David Bauder of the Associated Press attempts to unravel the knotted complexities of the Democratic Party’s objection to Fox News hosting their presidential primary debates.

Note to David Bauder: It’s not complicated, and you’ve still missed point.

Bauder begins his exercise by asserting that Democrats are engaged in this dispute in order to “target” Fox, just as they do President Bush. So right off the bat he has reduced the dispute to a partisan triviality and is dismissing the genuine concerns that the network is verifiably unfriendly territory for Democrats. Worse than that, however, he perpetuates the utterly false and shallow accusation that by ditching Fox, Democrats are afraid to face the psuedo-news network:

“The risk to this strategy is it could make the candidates look like, well, weenies.”

Note to David Bauder: On the contrary, it makes them look stronger.

There is nothing about standing up for yourself, refusing to let known enemies exploit you, and challenging liars and propagandists, that can reasonably be construed as weakness. Fox’ own Bill O’Reilly pulls this stunt all the time, calling those who decline to appear on his program cowards. The real reason people turn down O’Reilly, and Fox News debates, is that they don’t want to dirty themselves with the biased, low-brow, anti-intellectual, sensationalism that Fox dispenses by the truckload. What’s more, poking a finger in the eye of the biggest bully on the cable news block is not the act of a coward.

The ludicrous notion that assertively rejecting Fox suggests an inability to face hostile foreign leaders, as Bauder reports, fails on two grounds: As previously noted, it is strength, not weakness, that is displayed by the shunning of Fox; and Fox is not the equivalent of a sovereign state that might have an impact on U. S. national security and it’s just plain silly to elevate them to such status.

While there has been voluminous documentation that Fox operates as a virtual arm of the Republican PR machine, Bauder obliging illustrates the problem in his own article, so we don’t even have to turn the page for corroborating evidence of Fox bias:

“A feud against Fox might not be the best long-term plan, either. People there have been known to hold a grudge.”

This ironic, and apparently inadvertent, admission really tells the whole story. Fox is not an impartial observer. If you cross them, they will “hold a grudge.” And Bauder acknowledges that they “have been known” to do so in the past.

Note to David Bauder: A reputable news organization does not hold grudges. And Democrats who refuse to certify Fox as a legitimate journalistic enterprise deserve praise for their integrity and their courage.