Well, we were right again.

FOX ATTACKS! Obama part 2: Spreading the Virus (now over 574,000 views) was about the dangers of the media parroting Republican talking points that originate on FOX. We were trying to draw attention to this problem and its effect on our political system, and urged the networks not to follow FOX’s Democrat-bashing lead with a petition with more than 200,000 signatures. But judging by ABC’s shameful democratic debate last night, with co-moderator George Stephanopoulos parroting a question given to him by FOX’s Sean Hannity, it appears they didn’t listen. And now they’re going to pay a price.

If you hear a faint ripping sound in the air, that’s the sound of ABC being torn to shreds over one of the most embarrassing, biased, yet still uninformative debates in memory, prompting the crowd to boo co-moderators Charles Gibson and Stephanopoulos during the post debate. Crooks & Liars has a compilation of some of the many idiotic, pointless questions asked that have absolutely no bearing on the lives and concerns of Americans in Pennsylvania, Indiana, or anywhere else, from lapel pins to pastors to Bosnia to the bored-media-generated “bitterness” “controversy”. And viewers are responding — just check out the over 17,000 (at posting) comments complaints being left at ABC’s website.

But Stephanopoulos’s question about Obama’s supposed “links” to former Weather Underground member William Ayers is what really took the cake and clearly proved the point we here at Fox Attacks have been making.

On Tuesday, Stephanopoulos was a call-in guest on Hannity’s show, where Hannity told Stephanopoulos what kind of question he should be asking at the Wed. debate:

HANNITY: There are two questions that I don’t think anybody has asked Barack Obama, and I don’t know if this is going to be on your list tomorrow. One is – the only time he’s ever been asked about his association with Bill Ayers, the unrepentant terrorist from the Weather Underground who on 9/11 of all days in the New York Times was saying “I don’t regret setting bombs. I don’t think we did enough.” When asked about it by the Politico, David Axelrod said that they have a friendly relationship, and that they had done a number of speeches together and that they sat on a board together. Is that a question you might ask?

STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, I’m taking notes right now.

ThinkProgress has the audio here. Hannity and the right wing has been trying to manufacture an Obama/Ayers “link” for some time now.

Then, at the debate, Stephanopoulos obeyed Hannity’s wishes and parroted Hannity’s question almost word-for-word:

STEPHANOPOULOS: A gentleman named William Ayers, he was part of the Weather Underground in the 1970s. They bombed the Pentagon, the Capitol and other buildings. He’s never apologized for that. And in fact, on 9/11 he was quoted in The New York Times saying, “I don’t regret setting bombs; I feel we didn’t do enough.”

An early organizing meeting for your state senate campaign was held at his house, and your campaign has said you are friendly. Can you explain that relationship for the voters, and explain to Democrats why it won’t be a problem?

Obama masterfully handled the question, saying:

George, but this is an example of what I'm talking about.

This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago, who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis.

And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values, doesn't make much sense, George.

The fact is, is that I'm also friendly with Tom Coburn, one of the most conservative Republicans in the United States Senate, who during his campaign once said that it might be appropriate to apply the death penalty to those who carried out abortions.

Do I need to apologize for Mr. Coburn's statements? Because I certainly don't agree with those either.

So this kind of game, in which anybody who I know, regardless of how flimsy the relationship is, is somehow -- somehow their ideas could be attributed to me -- I think the American people are smarter than that. They're not going to suggest somehow that that is reflective of my views, because it obviously isn't.

So can we FINALLY dispense with the ludicrous, Republican-invented notion that there is a “liberal” media? And if you can’t, can you answer why “liberal” ABC’s Stephanopoulos would take debate questions from FOX’s Sean Hannity and repeat them nearly word-for-word?

But there’s a bigger issue at hand, and that’s FOX’s effect on the rest of the media. Why would Stephanopoulos think that Hannity would be a good source for thoughtful questions to ask Obama, especially considering that Hannity is a racist neocon who is doing everything within his power to slime Obama and paint him as everything from a black supremacist to a Marxist to a terrorist?

And does Stephanopoulos think that Hannity is some sort of journalist? Why? Because he’s on FOX? Hannity is considered a “commentator” (like Bill O’Reilly), which in FOX language means that you are not held to any kind of journalistic standards and are free to lie, distort, and make things up as much as you want as long as it either hurts a democrat or helps a republican. But that’s the thing — FOX has purposefully destroyed the line between commentator and journalist on their network to the point where there is actually no difference. Their supposedly “straight” newsmen like Brit Hume and Chris Wallace are free to inject democrat-bashing commentary while commentators like Hannity and O’Reilly are free to pretend they are objectively reporting biased news. And Stephanopoulos, like most FOX viewers, fell for it.

And why on earth would ABC allow Stephanopoulos to moderate the debate when he had been a key member of Bill Clinton’s administration? Where was ABC’s journalistic integrity when they decided that there would be no perception of bias to have one of Bill Clinton’s former top advisors moderate a debate involving Bill Clinton’s wife? It reminded me of FOX’s coverage of the 2000 presidential election where FOX thought there would be no bias (or didn't care if there was) if Carl Cameron followed the Bush campaign, despite the fact that Cameron’s wife worked for the campaign. It seems like ABC’s journalistic standards are also following FOX’s — right into the toilet.

FOX had tried and failed on multiple occasions to host a democratic debate, but it seems they didn’t have to — ABC held a FOX debate for them, complete with a question written by Hannity. I really can’t imagine a Democratic debate on FOX with Hannity and Wallace and Hume moderating being any different from what we were subjected to last night. 

Sign MoveOn's petition criticizing ABC's debate.

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Tell us the questions you would've asked Obama and Clinton.

Demand that the media stop taking their cues from FOX.