It's a testament to how deeply our nation has been impacted by the mass shooting in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado that even Fox News has (mostly) suspended their partisanship. Here's an open thread where we can all share news, thoughts and emotions about this awful event.

Megyn Kelly, an attorney, visited The O’Reilly Factor last night, to weigh in on Sean Hannity’s interview with George Zimmerman the night before. Kelly didn’t mince words. “The real question is why would Mark O’Mara (Zimmerman's attorney) have agreed to this?” she asked. The answer appears to be that it was to raise money. But Bill O’Reilly was more interested in exploring why she thought Zimmerman had harmed his case than why an attorney would agree to such a thing.

Bill O’Reilly likes to boast about being independent but he was quacking an awful lot like someone looking out for Republicans last night as he demanded that former President George W. Bush “be generous to the country” and campaign for Mitt Romney in what O’Reilly called a “vital, vital election.”

Back in May, Fox news tried to force a meme called the “fiscal cliff” on their websites. According to the story, it’s a term used by financial insiders to describe a scenario where, if the Bush Tax Cuts are allowed to expire, the economy will go into a freefall, put us in another recession, and shrink the economy by 1.3% This is all fine and dandy for frightening people, except that good ol’ FNC didn’t tell the whole story, probably because that wouldn’t fit into their future tactics. So, as a result, they left out the parts of the report that they can’t use for that purpose.

The New York Times has an article about tensions ratcheting up between President Obama and Fox News. The Obama campaign has taken a few swipes at Fox lately and the GOP propaganda machine  executive vice president of news, Michael Clemente, is reacting the way they do to almost anything and everything Obama says or does: by going on attack. 

Along with your humble correspondent, several other media outlets picked up on Eric Bolling's insane and rather un-Christ like tirade, on yesterday's Fox & Friends, over a minor league baseball team's plans to host an atheist night at their Minnesota ballpark. As I reported, Bolling was so upset that he urged his Christians fans to pray for rain and admonished the atheists to "stay out of the ballpark" if said Christian prayers don't work. Poor persecuted Christian soldier Eric Bolling isn't happy about less than flattering coverage and is lashing out towards the evil, librul media that doesn't believe, as does Bolling, that atheists suck and are going to hell. And aren't good Christians, like Bolling, supposed to "turn the other cheek?"

In a bizarre, hour-long interview last night, Sean Hannity donned the role of defense attorney for George Zimmerman and spoon-fed him a series of leading questions designed to acquit Zimmerman in the Trayvon Martin shooting. Hannity was such a lapdog that he didn’t even bat an eye or challenge a word when Zimmerman said, “It was all God’s plan” that he shot the unarmed Martin. Nor did Hannity pay attention to Zimmerman’s astonishing statement that after he shot Martin, he never made an effort to find out his condition. Hannity even seemed to agree when Zimmerman said he felt he was due an apology from civil rights leaders. The fact that Zimmerman’s real attorney, who was present throughout, barely said a word suggests that there was very little daylight between his and Hannity’s roles. But while Hannity made a splashy show of sympathy for Zimmerman, it's hard not to think that the only person who benefitted from this spectacle was Hannity, himself.

Good evening, gentle reader. Good to be back. I did have a wonderful time, though; I was getting my eyebrows lowered at a thoroughly swanky, decadent spa in – no, never mind, I’ll leave it to your imagination. Meanwhile Fox News has been busy lowering something else: namely the tone of the political debate. Ellen has already noted the dedication with which Fox News is spinning President Obama's remarks about success being not only a matter of individual initiative but also “because we do things together.” They were doing it again on last night's On the Record, with Brit Hume as chief spinmeister. 

“Objective news” host Jon Scott offered what he called a “fair and balanced” debate on Happening Now this morning. That is, if your definition of “fair and balanced” includes a host validating Republican talking points, asking all the skeptical questions of the Democratic guest, making no challenge to the conservative, pro-Republican guest and taking a gratuitous swipe at President Obama.

Yesterday, Romney-surrogate John Sununu made a series of stunning statements that were distinct dog whistles about President Obama’s American bona fides. One of them, “I wish this president would learn how to be an American,” even Sununu walked back slightly. Yet, when Sununu appeared on Hannity last night for a debate with liberal Juan Williams, he made no effort to call Sununu on such inflammatory rhetoric. In fact, Sununu again suggested that Obama is somehow Un-American even as the discussion was framed around the supposedly outrageous rhetoric coming from Obama.