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"Rush Limbaugh to be on in minutes" Gretchen covered Rush twenty years ago.

Chris Wallace really went after the Fox and Friends crew this morning for spending a too much time discussing Obama's just a typical white person remark. He needs to move over to MSNBC.

I count Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace among the fairest and most incisive interviewers in the business, and hope his tenure at Fox News is a long one. Anyone who can relentlessly cross-exam Mitt Romney on his changed position on abortion the way Wallace did a while back, then turn around and provoke Bill Clinton to near the point of taking a poke at him, is doing his job and playing no favorites. But should Wallace ever wish a change of venue, never fear: MSNBC apparently can find a place for him. Wallace made some news when, appearing on...

I've been a Fox News viewer from the very beginning, long before Fox & Friends was created. I remember when E.D. first appeared, filling in for Alison Costarini during the morning news. I've watched Steve, E.D., Brian faithfully all these years, and found them a wonderful break from the MSM's morning spew. I will admit, I miss E.D., but I was willing to given Gretchen the benefit of the doubt at taking her place. Her performance has been lackluster and this morning she just sank the show for me. How? Gretchen Carlson went out of her way to correct Steve...

The Fox News Channel shakes up its anchor roster a little today, with former WABC/ Ch. 7 correspondent E.D. Hill moving from "Fox & Friends" to the network's "Fox Live" anchor team. Former CBS News anchor Gretchen Carlson will take Hill's place as a co-host of the freewheeling morning show. "Gretchen's warm personality and dynamic energy are a perfect fit for 'Fox & Friends,'" Bill Shine, senior vice president of programming, said in a statement. Also starting today on FNC is "Live Desk With Martha MacCallum" at 1 p.m., replacing "Dayside," and a full hour of news with Jane Skinner...

by Mark Finkelstein September 3, 2006 - 09:54 It was a rollicking episode of 'The Long & The Short of It' this morning, and even taking my personal biases into account, it was hard not to score it 2-0 for the tall man. The regular Sunday-morning feature of Fox & Friends Weekend pits long, conservative Newsday and TCS columnist Jim Pinkerton against short, liberal Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News. The opening topic this morning, in a match refereed by FNC host Kiran Chetry, was a report that retired General and former Dem presidential nomination-seeker Wesley Clark will be issuing...

by Mark Finkelstein July 30, 2006 If private citizens met a few years ago with the ambassador of a hostile country, then top US officials should do the same in the current sensitive context. That was the liberal logic Ellen Ratner of Talk Radio News put on display this morning during 'The Long & the Short of It' segment on Fox & Friends Weekend. The topic was the conflict in the Middle East. Ratner decreed that the time had come for bringing in the "partners" in the area, and that in addition to Lebanon, "that means Syria." Syria? Partner? What-evuh....

by Mark Finkelstein July 9, 2006 - 14:12 Twice in less than 24 hours, conservative columnist Jim Pinkerton left liberal talking-head rivals at a loss for words on the issue of missile defense. Pinkerton's first victim was Neal Gabler, on last evening's Fox News Watch. In the context of the North Korean missile tests, liberal Gabler flatly stated: "Missile defense does not work. That is what we have learned." Shot back Pinkerton: "The Japanese believe in it. That's why they're building it right now." Gabler's silence was golden. Then this morning, Pinkerton made his regular appearance with Ellen Ratner in...

by Mark Finkelstein June 27, 2006 Come on, Carl. The Tigers are in first place. GM announced some good news this morning. The sun is gonna shine again. Why so cranky? The senior Democratic senator from Michigan had some very testy exchanges with Fox & Friends' Brian Kilmeade this morning. The topic was possible troop reductions in Iraq. Levin has been leading the Dem charge in alleging that the Bush administration is orchestrating the drawdowns with an eye on the November elections. At one point, the give-and-take went like this Brian: "Judging by conditions on the ground, do you think...

by Mark Finkelstein May 13, 2006 If you're not outraged by the NSA program that monitors phone-calling patterns, you're probably . . . too dumb to understand its implications. That, in a nutshell, and I do mean nutshell, was Ellen Ratner's argument on this morning's 'Long & the Short of It' segment on Fox & Friends Weekend. Oh, well, that - and opening our borders with Mexico. Host Julian Phillips [who expressed his personal opposition to the NSA program] put it to Ratner that "most Americans don't care about this. They say the NSA should do that to keep our...

by Mark Finkelstein April 29, 2006 Give Ellen Ratner credit for consistency - if not for logic. For the second week running Ratner used her 'Long & Short of It' platform on Fox & Friends Weekend to tout her solution to the immigration problem - sheer surrender in the form of 'open borders'. Here is Ratner's rant on the same subject from last week's show. Ratner: "I want to say again . . . I know it gets a lot of mail, why I am in favor of really having open borders between Canada and Mexico, because there is not...

