I really want to give Fox News Channel credit for launching a new show. But I can’t.

			Half-Hour News Hour, FNC’s new show, was nowhere near as funny as the unintended comedy of Sean Hannity’s distortions and flawed analysis. Half-Hour News Hour is a dreadful attempt to counter Comedy Central’s The Daily Show.

Still, my rule is: don’t judge a new TV show on one episode. So, I will watch one more time this weekend. Oddly, Fox executives seem to share my pessimism.

Only one more episode is scheduled, according to my TiVo. And unlike other FNC weekend shows that get multiple runs, Half-Hour News Hour was only airing once a week.

To be fair, there were some mildly funny moments: Iranian leaders forgetting they held a "holocaust denial conference"; a t-shirt photo of Iranian President Ahmadinejad with the caption "Shiite Happens"; and Barack Obama, admitting cocaine use as a teen, dropped his approval rating to its lowest ever at 99.9%. But that was it.

Nearly every other story or gag missed the comedy mark: faux commercials; an interview with a climatologist who is also a game show host; and actor Ed Begley failing to appear because his electric car ran out of energy.

The flaws of this show are too apparent.

A news channel can’t do comedy. That’s not to say funny intended moments can’t happen on a news channel. But moments of levity shouldn’t be the main fare. News – or something resembling news – should be a news outlet’s staple. ESPN learned its lesson after failing with scripted dramas. It’s not in their DNA. Would you expect the NFL to produce opera?

FNC should learn from the comedy miscues of Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, and George Allen. Leave comedy to comedians. The Daily Show is funny because it's produced by funny people who understand comedy. If not, disaster looms. I saw it first hand. A local TV weathercaster in Las Vegas, a novice at comedy, ultimately ended his career by saying on air the derogatory phrase, "Martin Luther Coon Day."

One of the best broadcast journalists I know is my good friend Gerry Brooks. He’s the lead anchor at WVIT-TV in Hartford, Connecticut. He’s a serious newsman, probably the best broadcast news writer in the business. But Gerry is also a funny guy. Folks in Hartford will remember his pieces called "The Brooks File" which are legendary in Connecticut broadcasting. But Gerry has some hard and fast rules.  He always warned people in the business to stomp out any urge to be funny on camera -- especially on a newscast. But if you can’t resist, he said, be self-deprecating. It’s safe.  FNC should realize that taking pot shots at themselves, their coverage, and their core audience might actually attract a wider audience.

But that’s difficult for conservatives. Conservatives, in general, aren’t funny. Churchill was an exception; remember most Britons are born with a wit gene. But in America, the number of conservative comedians is small. Why? My theory is this. Everything is a struggle between freedom and order: conservatives are order; liberals embody freedom. As a result, good conservatives are practical. But when taken to an extreme, practical becomes simplistic. And simplistic people – like George Bush, Tom Delay, or Bill Frist – are better targets rather than creators of comedy.

This lack of self-deprecation didn’t lead to any comedy meltdowns on Half-Hour News Hour. But it revealed the show as inherently disingenuous. Half-Hour News Hour purports to be a comedy show. It’s really a political show disguised as a comedy show. The sole targets of the comedy are liberals and Democrats – never conservatives or Republicans. Jon Stewart is credible because he swipes at the silliness of all political viewpoints.

More importantly, when I watch The Daily Show I intend to be entertained, not informed. The Half-Hour News Hour’s direct aim at "liberals only" makes me think they are trying to persuade my thinking rather than revealing a nuance or irony about life and politics. This confusion reveals the usual dishonesty of FNC. First, they tell us they’re "fair and balanced" and now they tell us this is a "comedy show."

Let me be clear. There are plenty of comedy shows that make political statements. Will & Grace was a good example. They poked fun at conservatives just as much as Hollywood elites and gays. But that was secondary to the comedy of the characters.  I know there are political statements being made in Fox's 24, but that's OK since I watch the show for the drama, not to be transformed into a paranoid neo-con.  (Paranoid neo-con?  Is that redundant?)

Another admission here: I think FNC and Roger Ailes & Co. are brilliant broadcasters and business people. They made broadcasting history. They saw a niche market and captured it and became a force in their industry. Many broadcasters tell me they hate FNC’s content, but admit "they’re so good."

One of the reasons FNC is so good is because they keep costs low. That’s easy when you produce talk shows – not investigative pieces. And good investigative journalists are like good comedy writers. They're expensive.  You can’t produce a scripted show like Half-Hour News Hour without a team of good writers and highly-skilled comedy talent. Unfortunately, this show looks like cheap local TV.

Further adding to the amateurishness were the actors who tried to parody the characteristics of the correspondents on The Daily Show and the trumped up laugh track or the urging of laughter from a home-team live audience.

The show also gave fodder to MSNBC's Keith Olbermann who now refers to Rush Limbaugh as Comedian Rush Limbaugh. Rush and Ann Coulter appeared in the show’s opening skit as the new President and Vice President in a flash-forward to 2009. Again,  these one-siders took themselves too seriously.

What was funnier, though, was the look on my wife’s face when Rush and Coulter hit the screen. She violently grabbed the remote from my hands and said, "I don’t think I can do this."  Fear not, my dear. You probably won’t for much longer