Fox News host set up false contrast between Palin and Biden, both of whom have sons going to Iraq

Summary: Summary: Fox News' Jon Scott suggested that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin can contrast herself with Sen. Joe Biden on Iraq because her son is "deploying to Iraq next month." But Scott did not note that Biden's son is also reportedly deploying to Iraq.

During the August 29 edition of Fox News' Happening Now, co-host Jon Scott suggested that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin can contrast herself with Sen. Joe Biden on Iraq because her son is "deploying to Iraq next month." But Scott did not note that Biden's son is also reportedly deploying to Iraq. After guest Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said that a vice-presidential debate between Palin and Biden will be "fascinating," Scott asserted of Palin: "[H]er oldest son is deploying to Iraq next month and volunteered to serve, you know, September 11th of last year. That's a pretty compelling storyline when Joe Biden, you know, suggests that Iraq is not the place American troops ought to be."

Biden's son Joseph R. "Beau" Biden III -- a member of the Delaware Army National Guard -- is scheduled to deploy to Iraq on October 3, according to a FoxNews.com article.

From the August 29 edition of Fox News' Happening Now:

SABATO: Yeah, and that vice-presidential debate is going to be really a headliner. You've got Joe Biden, who, of course, is very blunt and very frank, and I happen to know some people who know Sarah Palin, and she is also very blunt and very frank. That is going to be a fascinating debate. I think it may get a much larger audience than the vice-presidential debate normally gets.

SCOTT: Right, and the fact that their son -- her oldest son is deploying to Iraq next month and volunteered to serve, you know, September 11th of last year. That's a pretty compelling storyline when Joe Biden, you know, suggests that Iraq is not the place American troops ought to be.

SABATO: Look, this -- there are so many pieces to this. I can see why they were so attracted to her, not just the nature of a woman candidacy, but also the family connection there, the Western spirit -- and by the way, the West has always been very open to women politicians.

SCOTT: Right.

SABATO: The first two women governors came from Texas and Wyoming.

—J.H.