The liberal website Slate issued a cynical, hate-filled obituary for Fox News host Alan Colmes just a few hours after his passing Thursday.
“Alan Colmes, Buffoon and Patsy, Was Fox News’ Original Liberal Weakling,” declared the article’s headline.
Slate’s Issac Chotiner wrote that Colmes, who died at age 66 following a brief illness, deserved scorn for not being a good enough liberal.
“Colmes was the most absurd, useless, and mocked television personality in America for many years, precisely because he was nice,” Chotiner wrote.
“In the context of Fox News, being a nice guy — and a ‘liberal’ nice guy at that — meant being a buffoon, and a patsy. Colmes not only played the part to perfection — he defined it,” the writer continued.
Apparently, in the eyes of Slate, the fact that Colmes was considered a good friend and colleague by the personalities at Fox News is worthy of condemnation in and of itself.
Chotiner went on to berate Colmes for his performance as co-host with Sean Hannity of Hannity & Colmes, a show he described as a “dreadful, morally bankrupt, Foxified version of Crossfire,” CNN’s point-counterpoint political show.
“The joke about Hannity & Colmes was always that Hannity dominated it to an extent that Colmes was left as a mere bystander,” he wrote.
Chotiner argued that because of the liberal co-host’s inadequate performance, the show was often “racist or homophobic or Islamophobic.”
He wasn’t finished. The writer then accused Colmes of intentionally downplaying his intelligence during his time on Fox News in a scheme to “make liberals look dumb.”
“In short, he was smart enough to know he was being used, and to take the money that his services demanded,” Chotiner argued. “If this is something less than morally reprehensible, it is still pretty gross.”
Slate’s vitriolic obituary for Colmes was almost universally condemned, even by longtime readers of the magazine.
“Just an unnecessarily cruel article, I am cancelling ,
“Alan Colmes’s decency and kindness were not weaknesses, but rather strengths,” wrote another in defense of the Fox News host.
“I can’t stand Trump and enjoy reading Slate every day. But this is absurd. Slate should be embarrassed.” wrote another reader.
