Fox News: A 24/7 Political Operation
Media Matters releases video destroying network's defense of its straight news programming
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tuesday, October 20, 2009 |
CONTACT Jess Levin (202) 772-8162 |
Washington, D.C. - Today, after Fox News responded to White House criticism with the demonstrably false defense that, unlike the network's "editorial" programs, its "news" programs are straight and objective, Media Matters for America released a video demonstrating that Fox News' dayside programming unquestionably echoes the tones, themes, and content of its evening opinion programming. In fact, the parallels are so clear that the network's daytime anchors often seem to be taking direct marching orders from their colleagues like Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity.
WATCH VIDEO HERE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRx5ethd8JU
BACKGROUND:
Fox News has responded to White House criticisms of its network by claiming that while its "editorial" programs are filled with "vibrant opinion," its news hours are straight and objective. However, Fox News' purportedly straight news programs often echo its "editorial" programs and feature smears, falsehoods, doctored and deceptive editing, and GOP talking points. Examples include:
- Hemmer advances smear that Jennings knew of "statutory rape" and "never reported it." During the October 1 edition of America's Newsroom, co-host Bill Hemmer joined his network's smears against Department of Education official Kevin Jennings by claiming that Jennings knew of a "statutory rape" case involving a student but "never reported it." In fact, as Media Matters has confirmed, the student in question was of legal age of consent at the time he was counseled by Jennings.
- Baier smears Jennings as failing to report "sexual abuse." On October 1, host Bret Baier joined Fox News' witch hunt against Jennings, claiming that "Education Secretary Arne Duncan is standing behind his so-called safe schools czar after revelations that Kevin Jennings did not report a case of sexual abuse he encountered as a schoolteacher."
- Kelly on Sotomayor comment: "sounds to a lot of people like reverse racism." On May 26, Megyn Kelly joined conservative commentators such as Rush Limbaugh by stating that then-Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor's "wise Latina" remark "sounds to a lot of people like reverse racism, basically. Like she's saying that Latina judges are obviously better than white male judges, and that that's her assumption, and people get worried about putting a person like that on the U.S. Supreme Court." Kelly later added, "I've looked at the entire speech that she was offering to see if that was taken out of context, and I have to tell you ... it wasn't." In fact, Sotomayor was specifically discussing the importance of diversity in adjudicating race and sex discrimination cases; several conservative legal figures have made similar comments.
- America's Newsroom promotes tea party organizing info on-air and online. America's Newsroom encouraged viewers to get involved with April 15 "tea party" protests across the country, which Fox News had described as primarily a response to President Obama's fiscal policies. The program frequently hosted tea party organizers and posted on-screen organizing information such as protest dates and locations. America's Newsroom also repeatedly directed viewers to its website, which featured a list of tea party protests.
- America's Newsroom promotes czar hysteria with ominous music. On September 7, Kelly teased a segment on whether the so-called "mainstream media" was ignoring "questionable backgrounds of some of the other 30-some-odd czars" in the Obama administration while ominous music played in the background.
- "Death book" distortions abound on Fox News Sunday. On the August 23 edition of Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace hosted former Bush administration aide Jim Towey to discuss his Wall Street Journal op-ed, "The Death Book for Veterans," and in doing so promoted numerous distortions about an end-of-life educational booklet used by the Veterans Health Administration (VHA). In addition to forwarding the smear that the booklet is a "death book," Wallace promoted Towey's distortion that the booklet encourages veterans to "pull the plug" -- it doesn't; Wallace and Towey both suggested that the Bush administration suspended use of the booklet -- it didn't; and Wallace claimed that a VHA document requires doctors to direct veterans to the booklet -- it doesn't.
Media Matters president Eric Burns recently explained on Countdown with Keith Olbermann: "I think that what we have all thought of as a conservative news organization has really morphed itself this year into a 24/7 political operation with a very specific goal. And that is to destroy this presidency, and destroy any sort of progressive policy agenda that the American people voted for in November."
WATCH VIDEO HERE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRx5ethd8JU
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Which one of these is the greatest Transformer?
Hannity has the ability to Lie at the drop of a Dime.
O'Reilly tries to look Legitimate but Keith Olbermann & I know he's just Complete Slime.
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
You can say Obama has "A Deep Seated Hatred of White People" & your job is not Compromised.
News Corp. is so Bold they run their Corporation like an Old Southern Plantation.
