Surprise Surprise

I'm going to do something I've never done before: compliment Alan Colmes.

This report comes courtesy of News Hounds ("We watch FOX so you don't have to"):

Hannity will do anything to make Howard Dean look bad and since people aren't buying the far left and unstable tag anymore,Hannity is forced to create material for his nightly Dean smears. Tonight there were two segments devoted to destroying Dean and both were ridiculous. 2/16/05

The first attack concerned a comment Dean made while speaking to the Congressional Black Caucus. Hannity and Michael Steel claimed that Dean's comment was racially insensitive despite the fact that Dean recieved a standing ovation at the end of his speech.

Tony Coelho refused to fall into Hannity's trap and started talking about the budget cuts that would radically affect the Black community. Hannity immediatly interjected, "I don't have a lot of time here." Colmes cornered Steele with a direct question, "Are you calling Dean a racist?" Steele backed down.The big scandal quickly turned into a meaningless non issue and it was finished.

The recent attacks on Dean are pretty much standard operating procedure for the Republican party. The attacks are by implication than by direct assertion. A Republican hate group doesn't say Dean sympathizes with suicide bombers. But they place a quote from him above a picture of men with bombs strapped to their chest. The head of the NY state Republican party doesn't say that Dean is in league with terrorists, but he lists Dean with a lawyer who was recently convicted of aiding her terrorist client. And Hannity and Steel don't directly call Dean a racist, but they feign outrage over a joke Dean made about black Republicans.

Alan Colmes, to his credit, goes right to the heart of the matter by asking Steel to make his accusation direct instead of just implying it. Steel, of course, can't comply, so he has to back down.

Good job Mr. Colmes! Have a biscuit.