Is Sean Hannity a Fraud?
I suspect that most of my readers have seen Sean Hannity on FOX or listened to his radio show - which is second only to Rush Limbaugh’s in popularity. Those who have seen or heard him know he is a proudly patriotic man who loves America. His signature phrase, “You are a great American” is familiar to faithful radio listeners. Hannity repeatedly points out that he does not consider himself a Republican but, instead, a conservative.
In light of what I have heard on his radio program together with what transpired on his television show last Monday, I’m trying to decide if Sean Hannity is clueless or simply a fraud.
Appearing Monday night on Sean Hannity’s Fox News television program, GOP gubernatorial candidate Chris Christie took the opportunity to reach past Gov. Jon Corzine’s individual term as governor, lumping him with his U.S. Senate tenure him into the bigger blender of what he sees as failed Democratic Party rule in the State of New Jersey.
“Jon Corzine has been in office statewide how long now?” Hannity wanted to know.
“Nine years,” replied Christie.
Seated beside his ally, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani packaged Christie to Hannity by contrasting him with the sitting governor.
“The people of New Jersey see a leader, and what they have instead is the absence of that,” Giuliani said.
To the question of how the Republican Party rebuilds in the wake of substantial losses over the course of the last three years, Christie told Hannity, “Part of it is tone and part the candidates.”
“At times we’ve been a little too harsh,” Christie told the Fox News host.
In contrast with those in his party who might have made other issues the chief emphasis of their campaigns, the former U.S. Attorney sold himself with his storyline, noting that the voters saw him fulfilling his duties as U.S. Attorney for seven years.
He complained that Corzine is proposing – in Christie’s words – to raise taxes by $2 billion while refusing to cut the state payroll.
I did not see the show and so I must rely on Max Pizarro’s report. I do recall listening to Hannity’s radio program a couple of weeks ago when a female caller asked him about the New Jersey primary. He tried to steer clear of the issue, saying that he didn’t get involved in state primary races and that, in his opinion, Christie and Lonegan were both “good conservative candidates.” She tried to point out the differences between Lonegan and Christie but Hannity would have none of it and moved on to another call.
It was a whiskey-tango-foxtrot moment for yours truly. What the hell was Hannity thinking? Was he even thinking at all? Does he not realize the significance of the New Jersey Republican primary to future of the party itself not to mention the future of the republic? WTF?
I contacted the Lonegan campaign and they informed me that they have been in touch with Hannity’s people non-stop to no apparent avail. To date, Hannity has yet to book Mayor Lonegan on his television show or interview the candidate on his radio program.
Sean Hannity seems like a decent, thoughtful and sympathetic person. Does he not understand what is taking place here in the Garden State? Hundreds of volunteers are knocking on doors, making phone calls, sending e-mails, blogging, calling talk radio shows and campaigning our hearts out for a good man, a great conservative and, yes, an outstanding American - Steve Lonegan - who is not only being ignored by the GOP establishment, but attacked by them for the Reagan conservatism he embraces. They are working tirelessly to ensure that Mr. Lonegan is the Republican nominee for Governor because he’s the only man who can turn this state around and bring back liberty and prosperity.
All of their work, all of their effort, everything they tried so hard to overcome was dealt a serious blow by a single televised appearance of a RINO candidate accompanied by his RINO handler, Rudy Giuliani.
In last year’s presidential race Hannity gave all the candidates a chance to speak equally. In the end he openly supported Mitt Romney because he knew in his heart McCain was the wrong candidate. Did Hannity stop to consider for one moment the effect this interview had on the grassroots supporters of Mayor Lonegan in New Jersey who regularly listen to the Sean Hannity Program? They know what is really going on in the Garden State. They know Christie is absolutely the wrong candidate - regardless of what Rudy Giuliani and Steve Forbes are saying. The grassroots know differently - and Hannity claims to be a man of the grassroots.
So I’m left wondering: Is Sean Hannity really that clueless? Or is Sean Hannity the talk radio equivalent of a potemkin village where the host adopts an elaborate facade of conservatism to mask what is little more than a self-aggrandizing agenda aimed at nothing more than ratings?
Say it ain’t so, Sean. Say it ain’t so.
Perhaps you, Manly, should be in contact w/ Hannity. You’re a convincing man with an enviable talent for words. Perhaps you can convince the man to put Lonegan on the show… OR have Lonegan call into Hannity’s radio program. He’d have virtually no choice but to put him on air.
Package up and send your considerable amount of Lonegan data, his conservative “bona fides” if you will and begin an email and mail campaign to both Hannity AND Limbaugh AND Grandy & Andy.. etc.
It’s a good idea… had I your word smithing skills I’d already be on it. However, I simply do not.
