Mancow Muller - Politics

Politics

On December 6, 2005, Muller made an appearance on Fox News Channel's Fox & Friends where he referred to Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean as "vile", "bloodthirsty" and "evil". Muller also commented on Dean's negative opinions on the War in Iraq, calling Dean a traitor who "ought to be kicked out of America" and "tried for treason".

On May 22, 2009, Muller had himself waterboarded during his radio program on WLS-AM, having lost a listener poll determining whether he or co-host Pat Cassidy would be the one waterboarded. The talk show host had previously claimed that calling waterboarding "torture" was wrong, something he had stated that he hoped his reenactment would prove. Lasting only 6 seconds ("8 seconds less than the average person", according to program guest Marine Sergeant Klay South), Mancow afterward changed his opinion, saying, "It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that's no joke", and described waterboarding as "absolutely torture".

Questions were later raised about the validity of the procedure. South had no formal training in waterboarding and had never before performed the procedure, leading the online celebrity and gossip site Gawker to accuse Muller of faking the whole thing. Muller later stated in an interview on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, "I admit it, it was a stupid radio stunt. But waterboarding, all it is, is water in your nose and mouth with your head back." Further adding "We went into this thinking it was going to be a joke. But it was not a joke — it was horrible. 'Hoax' is probably not the right word, but we did think it was going to be a joke."