Fox & Friends, whose network's slogan is “Fair and Balanced,” today attacked a school board for allowing anti-war groups to speak to high school students alongside military recruiters. Their outrage was sparked by a recent decision by the Portland, OR, school board, as an October 23 article in The Oregonian explained:

The Portland school board is set to adopt a rule Monday [October 24] to give “counter-recruiters” skeptical about the value of joining the military the same access to high school students that military recruiters enjoy under federal law.

Instead of standing out on the school sidewalk waving signs and offering fliers, as they have done regularly outside Portland high schools, anti-war activists will be able to staff recruiting tables and hand out pamphlets in the school career center or cafeteria, just like military recruiters in uniform.

The article later stated that similar policies are already in place in “Seattle, San Francisco, and other left-leaning city school districts.”

Somehow, the co-hosts of Fox & Friends did not view this decision as allowing students to have both perspectives on the military. Instead, they scoffed at anti-war groups and claimed the plan is an attack on the “personal choice” of parents and students. Co-host Brian Kilmeade began by claiming that “you can't possibly look at both organizations equally”:

GRETCHEN CARLSON (co-host): The school board [in Portland] has approved now anti-war protesters to recruit kids in the school. Because, remember for a long time, schools -- some schools did not allow the military to come in and recruit because of the gay policies within the military and things like that. Well now, those people are back in recruiting.

KILMEADE: You can't use that anymore.

CARLSON: You can't use that anymore. So now, they're allowed back in, but now they want the other side. I'm wondering, when you have an anti-military recruiter, what do they tell the kids?

KILMEADE: Right.

CARLSON: What do they say to the kids? Don't go into the military?

KILMEADE: There's no way you can actually put on parallel paths, the military and the people that don't like war.

STEVE DOOCY (co-host): Right.

KILMEADE: One is an anti-war protest, the other one is a -- is a department, is a [sic] armed forces network. You can't possibly look at both organizations equally, although this school is.

This text was aired during the segment, alongside, bizarrely, the words “hypocrisy watch”:

Later, Carlson wondered if students' access to both military and anti-war groups would affect their “personal responsibility and personal decision-making”:

DOOCY: Here's the statement from the school district: “The intent is to provide students with as much information as possible so they may make informed decisions.” That according to the official spokesperson.

[...]

CARLSON: But isn't that the personal choice of the parent and the kid to actually seek out that recruiter who comes to the school on behalf of the military? I mean, what happened to personal responsibility and personal decision-making? It just -- this doesn't add up to me. Someone tell me what the anti-war person would tell the kid if he goes into the military room and then goes into the anti-military room.

DOOCY: One board member says what's key is giving them all the information they need to make good decisions. A military recruiter is quoted in one of the Portland newspapers this morning as saying he's not worried about this going forward. He says, quote, “a person who has made up their mind that they want to do this is still going to join the military.”

Watch:

Doocy is correctly quoting U.S. Army Lt. Col. Thom Cowson, who spoke with Portland's KATU for an article on the subject. In fact, Cowson “said he doesn't think it will affect his recruiting efforts”:

U.S. Army Lt. Col. Thom Cowson said he hopes this doesn't turn into an “us versus them” issue, and he said he and other military recruiters won't mind the extra company, even if it is a counter-recruiting message.

“When it comes right down to it, we'll have the same access to the schools,” Cowson said. “The same kids who are interested in the military will still be interested in the military, and I welcome them to give the other kids who aren't interested, another set of options.”

He said he doesn't think it will affect his recruiting efforts.

“A person who's made up their mind that they want to do this is still going to (join the military).”

Cowson actually appeared on Fox & Friends in a later segment, but he sounded quite different than he did in his KATU interview. He and Kilmeade seemed to suggest the decision will prevent military recruiters from getting “equal access” to students:

KILMEADE: Colonel, how much harder is your job knowing that there is antiwar missions going in after or before you?

COWSON: You know, I'd like to pretend it's a more difficult thing to do, but reality is, the Portland public school district has never been on board with military recruiters, and the anti-recruiters have really always had a certain degree of access that we just don't have. So what we're hoping is that this will actually give us increased access to school and put us on the same level as the anti-recruiters who are already there.

KILMEADE: Wait a second. So you're saying the anti-recruiters have more access to the schools than you have right now?

COWSON: Well, yes. Sympathetic teachers and school board members allow them to go in and we've had reports in the last couple of days of them actually doing classroom presentations for kids. And what we would like is just the equal access so we can go in there and present options. 'Cause we've got some pretty good options for the future -- education, training, and jobs out there that could bring them in to be a responsible member of society.

But that's actually the opposite of what's happening. As the Oregonian article explains, military recruiters have had full access to high school students -- and their home addresses and phone numbers -- for the past 10 years, while peace activists and anti-war groups have not:

Beginning in 1995, the Portland school board banned military recruitment in schools, primarily because of the military's discrimination against gays. Then in 2001, the federal No Child Left Behind law mandated that military recruiters get the same access to every public high school campus and to students' addresses and home phone numbers that college recruiters do.

Peace activists and military “counter-recruiters” weren't extended the same rights.

Hence the regular sidewalk protests by members of the War Resisters League, Veterans for Peace and other groups outside Portland high schools, said John Grueschow, coordinator of the Resisters League's military and draft counseling programs.

Yet even after Cowson admitted he's “not in the classrooms” during anti-war groups' presentations, Kilmeade baselessly claimed students “get a lot of those antiwar messages on a regular basis.” He concluded by encouraging Cowson to “continue to try to get access and talk to the kids”:

KILMEADE: Also, if you look at the schools, just the current make-up of what we hear, they're surrounded by liberal teachers, they get a lot of those antiwar messages on a regular basis even within basically within the opinions from the teachers. They're really tilting the playing field if they're giving war -- groups like war resisters more access than recruiters like yourself, who are not saying you better join. They're saying, let this be an option for you.

COWSON: Yeah, and that's really in the end what we're all about, is trying to provide some options for these kids. I mean, it's a cruel world out there and there is a lot of things that -- a lot of opportunities that they're missing if they don't look at everything that's available on the table.

KILMEADE: And Colonel, I'm sure you have a great pitch, and I'm sure you could sell the military well, but you know what your best sales tip is? Go to social studies class. These things like Revolutionary War, War of 1812, World War I, World War II -- there would be no America without people like you.

COWSON: Oh, yeah. It's a great place to be, and I'll tell you, it's -- proud every day I put this uniform on, and these guys won't stop us.

KILMEADE: I agree, and I don't see you giving up. Lt. Col. Thom Cowson, you'll continue to try to get access and talk to the kids and give them an option.

Watch:

Again, this decision doesn't take away the military's current access to Portland high schoolers -- it just creates access for anti-war groups as well. Yet this is text that was aired during the segment: