As Karoli posted a bit earlier, Paul Ryan looked not so vice presidential yesterday when he ended an interview with a local reporter in Michigan after being asked if tax cuts would help prevent gun crime. Although Fox is forever complaining about the media favoring Obama, I half expected the curvy couch crew to break out the pompoms for Ryan.
As Steve Doocey introduced the segment, Fox & Friends producers got right to the point with a chyron saying, “TWISTING HIS WORDS: reporter crosses the line with Ryan.”
The reporter “apparently had some gotcha questions in mind,” Doocey explained - before running the clip. Just in case anyone hadn’t yet gotten it that the reporter was the villain in this story.
For some further Ryan insurance, Gretchen Carlson and Brian Kilmeade made a point of noting that the interview occurred in an important swing state. Fox News liberal-media haters all over knew what that signified: this bit of media malpractice was probably another deliberate attempt to re-elect President Obama.
“Good for Paul Ryan, sticking it to the press,” Doocey said. “The guy obviously had something in mind… It’s exactly the same thing that Newt Gingrich did during the primary debates and was very effective at it.”
Yes, so effective that Mitt Romney is the presidential nominee, not Gingrich. Gingrich isn't even the VP nominee.
Of course, Fox’s idea of gotcha questions seems to depend a lot on who’s doing the asking and who’s getting asked. They were delighted when Univision asked President Obama very tough questions recently. And I don’t recall anyone objecting when Bret Baier used the guise of “viewer email” to ask President Obama very inflammatory questions during his 2010 interview on Fox:
We asked our viewers to e-mail in suggested questions. More than 18,000 people took time to e-mail us questions. These are regular people from all over the country. Lee Johnson, from Spring Valley, California: "If the bill is so good for all of us, why all the intimidation, arm twisting, seedy deals, and parliamentary trickery necessary to pass a bill, when you have an overwhelming majority in both houses and the presidency?"
Sandy Moody in Chesterfield, Missouri: "If the health care bill is so wonderful, why do you have to bribe Congress to pass it?"
Some might call those "gotcha" questions. But Fox didn't.
