The PR agents for Outfoxed are hopping mad at Bill O'Reilly. But they still haven't learned a vital lesson: don't shoot without powder.

The "newshounds" (another fine product from the Outfoxed gang) erupted into rabid paroxysms of anger yesterday, when they went off on a rant about a Bill O'Reilly broadcast from four days earlier. (Why no comment about it at the time?) The yorkies announced a jihad against Mr Bill and all his advertisers because "Wives Are Off Limits!":

I thought O'Reilly had gone as low as he could go - but he and FOX tested the depths with this one. FOX News Channel has fired a salvo in a campaign of innuendo, distortion and untruth aimed squarely at Teresa Heinz Kerry, the Democratic candidate's wife! O'Reilly's guest, Tom Randall, accuses Mrs. Kerry of secretly funding a group of radical anarchists, using the Heinz Endowments as her "cover". True to form, no one was there to argue Mrs. Kerry's side. Right wing bloggers have been pinging this story all around the net for a long time, but O'Reilly has now given it the FOX seal of approval. John Kerry's been put on notice: Your wife is fair game.

They list all of O'Reilly's advertisers (looking very much like a rundown pasted in from some hyperventilating email alert) and ask that everyone contact these companies to put pressure on them not to advertise on Fox. Excuse me, on FOX.

The hounds cite the following comments by O'Reilly and his guest as examples of the "innuendo, distortion, and untruth" running rampant on the broadcast:

[sound of crickets]

What is this? No transcript? Not even the usual misquotations that the hounds scribble in their handwritten notes? Not one word on what O'Reilly or his guest actually said? It matters not--wave the bloody shirt and the rabble will follow, as the outraged comments posted after the entry verify.

Sprinkled among the foaming responses were a few asking why not post what was actually said, so we will have, like, a few facts before we march off to war. But still nothing--another case of the dog that did not bark. How hard could it be to quote from the program? Unless, of course, they didn't see it. For that matter, how difficult could it be to quote from a transcript? It's not hard for us; we found one in thirty seconds, sitting comfortably on the internet, hiding in plain sight.

The topic of the show was the funding of a group called "The Ruckus Society". This is a sort of training outfit for protestors (some of them named as domestic terrorists by the FBI), and Ruckus gets money from the Tides Foundation. Mr Randall did a study on Tides, which explains why he was there. After identifying Randall as an analyst with the conservative-leaning Capital Research Center, Mr O asked about Tides:

TOM RANDALL, ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANT: Well, I think we should be worried about a lot of the groups that they give money to, such as the Ruckus Society, Greenpeace, the national -- Natural Resources Defense Council, which is running ads against President Bush.
O'REILLY: Well, I mean, just because they run ads against President Bush, we shouldn't be worried about it. I mean, we'd be worried all day and all night. I mean, a lot of people were.

After a bit more discussion along this line:

O'REILLY: But that happens all the time. I mean, Bill Moyers over at PBS has a foundation. And he pumps into all kinds of far-left concerns. What's wrong with that?
RANDALL: This one is run by the opposing candidate, John Kerry's, wife.
O'REILLY: Is it really run by her?
RANDALL: She is the president of the Howard Heinz Endowment. And she is on the board of the other endowments that the Heinz family have.
O'REILLY: But if she were sitting here now, Mr. Randall, do you believe that she would know the Ruckus Society received $200,000 from her foundation?

Randall then gave an exposition about how the Heinz Endowment doesn't give money directly to Ruckus; they give it to Tides, and then Tides donates to Ruckus (this gets to be a bit tenuous--a twice-removed donation).

O'REILLY: Here's what Heinz Endowment's President Maxwell King, who I--he's the guy that actually doles out the money. Teresa Heinz doesn't dole it out. She's the president, you know, the name, but this guy bills out. He says they give the Tides Center money only for management and administrative services. They don't give it money to funnel into the Ruckus Society. So that's what their argument is. Look, we give this operation money, but we don't tell them to give it to Ruckus.

O'Reilly suggests this gives Ms Heinz plausible deniability, adding that Tides does help children and run charities. Randall makes the point that giving money, even earmarked money, frees up other Tides funds to go to the Ruckus Society (as we said, a bit tenuous!), and that Tides keeps 10% of what they get anyhow to use as they see fit (a better point).

O'REILLY: I know you analyze the Tides Foundation. And that's why we know that they fund Ruckus, but have you analyzed the Heinz Endowment? Does all of their money go to liberal causes? Because Senator Heinz, Teresa's first husband, was a Republican, a fairly conservative guy.
RANDALL: Well, he was. But her current husband isn't. And...
O'REILLY: Oh, I don't think Kerry has any idea that this is going on. I mean, I'd have heard about it. But I know he's not involved in this.

Then Mr Bill has a suggestion of how to calm the waters:

O'REILLY: I would just call Tides up and say you can't give them [Ruckus] another penny. And if you do, you won't get another penny from us. That's the solution here, is it not?
RANDALL: Sure. Because just the association is bad enough.
O'REILLY: Right, right. So that's what she should do. She should just say no more Tides money. Tides give any more questionable money to anybody other than the Ruckus and the two you mentioned? Anything else on their resume?
RANDALL: Well, as I say, the Natural Resources Defense Council, which does have a political agenda, and the political agenda is in favor of her husband and opposed to President Bush.
O'REILLY: OK, but that's logical. I mean, you know, she wants her husband to get elected. All right, Mr. Randall, thanks very much. We appreciate it. And once again, the Ruckus thing is not OK with us. Political stuff we don't care about.

Well, there you have it. A vicious smear of "innuendo, distortion, and untruth". That was really a disgraceful interview, was it not? How dare Mr O'Reilly suggest that the Heinz Endowment should insist no money be given to Ruckus? That's just more far-right bloviating!

Except that Ted Turner's foundation did exactly that. The FBI has classified the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front as domestic terrorists, based on their use of violent tactics--and Ruckus did train members of these groups. That was too much even for Ted: the Turner Foundation pulled the plug on funding Ruckus in 1999. "Many of us share their values--we all want to breathe clean air--but there are many ways to go about accomplishing that, and burning down buildings isn't one of them," said foundation President Michael Finley.

But after all this, the crowning irony of the newspups' tirade is its very title. Since, just a few days before, the same site made the following statement about Fox reporter Carl Cameron:

His wife worked on GW Bush's 2000 campaign while he glowingly covered Bush on the trail, it is evident that Carl Cameron is a Republican partisan and should be removed from coverage of the 2004 elections.

Yes, for the Outfoxed syndicate, "Wives are Off Limits!" Except when they're not.