Fox News vs. Frogs

The CEO of Fox News was on This Week this morning. Guest host Barbara Walters couldn't stop looking at this issue of Cosmopolitan that showed Scott Brown nude and herself 2-3 decades younger. The Jabba-the-Hutt-like Fox guy (much like right-wing clone of Larry Flynt) proved his perfect grossness by responding to every point with something petty, like, "Everyone in the media hates Sarah Palin because her book sold so many more copies than their books sell." Somehow this was an answer to a question about Palin's future plans. George Will was still rolling his eyes from Barbara looking at Cosmo; everyone else was hoping Paul Krugman would jam a pencil into Jabba's jowls or temple.

The lesson of the day seemed to be shaping up into something like, "Conservatives: primarily an army of fat conniving bastards who put forth beauty-queen champions like Palin and Scott Brown under false pretenses of persecution," and "Liberals: Can Paul Krugman juggle the three balls of his logical humanism, his voluminous facts and his frightened, elfin demeanor, all while staving off the inevitable nervous breakdown?

Just when I realized there was a silent showdown going on between the luxurious hairdos of George Will (tidily radiant) and Arianna Huffington (youthfully resplendent), my wife got mad and compared Fox's Jabba to a frog. Unfair to frogs! Now I must again rise to the defense of frogs, beginning with one of the classic lessons of Sesame Street: they eat flies, thus helping mankind.

FOX NEWS vs. FROGS—the main points

FOX: Always the lowest, pettiest ideas....FROGS: Always moist
FOX: Breeds paranoia ........................FROGS: Eat pests
FOX: Slave to ratings .........................FROGS: Friends of man
FOX: Loved by elderly shut-ins .............FROGS: Undetermined favorability to elderly
FOX: Justly hated by my wife...............FROGS: UNjustly hated by my wife

Just when Paul Krugman had managed to nail down a few substantive points, thus allowing his rhetorical momentum to overtake his shrimpy awkwardness, Jabba de Fox wrested the spotlight back with the obvious untruth that America has the best healthcare system in the world, and then dragged everything back to 9/11/2001 by declaring, "The #1 issue is still the safety and sovereignty of the United States. For years we've had to take our shoes off, and now a lot of people are going to have to take their underpants off." He managed to say "underpants" at least one more time, which I'm sure scored high with frightened elderly shut-ins.

Let's afford the frog some basic dignity, people.
(Like FOX, I will find ways to profit handsomely from controversy.)