Brit Hume, Christian Evangelist, on Tiger Woods

I like Brit Hume. For several years, when I filled the role of token leftie on Fox News, he was always kind and courteous. His detached professionalism, honed when he covered the White House for ABC, set his Washington Bureau apart from the New York-based talk-radio ranters on Fox like Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity. Being a Republican doesn't have to mean being a self-obsessed bully--though that perspective seems increasingly scarce lately. The Republicans started getting more and more outrageous during the Clinton years, and, with the extra tinge of desperation brought on by their current minority status in Washington, they seem to have descended to a new low. But, like his friend and former tennis partner George Bush I, Hume has always maintained a certain aloof civility.

So I was surprised when Hume, who has retired as the head of Fox's Washington Bureau to an emeritus commentator status, grabbed headlines by saying on the air that Tiger Woods should convert to Christianity--

This is Ann Coulter territory, though his presentation was not as bloodthirsty.

If you watch the clip from Fox News Sunday, Hume seems compassionate toward Woods. Woods will really need his faith at this difficult time, he says. You can't help but think of the tragic death of Hume's own son as he says this. But then he segues to the evangelism: As a Buddhist, Wood doesn't have a tradition that allows the kind of shot at full redemption that Christianity allows. And that is the transition to farce.

I could almost hear Roger Ailes in the background chuckling. Ailes once told me, just as he was getting Fox News up and running, that all the political analysis and talk on TV boils down to one thing: entertainment.

Making an outrageous remark about a celebrity sex scandal is vintage Ailes. It's show business.

I don't for a minute think that comment was meant to be taken seriously: except, of course, by the beehive of bloggers who are helping to give Fox a boost by circulating the video.

As Ann Coulter taught her ideological colleagues, strategic deployment of really offensive commentary is a great way to boost ratings and book sales.

Here is the real cynicism of these sorts of comments: they are pretty much totally free of ideological content. Despite the Republicans' constant chatter about "values" and pandering to a Christian evangelical base, these sorts of comments show that they are no better or worse than the rest of the scandal-rubbernecking in the media they love to bash.

Unless, that is, you consider the deeper implications of Hume's comment . . .

Republicans, who have lately morphed into the party of sex scandal, might consider themselves immune from criticism on the basis of their Christian faith. In that light, Hume's comment could be seen as a way of selling indulgences: join the Christian Right and you, too, can pursue your wild sexual escapades. Through Christ, Brit Hume, and Roger Ailes, all is forgiven.

Ruth Conniff is the political editor of The Progressive magazine. To subscribe for just $14.97 a year, just click here.