They have even Launched their own Hate-Speech Website called Aryan, Oh' excuse me, Fox Nation.
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
Because of her Face i had given Greta a pass, i tend to leave the Disabled alone.
Please get your facts straight Ms. Van Susteren "Fox" Does nothing close to resembling "News" & that's a Fact.
News Corp is a Sham, A Bam Boozler, A Con & "A Racist Enterprise" Does this help you get back on Track?
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
Newt Gingrich should write another book called "The Two Faces of Newt"
Mr. Gingrich, I had almost forgot that you had your first wife served with Divorce Papers on her Hospital Bed.
As i close my eyes i can almost see your first wife's Humiliation & deep since of Dread.
Speak truth to power.
Mr. News
But when a company claiming to be a news organization does it as much as Fox they eventually lose all credibility as a valid news source.
It's The Ethics, Stupid.
You mean like publishing a false story, complete with false documents about the National Guard service of President on the United States?
I love the outrage! ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN all in the tank for this administration and the Democrats and you're worried about FNC being slanted right.
You'd know this if you actually spent time watching other news sources rather than relying on secondhand reports about what those news sources are saying.
"You mean like publishing a false story, complete with false documents about the National Guard service of President on the United States?"
This is your example of mainstream media malfeasance? A single example taken from a few years ago that led to the hastening of a major new anchor's retirement? When questionable facts came to light, Dan Rather took responsibility for reporting on the story. This is despite the fact that the documents in question were never PROVEN to be forgeries, albeit highly questionable.
That's a far cry from Fox News and its crew doing these things day in and day out, never taking responsibility at all for the lies for which they get called out on a daily basis. They might issue a minor retraction but then they go about acting as though nothing at all happened.
No one said that ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, or CNN are perfect. You'd be hard pressed, however, to prove that they slip up as much and to the same degree that Fox News has been demonstrated to do on a daily basis.
It's not a false story. Bush stopped showing up for Guard duty when they started doing random drug tests. That's a proven fact.
Perhaps, before you type your foot any deeper into you mouth you might want to read this:
http://www.factcheck.org/bush_a_military_deserter_calm_down_michael.html
Do you really consider lying in order to smear reputations and destroy lives to be "ethical"? Do you truly think it's ethical for a news organization to invent stories out of whole cloth or to take out-of-context comments and build upon them as though they were major news when it serves that organization's political agenda?
Just... wow.
Tell that to the family of Dr. Tiller, who got killed as a result of the smears spread against him by the likes of Fox News.
There is nothing wrong with opinions, agendas, and angles so long as a network upholds journalistic standards in exploring those things. Fox News does not do that. It operates according to an "End justifies the means" philosophy and doesn't let troublesome things like ethics or proper journalistic practices get in the way of advancing its agenda.
Yeah.
Unfortunately, mentally sick individuals don't commit acts like that in a vacuum. What they do is see things built up to a certain level and decide to take matters into their own hands in order to address the problem they perceive. I think that Fox News very much contributed to creating an atmosphere where an individual like Scott Roeder felt that acting out violently was the right thing to do.
That is my overall point. If Fox News is a legitimate news source, they have a responsibility not to create an atmosphere that lends credibility to fringe accusations. That they both do this and, in many cases, quote the people that they are trying to smear out of context and bring up allegations against them on the flimsiest of evidence is exactly a big part of the "unethical" equation to which I am referring.
By your own admission you have no evidence to believe what you believe. By your own admission even if Roeder had never even heard of Fox News they should still be held somewhat accountable.
Oh, I'm sorry. I was under the impression that I was talking to a reasonable person here.
My apologies.
"Oh, I'm sorry. I was under the impression that I was talking to a reasonable person here."
Just curious. How would you describe the abortion of a full term baby? In case you need further explanation a full term baby means a living being. One of Tiller's abortions was for the simple reason a young woman wanted to attend her graduation party!
BTW: The abortion activists who want the right to kill living humans are the same folks who don't want to off mass murderers who torture and kill small living humans (death penalty foes).
I know, doesn't compute for us logically driven types but somehow does for the mentally challenged.
Whether or not the abortion of a full term baby is actually "baby killing" is beside the point in this discussion. What Tiller was doing was legal. If people don't like that, they can change the laws in question and make it illegal.