Listen to Sean for any length of time, and you will notice that even when his close friend, Rush writes someone off e.g. McCain, Sean will not necessarily follow suit.
If he has some kind of friendship or connection with the person involved, he maintains friendship and dialogue with these individuals, even if what they are promoting goes against his own personal convictions.
I think this is what is happening here in the case of Rudy Guiliani and consequently Christie, who just happens to be the beneficiary of their friendship.
The baffling thing here is Sean refusing to give any air time to a conservative like Lonegan at such a crucial time.
Sean has fought tirelessly to bring to light the fraud that is Obama, but I still don’t understand how he can claim to be a true patriot while remaining silent or “silencing” other conservatives at this important time in our country.
Does anyone have any recollection of Sean becoming closely involved with individual state battles? You hear him speak constantly of the national battle but I don’t recall him going into details regarding state wars.
In the end, I suppose it is partially about ratings and not entirely about the state of our party.
I agree with Charlotte’s analysis here. It seems to me that Sean is psuedo-sympathetic to people he’s personally friendly with; and thereby more inclined to give them his air time.
Hannity is not really a conservative although he has a past of being a neo-conservative in the way he supports a more interventionist military, etc.
He is a Romney supporter and of the east coast GOP type who is about half-way to being an insider.
He is not as grassroots. I watched on Fox as he tried to hijack the Tea Parties of April 15th.
I will though mention that he did fight for McCain against Obama during the election.
Sean is a good guy, but not the conservative he portrays himself. He is more of a GOP guy than a conservative guy.
And it is NO surprise that he probably will support Christie or Guiliani, etc. They are his people.
He is not a Lonegan man and he certainly is not one of:
Sarah’s People (not yet anyway)
Sean Hannity was way too nice to the fraud Huckabee and is always too nice when criticizing the faux conservatives like Huckabee, it al.
And therein lies the problem among so called A-lister conservative pundits - Sean being chief among them - an inability to criticize when it is due.
I have written Hannity off a long time ago as the A-lister of conservative metrosexuals.
In other words.. A complete and total wuss where it counts.
What needs to happen is ALL of the grassroots in New Jersey needs to jam the phone lines and his email inbox with very well reasoned debate points, until he looks like a fool for being so one sided regarding Christie, because if he doesn’t come along in this new revolution, he himself is irrelevant in it.
I equate not criticizing evil - and the lies of Huckabee and Christie, et al, are evil - with association of evil, and therefore only a hair breathe away from being guilty of the same.
I guarantee, if you (Manly, and others) Fedex a nicely written letter to him, he WILL READ IT!
He may not respond, but he will read it!
These are terrible times we live in and they require extraordinary measures.
I further guarantee, that if a hundred people will separately write well reasoned letters to him and send them via Fedex, he WILL change his tone and allow Lonegan on the show/s and give him equal time!!
Further, if in case I am wrong, and he gets those letters and still doesn’t change his tone, then here is a promise: I will personally call him up on his live radio show and I will chew him out till his royal butt is raw - I will get through, OH YES I WILL - true Mad Dog style , and OH YES I TALK LIKE I WRITE!!
And then if he doesn’t change, I WILL DESTROY HIM and his show in a blog, specially made for him, telling the truth.
And then I will start a radio program to take over his vacuum, OH YES I WILL!!
THAT, IS HOW ANGRY I AM regarding all things RINO and their cohort collaborators like Hannity!!
I AM SICK, SICK I TELL YOU OF THIS BULLSHIT!!!!
When I get this angry, NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING stops Mad Dog from reaching what I set out to do!
So you better take note Sean Hannity!!
Because we are not going to stand idly by while this country is being destroyed by Statists and their counterpart RINO’s and their cohart collaborators like you, little ole’ Sean Hannity!!
MARK.
MY.
WORDS!
Hannity is both a light-weight and a fraud. He is to political analysis, as Ashley Simpson is to the art of music - nothing original, just a product.
Btw, I’ve been tooling around your site reading many posts. Great stuff! Keep up the good work!
I believe that Hannity means well, he’s never impressed me as one of the brightest amongst conservatives. It’s unfortunate that he’s so easily influenced by his buds such as Giuliani.
I say he needs to be educated by our own “Mad Dog”. I wouldn’t want to jump in the kennel with you.
Call him! Educate him! … and then - easy boy … settle!
Voice commands don’t work too well for MD, ORighty.
The collar’s the thing.
Either way, Hannity’d be like a cat up a tree.
way to go MD!
Regardless of anything that Hannity states, he lost his conservative principles long ago. Only Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh have held true to conservative principles. Hannity is a defender of republicans regardless of ideology.
I remember when WABC-radio personalities, including Hannity mentor Bob Grant, facilitated the reign of NJ ex-gov RINO Christy Whitman until Gov. Whitman went with the slandering Left over some racial dust-up involving Mr, Grant.
