Some Advice For Sean Hannity

From shrink-free violet and friend, Pundita - or maybe she's just pre-washed from being my pal for so long!

Opposition research is not Hannity's strong suit; every time I've tuned in, I've noted he's flubbed his facts so much that he makes Obama look in the right. And despite his pugnacity he doesn't have the temperament to be an effective critic.

Sean Hannity is at his best when he's encouraging people to take a positive view of themselves and America. His TV audience has seen little of that side of him during the past year, as he's futilely battled Barack Obama's cunning and luck.

Comments

[Peg C.]

I would agree. I like Sean but don't listen much because he seems congenitally incapable of effectively criticizing our opponents. He is best when he is positive, worst when he mollycoddles the Left. For great critiques and in-your-face attacks on the statists and the Marxist-in-Chief, I turn to Rush and Mark. Rush has no equal overall, but Mark is the best attack dog on the planet because he is brilliant, knows his facts and takes no prisoners. I love a good bloodletting. :-D

[Mark_0454]

I don't think Hannity does his homework. He just doesn't have the facts ready to go. As an example a few months ago he had Bjorn Lomborg on to discuss global warming. Lomborg is an economist and statistician who agrees with the IPCC average projections for global warming, but thinks we can spend our money a lot smarter. He's the guy Al Gore won't debate (or at least one of many). All Hannity wanted to talk about was Al Gore's home and jets. Lomborg probably doesn't give a damn about Al Gore's private jet, but could make a very good explanation of why cutting carbon dioxide will not reduce the incidence of malaria. As another example he had Amity Shlaes on his TV show. First, he kept mispronouncing her name (Amity Shales). Second, instead of using her to explain why the New Deal policies did not end the depression he launched into an attack of the New Deal as immoral. The guest was left to defend FDR's morality in instituting the New Deal. Hannity needs to be better informed and make better use of his guests.

[Pundita]

"instead of using her to explain why the New Deal policies did not end the depression he launched into an attack of the New Deal as immoral. The guest was left to defend FDR's morality in instituting the New Deal."

I'm glad I didn't see that one or I might have ended up in the ER. But, yes; time and again he's not prepared, and it's not just with Obama. So it often ends up that he wastes good guests -- and also he gets blindsided.

RBO reader who saw my post also made a very telling observation:

"I had been banging away with fervor for months on some of the conservative sites that there has to be some mention of Republicans who are doing good things. If they can’t find them at the national level, go state, if not at the state level, go local. Any press is good press as they say, and so the constant attention on the Dems and Obama without any solutions, you’re essentially an entertainment outlet following Brittany Spears."

Yes. Republican talkers might get away with that entertainment on radio but once writ large on TV, day after day, and it's more help to the Dems than the GOP.

And I agree with Pat about Rush and Mark. I think what happened is that during the days when Conservatives had the wind at their back, it mattered less how well prepared Conservative talk show hosts were. Pretty much all they had to do was rant about how much they hated Dems and lefties. But Rush and Mark made it look deceptively easy; behind their populist rants are very bright and quick minds.

Once the political winds died down and talk show hosts were forced to row, then it was easy to see the shortcomings of talkers such Hannity.

Yet he isn't stupid and he's a likeable cuss, and his heart's in the right place. He has the ability to inspire a positive attitude in people; that's very necessary, especially in these times. So he should do what he does best and leave the surgical knives to the surgical minds.

If he can routinely bring Republican politicians together on his show, and simply moderate their discussions, then he can do that well. And his show would be a place where the TV audience knows they can go to get such discussions. That would be a great contribution to American politics.

[crosspatch]

I more or less agree with that. Hannity would do a lot better finding things for people to get behind and be for rather than spending hours replaying Obama sound clips followed by several minutes of criticism. If I want to listen to Obama, I can watch CNN. Hannity and the other hosts on the right have an opportunity to get other messages out that the media suppresses. Maybe some amazing sound bit from a Republican Senator, maybe something said by someone in a state legislature. They have the opportunity to advance their side but instead seem to concentrate on nothing but criticism of the other side.

Lets hear more of what various Republican governors, legislators, and members of Congress are saying and less of what Obama is saying.

