Bill Maher is on the CNN with Breaking News Blizter and Ware interview

I love that guy and am SOOOOOOOO glad they snatched him away from Newsweek to be their main Baghdad Correspondent.

The guy ROCKS!!!

He was saying that it was not like the kid was a child since he was the age of consent.
He also remarked that the kids were flirting back.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!

Not that surprised personally.

a 50-year-old guy coming on to 16-year-olds. I think Bill's been spending too much time over at Hef's place.

I watched it and he was absolutely serious about the teenagers being of the "age of consent" and "flirting back" - definitely suggesting they shared some of the blame. Also blamed the US climate of repression that kept Foley in the closet and seeking out these cyber-encounters with the pages instead of an adult relationship.

Believe me, I can TELL when he is being sarcastic or not, and he was being serious!
I was floored.

it was creepy.

Bill Maher is a slimeball.

Yeah, it may have "only" been e-mails and notes, and not physical contact, but the kid wasn't legally an adult. Game over, in that sense.

However, in Maher (and, oddly, Foley's) defense, he's right: at least one of those kids was indeed coming onto Foley--and I don't think it was to blackmail him later. He seemed to be enjoying the interaction and getting some pleasure from it. Yes, Foley should've known better, but the kid who was texting with him is not a lily-white innocent here. (Big difference from the other kids who WERE unnerved and uncomfortable with Foley's overatures.)

However, EVEN IF the kid was 18, Foley was in a position of authority, and this would fall under abusing that authority, just like teacher-student, employer-employee, etc. Thus, he should be firmly punished for abusing that trust.

(And yes, that CNN guy is gorgeous.) :)

Maher sucked in that interview and was WRONG ... and yeah, Australian born Michael Ware is awesome!

He's pretty new to CNN, but he started covering the war when it first began as Newsweek's chief Baghdad Correspondent.

He ALWAYS tells it exactly like it is just like Christiane Amanpour >
(CNN's lead foreign correspondent)

You can tell that Ware does not care for the Bush administration. If he did, he wouldn't be so brutally honest EVERY TIME he's on the air and SO critical of Bush. BTW.. both Media Matters and Crooks & Liars LOVE his reports!!!!

I knew that Christiane Amanpour was also critical of the bush administration, but it wasn't until Kerry's race that I said "duh".. no wonder -- she's not just another media head trying to paint a rosey picture. She's married to Jamie Rubin, U.S. State Department spokesman under President Clinton and Senator Kerry's foreign policy analyst during his presidential run.


Anyway.. Maher you sucked tonight.. And Michael, you were spot on as usual!