Last week, Fox News pundits mostly gushed over Ann Romney’s speech to the Republican National Convention. But last night, Michelle Obama really wowed the crowd at the Democratic convention. And the Fox News pundits immediately set to finding fault. 

Bret Baier said, “It was a speech that was highly personal, laced with… those humble-beginning stories. She did say a number of times that ‘Change is hard,’ a message that will try to attract some of the challenges that this president has facing this economy. I will say one line - I could almost see the Republicans raising eyebrows up in Washington. And that was this line: ‘For Barack, there was no such thing as us and them. He doesn’t care whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican or none of the above.’ I think that the Republican reaction to that might be different than what we saw in this hall. Judging by what happened up on Capitol Hill the last number of years.”

Chris Wallace said, “I thought it was an OK speech but as you heard her delivery, it was just masterful. And she was reading from a Teleprompter. But you couldn’t tell. It seemed to come totally from her heart and very much seemed to affect the crowd.” He acknowledged Michelle Obama had served as “a very powerful” character witness for her husband. But then he added, “I’ve got to say, listening closely to the speech, one of the things that struck me was it was all about government. When she talked at the beginning about the people who exemplified the best of the American spirit, she talked about teachers and first responders and the military. All very admirable professions. But all government. When she talked about ways to build the middle class, it was all about the auto bailout and student loans and health care reform. Once again, all government programs. And that was a subtle subtext to the entire speech.” 

Wallace continued, “The other thing that I noticed and you talked about the about that ‘we’re all one America’ - and certainly that hasn’t been the way this president has run the campaign which has been quite sharp, quite partisan, quite negative.” 

Martha MacCallum noted the “very positive” and “very enthusiastic” response from the crowd. But she soon made a point of reminding us how terrific - even maybe a bit more terrific Ann Romney was: “When I think back to the Republican convention and we think about Ann Romney’s speech, it really was about personal strength, embracing success, individual merit, the importance of individual merit in the United States.” 

Brit Hume called Michelle Obama “an extremely impressive and attractive woman.” But he, too, took a swipe at her under cover of praise. “She in delivering it was better than the speech.” He went on to complain that there’s a “destitution derby” going on, meaning that the speakers were supposedly trying to outdo each other with tales of humble beginnings. Can there be any doubt that if these were Republicans, Hume would be dazzled by the “personal achievements?” Meanwhile, he groused along with Wallace that “There was no mention… about the private sector.”

And then it was on to Karl Rove, once again playing the role of a neutral political analyst - instead of one of the GOP’s biggest players.