SALON

Thursday, Feb 22, 2007 1:21 AM UTC

Sen. Bill Clinton? Really?

A new Fox News talking point doesn't seem to hold water.

By

Topics: Bill Clinton, Fox News, War Room,

We’re a little late getting to this, but we’ve been fascinated for several days by a recent article by Bill Sammon of the Washington Examiner. In his article, Sammon wrote, “If Hillary Rodham Clinton wins the presidency, some top Democrats would like to see her husband, former President Bill Clinton, appointed to serve out Hillary’s unexpired Senate term.” Fox News then took up that ball and ran with it; the story inspired hysterical commentary from Sean Hannity, who warned that “with Senator Hillary Clinton making her run for the White House, many supporters are looking at husband Bill to fill her Senate seat if she wins,” and wondered if we would be getting “two for the price of one.”

It wasn’t particularly surprising to see Sammon’s story getting pushed so hard by Fox; as a former reporter for the Republican-leaning Washington Times, Sammon should be used to that by now. It’s a familiar part of the right-wing echo chamber: A reporter like Sammon writes something that gets picked up by Brit Hume and other Fox anchors, then pushed out to the mainstream as a new talking point.

But what did surprise us, when we read Sammon’s piece, was just how little it seemed to say of what Fox said it did. The way we read it, Sammon wasn’t reporting on actual support for the appointment of Bill Clinton to his wife’s Senate seat — he was asking prominent Clinton supporters how they would feel if it happened. For instance, Harold Ickes, President Clinton’s former deputy chief of staff, is quoted only as saying, “As a senator, he’d be a knockout. He knows issues, he loves public policy and he’s a good politician.” Paul Begala, another former advisor to the president, was quoted similarly.

Sammon didn’t respond to a request for comment, and neither did Ickes or Begala, but University of Virginia professor Larry Sabato, who was also quoted in the story, did. In an interview with Salon, he said that he had asked Sammon if the reporter had any information on serious consideration of the possibility of Bill Clinton’s appointment to the Senate and was told “it was a chitchat piece.”

“People haven’t gotten that far,” Sabato said. “I certainly don’t think [Clinton supporters] are plotting to do that. It’s not part of the dialogue, and I don’t think it would be a serious consideration for anybody yet.”

Alex Koppelman is a staff writer for Salon. More Alex Koppelman.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 16 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations