualize the comment. “I’m a white guy, I’m not in that mindset,” he noted, but explained: “if you’re an African American and you hear this incoming from a group of people who are basically white, basically older, and there are a number of studies that have shown they are not particularly sympathetic to black people…”

Bruce then interrupted to add that the idea that Carson was suggesting “that this is what people in the black community want to hear right now when they don’t know how they’re going to pay the rent next month” was insulting, as “poverty and unemployment does not discriminate,” a point Colmes agreed with, but replied that it could coexist with his point. He didn’t seem to sway the panel too much on that front.

The segment via Fox News below:

Colmes assessment of Buchanan’s comment:

“It’s kind of soft racism, I’m not sure it’s overt. I don’t think Buchanan meant it, but look at the history of things this guy has said, what is the matter with him? . . . You wouldn’t say that about a white guy would you?”

Imus admits that now he calls everyone “dude,” since he “used to say ‘boy’ all the time, but not about black people, just about everybody.” Colmes continued, “but if you’re Pat Buchanan and if you’ve got that kind of history, it’s part of a narrative, so you know it’s not the first time he would have made a comment that had that tinge to it.”

While Imus and Colmes agreed Buchanan’s comment wasn’t too smart, they disagreed on Cavuto’s political leanings. Imus said he can never sense Cavuto’s politics, but Colmes informed him that even though he really likes Cavuto, he thinks “he’s very right-wing.”

Watch the clip from Fox Business below:

Unsurprisingly, they found very little common ground.

This weekend, it was discovered that Spencer’s anti-Jihad (some, not Spencer, would say “anti-Muslim”) writing was cited 64 times in the manifesto of the terrorist Anders Behring Breivik. Because of this, he quickly received a large amount of unwanted attention, being mentioned on NBC Nightly News and featured heavily in a New York Times article entitled “Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S.” Spencer has decried this “blame game” as a “leftist fantasy.”

In this writer’s opinion, Breivik was crazy and you can’t blame any one person for crazy being, well, crazy. I may find much of Spencer’s writings reprehensible and he may have contributed to an anti-Muslim culture that Breivik dwelled in, but he’s no more guilty for this crime than a heavy metal band is for Columbine.

That being said, Colmes got some good points in when he pointed out the difference between the way people like Spencer categorize Breivik to the way they do Islamic terrorists. Why are the latter endemic of a massive Islamic cultural problem whereas Spencer is so quick to describe Breivik as a lone gunman. Hypocrisy is just as dangerous as irrational blaming.

It’s a fascinating (and heated) conversation. Watch the clip from Fox News below:

Here at Mediaite, we believe we have a responsibility of passing down our colorful history to the next generation. We do it for the children. So as we approach the second anniversary of our founding, we will be regularly taking a look back at the moments that made us laugh, cry, and throw things at our television set– but probably just made us roll our eyes at the time. Herein is the seventh installment of Mediaite Historical Society Presents:

Tim Pawlenty as 2011 has come to know him is a pretty even-tempered guy: that is to say, about as milquetoast as they come. But he has shown a sense of humor, drawling out Tiger Woods jokes and enthusiastically (well, enthusiastically for Tim Pawlenty) gushing about Lady Gaga‘s oeuvre. Perhaps the national spotlight has kept his sense of humor in check, or the heightened sensory ability of the 24/7, Twitter-driven news cycle to catch off-color jokes has warded him off them, because he was delivering punchline after awkward punchline to Hannity & Colmes in 2008.

In November 2008, Pawlenty appeared on the program to discuss allegations of voter fraud in his home state of Minnesota. After a serious discussion with host Sean Hannity, he appeared not to be able to help himself when addressed by Alan Colmes. Apropos of nothing, really, Pawlenty thanks him for inviting him to the program and adds, “by the way, when you see your wife, tell her that I said thank you for staying with you.”

The deadpan with which it was delivered seem to catch Colmes by surprised, as he responded, “I’m not quite sure what that means; maybe you’re just trying to get her vote in 2012.” Meanwhile, Hannity is having a ball off-camera, declaring it “the line of the year.” That gives Colmes enough time to quip back, “Believe me, I’ll thank her a lot more than you will.”

Unfortunately, at some point this conversation has to veer into an actual political topic, but that doesn’t stop Pawlenty from delivering one last cringeworthy joke– calling the host of the program he was invited to “Sherlock Colmes.”

The segment via Fox News below:

Jim Pinkerton assessed the situation and said the people who hacked the phones for Murdoch’s British newspapers shouldn’t be called journalists. Pinkerton also concluded, “in the annals of damage control [Murdoch's response] is pretty good,” given that the News Of The World was shut down, executives have left the company and Murdoch will testify in front of the British government.

Yet Colmes and Cal Thomas sparred about whether or not the “liberal media” was making a larger case out of the scandal than it should be. Thomas argued the coverage has been “the biggest case of piling on [because] the Left has been out to get News Corp., especially Fox News Channel and the Murdoch family for years.” Colmes reminded Thomas that even Republican Congressman Peter King is calling for an investigation of News Corp. in America.

And Colmes replied “there has to be personal responsibility and stop blaming the Left and the liberal media like it’s the liberal’s fault that this happened.” Thomas insisted that commentators like MSNBC’s Martin Bashir have been so over the top, while others seem to be covering the story with glee. Yet Colmes preferred to listen to that “famous” political analyst Hugh Grant who voiced his appreciation for the fact that British politicians are no longer competing to suck up to Murdoch. Although host Jon Scott delicately reminded Colmes that Grant is no “paragon of morality” given his own checkered past.

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

Here at Mediaite, we believe we have a responsibility of passing down our colorful history to the next generation. We do it for the children. So as we approach the second anniversary of our founding, we will be regularly taking a look back at the moments that made us laugh, cry, and throw things at our television set– but probably just made us roll our eyes at the time. Herein is the sixth installment of Mediaite Historical Society Presents:

In December 2008, cable news’ premier debate couple, Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes, split up, one to host his own program and the other to contribute to the debates of many on Fox News. At the time, it was unclear to what extent Colmes would remain with Fox News or what a program without Colmes to balance out Hannity’s conservatism would look like. When discussing the run of Hannity & Colmes, many tend to look back at the heartfelt goodbyes (featuring a fairly nationally unknown Tim Pawlenty!) Colmes’ fans gave him, but seem to overlook the fun Colmes had with the departure in the immediate aftermath.

Five months later, on April 1st, viewers of Hannity tuned in to their program expecting an unadulterated stream of conservative talk, but what they got instead was a blood-red, dyed-in-the-wool communist news show entitled Colmes. With a Soviet anthem blaring in the background, an announcer boomed, “From Red Square to the shores of Havana, from San Francisco all the way to Berkeley, and from the West Village to the Upper West Side, Colmes is on!” Yes, really.

The news stories are fairly predictable– Why do Republicans hate baby seals?– and the guests on the anti-American panel perhaps even moreso: Bill Ayers, Sean Penn, and “Anybody from France” (Illustrated as Pepé Le Pew). And yet somehow, as an April Fool’s joke, it’s perfect. We’re sad to report that the entire show was not done in this fashion, as much as we would have loved to watch Sean Penn debate Pepé Le Pew.

The retro segment via Fox News below:

Colmes also said, “I wish Chris Wallace had not apologized for what was not even a serious question.” Wallace’s apology was unnecessary according to Colmes since “flake” is not a sexist term and since Bachmann does in fact frequently make questionable statements. “Even this morning she got it wrong on another show, saying John Quincy Adams was a Founding Father, she cannot get anything right,” Colmes concluded.

And like another morning show contrasting Sarah Palin and Bachmann, Colmes made his own comparison: Bachmann is “actually a nicer person than Sarah Palin.” Regardless though, Colmes claims the whole Bachmann show is “fun to watch, get the popcorn, but she has no chance whatsoever.” Although as also noted earlier, might underestimating Bachmann be something those in the media later regret?

