Brit Hume

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Alexander Britton "Brit" Hume Sr. (born June 22, 1943) is the Washington, D.C. managing editor of the Fox News Channel. He anchors Special Report with Brit Hume and is a panelist on Fox News Sunday.

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Early life

Hume was born in Washington, D.C., the son of Virginia Powell (née Minnigerode) and George Graham Hume.[1] He attended St. Albans School and is a 1965 graduate of the University of Virginia.

Career

Hume first worked for the Hartford Times, and later for United Press International, and the Baltimore Evening Sun.[2] He then worked for the syndicated columnist Jack Anderson from 1970-72. Later, Hume worked for ABC for 23 years from 1973 through 1996, when he went to work for Fox News Channel. From 1973 to 1976, Hume worked as a consultant for the documentary division. From 1976 through 1988, Hume worked as Capitol Hill correspondent; in 1989, he became ABC's chief White House correspondent.[2] In 1991, Hume won an Emmy Award for his Gulf War coverage. He was also twice named "Best in the Business" as a White House correspondent by the American Journalism Review in a readers' poll. In January, 1997, he left ABC for Fox News.[2] By the time Hume left, he had worked on many ABC shows, including, World News Tonight With Peter Jennings, Nightline and This Week.

Hume has published two books; his 1971 Death and the Mines: Rebellion and Murder in the United Mine Workers and the 1974 Inside Story, a memoir of his days working with Jack Anderson. Hume has also contributed to such publications as Harper's, The Atlantic, The New Republic and The Weekly Standard.

As a reporter for Anderson's column, Hume uncovered an internal corporate memo indicating that the 1972 Republican National Convention had been underwritten by ITT Corporation and that, in exchange, an antitrust case had been conveniently dropped by the Nixon White House shortly thereafter. Later, Anderson published a series of classified documents indicating the Nixon administration, contrary to its public pronouncements, had tipped in favor of Pakistan during its 1971 war with India. After those revelations, Anderson and his staff, including Hume, his wife and children were placed under surveillance by the Central Intelligence Agency.[3] The agents code-named Hume "eggnog" and observed his family going about their daily business. This came to light during the Ford administration during Congressional hearings, and more recently as the result of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

Controversy

On the February 3 edition of FOX News' Special Report with Brit Hume, Hume claimed that Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the founder of Social Security, had proposed something similar to the personal accounts offered by President Bush as part of his Social Security reform plan:

Senate Democrats gathered at the Franklin Roosevelt Memorial today to invoke the image of FDR in calling on President Bush to remove private accounts from his Social Security proposal. But it turns out that FDR himself planned to include private investment accounts in the Social Security program when he proposed it.
In a written statement to Congress in 1935, Roosevelt said that any Social Security plans should include, quote, "Voluntary contributory annuities, by which individual initiative can increase the annual amounts received in old age," adding that government funding, quote, "ought to ultimately be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans." [4]

Media Matters and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann have claimed that Hume distorted Roosevelt's views. According to Media Matters, an inspection of the context in which Hume quoted FDR reveals that the former president wanted Social Security as we now know it, supported by taxpayers, to supplant the government funding simply given to retirees who had not paid into the system at the time of Social Security's enactment. [5] [6]

Olbermann claimed that Hume and FOX News committed "premeditated, historical fraud" in distorting FDR;[7] on Olbermann's program, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, James Roosevelt Jr. said that Hume's "outrageous distortion" of FDR's statements "calls for a retraction, an apology, maybe even a resignation".[8]

Personal life

Hume is married to Kim Schiller Hume, Fox News Vice President and Washington bureau chief.

Brit Hume's son, Washington journalist Sandy Hume, was a reporter for The Hill, who broke the story of the aborted 1997 coup against Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. In February 1998, Sandy Hume committed suicide by a self inflicted gunshot from a hunting rifle. The National Press Club honors his memory with the annual Sandy Hume Memorial Award for Excellence in Political Journalism.

References

  1. ^ http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-753534.html?refid=gg_x_02
  2. ^ a b c FOXNEWS.com Brit Hume Bio (2007-06-21). Retrieved on 2007-08-16.
  3. ^ Documents Show CIA Spying on Journalists, Including Brit Hume and Michael Getler, from the Associated Press in Editor and Publisher, June 21, 2007, accessed August 16, 2007
  4. ^ Brit Hume (2005-02-04). Dems Invoke FDR. Fox News. Retrieved on 2007-08-20.
  5. ^ Distorting FDR: Bennett and Hume claimed father of Social Security system wanted privatization. Media Matters for America (2005-02-04). Retrieved on 2007-08-20.
  6. ^ Research Note #15: The Roosevelt Administration's Proposal for Voluntary Annuities. Social Security Administration (2001-06-21). Retrieved on 2007-08-20.
  7. ^ Olbermann: Hume, FOX News committed "premeditated, historical fraud" in distorting FDR. Media Matters for America (2005-02-04). Retrieved on 2007-08-20.
  8. ^ James Roosevelt Jr: Hume's "outrageous distortion" of FDR "calls for a retraction, an apology, maybe even a resignation". Media Matters for America (2005-02-16). Retrieved on 2007-08-20.

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