Chris Wallace, We Hardly Knew Ye

For a veteran guest, Chris Wallace, the host of Fox News Sunday, made a seriously rookie mistake this morning. But first, he and Imus engaged in a chat that was equal parts informative, entertaining, and passive-aggressive; you know, the usual.
 
Asked what he thought about President Obama’s 13-minute speech on Afghanistan last night, Wallace initially replied, “About the length of time he spoke?” Realizing Imus wanted his view on the content, Wallace deemed the address “sensible,” even though he suspects many people would disagree.
 
“After ten years there and the commitment of 100,000 troops, and weighing all of our other commitments and the cost of this, it seems to me the idea of drawing down is not a rush for the exit,” he said of Obama’s announcement that 10,000 troops would return home by the end of this year, followed by an additional 20,000 by the end of 2012.
 
None of the so-called “armchair generals” in Washington, DC really know the right approach, in his view. “The idea of nation-building, and creating a stable situation in Afghanistan, seems dimmer and dimmer,” Wallace said, adding, “An unending commitment there is crazy, foolish, and has no guarantee of success.”
 
Imus feels, and has always felt, that regardless of whatever progress American troops have made in Afghanistan, the country will revert back to the way it was before “as soon as the last American troops leave.” The only difference, as he sees it, is that the Taliban will be more motivated than ever to “glom onto those 90 nuclear weapons in Pakistan.”
 
Wallace disagreed, noting that the surge of American troops has, since 2009, helped push the Taliban back. “This is really sad,” Imus said. “You lapping the Obama kool-aid.”
 
As tensions mounted, Imus steered the conversation to last week’s appearance by comedian and Daily Show host Jon Stewart on Fox News Sunday. “He was good, you were good,” Imus told Wallace, who has found a common theme among critics of the interview.
 
“If you were a liberal, you thought he just wiped the floor with me,” he said. “If you’re a conservative, you thought I wiped the floor with him.”
 
Stewart’s claim that he is “just a comedian” is hooey, as Wallace sees it. “I don’t think he is ‘just a comedian,’ and I don’t think he wasn’t to be ‘just a comedian,’” he said, then laughed at the idea that he edited the interview to make his guest look bad, as Stewart has alleged. “I think if he looked bad, it was his fault.”
 
Imus and Wallace are both fans of Stewart’s, but neither agreed with his comment that his job—to be funny about the news—is harder than Wallace’s. “You know what’s a hard job?” Imus said. “Trying to pay your mortgage when you don’t have a job.”
 
Though Stewart denied he has an ideological agenda, Imus suspects otherwise. “He probably, in his heart, doesn’t think he does,” he said. “But he has to recognize that perception is reality.”
 
To which Wallace callously replied, “Did you come up with that yourself?”
 
This Sunday on his show, Wallace will interview Rep. Michele Bachmann, who is running for President and who Matt Taibbi recently described as “evil.”
 
“Somebody who takes in 23 foster children and helps bring them up in her house is not evil,” Wallace said. Imus noted that people get paid to take in foster children, and Wallace shot back, “How many foster children have you brought up?”
 
It wasn’t exactly the best tact to take with someone who has devoted the last 13 years of his life—not to mention considerable resources—to running a working cattle ranch for kids with cancer. Though Wallace acknowledged, “That probably was not the way to go with you,” Imus had little sympathy for his guest’s faux pas.
 
“You’re another elite, liberal phony,” he said. “Get off my radio program.”
 
-Julie Kanfer