The New Left was, as Hannity himself admits earlier in the book, a radical movement that wanted to largely dismantle capitalism and the U.S. military. To back up his use of this label on Daschle, Hannity cites only a list of 10 votes over a 23-year career in which Daschle voted against increased defense spending and missile defense, against the Persian Gulf War, and for a nuclear freeze. One of the cuts Hannity cites Daschle voting for is a minuscule $329 million. Missing from the list, of course, are all of the defense budgets Daschle voted for, including this year's, which included nearly $30 billion in increased spending -- hardly the action of a New Left radical.

The lies continue in Hannity's chapter on the environment, where he focuses on the dispute over the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He states that the U.S. Geological Survey said ANWR could yield up to 16 billion barrels of oil. But in March a Washington Post reporter interviewed a geologist at the USGS who said the total was closer to 3.2 billion barrels. Even the highest estimate given by Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, during the congressional debates was 10.2 billion barrels.

But then, Hannity is repeatedly at odds with reality in this chapter, stating that ANWR oil would make the United States "far less dependent on foreign oil" and noting Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa Jr.'s assertion that drilling would create 735,000 jobs. A Miami Herald article citing data from the USGS, the Department of Energy and the Congressional Research Service, however, stated that, at its peak, ANWR would produce less than 5 percent of daily U.S. oil consumption and create between 60,000 and 130,000 new jobs. Yet Hannity, in typical style, uses these falsehoods to make the broad claim that "it is difficult to point to another issue in modern American history where a major political party's rhetoric is so divorced from reality."

Distortions and lies are par for the course throughout "Let Freedom Ring" because, without them, Hannity wouldn't be able to make the continual stream of over-the-top accusations against liberals: They "loathe and ravage so many of our core values and traditions"; they "told us global warming and gays in the military were top priorities, well above securing our nation"; and "after we defeat our last foreign enemy, we will still face threats to our freedom, largely from left-wing extremists in our own country."

On "Hannity and Colmes," Hannity often seems to roll over the timid Colmes with his bluster. When his words are frozen on the page, though, there is no disguising what they are: poorly argued propaganda.

With the 51-year-old Rush Limbaugh's profile fading, and only the 53-year-old Bill O'Reilly (who doesn't toe Limbaugh's conservative line nearly as well as Hannity) equaling him in popularity, Hannity seems on the brink of becoming America's leading conservative pundit. "Let Freedom Ring" is troubling evidence that Hannity won't let a little thing like truth get in the way of his rapid ascent.

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