What I found unreasonable was MagCynic's attempt to defend O'Reilly's choice of rhetoric and Fox News's decision to continually spread it. It is a known fact that there are unbalanced individuals out there that feel entitled to take justice into their own hands when they feel that an injustice is being committed. An organization like Fox News has a social obligation to weigh the various factors around an issue like this. The reasonable decision would be that even if Tiller IS a baby killer, it is not socially responsible to actually say that on the air. It is not the duty of an organization which claims to report on the news to stir up sentiments which might lead to individuals taking the law into their own hands against someone that is doing something which is completely legal.
If you don't think late-term abortion should be legal, that's fine. Change the laws. It is neither appropriate nor the responsibility of organizations which claim to report the news to involve themselves in that process. There is a point where certain rhetoric, while perhaps true, reaches the point of yelling "fire" in a crowded theater (which, incidentally, you definitely do not do ESPECIALLY if there is a fire!).
And yes, by my own admission even if Roeder had never even heard of Fox News, they should still be held somewhat accountable for helping to cultivate that culture and for lending credibility to it.
There is acceptable and unacceptable rhetoric in a journalistic setting. Calling someone the "Worst Person in the World" is goofy to the point of being a joke - no one is going to take that seriously. It's about as non-threatening as it gets. That's acceptable. It doesn't cross a line. Calling someone a "teabagger" points out their disconnect from the culture around them by choosing a political identity around a name which also doubles as a sex act. At the end of the day, it is satirical and shows that the people in question are a segment of the population and not representative of the American population as a whole. It's embarrassing but not threatening.
Calling someone a "baby killer", on the other hand, does create a threatening atmosphere. Respectable news sources avoid that type of rhetoric precisely because they accept the fact that they will be partially responsible if someone acts out on that. When you have a form of media that is available to tens of millions of people and you claim a certain level of respectability, when you allow comments like that to be repeated day in and day out on your broadcasts you lend credibility to other people that are saying it as well.
There is a very real ethical question involved here and MagCynic is avoiding it by missing the forest for the trees. It's not about whether Tiller personally watched Fox News. MagCynic wants to focus on Tiller when Tiller was just a side note of what I was really talking about when I posted my initial comment. The point is that large organizations which purport to deliver the news have obligations to society not to stir up dangerous rhetoric and not to lend credibility to fringe elements within that society.
Standards and practices are important in any organization, but they are especially important when the scope of that organization reaches to the lengths we see in Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN. If Fox can't live up to those standards, I can't particularly feel bad for them if people start deciding that they aren't really a news outlet.
*http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brad-wilmouth/2008/05/15/olbermann-accuses-bush-murderous-deceit-should-shut-hell
(Yes, it links to a transcript at Newsbusters. If I can stand to read MMFA then you all can read Mr. Olbermann's comments at Newsbusters.)
BTW, there was nothing deranged about hating Bush & Company. They lied us into a ruinous war, tortured people, spied on us, and turned a 800 billion dollar surplus into a 5 trillion dollar deficit. Just to start.
And it doesn't have to "hold up in court" to be unethical. I happen to disagree with abortion as an option to a healthy pregnancy and birth for adoption, but it's legal and only my business if its my body in question. Some people actually believe that a fetus isn't a baby until it is born. Since it is a matter or opinion (all religious doctrine aside - immaterial in this secular government) you can't prove them wrong.
While the Congress and Senate cowered in fear the corner. - Did you think before you wrote that? The Presidency doesn't rule in a vacuum. Last I checked Congress declared War; drafted and passed "The Patriot Act"; okayed Gitmo and was aware of the water-boarding despite Ms. Pelosi's sketchy memory on the subject.
Want a shoe horn for the other foot?
I disliked GW as well, but he didn't do it without the rest of the Washington circus.
I don't have a problem with you linking to Newsbusters - I asked you for proof and you provided it. Information has to be considered on its own merits despite the source. I'm actually giving you a thumbs up for providing a link. That should be encouraged.
I might take flak for it around here but I'm personally not particularly big on Bush bashing. I believe that Olbermann may have very well came close to crossing the sort of rhetorical line about which I've speaking - and perhaps he did cross it.
I would add, however, that there is also a difference in criticizing the most powerful elected official in our country when that person makes statements that play on deep seated fears in order to influence an election in favor of his party and vilifying a private individual for doing something that is completely legal. "Bush Derangement Syndrome" was the result of people reacting to the Bush Administration's tendency over the course of the past eight years to overstep countless boundaries, both legal and institutional, which have traditionally defined the Executive Branch of our government.
