Obama a Socialist? Fox News Exec Said So, but Didn't Believe It

MrJayremmie · Mar 30, 2011

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-...-fox-news-exec-said-so-but-didnt-believe-it/#

Bill Sammon, who’s responsible for the network’s Washington coverage, linked Obama to socialism many times during the 2008 campaign, but didn’t believe the allegation, he acknowledged.

In the final stretch of the 2008 campaign, a Fox News executive repeatedly questioned on the air whether Barack Obama believed in socialism.

Now it turns out he didn’t really believe what he was saying.

Bill Sammon, now the network’s vice president and Washington managing editor, acknowledged the following year that he was just engaging in “mischievous speculation” in raising the charge. In fact, Sammon said he “privately” believed that the socialism allegation was “rather far-fetched.”

These remarks, unearthed by the liberal advocacy group Media Matters, raise the question of whether Sammon, who oversees Washington news coverage for Fox News, was deliberately trying to sabotage the Democratic presidential candidate. He has come under fire before for memos he sent to the network’s staff that have seemed less than fair and balanced.

Sammon’s admission came on a 2009 Mediterranean cruise—cabin rates ranged as high as $37,600 per couple—sponsored by conservative Hillsdale College. Here is what he said, according to an audio recording:

“Last year, candidate Barack Obama stood on a sidewalk in Toledo, Ohio, and first let it slip to Joe the Plumber that he wanted to ‘spread the wealth around.’ At that time, I have to admit that I went on TV on Fox News and publicly engaged in what I guess was some rather mischievous speculation about whether Barack Obama really advocated socialism, a premise that privately I found rather far-fetched.”

That he did—on several occasions.

On Oct. 14, 2008, Sammon said on the air that Obama’s “spread the wealth” remark “is red meat when you’re talking to conservatives and you start talking about spread the wealth around. That is tantamount to socialism.”

On Oct. 21, he told Greta Van Susteren: “I have read Barack Obama’s books pretty carefully, and he in his own words talks about being drawn to Marxists… Now all this stuff’s coming out about whether he’s a socialist. I don’t know why anyone is surprised by it, because if you read his own words and his sort of, you know, orientation coming up as a liberal through college and a young man, it’s not a huge shock.”

Sammon, a former Washington Times reporter, also made sure his troops got out the word. On Oct. 27, he sent an email to staffers highlighting what he described as “Obama’s references to socialism, liberalism, Marxism and Marxists” in his 1995 autobiography, Dreams From My Father.

In an interview, Sammon says his reference to “mischevious speculation” was “my probably inartful way of saying, ‘Can you believe how far this thing has come?’” The socialism question indeed “struck me as a far-fetched idea” in 2008. “I considered it kind of a remarkable notion that we would even be having the conversation.” He doesn’t regret repeatedly raising it on the air because, Sammon says, “it was a main point of discussion on all the channels, in all the media”—and by 2009 he was “astonished by how the needle had moved.”

Sammon notes that in the same talk on the cruise, he pointed out that George W. Bush had his own stimulus package and had spent half the TARP bailout money: “I was talking about both sides being big spenders.” (True; he also told the cruise guests that “when it comes to spending money, Obama makes Bush look like a piker.”)

In that speech, Sammon said he eventually concluded that what he had thought was baseless speculation among Obama’s socialistic views turned out to be accurate:

“Now imagine my surprise when this year, I witness President Barack Obama standing in the cross hall of the White House and having taken over the American car industry, look into the camera, and announce to the nation essentially, that he would personally vouch for the warranty on your car’s muffler. All of a sudden, the debate over whether America was heading for socialism seemed anything but far-fetched…The debate over whether America is headed for socialism seems all too real, especially to those who still believe in capitalism.”

During last year’s health-care debate, as The Daily Beast has reported, Sammon urged Fox News staff in a memo to “please use the term ‘government-run health insurance,’ or, when brevity is a concern, ‘government option,’ whenever possible.” He acknowledged that the phrase “public option” was “firmly ensconced in the nation’s lexicon,” so when it was necessary to use it, he wrote, add the qualifier “so-called,” as in “the so-called public option.” And “here’s another way to phrase it: ‘The public option, which is the government-run plan.’” Many Fox News journalists followed suit, using terminology that Republican pollster Frank Luntz had pushed on the network.

In an interview at the time, Sammon defended the memo and said his 25-year record as a newspaper reporter demonstrates that he hasn’t favored either side. “Have I said things where I take a conservative view? Give me specifics,” he said.
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Trying to influence public opinion, eh? Unfortunately, this works on the uneducated and closed minded.

