When Brit Hume signs off on his Fox News show "Special Report," he describes himself, and his network, as "Fair, Balanced, and Unafraid." I always thought that was cool, and that Brit was cool for having differentiated himself and FNC from the MSM so effectively over the last decade.
But only upon reading this piece in The Chicago Tribune this morning did I learn the following about Brit, way back when:
The CIA's [Capitol Hilton Hotel] observation post also was used to monitor syndicated columnist Jack Anderson and his assistants, including Brit Hume, now an anchor with Fox News, who had their offices nearby. Hume said in a telephone interview that he believed the CIA's interest in Anderson's sources had been occasioned by the leak of "this enormous stack" of classified documents showing that the U.S., although publicly neutral during the 1972 India-Pakistan war, was privately "tilting toward Pakistan," then a military dictatorship, at the expense of India, "the world's largest democracy."
Anderson's columns caused a furor and won him the Pulitzer Prize. Hume said he had known for years that the CIA had photographed him and Anderson entering and leaving their office, and also the outside of Hume's residence, "watching my wife take the kids to school."
In other words, Brit had plenty of powerful enemies 35 years ago. But he wasn't afraid then, and he obviously isn't afraid now.
