Porter

You know, speaking of mischief, last year, candidate Barack Obama stood on a sidewalk in Toledo, Ohio, and first let it slip to Joe the Plumber that hewanted to, quote, “spread the wealth around.” At that time, I have to admit that I went on TV, on Fox News, and publicly engaged in what I guess wassomerather mischievous speculation about whether Barack Obama really advocated socialism, a premise that privately Ifound rather far-fetched.
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At the timeSammon made these “mischievous speculations,”he was Fox News’s Washington deputy managing editor, and it


Introduction: Not Necessarily the News
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washis job to oversee the reporting of the news on one of ourcountry’s major cable networks. Yet here, in front of a friendly audience, on a luxury cruise anocean away from the United States,he was candidly, nonchalantly admitting to consciously misrepre-senting the ideology of a presidential candidate to Fox’saudiencedays before an election.E-mails we obtained from that time, written by Sammon and aFox producer, show that this calculated smear against Obamawasnot an on-air slip but part of a coordinated campaign of decep-tion. Not only had Sammon personally appeared on the network to make these charges againstBarack Obama, but he had also sent an e-mail to journalists who worked for him, encouraging themto cover the Democratic candidate’s “racial obsessions” andsup-posed connections to Marxism.
From:
Sammon, Bill
Sent:
Monday, October 27, 2008 1:02 PM
To:
069 -Politics; 169 -SPECIAL REPORT;030 -Root (FoxNews.