While most Fox News hosts seem to be competing for a Biggest Trump Supporter On Cable News award, Shepard Smith stands in stark opposition. Nothing exemplified that more than his tear about the Trump administration and Russia: “It’s too much lying and too much Russia and too much smoke.”
In the video below, Smith began by noting that former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn has just retroactively registered as “a foreign agent.”
Raw Story has more:
Noting Flynn is the same person who “lied to the Vice President about his conversation with Russian leaders, and was forced to resign after 24 days on the job,” Smith reported that Flynn also helped “the Turkish leader as a lobbyist during the U.S. presidential campaign,” earning $530,000 for his work.
Smith played footage of Flynn “on the campaign trail with Donald Trump complaining about pay-for-play, as he was paid to play by a businessman that supported the Turkish leader who’s voting base is Islamic voters.”
But as Julie Bykowicz, of the Associated Press, told the viewers, the White House “wasn’t aware during its vetting process of Mike Flynn that he had done work that could be construed as for the Turkish government.” She added, “You would think that the White House would, in the course of vetting someone for such an important job, come across that information.”
Yes, you would think. Frankly, I don’t know whether incompetence or willful negligence is the worse explanation for such an oversight.
Meanwhile, Smith laid into Trump:
SMITH: There’s been a lot of lying. There’s been lying about who you talk to and by lots of people. And almost inevitably and invariably, they were lying about talking to the Russians about something. It’s too much lying and too much Russia and too much smoke and now they’re investigating.
[…]
The president, as far as I can tell, hasn’t answered questions on anything from reporters since this Russia story began building. He’s said Russia is a ruse, that it’s all fake news, but leaks are real – something that really can’t live together.
Bykowicz told Smith that reporters are pressing White House officials for more information but “They’re having a difficult time sort of talking their way out of this situation because, again, there’s just so little clarity.”
Watch it below, from the March 9, 2017 Shepard Smith Reporting.
http://www.newshounds.us/fox_s_roberts_wallace_smith_skeptical_white_house_claims_flynn_turkey_lobbying_031017
I believe you are correct about Fox hedging its bets. I have a post coming up in the morning where I go int this more but I also see it as a CYA move. If Trump crashes and burns which some at Fox (e.g. Murdoch sons) see as a real possibility, the network can say it covered Trump aggressively and critically.
Fanboys also often rage they change channels when Shep’s on. To what I don’t know since other than the Comedy Channel there’s no equivalent to Fox’s regular news programming and the Comedy Channel satire more often than not mocks the fertile ground of Republican hypocrisy.