Watch the clip from Fox Business below:

Colmes refuted the idea that the media actively supports Obama, and instead shifted the argument to not understanding why anyone continues to advocate we stay fighting in Afghanistan when the people responsible for 9/11 are long gone. Yet Thomas wanted to return to criticizing the media:

“You know what the press is really reluctant to do and I think they’re going to have to do it at some point. . . . They were cheerleaders leading up to 2008 election. This was the guy who was going to part the waters, he was going to smooth out the crooked places, do all these things, cure tooth decay and now they’re realizing he’s mortal just like every other President. When are they going to come to their senses and say ‘we were wrong about this guy?’”

With seconds left before the final buzzer for this round, a frustrated Colmes very humorously and sarcastically responded:

“Whenever a liberal gets elected, and he’s not even that liberal, it’s ‘the media that did it.’ But whenever a conservative gets elected, it’s ‘the people have spoken!’”

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

Conservative columnist Cal Thomas explains his theory for Bachmann’s positive press:

“The Left likes to build up people in order to tear them down. One of my favorite lines on this was that ‘she exceeded expectations.’ Well, who set the expectations? The media did. . . . Chris Matthews praises her, which is sort of like getting a civil rights affirmation from David Duke.”

Liberal commentator Alan Colmes thought attacking the “liberal media” for this was tired, and others on the panel suggested that Bachmann just now demonstrated that she is ready for primetime and a truly serious candidate. And just to prove to Thomas that the left wasn’t actually trying to build Bachmann up, Colmes did his part to suggest that unlike Matthews, he doesn’t think Bachmann or any of the GOP candidates are impressive at all:

“There’s nothing they offer that would give us a reason to vote Republican. To do anything to move the country forward. Other than these broad generalities.”

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

The email that gave Breitbart hope in Colmes’ potential came after Breitbart attempted to crash the progressive conference Netroots Nation and was rejected for not being a member of the media. Colmes sent Breitbart an email commending him for his work and condemning the response he received, adding, “assholes like that give liberals a bad name.” Breitbart then told the audience the world was theirs if they could “convert one Alan Colmes at a time.”

In response today, Colmes collected his favorite angry comments on the possibility of him joining the right from Gateway Pundit, adding, “with such a warm welcome to the right, how could I resist?”:

* What a waste of breathe.
* How? A brain transplant? I always thought you needed a trade-in for one of those.
* Don’t get too hopeful, Andrew. Pharmaceuticals may help, but Colmes is likely suffering from a rather severe form of liberal mental and spiritual disorder.
* You cannot convert sheer evil and Alan Colmes is sheer evil.
* there is no cure for stupidity…
* Which sex has Breitbart chosen for Alan? And good luck.
* The ONLY way to convert a radical socialist is with a bullet between the eyes. 100% efferctive.
* Human waste can be converted to fertilizer or energy. Has Breitbart chosen which of those he prefers for Colmes?
* Good luck. I have written numerous letters to Fox News trying to get Colmes off Fox News Watch because the man destroys a discussion…
* Alan Colmes is a moron – you’d have to give him a brain transplant before you could even start on giving him a logical thought, and even then the ‘stupid’ residue left over in his body would probably pollute his new brain.
* …Allen is a (white man) and as good as he is at sucking up to the kenyan fraud his head would be one of the first to be cut off! That is the only thing that will shut of that scum bag up!
* Wow! I was going to leave a comment but so far you commentors have said everything I can think of! Keep them coming folks these are great!

Say what you will about Colmes, but the man has good taste in terrible comments. That said, looks like Breitbart is going to have to work a little harder on this one.

Breitbart’s speech (via Colmes) below:

Colmes elaborated:

“Unless we find out that he broke the law . . . that’s a different story. . . . I think it’s a shame that a personal situation like this should result in him having to leave his job. . . . I’m not condoning his behavior . . . this has nothing to do with whether or not he’s a good congressman. I want someone in office, not to be my moral guide, but I want someone who is going to vote the way I want them to vote.”

