It Was a Good Day to Be Chris Wallace

Finally back from a few weeks of vacation in Martha’s Vineyard, Chris Wallace, host of Fox News Sunday, happily accepted some uncharacteristic praise from the I-Man.
 
“I saw you ask Michele Bachmann if she was a flake,” Imus said, referring to the attention-grabbing incident of a few weeks ago. “I thought it was completely innocent on your part. I didn’t think it was inappropriate. You did it with a little chuckle, I didn’t think it was disrespectful.”
 
What’s more, Imus continued, “I thought she was a jerk for not cutting you some slack and laughing about it just to demonstrate some self-deprecation. She could have answered it easily by saying, ‘Here’s why I’m not a flake…’ But she didn’t. She hung you out to dry, and I thought it was unfair.”
 
Feeling more love than he ever dreamed possible, Wallace thanked Imus for his support, and explained that while he thought the topic was legitimate and he would ask Bachmann the question again if given the chance, he admitted he could have phrased it better.
 
“She has said some questionable comments, things that were demonstrably wrong in the past, and this was in the immediate aftermath of a poll that showed she’s now the number two candidate in the Republican field,” Wallace said. “Does she have to be more careful with what she says? If I had asked that question, I don’t think I would have had a problem.”
 
It was not until after the show, when he read e-mails from viewers, that Wallace realized he offended some people, and apologized for what had come off as a rude remark.
 
“Most of the people who send e-mails are morons, including the ones who send them to this program,” Imus said, then corrected Wallace’s suggestion that he does not “respect” his audience. “The ones who send the e-mails, which is a very small percentage of the audience…most of the time they’re disgruntled mouth-breathers, sitting there drunk on their sofas.”
 
He added, in conclusion, “They shouldn’t be allowed to have a computer.”
 
Neither should anybody in Washington, DC, if they don’t reach an agreement—and soon—on the looming debt crisis. “These talks are not going well,” Wallace said, referring to ongoing negotiations between President Obama and Congressional leaders over how to most responsibly raise the debt ceiling. According to reports, a frustrated Obama stormed out of a meeting yesterday.
 
“I have to think that wiser heads would prevail, but I’ll be honest, Don—I would have thought wiser heads would have prevailed a long time ago,” Wallace said. To make matters worse, Moody’s issued a warning yesterday that it would review U.S. debt to consider downgrading it from triple-A status to something much less desirable.
 
Like Stuart Varney, Connell McShane, and Dagen McDowell, Wallace thinks ultimately some deal will be reached before the August 2^nd deadline. “I don’t say that based on anything other than common sense,” he warned Imus. “And that doesn’t seem to be prevailing here in Washington.”
 
Or, most days, on the Imus in the Morning program.
 
-Julie Kanfer