Liberal TV personality was a Fox News original
Alan Colmes, a top-rated television and radio broadcaster who, as co-host with conservative Sean Hannity of “Hannity & Colmes,” became best known as the liberal in the “lion’s den” of FoxNews, died at a hospital inManhattan. Hewas 66.
His wife, Jocelyn Elise Crowley, said that he died late Feb. 22 or early Feb. 23 and that the causewas lymphoma.
Colmes joined the Fox News Channel on its founding in 1996, debuting with Hannity the evening the channel first went on air. “Hannity & Colmes” became the channel’s longestrunning prime-time program — second only in the cable ratings to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly’s “The O’Reilly Factor” and outranking CNN’s “Larry King Live” — before Mr. Colmes left the showin 2008.
Facing off against Colmes, Hannity projected a style that invited comparisons to that of a bulldog. By contrast, Colmes, a onetime stand-up comic, was more peaceable — although no less convinced of his argument.
On his departure from “Hannity & Colmes,” he quipped that hewas “proud that both Sean and I remained unharmed after sitting side by side, night after night for so many years.”
Reflecting on the odd couple they made, Robert Thompson, a Syracuse University scholar of television and popular culture, mused that “we’ve had perfect pairings of people who often don’t agree with each other — Siskel and Ebert come to mind. It always depended on bringing balance to that chemical equation.
“‘Hannity& Colmes’was not one of those balances,” Thompson continued, recalling Hannity’s habit of frothing in the talk-radio tradition while Colmes attempted to proffer calmer arguments.
The Fox News viewership “enjoyed the mismatch,” Thompson said — the nightly tossing of Colmes “to thewolves.”
Colmes, a self-described liberal patriot, argued that hewas at an inherent disadvantage on television, a venue that often favors oratorical aggression. Those who kept count noted that he often spoke fewer words per installment than Hannity.
“I don’t judge my effectiveness by how many words I say,” Colmes told The Washington Post in 2003. “I think liberals often see nuances in things. . . . Conservatives tend to see things in black and white. It gives them an air of certainty and conviction that might make them more comfortable towatch.”
Colmes gamely endured withering criticism from the left, which saw him as the Fox News token liberal. Some critics perceived betrayal in his presence on the channel, founded by Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch, to counterbalance what many conservatives view as left-wing bias in other news outlets.
Alan Samuel Colmes, a grandson of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, was born in Brooklyn on Sept. 24, 1950. His father, an auctioneer, ran jewelry stores with his mother. Colmes grew up in Lynbrook, N.Y., a Long Island community about five miles from the home town of Hannity, who was 11 years his junior.
Colmeswas a 1971 speech graduate of Hofstra University on Long Island, where he began his radio career in high school as a DJ. He ventured into professional talk radio, broadcasting from Long Island, Boston and WNBC in New York, aswell as taking occasional TV hosting gigs.
Hannity joined Fox at its inception and was slated to host a show akin to CNN’s “Crossfire.” Privately, the programwas dubbed “Hannity & LTBD” — “Liberal to Be Determined.”
“Roger Ailes said to me, ‘You know any good liberals?’ ” Hannity told the Times. “So we started auditioning some.”
The “liberal to be determined” turned out to be Colmes, whomHannity had debated on other television programming.
Colmes’s books included “Red, White and Liberal: HowLeft Is Right& Right Is Wrong” (2003) and “Thank the Liberals* *For Saving America (And Why You Should)” (2012).
Besides his wife of 13 years, who resides in New York City, his survivors include a sister.
Colmes confessed that, unlike Hannity, who sincerely hoped to persuade audiences of the rightness of his view, he saw limits in the power of their parrying.
“I don’t delude myself into thinking I’ll bring anyone around to my way of thinking, especially Sean Hannity,” Colmes told the Newark Star-Ledger in 2003. “The point of a show like this is to provide debate points, fodder and an entertaining exchange.”