Hemmer was shocked that Colmes thought Weiner’s behavior was not a huge offense, and Hayes doubted Colmes would be singing the same tune if this scandal involved a Republican. Colmes forcefully declared it wouldn’t matter what Weiner’s political affiliation was and yelled “call me a liar,” if they didn’t believe he would say the same thing about a Republican. The fiery and enjoyable discussion demonstrated that the Weiner story stirs up passionate responses in everyone, as even Hemmer found it hard to let Colmes’ statements go completely unchallenged.

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

While the consensus among the panel was that the apology was sincere (National Review‘s Rich Lowry joked “he could’ve dumped ashes on his head”), it was the executive decision of keeping him that struck a chord. Judith Miller argued, quoting colleague Andrea Tantaros, that “the last acceptable form of prejudice was trashing conservative women,” and the suspension proved it.” Fellow panelist Jim Pinkerton added that “if this were a conservative, he would’ve been fired,” and the suspension presented a double standard.

Here, Colmes jumped in to note that Limbaugh makes “outrageous statements, racially tinged statements all the time.” “He can’t fire himself,” Pinkerton replied, though Colmes retorted that Limbaugh is still hired and given speaking fees by others in the industry. Among other cases of incivility, Colmes also cited right-wing rock person Ted Nugent‘s command to President Obama to “put his gun in his mouth and suck on it,” to which again Pinkerton replied, this time calming Colmes down by assuring him “Nugent will never have a show on Fox.”

The discussion via Fox News below:

Many liberals, myself included, probably dismissed Sarah Palin’s suggestion to “Show photo as warning to others seeking America’s destruction. No pussy-footing around, no politicking, no drama;it’s part of the mission” as so much political posturing, and initially, I also dismissed the notion that such photos could possibly act as a deterrent to people who are, by definition, willing to blow themselves up for a shot at martyrdom and heavenly reward.

Palin may, indeed, have been grandstanding, but upon further reflection, I do see some merit in the deterrence argument, at least as far as the recruitment of noobs like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, whose visions of virgins in the afterlife might dissolve into reality if presented with the no-frills physical consequences of the act. It’s similar to those programs that attempt to combat the glamor of alcohol abuse with a trip to the morgue.

For an existing terrorist, though, such photos would act as nothing so much as martyrdom catnip, but that’s just a twig into a bonfire. But aside from deterrence, the photos would likely demoralize more than a few members, and prospective members, of al Qaeda.

Wednesday night, Jon Stewart made the satirical point that the graphic nature of these photos pales in comparison to the steady diet of guts-cam shots that make up some of the most popular American television entertainment. He also pointed out the steady diet of gruesome news footage from US military action that the Muslim world is already exposed to.

In a similar, but more focused, vein, liberal Fox News fixture Alan Colmes points out that most of these horses have already left the barn. The photos of the raid’s aftermath, released by Reuters, feature several gruesome shots of dead al Qaeda combatants, the “propaganda” value of which would seem to rival the bin Laden photos, but with none of the demoralizing effect. Says Colmes:

Reuters has obtained gruesome photos of three men shot dead at the bin Laden compound. I am not posting them so readers of this site can make the choice to see them; they are at this link. The photo on this page depicts the wreckage of the U.S. helicopter and was taken hours after the raid.

If these pictures can be released, there is no reason not to release the bin Laden photos as well.

I also addressed the issue of the photos in an unrelated post Wednesday night. As you can see, my position on Palin’s argument has evolved somewhat, but there are reasons more important than all of these to oppose concealing the bin Laden photos:

For what it’s worth, and I hate like hell to even kind of agree with Sarah Palin on this, I think the photos should be released. Not because of any “pussy-footing” taunts or chest-thumping “deterrent” (although there is a case to be made that such a physical symbol of defeat could actually save lives by demoralizing the enemy), but because the reasons to do so outweigh, in importance, the reasons being given not to.

