Howard Dean made his much-anticipated appearance on Fox, and found the environment much less friendly than did Barack Obama last week. Chris Wallace pressed the DNC chair hard on the latest ads from his organization, which even the nonpartisan group Fact Check insist are distortions of John McCain’s remarks on the economy and on Iraq:

Dean sputters and spins, but doesn’t make any headway against Wallace in this appearance. He flashes a piece of paper that supposedly contains what McCain really said, but Wallace calls his bluff and shows the whole clip. Wallace also scornfully ripostes Dean’s contention that it would take “six minutes”, when it only takes less than ten seconds to show how the DNC used creative editing to distort the remarks.

It’s a remarkably dishonest effort from a remarkably dishonest man. Pay attention to how Dean never actually answers Wallace’s accusations of distortion, changing the subject back to the DNC’s talking points each time. Dean never defends his ads directly, and for good reason; they’re indefensible. Dean found himself overmatched against Wallace. Next time, he should stay in the intellectual minor leagues at MS-NBC with Keith Olbermann.