I'm not entirely certain that the outrage was not unwarranted, just as it would not be if elements of the right could actually substantiate their claims that the Obama Administration is undermining our country in the manner which they assert.
CohibaMan, although I often disagree with you and find your arguments flawed, you are actually one of the more thoughtful and respectful posters here. I, metaphorically at least, hear what you are saying.
But, by your logic, the recently arrested terror suspects who where thinking of using the DC sniper M.O. were aided by the media having reported and even commented on the effects of those events and therefore, had the attack taken place, the media should be held accountable. I disagree with this premise.
Most, if not all, people in this country, from childhood know murdering another human being is a bad thing and at the very least it violates a tenet of civilized society. My pointing out that someone is, in my opinion, evil; does not give anyone licence or encouragement to violate that tenet. Your argument is saying that we as individuals are not solely culpable and that any speech which might be provocative should be controlled because individuals may be influenced to act on that speech regardless of consequence. Mmmmmmmmm... not so much.
Please do not try to place the "Fire!" in a crowded theater analogy here, it doesn't fit.
While the abortion subject is a legal one, it is also a moral one. The typical stance on the left is to call it "Pro-choice" but if you drill down it is more pro-abortion. Very often pro-abortion advocates are the same people who oppose the death penalty for criminals. On the other side; the Pro-lifers seem to be the same folks that support the death penalty in capital cases. Doesn't make sense does it? A baby can live outside the womb at around 25 weeks. And we all can agree that sometimes legal doesn't mean "right" (after all, human slavery was once "legal"). I think people have to live with their own decisions on this subject but if your assertion is correct that we are collectively culpable (an assertion I disagree with) then aren't pro-choice advocates of late term abortions "ethically" suborning legal murder; as are pro death penalty advocates? Of course the death penalty victim gets a trial and appeals process. I personally don't care if a pregnant woman chooses to drink, smoke, shoot drugs, douse herself with gasoline and set herself on fire as long as it doesn't infringe on create a burden or danger to me or anyone beside her and her fetus. If she asked me I would recommend against those things but ultimately; her choice. I also have no problem with the state executing criminals convicted of capital crimes as long as due process was served, and it is quick, painless and cost efficient.
I suppose it depends on if you think America is a country of individuals or a heard nation. I suppose it's something in between, but I'd like to be free to decide where I fall.
And the Indians had WMD's.
Again, the liberals have all the other news and media outlets locked up, but they won't be satisfied as long as a single conservative slanted entity exists. Too funny!
I see people on your side of the aisle make this assertion all the time yet the best you can do in backing it up are comments on the behalf of individuals that they are personally liberal.
Where is your proof that these individuals allow their political opinions to override their professional standards in reporting and discussing the news in the same manner that people on Fox News do?
I want to see some proof, more than just a single incident from a few years ago where the guy ended up taking responsibility for advancing a story based on questionable evidence.
Look, I'm really taking a devil's advocate roll here, if the best MM can do is attack Beck then this has become ridiculous. Don't parade the opinion shows on FNC as "dangerous" and journalistic "malpractice" when "real" news networks have done worse. MM gives the impression that it is a media accuracy watchdog against conservative misinformation. I'm a little disappointed that Rush, Beck and Hannity are the best that they come up with, since, outside of opinion, I doubt many people view their ilk as serious journalists. Yet I see the almost hand wringing delight of the supposed liberal intellectuals here when parsing Beck, Limbaugh or Hannity's words; it's embarrassingly pathetic. I was hoping for some intelligent and challenging debate and what I find are a bunch of name calling Internet style bullies that only want to drink their own vomit. I've been called a teabagger, right wing nut, etc... What I actually am is a veteran, retired police officer and businessman, my wife is a former nurse and now an Emergency Room physician. I have read and studied the Constitution of the United States and have a deep interest in American History and the principles of it's foundation, specifically Liberty. So if any of that makes me a birther, teabagger, right wing wacko, etc. then so be it. My concern for America is genuine and I have put myself at risk to defend it and it's public for a good part of my adult life.
So enjoy your smokes, worry about Beck, Limbaugh, while the politicians on both sides of the aisle slip it in. Good luck.
With former Washington "Moonie" Times people like Bill Sammon and Major Garrett heading up their political coverage, Fox simply cannot be permitted to continue their charade.
