Observations From the Back Row: My Take on Ted Kopple versus Sean Hannity

By Rich Kozlovich

This article, Why CBS should #ReleaseTheHannityTape NOW, by: Robert Eno appeared on March 28 saying:

Last weekend on “CBS Sunday Morning,” the program tackled the problem of “The great divide: Politics in the Age of Trump” by hosting a discussion between veteran newsman Ted Koppel and Fox News’ Sean Hannity about the role of conservative voices in the direction of the country. It was readily apparent that CBS wasn’t trying to solve the divide, but rather sought to add to it.

He went on to say:

Koppel railed against opinion “taking over” journalism. He went so far as saying that Hannity is “bad for America.” His reasoning is a slap in the face of the millions of American conservatives he assumes are unable to distinguish news from opinion. He further goes on to say that these conservatives’ beliefs are not fact based.

Below is Hannity's response to this, and it's a good one, explaining how this interview by Ted Koppel was "fake news". 



For years I watched 60 minutes, and like most Americans I thought they were honest reporters. As time went by I became disillusioned and stopped watching for a number of reasons. 

They did a hit piece on Chlordane, a pesticide EPA irresponsibly forced off the market. It was clear they weren't telling "the" story - they were telling "their" story - and that story was inaccurate, but that inaccurate story fit the narrative of "their" story, just as did their hit piece on Alar, which was blatant journalistic corruption.

Often times 60 Minutes would do a story and state that one party (In one case it was Eli Lilly the pharmaceutical company) refused to be interviewed to tell their side of the story. This of course gave the impression they had something to hide.  Well, maybe that's not "the" story after all!

Around that time Mike Wallace did a story on the Unification Church, commonly referred to as the Moonies. The church said they would do the interview but the entire interview had to be shown. Wallace, while explaining what we were going to see, scoffed saying that was impossible and that every story had to be edited for time. Okay, that makes sense, but what they finally agreed to was the Moonies would also film the interview, and that clearly rattled Wallace, because he wasn't the same interviewer in that program

It was obvious to me he was intimidated by the fact any editing they did could be debunked, and he was obviously uncomfortable. And nothing particularly shocking came out as a result. Then I realized beyond any shadow of a doubt the reason why people refused to be interviewed by these media propagandists was because these media people are corrupt.

For over 25 years I've considered 60 Minutes to be unworthy of my time, and Dan Rather was the icing on the cake for many others, and not one thing they've said or done has changed my mind about the Main Stream Media.  There's a reason why news blogs - like this one - are so popular.  We're only interested in telling "the" story, not some fictional propaganda to promote some left wing agenda, or any agenda for that matter.   It's all about the facts and the willingness to follow them wherever they may lead.

My personal motto:  De Omnibus Dubitandum - Question everything!