@W Mace – yep, you nailed what it is BOR does. He’s absolutely anti-Obama but is quite clever with how he wields his “fair & balanced” hammer. He realizes that appearances are everything so he offers up just enough generous comments about the President so that he has plausable deniability (you know, just in case he’s challenged as being biased against Obama in his “analysis”). Then he can always put on his outraged face and play a clip where he said something kind and/or fair about Obama so he can call his accuser a liar. Nevermind the fact that the kind and/or fair things that BOR has said about Obama don’t go very far in a discussion about whether Obama has been a competent and/or strong leader/policy maker for our country. Nah, BOR’s type of kind and/or fair comments about Obama are, as far as political analysis goes, rather shallow and obvious.

As far as the talking heads on FOX “news”, while Hannity is completely out-of-the-closet with regards to his rabid hatred of Obama (and, in some sick kind of way, I can almost respect him in that he doesn’t pretend to be something that he’s not), I find the way BOR plays his hand to be quite dishonest and rather disturbing considering he has often referred to himself as a journalist and he’s supposedly FOX’s go to guy for “no spin” and “fair & balance”. BOR has carefully cultivated his “no spin/f&b” persona and he’s cautious about letting the “real” BOR out.

But, though BOR spends a great deal of time touting his so-called fairness, all one has to do is listen to the savvy way with which he words his statements or what facts he conveniently chooses to leave out or what stories critical of the right-wing that he deliberatly ignores (while hyping most anything that he can use to make the left look bad) to see what he’s actually all about. Yeah, BOR might claim that no one tells him what to say or that he doesn’t take direction from any right-wing talking points memos, but there’s no doubt he sets his show up (and his guests too with how he typically provides positive reinforcment to what his conservative guests say while deriding the liberal guests’ points and throwing in words like the “looney left”) in order to get the conservative POV to come out on top as the winner when all is said and done.

Fux Nuze sez

Rmoney in White House = WHITE HOUSE!

Obummer in White House = @#%$&!!!

Don’t make our blood boil any longer, Vote Rmoney!

Sununu’s comments made very little sense, and he really tried hard to avoid answering the direct questions that were being put to him. O’Reilly asked him very simply what he thought Romney could do to get his personal popularity up from 30 percent. Sununu responded with talking points about Obama’s comment on small businesses, which wasn’t even the question being asked. When pressed, Sununu was sure to get in the dog whistles about “community organizing handbook” and “communal way of thinking” in terms of Obama.

In the middle, Sununu made a spectacular comment about how GW Bush’s popularity was very high “until the last 5 or 6 weeks”. Is Sununu aware that Bush’s popularity and approval ratings over 2008 were simply terrible? That McCain didn’t want to campaign with Bush based on how bad Bush’s numbers were? In what fantasyland is Sununu living?

Rather than responding to O’Reilly’s question about how Romney comes across as “placid”, Sununu showered Romney with compliments about what a great guy he is and then followed that up with the fanciful thought that half of the country hasn’t been paying any attention yet, and that the real campaign doesn’t start until 2 weeks before the conventions. So somehow Sununu thinks Romney can hit a reset button next month and then half 2 1/2 months to really run his campaign, as opposed to what he’s already been doing. Once again Sununu’s comments don’t make any sense in reality.

But he was sure to get in more swipes at Obama for the unemployment rate, along with a backhanded swipe about 2008 being “an election of style over substance” with the new thought that 2012 will be an election “of substance”. Once again, welcome to Planet Sununu. Where in 2008, people were blissfully unaware, apparently, that the economy was in freefall and that the GOP had no plan of what to do about it. Where people were apparently unaware that on Fox News, guys like Hannity were desperately yelling that there wasn’t a recession happening. Where people were apparently unaware that their retirement accounts and home values had been gutted. In all seriousness, if Sununu really believes what he’s bloviating, somebody needs to have a quiet discussion with him about reality in the USA.

At the end, O’Reilly tried to play the middle ground in saying that both Obama and Romney are nice guys. O’Reilly noted that he was very happy with the way Obama treated him and his daughter. Sununu, amazingly, refused to acknowledge this, saying only that most public officials are warm and friendly when they meet you. O’Reilly realized that Sununu wasn’t going to acknowledge anything complimentary about the President and immediately ended the segment right there.

So what did we learn? O’Reilly never got any real answers to his questions. Sununu just spouted talking points, took swipes at Obama and offered a few warm fluffies for Romney.

I personally think that O’Reilly is having major doubts about Romney, as he has for the past few months. I wouldn’t be surprised to see his comments about Romney, even from last night, adding up into part of the big “why did he lose” explanation to come in November.

You should be Bildo, because RMoney’s gonna get his ass handed to him on a silver platter by President Obama. Can’t wait to watch your head explode along with Hannity’s, Levin’s, Limbaugh’s, Malkin’s, etc etc etc. You guys are all going to piss all over yourselves with your righteous indignation.

A 30 percent likeability rating is not bad for a guy with all the charisma of a department store mannequin. And a lot better than Dumbya’s 22 percent approval rating and Darth Cheney’s 11 percent approval rating when they left office.