You could very easily cut together 2-second clips from MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NBC, and CBS and make them look the same way, but uber-liberal. (Haven't you heard of NewsBusters?)
I feel sorry for the MM staffer who wasted all his/her time putting that together. What a stupid waste of time.
MHO.
The problem is when people come in and start spouting ridiculous comments about how liberals are sheep, about how we worship Barack Obama, about how we hate the Constitution, about how we support the murder of babies, about how we're un-American, about how we're all a bunch of socialists, and a host of other tripe we deal with here every day.
Being a liberal doesn't mean being a wimp. Figuratively speaking, if someone takes a swing at me, I'm going to hit him back harder, faster, and put him to the ground. History has shown again and again that a refusal to fight back in the face of aggression is to cede the argument to the aggressor.
I like to be nice but I refuse to be nice to someone who is spitting on me.
Truth is that the vitriol flows both ways here and many of the "liberals" here start with Nazi references (Snoopy); threatening innuendo (bobuell); claiming people are ignorant of history when their own grasp is flawed (mikehuck1976) and then resorting to snarky comments when unable to support their assertion. They give folks with opposing view points cute little nicknames like "birthers", "right-wing whack jobs", "uneducated", "ignorant" or my personal favorite "Goobers"(Irony101); all shoveled out regardless of veracity or understanding of the person behind the names actual background.
As an example I mentioned the Constitution and the first thing to fly off the keyboard of one of the very respectful and tolerant liberals (yes; I'm being facetious) was that I've probably never even read the Constitution (I happen to have read it, and keep copies for reference both on my desktop, pda and a hard copy. I also keep John Stuart Mill's essay on Liberty handy.)
Apparently choosing the tag I did gave licence to the respectful "liberals" here to start, metaphorically of course, spitting on me. If you really read here you can get the true sense of the contempt many of these self confessed "liberals" have for anyone who disagrees, even respectfully, with them.
I don't confuse "liberals" with wimps. I've seen riots, violent protests and the forcible nature of "liberals". They are far from wimps individually or collectively.
To tell the truth, it seems to me that political "liberals" are anything but liberal, which would indicate an open or accepting nature, yet many liberals I find are more angry and closed minded than the conservatives they hate.
So I just chuckle or outright belly laugh when I get attacked, because in my short time here I have come expect little else.
*http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1011/color-of-news-coverage
http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1011/color-of-news-coverage
On Fox News, in contrast, coverage of Obama was more negative than the norm (40% of stories vs. 29% overall) and less positive (25% of stories vs. 36% generally). For McCain, the news channel was somewhat more positive (22% vs. 14% in the press overall) and substantially less negative (40% vs. 57% in the press overall). Yet even here, his negative stories outweighed positive ones by almost 2 to 1.
And what did it conclude:
These findings augment what was learned from a broader report on campaign media coverage released a week earlier entitled "Winning the Media Campaign: How the How the Press Reported the 2008 General Election." That study found that in the media overall -- a sample of 43 outlets studied in the six weeks following the conventions through the last debate -- Barack Obama's coverage was somewhat more positive than negative (36% vs. 29%), while John McCain's, in contrast, was substantially negative (57% vs. 14% positive). The report concluded that this, in significant part, reflected and magnified the horse race and direction of the polls.
The report does not say what you want it to say.
Negative McCain: MSNBC - 73% FNC - 40%
Negative Obama: MSNBC - 14% FNC - 40%
Positive McCain: MSNBC - 10% FNC - 22%
Positive Obama: MSNBC - 43% FNC - 25%
Fox ran about the same number of negative stories for both candidates. They also showed slightly more favorable coverage for Obama than McCain. MSNBC on the other hand is much more skewed in favor of Obama. Judging from this data it's clear that MSNBC had a much greater agenda in the election than Fox News.
A news organization's job is to report facts, not to inflect a positive or negative tone on a story, candidate, administration etc. Once the facts are reported, you can consider yourself informed an make up your own mind based on the evidence presented. Reporting half truths, outright lies and rhetoric is NOT the job of a legitimate news organization, regardless of the percentage of their total air time that it takes up.
When you claim someone is reporting "out right lies" as fact, I would like to see the factual evidence in that regard. To quote another of my favorite political philosophers John Adams "Facts are stubborn things;" a quote the White House likes to use even when applying it to theoretical policy outcome but they omit the most important part of the quote:"... and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
A few people here playing with the Pew Institute studies have shown that even factual data can be interpreted differently by different people. But the facts remain constant on their face.
