Fox News STILL Smearing Obama

Fox News is a complete joke.

Nearly a month after CNN thoroughly debunked its preposterous "madrasa" smear of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, Fox News, amazingly, is still peddling revised versions of this steaming loaf of journalistic dung. I quote none other than the former journalist, Brit Hume, directly:

New Information on Whether Barack Obama Was Once a Practicing Muslim

Never a Muslim?

Barack Obama's chief spokesman has been saying since January that the Democratic presidential candidate has never been a practicing Muslim. Now the Los Angeles Times is reporting that Obama was registered as a Muslim when he attended primary school in Indonesia.

The Times quotes friends and teachers as saying Obama took Muslim religious classes in school and went to prayers at a local mosque. The Obama campaign reacted to the story this morning by reiterating its position that the senator "has never been a Muslim, was not raised a Muslim and is a committed Christian."

You know, I don't even have to write this one. A buddy of mine wrote it for me when this was sent to me:

"Would it make me a MOTO to point out that he most likely didn't fill out his own registration for primary school, and that it was most likely completed by his MUSLIM father? What 5 year-old actually "practices" any religion? Can any of us honestly say that we were "practicing Christians" at that age?"

Indeed...

Now, back to Fox News. Their apologists may argue that since they used the LA Times as their source they shouldn't be blamed for this shoddy reporting and that my problem is really caused by the notoriously "liberally biased" west coast daily. But given the recent changes at that paper, that claim is even more dubious than it otherwise would have been.

Furthermore, if one were to take the time to look up the actual Times story Fox cited, one would find that it wasn't quite as cut-and-dried as they implied. He attended Catholic schools, Muslim schools and secular public schools, for instance. All of this, of course, was reflective of his mixed parentage:

His former Roman Catholic and Muslim teachers, along with two people who were identified by Obama's grade-school teacher as childhood friends, say Obama was registered by his family as a Muslim at both of the schools he attended...

[Snip]

In 1968, Obama began first grade at St. Francis Assisi Foundation School, just around the corner from his home...

[Snip]

"At that time, Barry was also praying in a Catholic way, but Barry was Muslim," Dharmawan said in Obama's old classroom, where she still teaches 39 years later. "He was registered as a Muslim because his father, Lolo Soetoro, was Muslim."

Now, isn't that what I just said. Shouldn't this obvious fact have occurred to the learned Brit Hume before he filed his report? If not, shouldn't he have have read it in the LA Times story he cited?

Fox News: They distort. I deride.