Last updated on July 18th, 2023 at 11:18 am
Led by Sean Hannity and Mike Huckabee, Fox News is engaging in a smear campaign by claiming that Joe Biden was drunk during the vice presidential debate.
Here is the video of Hannity via Media Matters:
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Transcript of Hannity with Mitch McConnell,
HANNITY: I noticed that you guys were giving away bourbon to people over here.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): It’s the home of bourbon.
HANNITY: I wonder if Joe had some before the debate.
In case you thought that was an isolated incident, Mike Huckabee repeated the Biden drinking line on Fox News today:
Huckabee said, “Well, I thought Joe Biden came across like a guy that you meet at a cocktail party or some political event. An obnoxious drunk who’s loud and boisterous, and interrupts every conversation. He just is the kind of guy that you want to get away from.”
Lesser Fox News personalities like Greg Gutfeld and Eric Bolling took to their Twitter accounts to claim that Biden was either drinking or drunk. What makes this personal smear particularly tasteless is that due to a family history of alcoholism, Joe Biden doesn’t drink at all. In October 2008, The New York Times reported, “Senator Biden does not drink at all, and he is frank about the reason. ‘There are enough alcoholics in my family,’ he said last month as he sipped cranberry juice on a train ride from Washington to Wilmington.”
Fox News and the rest of the right can’t handle the fact that Joe Biden absolutely destroyed their anointed intellectual golden boy Paul Ryan on ideas and substance.
Notice that the Romney campaign, the Republican Party, and their media outlets aren’t talking about Paul Ryan today. Rep. Ryan was so bad in the debate that they are trying to do damage control by attacking Vice President Biden.
Just when Republicans started feeling good about the election again, Joe Biden stepped up to the plate and exposed every single weakness in the Romney/Ryan ticket. Biden hit the ticket’s connection to the unpopular Republican House, wildly unpopular positions on Social Security and Medicare, a lack of specifics, a tax plan that would benefit the wealthy, their weakness on foreign policy, and the fact that they have a general disdain for 30%-47% of the population.
It would have been easier for Republicans today if Ryan would have made a gaffe that they could explain away. The reality is that Joe Biden set the stage for the total dismantling of the Romney/Ryan ticket, and most importantly the agenda it is advocating for. Biden’s message was extremely populist and popular, so Fox News is trying to discredit the messenger.
Spewing hateful falsehoods against the vice president can’t erase the fact that it wasn’t just Paul Ryan who lost last night. In the wake of the VP debate, the biggest loser of all is the Republican agenda.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