Perhaps you can prove how "none of the television and few of the print or internet media" pass my litmus test for a credible news organization. What evidence do you have that every television news org deals in half truths and rhetoric, much less lies? Because I don't see that being the case, and I'd really like to know if I'm missing something.
Indeed, news can be delivered from a variety of sources. Yes, the National Enquirer broke the John Edwards story, but I think we all agree that the National Enquirer is still a supermarket tabloid. Otherwise you wouldn't have had to add, "of all media," in the middle of that sentence. Even a broken clock is right twice a day. When one of the handful of broken clocks out there actually breaks a credible, worthwhile story, we'll hear about it on the more credible news organizations too, so there's not much point in relying on sources like the Enquirer as a news source. They still have very little credibility.
This website has refuted some of FOX's outright lies with factual evidence ad nauseum. I'm not sure I see your point with the John Adams quote. I have absolutely no problem with facts. For example, when FOX alleges that a administration official knew of an instance of statutory rape, but never reported it, and the facts refute that allegation, I have no problem with that. Do you?
Anyone know if FOX has retracted that story yet?
First of all, it was Kevin Jennings own words that threw him under the bus. I happened to have seen the actual "news" version of the story when it broke and unless I'm mistaken I remember the word "allegedly" even being used even when referring to Jennings's admitted actions which was his own assertion that he had given questionable council to an "underage boy". Allegedly the actual student came forward and reported to MM that he was actually 16. This was well after Jennings appointment, so at the time, yes the administration only had Jennings version of the story.
FNC reported the contradicting report as well. It didn't lead and of course and "smirky face" Hannity didn't run with it (would Olbermann, if it had been a Bush story?) Should they apologize that Jennings's own recollection of the event which he was the source was faulty? Who told the "outright lie" here?
Let's look at the story where news agencies were reporting that there might be a kid in that balloon. Were they reporting "outright lies"? Look I know it's so tempting given the nature of this site to have contempt for FNC, but if they're "lying" about folks with regard to their reporting there is something called libel and they can be sued; and they can be forced to retract the lie and pay damages; and don't you think every lawyer at the ACLU would love to get a piece of FNC?
Looking at this from a purely neutral stand point and looking at the time line and facts as they have been revealed by all the players, I have zero problem with this story. Public figures, even those appointed by the President of the United States are subject to deeper scrutiny and criticism for actions both passed and present than the average citizen. I think the 24 Hr news cycle, the blend of opinion, news reporting and analysis is a trend to make these stations more watchable for short attention span public. However FNC isn't alone in this regard so I find the "outrage" comical even when sincere. After my time here I think MM would draw more of an audience if they called it "What FOX News Says Matters.org" or just "We Hate FOX News.org" When I want sterile news I read. When I want to get fired up I watch "punch me in the face" Olbermann for 5 minutes. When I want to laugh I watch Beck (He's really funny if you get it. The "tears" are tears of joy as his check is making it's way to the bank.)
Snarky unsubstantiated random comment alert!!!
Maybe Jennings was just trying to score points with his NAMBLA buddies.
end snarky unsubstantiated random comment
Sorry, sometimes I feel the need for sarcasm, nothing personal.
I think we agree on the National Enquirer point.
The John Adams point is that once the facts are there, that's all there is. Being that we're dealing with humans and I'll tell you from experience people, even eye witnesses can be pretty unreliable. That's why physical evidence is so much better than anecdotal; but when anecdotal is all there is only so much due diligence you can do. If you have conflicting stories you report them both.
Anyway, that's my take, good having a reasonable, civil discussion with you.
ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL: The manipulations and media machine behind the assault on progressive ideas
BY REBECCA BOWE AND SARAH PHELAN
Wednesday October 21, 2009
"While the connections between corporate interests and the country's leading conservative propagandist are extensive and obvious, there's a stark contrast between the message delivered by Fox News and the interests of its parent company.
Fox News plays up the theme of patriotism and reinforces the idea that there is a distinction between "real Americans" and outsiders. But Fox's board is made up of members whose lives and economic interests are scattered across the globe, but have one common thread: they all control extraordinary sums of concentrated wealth." Source:
http://www.sfbg.com/entry.php?entry_id=9297&catid=4&volume_id=452&issue_id=455&volume_num=44&issue_num=03