Hannity, while good, is neither honest nor conservative.
Sorry you had to discover reality at such a critical time for New Jersey, Manly.
I DID see the show and the segment was nauseating. I am disgusted and disappointed that Sean would act so blatantly, dog-pantingly, star-struck just because Giluliani pranced in with what appeared in all essence to be his “protege”. A YUCK segment like i have never seen on the Hannity show. Beyond hosting the fraudulent Christie (”Oh, yes, Sean, I’m pro-life, pro-life!”) Sean did not even MENTION the other Republican candidate Steve Lonegan, and apparently has no intention of inviting him on for equal time. Numerous emails and phone calls have been ignored.
Therefore, FYI, numerous volunteers are staging a grassroots protest in front of the FOX Studios in NY this coming Tuesday at 6pm.
Do your damn homework Sean, and READ Christie’s record. We pro-lifers were “extremists” whom Christie ridiculed until the campaign. You’ll also note his liberal (even radical) stance on other vital issues. GRRRR!!! You;ve lost a lot of your base in NJ Hannity, big-time, unless you FIX this. In fact, I’ll PERSONALLY see to it that you lose us.
Say-boy-howdy! I sure like the conviction and tone of all of the above. I just don’t know about Mr. Hannity. I think he has gotten too big for his pants, yes? I have always thought he was a bit smarmy, but on the right side of most issues; now it seems that his personal affection for guests is more about party line and moderate advocacy than aggressive conservatism.
I find Hannity contentious and irritating. He seldom brings new stuff to the program, preferring to “debate” lefties in a “gotcha” brawl.
People like to think of Rush as an “entertainer.” He is an entertainer in the same way that Will Rogers was an “entertainer.”
Hannity, on the other hand, puts so much effort into entertaining, that he grates on my nerves. His so-called “American Panel” or whatever he calls it, is a good example of “entertainment Hannity- style.” Anybody that thinks Geraldo Rivera is anything but an Obama butt-boy has a problem.
Was never impressed with Hannity, his depth of knowledge on issues is zip. This “your a Great American” stuff grates. All you have to do is write a song mentioning Mom, Flag, Apple Pie, Red, White and Blue, make several million dollars and you are a great American. The only thing real about Hannity was Marty and he’s gone now.
Does the term “getting a swelled head” ring true here? Lonegan does not fit the model Hannity is setting up for himself.
I am extremely dissapointed in Sean on this as well. I remember the call from a woman in NJ also, pleading with Hannity to get involved in the NJ governors race. He dissed her by saying that he couldn’t get involved in the primary because there were two good candidates running. Once the primary was over then he’d come out.
This kind of thinking flies in the face of everything Sean says he’s about. Just one look at Lonegan would determine that he is the TRUE conservative, the only one with a chance to turn this state around. But, Sean’s personal ties to Guliani will not allow him to publicly back the right candidate. That says more to me about Hannity and his search for truth than anything else. I don’t listen or watch the show as much anymore, and after this probably not at all. Talk is cheap. But fighting for what is right for this country is what Steve Lonegan is about. Hannity can’t follow through. . . so I can’t listen or watch him anymore.
For the record, Hannity had on Rudy Guiliani twice to shill for the Christie campaign, including the endlessly repeated lie that the Lonegan flat tax plan will raise taxes on 70% of New Jersyans. Sean let that calumny pass without challenge or analysis. At first I thought that Hannity might be letting Rudy take advantage of their friendship. But many people in the Lonegan campaign, myself included, have called his show asking for equal time. To the best of my knowledge, his show has refused to return a single call made by anyone identifying themselves as being with the Lonegan campaign.
One can only wonder what Hannity’s buddy, Neal Boortz, thinks of the Christie demagoguery of the flat tax.
John R. Poirier, Esq, Candidate for NJ State Assembly, District 16, Conservative Republicans Putting Taxpayers First
I agree with most of the posts, especially the reference to Mark Levin by Di Marco on the 23d. Hannity, of course, has the right to do what’s commercially best for him, and I the right as mentioned by several others, to stop listening to him. Not such a loss.
However, I don’t agree with the “protest” in front of FOX re: Hannity. It gives him the appearance of a gravitas he does not merit and will be spun as his resisting pressure and being resolute.
I believe Mark Levin is the more astute commentator, one who is philosophically in line with Steve Lonegan, and I have written to him asking that he find some time for Mr. Lonegan on his show. The Conservative Manifesto is very much aligned with principles espoused and practiced by Mr. Lonegan and I will be surprised if Mr. Levin will not find a slot for him.
Perhaps others could write as well, or call during his show:Phone: 1-877-381-3811
(Mon. - Fri. 6pm to 9pm)
Email: marklevin.show@citcomm.com