Rhal · Mar 30, 2011

Fox news blatantly lying again? I'm shocked. Fox has been exposed time and time again as a station that tries to influence public opinion on whatever position they want to push or want to pull down. Of course this is done by pretty much every station that isn't c-span atm but Fox just takes it to an extreme that the others do not (well MSNBC is up there but there second to Fox).

jlprk · Mar 30, 2011

Obama and the colonial powers have instigated a failed revolution against Libya for being socialist. No other reason, not humanitarianism. They provoked Libya to put it down, to give them justification to attack. (Khadaffi is a socialist because he nationalized oil fields to internalize profits, and prevent profits from escaping to Europe.)

Obama is no socialist. And Fox wants you to be amused at its being a liar network.

Shooter · Mar 30, 2011

Nah, Obama's no socialist. It's just a coincidence that he belonged to a church in Chicago for over 20 years that supports a form of marxism called Black Liberation Theology. It's also just a coincidence that he is friends with Bill Ayers, an avowed marxist, and that he has vowed to "spread the wealth around." All pure coincidence.

MARIS61 · Mar 30, 2011

Shooter said: ↑

Nah, Obama's no socialist. It's just a coincidence that he belonged to a church in Chicago for over 20 years that supports a form of marxism called Black Liberation Theology. It's also just a coincidence that he is friends with Bill Ayers, an avowed marxist, and that he has vowed to "spread the wealth around." All pure coincidence.
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Glad we agree. All pure coincidence.

Most of my friends are Republicans, and I have attended many different churches of different religions.

I am not Republican, and I am an atheist.

PapaG · Mar 30, 2011

Looks like Sammon was slow on the uptake. People like me knew Obama was a Socialist long before he took over GM.

At least Sammon was proven right...

During his cruise speech, Sammon said that while he found his own socialism speculation "far-fetched" in October 2008, it was actually proven correct during the first months of Obama's presidency.

"Now imagine my surprise when this year, I witness President Barack Obama standing in the cross hall of the White House and having taken over the American car industry, look into the camera, and announce to the nation essentially, that he would personally vouch for the warranty on your car's muffler," Sammon said on the cruise. "All of a sudden, the debate over whether America was heading for socialism seemed anything but far-fetched."
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Huge story. Didn't David Brock just state that Soros-funded Media Matters was declaring war on Fox News?

santeesioux · Mar 30, 2011

I thought he was a Nazi-Socialist Kenyan-Indonesian?

MrJayremmie · Mar 30, 2011

I thought he was a Nazi-Socialist Kenyan-Indonesian?
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I'm sorry, that is incorrect. You forgot Muslim and Terrorist.

maxiep · Mar 30, 2011

At some point, you have to call a spade a spade. Our current president has a more expansive view of the role of the Federal Government than any Chief Executive before him. It speaks volumes that he can't speak directly as to his end goals. He doesn't because he knows they're minority positions.

MARIS61 · Mar 30, 2011

maxiep said: ↑

At some point, you have to call a spade a spade.
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Racist.

jlprk · Mar 30, 2011

maxiep said: ↑

At some point, you have to call a spade a spade. Our current president has a more expansive view of the role of the Federal Government than any Chief Executive before him. It speaks volumes that he can't speak directly as to his end goals. He doesn't because he knows they're minority positions.
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If he's more expansive than Bush, why did Bush go into war refusing to have allies, while Obama has carefully limited the government's role (and thus spending)? And Bush expanded the government to take away long-cherished rights.

As for not giving goals, would you rather he keep flip-flopping on the goal as Bush did with Iraq? He's not giving goals because goals will be determined as a group by NATO powers.

maxiep · Mar 31, 2011

jlprk said: ↑

If he's more expansive than Bush, why did Bush go into war refusing to have allies, while Obama has carefully limited the government's role (and thus spending)? And Bush expanded the government to take away long-cherished rights.

As for not giving goals, would you rather he keep flip-flopping on the goal as Bush did with Iraq? He's not giving goals because goals will be determined as a group by NATO powers.
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Why do you have to bring up Bush? I didn't bring him up. It speaks volumes you can't build a defense of Obama without bringing up his predecesor. As for the other errors in your post, they're irrelevant as you can't even provide a decent response to my point.

MrJayremmie · Mar 31, 2011

Obama has not taken away our personal freedoms in the way Bush did. Obama did not expand government with the likes of Homeland Security. Obama went into a fight with allies egging us on to help and the UN giving the resolution for a no-fly zone, while Bush said Fuck You and went into Iraq for no reason. If anything, Bush is a socialist, IMO.

