Sandy GholstonJuan Williams is supposedly one of the “liberals” on Fox News even though he is nothing of the kind. Williams is, at best, a moderate. But, in all honesty, he barely fits that description based on upon how often he is in agreement with Bill O’Reilly. It is impossible to be considered a liberal or even a moderate when you agree with O’Reilly as much as Williams does.
Now, I can imagine Bill O’Reilly putting Juan Williams in the anchor chair for self-serving purposes as a fill-in host of The O’Reilly Factor. He uses the reputation of Williams as “a liberal” to portray himself as more fair and balanced than he is (since most of us understand that O’Reilly is neither fair nor balanced). Williams is being pimped by O’Reilly. Williams is very well paid for services rendered, I would imagine, so he must be cool with this role as the pretend liberal.
O’Reilly is certainly free to have whoever he wants host his show, but it’s laughable to try and portray Williams as anything but a right-leaning moderate (who generally is double teamed, when offering up liberal opinions) by Mary K. Ham and O’Reilly.
Here is a comment from The O’Reilly Sucks Blog:
Juan Williams filled in for O’Reilly so there was no TPM. Juan made the Obama agenda the top story and had the White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton on to discuss it. They talked about health care, cap and trade, etc. Juan sounded just like O’Reilly, he hammered Obama on every plan he has, and did not have one good thing to say about anything Obama plans to do. He asked a series of long questions to Burton with criticism of Obama in every question. Burton answered his right-wing spin questions, and it was pretty much just like O’Reilly was asking the questions. In fact, I would not be shocked to find out O’Reilly wrote the questions for him.
Juan is the so-called Democrat on FOX but he sounded more like Newt Gingrich than he did a Democrat. All his questions were full of Obama criticism and right-wing spin, just as if O’Reilly or Crowley were there asking them. It was just like having O’Reilly there, with just a different person to ask the questions. I would bet O’Reilly wrote those questions for him, because they sounded exactly like the questions O’Reilly would spin out. So if you thought the Factor would be any different with Juan Williams hosting you would be wrong. It was no different than if O’Reilly had been there, except without all the screaming and yelling.
Well said. Juan was brought in there to play a role and when you’re hosting the O’Reilly Factor, whether you’re Bill or not, you’re expected to be a right winger. Williams did what he was paid to do. He played his part well so as not to be punished.
The O’Reilly Sucks Blog:
http://www.oreilly-sucks.com/
Tags: Bill O'Reilly, O'Reilly Factor, conservative, right winger, Juan Williams, role, so-called liberal, Mary Katharine Ham
July 7, 2009 at 2:59 am
Your commentary regarding Juan Williams hosting is misguided. First, Mr. Williams is following a format and it is not his show to do with as he wishes. Second, if you watched the interview with Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton he was not debating whether or not we should reform health care, he was simply asking how we were going to pay for it. More specifically, he was asking how President Obama could reform health care without breaking his promise to raise taxes on people earning less than 250K per year. Bill Burton refused to answer the question directly and stated it was not the President’s preference to do so. You referenced “He asked a series of long questions to Burton with criticism of Obama in every question….. Juan is the so-called Democrat on FOX but he sounded more like Newt Gingrich than he did a Democrat.” Just because he identifes himself as a democrat does not mean he has to walk lock-step with everything on the Obama platform. Asking direct questions especially regarding the economic REALITY of certain policies is important regardless of who is in power and we the American people have a right to know the truth. To dismiss Juan Williams’s performance for doing his job and asking direct questions of the people who hold power over you and me is irresponsible.
July 7, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Jim,
(I apologize for the length of this response)
I think you may have missed the point of this post.
The point was that Juan Williams is portrayed as a liberal, but he is not a liberal (as proven by how often he agrees with O’Reilly). O’Reilly uses Williams to try and appear more fair and balanced than he actually is.
Obviously Williams is following the O’Reilly format. And, that was my point. He is portrayed as a liberal when he is on the show to follow a conservative format, echo conservative opinion and sometimes gently dissent. In a way, you made my argument for me.
I quoted another author (and I put the text around it so as not to take it out of context) to show another example of someone who views Williams as a moderate-conservative disguised by Fox News as a liberal.
I am not implying that he does or should have to walk in lock-step with Obama. But, if he is in agreement with O’Reilly as much as he is I would not say that sounds like much of a Democrat to me.
As for the interview with Burton (which was not the central point of the post), I don’t have a big problem with the way Williams interrogated him. But, I also know that he was and has historically been comparitively soft dealing with conservatives while on Fox.
You are correct: Williams is doing his job. But, maybe that’s the problem.