Terrible Ted & the Ted-Heads

I watched a little Fox News yesterday, thinking about how its proponents claim its news coverage is unbiased, and is completely separate from its commentary shows.

Yet the news anchor then kicked it over to a Bill O'Reilly interview of a radio man who'd spoken to the alleged male escort of Ted Haggard, and the radio guy talked about how "everyone believed the escort's story till today," when news broke of the escort failing a polygraph test. Neither O'Reilly nor the Fox anchor mentioned the many qualifications that the polygraph adminstrator gave regarding how the escort hadn't slept and was under duress.

In the wake of the firing of Haggard and the "proof" of "sexually immoral conduct," I find it fascinating to see the gamesmanship that's been involved in attempting to make this "just about politics." First Haggard said he never met the escort. Then he admitted some ostensibly harmless stuff with the escort. Now this. Why the initial denial of knowing the escort -- did he need time to gather his thoughts and emotions? (And will this re-wire the angry way in which Clinton-critics railed at the ex-president's own sliding confessions?)

You can now sense why Jim Dobson swung so quickly from such a hostile position against the media to such a gentle position regarding Haggard a few days ago.

Lots to think about regarding this issue. Haggard was a very reasonable evangelical, not a fire-breather. He was a moderate and even a progressive on environnmental issues. His support for certain social morality issues wasn't offered in an in-your-face manner that's all too common.

But what was going on inside Ted Haggard? And how will it affect public discussions of morality? I can't find online a picture of him in his minivan with his wife and kids, but gawd do I feel for his wife after seeing the look on her face.