Alan Colmes on the Defense, For a Change

Alan Colmes’s appearance this morning more closely resembled a hostage situation than an actual substantive interview, with Imus accusing his guest of misrepresenting his opinion for fact before Colmes, a Fox News contributor and syndicated radio host, had barely uttered a word.
 
Accused immediately of having an agenda, Colmes, a known liberal, defended himself by saying, “That’s called a point of view.” He added, for clarification, which was obviously needed, “Don’t we each speak from our own truth, and see life through different prisms?”
 
Mocked for sounding like a weenie, Colmes insisted that, unlike Imus alleged Frank Rich of doing in yesterday’s New York Times, he does not twist facts to make them suit his argument.
 
“When I’m on O’Reilly, I’m talking to an audience that doesn’t agree with me, and I try to substantiate it with actual numbers,” Colmes said, referring to the weekly segment he does, along with his right-wing sister-in-law Monica Crowley, on The O’Reilly Factor. Asked if he likes O’Reilly, Colmes dismissively said, “He’s very good at what he does.”
 
Which Imus likened to “saying the fat girl has a good personality.”
 
Colmes was disappointed today, and not just because the Democrats got their butts kicked last week, losing their majority in the House and lessening it in the Senate. “I was hoping O’Donnell and Angle would win,” he said, referring to two of the higher profile, more insane Tea Party candidates. “I wanted to get some popcorn and see those crazies walk on the national stage for a while.”
 
The presence of Tea Partiers like Christine O’Donnell in Delaware and Sharron Angle in Nevada likely cost Republicans the Senate, in Colmes’s view, and he chastised the so-called “grassroots” Tea Party organization for being dishonest about its origins.
 
“They’re backed by Dick Armey, and Freedom Works, and they’ve got the Koch brothers, who put millions of dollars into it,” Colmes said, lest Imus be convinced otherwise.
 
To Imus’s point that Colmes is being manipulated by people on the Left like George Soros, Comles protested that at least Soros donates money to liberal causes openly, whereas the many of the big money Tea Party backers remain anonymous, thanks to a Supreme Court decision earlier this year that granted them that luxury.
 
Despite everyone else thinking otherwise, Colmes maintains that the President is doing “a terrific job, under very difficult circumstances.” Though he’d like to see Obama do more—like actually close Guantanamo Bay and bring troops home from Afghanistan—he supports the health care bill, telling Imus that Republicans want to repeal the legislation, thereby punishing kids with preexisting conditions, and putting a lifetime cap on the amount of insurance a person can have.
 
But all Imus heard was Colmes’s outright support for offing grandma, something Republicans have insisted will be a consequence of health care reform. “I hope you’re happy,” he said.
 
-Julie Kanfer