Hume calls Froomkin backlash “quiet grumbling”; omits Domenech tirade

Written by Ben Armbruster

Published

In reporting on The Washington Post's decision to hire Republican activist Ben Domenech as a blogger on its website, Fox News' Brit Hume claimed that the Post hired Domenech “to quiet grumbling about liberal [Post] columnist Dan Froomkin.” However, Hume ignored Domenech's own criticisms of Froomkin, including his labeling of Froomkin as a “hack,” “a lying weasel-faced Democrat shill” and “one of the dozen or so people in the world” that he detests.


On the March 22 edition of Fox News' Special Report, host and Fox News Washington managing editor Brit Hume reported on a Washington Post decision to hire Republican activist Ben Domenech as a blogger on its website. Hume claimed that the Post hired Domenech “to quiet grumbling about liberal [Post] columnist Dan Froomkin." But in characterizing complaints about Froomkin -- whom he labeled a “liberal” without citing support for the assertion -- as “grumbling,” Hume ignored Domenech's own criticisms of Froomkin. Domenech has called Froomkin a “hack,” and “a lying weasel-faced Democrat shill” and has also said Froomkin is “one of the dozen or so people in the world” that he detests.

As the Eschaton weblog recently noted, “Augustine,” Domenech's reported pseudonym, responded to a RedState blogger post criticizing Froomkin by writing: “I've just gotta say it: Dan Froomkin is without question a lying weasel-faced Democrat shill.” In another comment on the same blog post, Domenech (also as “Augustine”) lumped Froomkin onto the list of people he hates:

I just have this specific and deep-rooted dislike for everything Dan Froomkin says and does. He's one of the dozen or so people in the world that I just detest - along with Noam Chomsky, Eric Alterman, Louis Farrakhan, Barbra Streisand, Kate Michelman, Mitch Albom, Michael Irvin, David Duke, Peter Singer, and Rick Reilly.

Media Matters for America also previously noted (here and here) that as recently as March 2, “Augustine” trashed Froomkin on RedState, writing that his “status as leader of the hack is without compare.” Domenech also agreed with a RedState commenter that Froomkin is “an embarrassment to the saner heads at [The Washington Post].”

From the March 22 edition of Fox News' Special Report with Brit Hume:

HUME: And The Washington Post has added a conservative weblog to its website, and some on the left who read that site don't like it one bit claiming they have no comparable liberal voice there. The Post hired RedState blogger Ben Domenech to quiet grumbling about liberal columnist Dan Froomkin. But the move has led to what Post political reporter Tom Edsall called “a firestorm of controversy.” Editor & Publisher magazine reports that critics bombarded Edsall with questions on the hiring during an unrelated online chat there this week.

One critic said, quote, “It would be nice if the Post could at least pretend to give some kind of equal voice to the left,” while another complained, quote, “If you're going to give the far right a forum, you'd better look hard for an anarchist or extreme radical for the other side.”