CNN, Fox News join forces vs. White House -- wait, what? (videos)

The White House attacks on Fox News have been such a losing battle. Barack Obama's entire election campaign was built on trying to bring voters together. A lot of viewers love Fox News. A lot of viewers hate Fox News. If you're a politician, why jump in the middle of that?

Now the war is starting to make for some very strange media bedfellows.

First up, CNN's painfully reasonable Campbell Brown, coming across a bit like a third grade teacher lecturing her wayward students. Below she hits the White House for its Fox News criticism. She asks: If officials are really so concerned about media bias, why not attack MSNBC? (After all, they're beating CNN in the ratings now too).

In the clip, it becomes clear Brown's larger concern is closer to home -- Why don't viewers understand that Fox News and MSNBC are not "real" news? Why do they reward them with viewership for merely expressing opinions -- that's so much easier than the hard work we here at CNN do....

Reminds me of a story: Student tours a modern art museum. She sees all these ink splat paintings. She gets irritated and tells her teacher the paintings shouldn't be in a museum. These are just ink splats, she says, this is easy, anybody could do this. Heck, she says, I could have painted these. And then teacher smiles and says: "Yes, but you didn't."

In response, last night, in a segment labeled "Professional Respect," Fox News' Bill O'Reilly called Brown's segment "fascinating" with "excellent" questioning, below.

Could a Fox News and CNN truce be next?