This is America, a free country with a free press, and whatever was gained by bin Laden’s killing was paid for by all of us. I agree that we ought not display it as a trophy, but those of us who feel the need to see it, to close the wound a little more, perhaps, or even for a flash of well-earned, wicked glee, or for reasons held too closely to convey, we ought to be free to do so. To deny us that, essentially to avoid pissing off some terrorists, is to grant the villain victory from beyond the grave.

There are perfectly defensible arguments in favor of not releasing the photos, and I respect the opinions of those who make such arguments, but I find the “propaganda value” argument hopelessly self-defeating. What sense does it make to combat “propaganda” by concealing the truth? And if the object of terrorism is to change our behavior out of fear of violence, what sense does it make to conceal these photos…out of a fear of terrorist violence?

It is true that we ought not needlessly inflame others, but the right of a free country, and a free people, to information of vital interest to them is not a needless incitement. In my view, concealing these photos is a subversion of the very freedoms that this terrorist struck at nearly ten years ago.

Colmes summed up his frustration with all the attacks made on Obama:

“The whole idea that he wasn’t born here, he’s African, he was a Muslim. All of that, the underpinnings of that are racist. The underpinnings of that are the fact that he’s not one of us, he doesn’t have the American experience, he’s not like all of our white Presidents.”

Others on the panel disputed that such questions had anything to do with race, since President Bush similarly experienced demands for his SAT scores and his military record, and nobody seemed to be complaining then. Yet Colmes was convinced the questions being asked of Obama were unfair, and didn’t see any evidence to support Miller’s theory.

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

Monica Crowley joined other conservative criticism of the pastor and Obama, but Crowley took it a step further, labeling Obama’s behavior to be “un-American.” Colmes responded that such a statement was “reprehensible.” O’Reilly didn’t want to go as far as Crowley though, and suggested this was just evidence of Obama displaying bad judgment:

“Barack Obama . . . is the poster guy for being able to succeed in a race-neutral society. If a half white, half black boy from a broken home can become President, that speaks well of America. . . . Then he goes and he sits in churches in front of people who run the country down.”

As voices grew louder by the end, Colmes bemoaned “guilt by association” attacks and concluded no conservatives are ever happy with Obama, since either he is attacked for not going to church often enough or now is attacked for going to the wrong church. Yet O’Reilly reiterated he just expects better judgment from Obama, especially given his controversial past with pastors.

Watch the clip from Fox News below:

Host Jon Scott began the segment with a quote from Chris Matthews, claiming that the current GOP contenders “sound more like a dog pound than it does a group of people running for President.” Most of the table agreed that such treatment of the possible candidates was prevalent and unacceptable, with Jim Pinkerton citing our own Alex Alvarez‘s work pointing out MSNBC host’s Cenk Uygur‘s physical insults at Rep. Michele Bachmann. While everyone at the table condemned that behavior, Alan Colmes made a point to remind the panel that, on the right, Rush Limbaugh speaks offensively about the First Lady as well, and has called Obama voters “vile savages and human refuse.”

The panel met that with some contention, claiming that they too condemned such rhetoric on the right. Panelist Andrea Tantaros argued that the personal attacks were “the last acceptable form of prejudice,” harping in particular on Matthews: “I didn’t know that Chris Matthews was being drafted for the Chippendale’s.”

As for Donald Trump, whose campaign host Scott described as “making noises,” Judith Miller described his rise as a testament to “the flatness of the Republican earth around him,” to which most of the panel agreed, but not without noting that the media had perhaps taken the ridicule too far. Here again, Colmes dissented. “Donald Trump was on every Fox show,” he noted, arguing that “it’s not just the liberal media.

The segment via Fox News below:

On Alan Colmes’ radio show Thursday night, Trump talked about his still-tentative presidential bid, and when Colmes asked him if he was “leaning yes” on a run for president, Trump replied that using the word leaning would be “inappropriate.” Questioning the President’s birthplace, however, is a-ok with Trump, but he grew frustrated with Colmes’ line of questioning, perhaps the first time Trump has wanted to change the subject away from Obama’s birth certificate: