Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam associated with the so-called Ground Zero Mosque, visited the Hannity show last night, where he attempted to promote his message of combating extremism on all sides. I'm not sure Imam Rauf did himself any favors with this appearance.

Rauf seems sincerely dedicated to the cause of peace and eradicating extremism. But there's nothing to indicate that Hannity is. In fact, every sign points to his willingness to go to almost any extreme and use any inflammatory tactic to promote his agenda. So while Rauf allowed Hannity to push him into apologizing for past remarks (such as saying U.S. policies were an "accessory" to the crime of 9/11, e.g.), he never confronted Hannity on his hate-mongering schtick. Instead, Rauf tried to debate Hannity with reason and common sense. While that may work, at least to some degree, on Fox News Sunday or any other news show that focuses on real news, Hannity - like most of "fair and balanced" Fox - is all about political theater. Rauf was able to get with that program when he challenged Bill O'Reilly to pick up his hammer, head downtown and make good on an earlier pledge to help build the Cordoba Community Center that Fox and the right-wing maliciously dubbed the "Ground Zero mosque."

What do you think?