Poor Fox news and conservative talk radio. All of a sudden we're supposed to believe that these bastions of freedom of speech {as long as it's right wing speech} are being muzzled by big bad President Obama. A statement in an interview that much of the conservative media is driving the republican agenda is being received with horror and surprise by people like Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Megan Kelly, and Steve Doocey at Fox and by the conservative media giants like Limbaugh and Beck, Levin and Ingraham. They are reacting as if the conservative media is immune from criticism but, heaven forbid, if the president strikes back at some of the "fair and balanced" slander that comes out of their mouths on a daily basis.

Let's look at the right wing media for one moment. These are people who are not attempting to reach new audiences. They are a group of commentators that have decided consciously to move their reporting from that of newspersons to the area of sensationalism and attack. Just a few of the conservative media's repeated accusations during the first four years of the Obama administration.

1. President Obama was not born in the United States. He was part of an active conspiracy to place him in the presidency hatched by his hippie mother and communist father. Even after this was disproven, the birther accusations have continued to fly unabated.
2. President Obama is attempting to take all of the guns of every law abiding citizen of the United States. Even after strengthening individual gun laws during his first term, the accusations continued.
3. President Obama is a communist and a socialist and a fascist. He is actively conspiring with people who want to overthrow the American government.
4. President Obama wants to confiscate all the income of the highest earning Americans.
5. President Obama wants to destroy Christianity.
6. President Obama is a Muslim.
7. President Obama has had the government totally take over the health care system, even though the system is still totally in the hands of private insurers.
8. President Obama is setting up secret detention camps to place all those who disagree with him into.
9. President Obama is purposely building up the debt so that the United States goes bankrupt, even though the evidence is that he has slowed the growth of government significantly.
10. President Obama is trying to eliminate elections in this country and allow himself to become king and assume tyrannical powers through the suspension of the constitution.

When ostensibly reliable news sources and commenters move into this kind of conspiracy theorizing and obvious untruths about the presidency and the legislative agenda of the other side, it becomes an obligation of the government to answer those charges before they become common belief among the uninformed. When President Obama called out Fox and Limbaugh and his ilk, it was a responsible action by this president to bring the political dialogue back to real issues.

Now we have the targets of the president's comments screaming as if no one has a right to criticize them when their existence is based on criticism. The first amendment's freedom of speech does cover news and commentary outlets, but it also covers the president. Those on the other side of his views should not see themselves as immune from attack just because it places some unwanted scrutiny on them. In fact, the President's comments may do the nation good. If it gets our legislators to look at the issues through the prism of what is best for all Americans, rather than through the prism of Fox News or Rush Limbaugh, we can all move forward. The fourth estate was meant to keep an eye on government and keep that government honest, not develop conspiracy theories and lies that are designed to manipulate those that legislate to a point of view.