Megyn Kelly Plays The Victim For Coming Under Fire For Race Baiting
Reported by Ellen - July 15, 2010 -
Poor Megyn Kelly. She’s been race baiting the Obama Justice Department over the New Black Panther case every chance she gets and then, on the rare occasion she interviewed someone who challenged her agenda, she had a very unbecoming on-air temper tantrum. And now some meanie progressives – and I proudly include myself among them – are accusing her of being a racist. So what’s an up and coming Fox News anchor with a long history of antagonism toward people of color to do? Play the victim.
If Kelly had any real integrity, she would have publicly apologized yesterday (7/14/10) to her colleague, Democrat Kirsten Powers, for the shockingly rude and unprofessional treatment Kelly dished out the day before on the air for no good reason other than that Powers dared to challenge Kelly’s coverage of the New Black Panther case. if Kelly had any class, she’d have brought back Powers for a civil rematch. Instead, Kelly seemed more interested in using yesterday’s follow-up segment as an excuse to justify her own behavior and demonize those who disagree with her even more.
Kelly is supposed to be part of Fox News’ “objective” line up, but once again she made no bones about her endorsement of the unsubstantiated accusations of GOP activist and former DOJ employee, J. Christian Adams, whom she referred to as a “whistleblower.” Kelly repeatedly referred to her own relentless and uncritical promotion of Adams’ views as “shedding light” on the case.
Here was her introduction to yesterday's segment:
As coverage of the New Black Panther case ticks up in the wake of the DOJ whistleblower coming forward, so too do the accusations of racism from mainstream progressives to more radical commentators. Some accuse those who are shedding light on this story of INFLAMING RACIAL TENSIONS (her emphasis), including one exchange you saw right here on this program yesterday and another from a man who is at the heart of the New Black Panther case.
Kelly went on to play a clip of her “debate” with Powers conveniently edited so as to look like Powers had done the attacking. Powers was shown saying that Kelly was doing the “scary black man thing,” to which Kelly responded with what I could swear is her only emotion: indignation. The clip also neatly excluded Kelly’s childish meltdown. You really need to see the entire clip to get a sense of just what kind of unfair, unbalanced, prima donna behavior Kelly exhibited.
Then Kelly juxtaposed Powers with video of New Black Panther Party head Malik Shabazz accusing Fox News of “playing on racial fears” with the case.
Slick way of suggesting Powers and Shabazz were two of a kind, Meggy!
And just in case that wasn’t enough bias for you, Kelly said, in an aggrieved voice, “That’s just a sample of the pushback against coverage of this case. Those providing it, accused, essentially, of racism… of inflaming racial tensions by shedding a light on this case.”
Guest Juan Williams proceeded to make, essentially, the same points Powers had tried to make the day before. But where Kelly was abusive, obnoxious and intolerant to Powers, she was polite and respectful to Williams.
Juan Williams did an excellent job: “I think the case is being overblown… This is really small potatoes. I think the key point here is that voter intimidation of any kind should not be tolerated… The charge that this is somehow a racial act by the Justice Department, I guess attaches to the fact that you have two black men, President Obama and Eric Holder, the Attorney General, in charge, ultimately, of any kind of decision.”
OK, so he didn’t use the words “scary black man,” but that’s ultimately what Juan Williams’ commentary amounted to. He went on to point out that Kelly’s so-called whistleblower was just the kind of political operative Powers had said he was. Williams said he thinks Adams' motivation for making his accusations is "because he’s upset at the fact that people said under the Bush Justice Department, the Civil Rights Division was found not to be pursuing cases of discrimination against minorities and even in a similar case, a voter intimidation case in Arizona where we saw people carrying guns, the Civil Rights Division had decided not to file any voter intimidation charge.”
So how did “objective” Kelly respond? By ignoring Juan Williams’ points and going to her conservative guest, Armstrong Williams, for validation - about herself. “Armstrong, I don’t know that we’re getting to the heart of my question… which is, is it racist to discuss this?”
In other words, Kelly could not have cared less whether this supposedly important case, worthy of so much discussion, was legitimate or not. The real issue, in her mind, was whether or not she’s a racist. And while it’s certainly not racist to discuss the case per se, “discussing” is nowhere near an accurate description of the kind of biased promoting of Adams’ accusations that Kelly has been doing.
But, as Kelly surely knew would happen, Armstrong Williams got her back and used the opening as a pretext for his own race baiting. “Megyn, unfortunately, it is all about who is being accused of racism. Obviously, there is a double standard. If this situation had happened where it happened to be someone who happened to be a Caucasian yelling these racial epithets… obviously, the networks would be all over it… There is such a double standard… If you are conservative, if you happen to be black, conservative, if you’re Fox News, there’s an entirely different standard for you… But it’s OK to be racist if you’re liberal…. That is the real issue here.”
Funny how Kelly didn’t object to Williams suggesting liberals are racist.
Update: Priscilla notes: I find it ironic that in her diatribe about the press reaction to her Black Panther "coverage," including her on air melt down, she had Armstrong Williams as a conservative guest. In 2005, it was disclosed that he received money from the George Bush administration to push the "No Child Left Behind" act. Because of this, his contract with Tribune Media Services, which syndicated his column, was terminated. Maggie Gallagher, right wing homophobe, was also paid to push an anti-gay marriage agenda. But the Williams thing produced a firestorm of reaction from the media community and as such, a lot of pressure on the Bush administration about why they used tax payer money to, secretly, pay this clown. The folks in the industry were very upset about this "pay for play" as it created a question about media ethics in general. There was discussion between the inspector general for the Department of Education and the US Attorney's office but nothing came of it.
