Hannity & Colmes
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Image:HannityandColmes.jpg Hannity & Colmes is an American television program on the Fox News cable television network featuring conservative host Sean Hannity and liberal host Alan Colmes.
Usually, guests are invited on to debate the two hosts on current news stories. For some issues, Hannity and Colmes invite a conservative guest and a liberal guest who debate the issue in question. Also, there are occasional one-on-one sit-down interviews. Normally, in these interviews, Hannity interviews conservative guests and Colmes interviews liberal guests.
Fox News points to this show as an example of balance when critics claim that the network is too conservative. The program's supporters claim that both hosts receive equal amounts of time, and that they introduce and debate items in an equal manner. The producer makes signals to each host to reduce crosstalk and allow the first host to have some time to ask questions of the guest without being immediately challenged by the other host. However, critics claim that the show seeks out topics that paint the left in a negative light, Hannity often expresses his points more forcefully than Colmes, Hannity is more telegenic than Colmes, Colmes is often seen as a nerd in expressing his views, Hannity is a more popular media personality than Colmes, and that Hannity is often misleading in his statements. Colmes has been doing a lot of voiceovers, when Hannity has not been on the show.
The show is also well-known for its conservative-themed campaigns, which have included ongoing specials concerning illegal immigration, Terri Schiavo's final weeks, left-wing professors in academia and abuses in eminent domain.
A study done by Media Matters, a liberal Media Watchdog website, conducted throughout the first two months of 2006 found that the number of conservatives and Republicans brought on as guests outnumbered the number of liberals and Democrats by landslide margins of 72%–28% in January, and 67%–33% in February. Of the solo interviews that are conducted on the show, 80% of the interviews are conducted with conservatives and Republicans.[1] However, it should also be noted that many results in the study excluded those considered by the group as "neutral".