[101st Abn]

Crosspatch is right about the sound clips, and endless repetition of tropes from Kerry ("I was before...before I was against...) and Michelle Obama quotes (.."mean country...), on and on, or Dick Durbin gassing about Nazis. Hannity's ideological world has grown static and embarrassing, and provides the idiots on the left the power to identify conservatives as fixated losers with an untreatable rash. How many times can you listen to this shit and still get angry about it? How can Hannity still get angry about it himself?

A lot of Conservative talk radio is centered around condemnation of a certain kind of contemptible, effete (and elite)leftist personality, against an energetic, liberty-loving populist conservative, and this just isn't enough to win any intellectual battles. It just defines the contestants. All of the radio should stop referring to conservatism as an ideology, too, because conservatism is a frame of mind, not an ideology. An ideology is a statement about reality, and when the reality doesn't fit the ideology, the idealogue needs to alter the reality. That's where the authoritarianism comes in.

[syn]

"All of the radio should stop referring to conservatism as an ideology, too, because conservatism is a frame of mind, not an ideology. An ideology is a statement about reality, and when the reality doesn't fit the ideology, the idealogue needs to alter the reality."

Highly recommend Mark Levin's "Liberty and Tyranny" to understand why this statement if off the mark. If you believe in the founding principles under the Constitution then you believe in an ideology far greater than a state of mind.

It is the 'state of mind' which need to alter reality and in doing so, mush impose all sorts of Statist laws in order to maintain stablity.

For example, the state of mind wants to have this thing called 'gay marriage' of course, the fallacy of the concept of gay marraige is that homosexuals have since the dawn of marriage been afforded opportunity to marry..ie Jim McGreevy who is a homosexual has married twice and was never denied marriage. There is no such thing as 'same-sex union between a man and a woman' however in order for the Statist to impose this laws will be created which protect an irrational concept.

Eventually as the Statist wields authoritarian power over reason what will happen is for example, marriage will be eventually be considered a hate crime unless one is homosexual.

Now I am aware that Darwinian apes wearing black robes have deemed themselves superior beings just because they have an Ivy-Tower degree from Harvard, Yale or the University of Tennessee (in Knoxvile), unfortunately in order to maintain their irrational state of mind they will evolve into a state of totalitarian tyranny.

Planet of the Apes...interesting movie.

[101st Abn]

Wrong, syn. The point has been made by Russell Kirk, Buckley and others that conservatism is properly a temperment, a tragic view (a conclusion taken by ex-liberal David Mamet)of life, and not an ideology. Ideologies are fixed views of reality; they're systemic rules about the social contract which are self-impositing whatever the state of human affairs might be. Ideologies do not leave people alone, but are the mainsprings of authority and government.

The Constitution doesn't fix an ideology; it does nothing except establish a position on natural rights, and it allows for the flexibilities of liberty by limiting the administrative state in its intervention with individuals as they pass through time.

It isn't a "state of mind" which seeks to place gay marriage in the context of civil liberties, it's a debatable rule of law, imbedded in an ideology which denies aspects of free majoritarianism, and local rule. It could be argued that The Bill of Rights has had a corrosive effect on liberty in this country because it defined a range of rights that would leave the state in judgement of those "rights" not enumerated.

This was the anti-Federalist's position, and Hamilton's, too. Defining liberties and rights is the first phase of ideology. The Bill of Rights is actually a monarchical constitution like the Magna Carta, because it establishes EXCEPTIONS to state rule...the assumption being that the state has the authority in the first place.

I find myself more on the libertarian side after forty-five years of conservative action, chiefly because conservatives have hardened their views on the GOOD STATE, rather than always, always, always, erring in favor of liberty.

In all fairness about gay marriage, while I disagree with it, the only consistent and proper principle is that the state has no business defining marriage in the first place, or sanctioning it. It was originally incentivized to protect women and children, and even then, it was a lurking intervention in the lives of couples where civil law could already work effectively.

[101st Abn]

Correction, it wasn't the Anti-Federalist's position, but Hamilton's. Madison, I believe, was indecisive.