by Mark Finkelstein on April 22, 2006 - 07:56. When Ellen Ratner went a couple weeks without any major liberal loopiness, one wondered whether perhaps Jim Pinkerton was having a salubrious effect on her. But things got back to normal this morning when Ratner let Pinkerton goad her into boasting that she supports "open immigration." The opening topic on today's 'Long & the Short of It' segment on Fox & Friends Weekend dealt with Howard Dean's recent claim that job # 1 in his view is tougher border security. Pinkerton smelled politics, describing Dean as "somebody who is reading the...

by Mark Finkelstein April 1, 2006 Regular readers of this column know the delight that has been taken in skewering Ellen Ratner for her loopy liberalism, as here, here and here. You can thus imagine my surprise when, on this morning's 'Long & the Short of It' segment on Fox & Friends Weekend, Ratner offered up some tough talk on immigration Ratner's remarks were simpatico with the take of Jim Pinkerton, the conservative side of the equation who is a Newsday and Tech Central columnist. An aside: Pinkerton is one of the rare conservative commentators willing to roll up his...

A 'tension convention' - that's how Don Imus would have described the ill-concealed ill will on this morning's Fox & Friends Weekend between Juliet Huddy and Julian Phillips. Huddy is a former host of the show who was making a guest co-hosting appearance. She wasted no time in setting the confrontational tone. In her opening comments, Juliet congratulated host Gretchen Carlson on "doing a fantastic job" then pointed to Phillips saying "and Julian, you're doing a . . . " as her voice trailed off in a sarcastic riff. "I decided to come back to harrass you," Huddy continued, as...

by Mark Finkelstein March 11, 2006 Ellen Ratner doesn't just like John McCain. She doesn't even just love him. Nope. Ellen lov-v-v-v-v-es [as FCC rules require us to describe him] "the maverick senator from Arizona." But the question arises: just how influential will Ellen's adoration will be for Republicans choosing their 2008 presidential candidate? Can we imagine they will not be particularly swayed by the whims of a woman who openly rooted for the war in Iraq to go badly so as to damage President Bush politically? Ratner's remarks came in the course of this morning's 'Long and the Short...

Those of us who are, let's say, not necessarily huge fans of Julian Phillips, co-host of Fox & Friends Weekend, didn't have to wait long for some fresh grist for our mill. In the first few minutes of this morning's show, we: 1. we learned that Julian wears driving gloves while driving his pride & joy, a super-customized Mercedes; 2. saw the ostentatiously religious Phillips manage to slip in a reference to his church attendance; and 3. witnessed him discuss in the same sentence the death of the West Virginia miners and that of . . . a whale. At...

by Mark Finkelstein January 15, 2006 - 08:04 Once might be excused as an aberration, but twice signals a troubling trend. On Saturday's Fox & Friends Weekend, over-promoted host Julian Phillips seemed to downplay the threat posed by Iran's nuclear ambitions. He implied that there was limited cause for concern since Iran has agreed agreed to allow International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors to carry out surprise inspections of its nuclear sites with as little as two hours notice. Phillips was back at it this morning. His guest was Barry Schweid senior diplomatic correspondent for AP and a Fox News contributor....

by Mark Finkelstein December 31, 2005 - 07:56 In their heart of hearts, do the liberal media believe that when it comes to the struggle against terrorism, we are truly at war? To judge by liberal Newsday columnist Ellis Henican's performance on this morning's Fox & Friends Weekend, you would have to conclude not. Thankfully, fellow Newsday columnist Jim Pinkerton was there to remind his colleague of some cold, hard facts. The topic was the Justice Department's investigation into the leaks behind the New York Times' publication of the highly-classified program of NSA surveillance of possible Al-Qaeda-related phone calls. Henican...

by Mark Finkelstein December 3, 2005 - 07:34 Readers of my NewsBusters entries know that Ellen Ratner, the short end of the "Long & Short of It" feature at Fox & Friends Weekend, has been a frequent object of my ire, as seen here http://newsbusters.org/node/2970, here http://newsbusters.org/node/2062 and here http://newsbusters.org/node/1782. It's thus saying a mouthful that the puerile performance of pinch-hitter Ellis Henican this morning was almost enough to make one long for the short Ratner. Almost. Henican took on fellow Newsday columnist Jim Pinkerton, who normally locks horns with Ratner in the segment. The topic was Iraqi pre-war intelligence....

by Mark Finkelstein October 30, 2005 - 08:23. Readers of my entries here and at Free Republic know that over the months I've enjoyed skewering Julian when he has let his liberal slip show. But this morning, Julian sang a very different song. The context was a report that Bill Clinton yesterday urged his fellow Democrats to speak out bluntly on controversial issues, from abortion to religion. Phillips had this to say: "You can speak up and be tough but the question is, do you have any different solutions? And I think that's the thing with the Democrats at this...