The patriot act reminds me of Orwell's 1984.

maxiep · Mar 31, 2011

MrJayremmie said: ↑

Obama has not taken away our personal freedoms in the way Bush did. Obama did not expand government with the likes of Homeland Security. Obama went into a fight with allies egging us on to help and the UN giving the resolution for a no-fly zone, while Bush said Fuck You and went into Iraq for no reason. If anything, Bush is a socialist, IMO.

The patriot act reminds me of Orwell's 1984.
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Once again, no one can discuss how the Obama Administration has radically shifted this country to the left (increasing the size of government by 24% in two short years, taking over the country's largest auto company and 1/6th of the US economy with ObamaCare), without saying "Oh, yeah? What about Bush?"

BTW, the Patriot Act was upheld by this Administration and a Democratic Congress. It seems to me to be pretty bi-partisan.

P.S. Since the mistake was made twice, I'll now have to correct it. The coalition that went into Iraq was larger than the one that went into Libya and had 17 UN resolutions behind it, instead of the one that gave rise to trigger military action in Libya.

blazerboy30 · Mar 31, 2011

MrJayremmie said: ↑

Obama has not taken away our personal freedoms in the way Bush did. Obama did not expand government with the likes of Homeland Security. Obama went into a fight with allies egging us on to help and the UN giving the resolution for a no-fly zone, while Bush said Fuck You and went into Iraq for no reason. If anything, Bush is a socialist, IMO.
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1) You must not know what "socialist" means
2) Saying that Bush made mistakes doesn't show that Obama isn't more socialist.

MrJayremmie said: ↑

The patriot act reminds me of Orwell's 1984.
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Yeah, you're right. Except they aren't very similar.

MrJayremmie · Mar 31, 2011

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Council_and_the_Iraq_War

In March 2003 the United States government announced that "diplomacy has failed" and that it would proceed with a "coalition of the willing" to rid Iraq under Saddam Hussein of weapons of mass destruction the U.S. insisted it possessed. The 2003 invasion of Iraq began a few days later.

Prior to this decision, there had been much diplomacy and debate amongst the members of the United Nations Security Council over how to deal with the situation. This article examines the positions of these states as they changed during 2002-2003.

Prior to 2002, the Security Council had passed 16 resolutions on Iraq. In 2002, the Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1441.

In 2003, the governments of the U.S., Britain, and Spain proposed another resolution on Iraq, which they called the "eighteenth resolution" and others called the "second resolution." This proposed resolution was subsequently withdrawn when it became clear that several permanent members of the Council would cast no votes on any new resolution, thereby vetoing it. [1] Had that occurred, it would have become even more difficult for those wishing to invade Iraq to argue that the Council had authorized the subsequent invasion. Regardless of the threatened or likely vetoes, it seems that the coalition at no time was assured any more than four affirmative votes in the Council—the U.S., Britain, Spain, and Bulgaria—well short of the requirement for nine affirmative votes.[2]

On September 16, 2004 Secretary-General of the United Nations Kofi Annan, speaking on the invasion, said, "I have indicated it was not in conformity with the UN Charter. From our point of view, from the charter point of view, it was illegal."[1]
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MrJayremmie · Mar 31, 2011

Yeah, you're right. Except they aren't very similar.
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So I'm guessing you haven't read 1984? Hell, search patriot act 1984 on google. Don't play dumb.

MrJayremmie · Mar 31, 2011

2) Saying that Bush made mistakes doesn't show that Obama isn't more socialist.
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The problem is you cannot believe anything Maxiep says without seeing him equally criticize both sides. All i see in his posts are pure partisan bias. Similar to yours.

maxiep · Mar 31, 2011

BTW, I love the root post. It's based on Media Matters taking off its mask and admitting that it's undertaking "guerrilla war" on FOX News. Hysterical.

MrJayremmie · Mar 31, 2011

Once again, no one can discuss how the Obama Administration has radically shifted this country to the left (increasing the size of government by 24% in two short years, taking over the country's largest auto company and 1/6th of the US economy with ObamaCare), without saying "Oh, yeah? What about Bush?"

BTW, the Patriot Act was upheld by this Administration and a Democratic Congress. It seems to me to be pretty bi-partisan.
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If you think Obama is a leftist, you are sorely mistaken. He has taken the country more to the left, but it is debatable if this country is even left leaning right now. Most would say it is still center right.

And the Libyan Mission, Obamacare mandate, and renewal of the patriot act were all huge failures by Obama. I'm not defending them. But if we are talking government expansion, nobody expanded government like Bush.

As much as I am anti-government, I do support the GM takeover and sell back. It was simply the right thing to do, and looks to be turning out very well.

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Obama a Socialist? Fox News Exec Said So, but Didn't Believe It

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Obama a Socialist? Fox News Exec Said So, but Didn't Believe It

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