[Pundita]

Wow. Very interesting discussion. We need more of these kinds of discussions. I want to pass along comments from another RBO reader in response to RBO's crosspost of my Hannity post:

"Unfortunately, Sean Hannity is NOT a Republican. He is an independent. I have no respect for him, or for anything he says about Republicans if he doesn’t have the intellectual honesty to make sure people know he IS NOT Republican.

Maybe, if those who are not Republicans would mind their own business, or take the pains to join the party and learn how to work with us, then they need to quit telling the GOP what to do.

The worst part of it, when decent people rise to the top of the GOP, people like Hannity, who, I repeat, are not Republican, do their level best to destroy them. They have their own list of people they want to lead the GOP.

I’m sorry, if you can’t “put your money where your mouth is” then you’re part of the problem.

SJ Reidhead

The Pink Flamingo"

I haven't tried to verify Reidhead's claim, which I find very unsettling. But even if it's true I don't think that people who aren't Republicans should be excluded from Republican discussions -- although they should be very clear about their political affiliation or lack of such, particularly if they're in the public eye.

[Pundita]

I'm doing more back-and-forth ferrying of opinion between RBO and RWV. From RBO's comment section comes an angry comment from "Buckshot:"

http://therealbarackobama.wordpress.com/2009/04/11/pundita-sean-hannity-constructs-a-political-platform-for-republicans/#comments

"If it wasn't for Sean HANNITY, the infamous rev. wright would not have reached the msm. He harped on it for a year before anyone else gave a shit. He is the only commentor to stay on obowme’s ass since the beginning of this national nightmare, so you should all be greatfull that there is HANNITY at all [...]

Here was my reply:

Buckshot: I agree with the spirit of your comments. If I didn’t think Hannity had something to offer I wouldn’t have taken time to praise his April 9 show and offer criticism and advice.

And yes, he raised the alarm about Rev. Wright. He was also instrumental in publicizing the connection between Ayers and Obama. Then he completely ignored the most powerful and relevant arguments against the relationship.

Worse, he played into Obama’s hands by NEVER ONCE mentioning Obama’s work for the Annenberg Challenge — until he had no choice but to mention it. That was very late in the day, after a Conservative was initially blocked from trying to obtain documentation on the Annenberg papers and cried foul at NRO. That catapulted the story into MSM newspapers, even in Chicago and New York.

Yet even after Hannity mentioned the Annenberg Challenge and Obama’s connection to it, he continued to ignore the key arguments against the Ayers’ educational viewpoint, which Obama’s key education advisor, Linda Darling-Hammond, reflected.

And he never once mentioned Darling-Hammond!

But believe you me, I and others tried desperately over a period of several months, starting in May of 2008, to alert Hannity to the situation. We were ignored.

Meanwhile, RBO, my blog, No Quarter, and Steve Diamond at his Global Labor blog were screaming the truth at the top of our lungs.

Many other blogs picked up our reports. John Batchelor’s show featured Steve about three times — and I am quite certain that Hannity and his producers closely follow John’s show because everyone in power in the U.S. media follows his show.

So it’s not as if this information was buried.

The upshot is that Hannity used his position of great power in the media to divert public attention from the real story of the Obama-Ayers relationship. Instead, he played into Obama’s hands by harping night after night on his TV show about Ayers’s terrorist past.

I am telling you that if Hannity had done his homework on the Obama-Ayers relationship, it’s unlikely that Obama would be have been elected — or at the least, he would have been elected by a narrower margin.

So my criticism of Sean Hannity is valid and it’s based on my personal experience.

If you want to read criticism in a similar vein by thoughtful people who also closely follow Hannity’s show, I hope you’ll take the time to visit Riehl World View, which posted on my Hannity post, and read through the comment section. (More comments have come in today, for readers who saw the comments posted yesterday.)

http://www.riehlworldview.com/carnivorous_conservative/2009/04/some-advice-for-sean-hannity.html#comments

The stories they tell about Hannity’s show are the truth. And I could add more horror stories to those.

However, my major point, and I think the major point of commenters here and at RVW, is that more needs to be done toward establishing the ground of opposition to Obama’s administration. [...]