Watchdogs to WHCA: Reconsider Fox News' front-row seat
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Monday, August 23, 2010 |
CONTACT Jess Levin (202) 772-8162 |
Media Matters, Public Campaign, Center for Media and Democracy issue joint letter to WHCA in light of News Corp.'s RGA donation
Washington, DC -- Today, following reports that News Corp. donated $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, Media Matters for America joined Public Campaign and the Center for Media and Democracy in issuing a letter to the White House Correspondents Association asking them to reconsider its decision to allow Fox News Channel a front row seat in the White House briefing room.
The letter reads:
To Board Members of the White House Correspondents Association:
We are writing today to ask that the White House Correspondents Association reconsider its decision to allow Fox News Channel a front-row seat in the White House briefing room in light of reports that Fox News' parent company, News Corp., has donated $1 million to the Republican Governors Association -- a massive ethical lapse that demonstrates Fox News' inability to function as an objective media institution.
Media outlets are supposed to cover elections and issues to inform voters, not help to elect candidates who espouse certain positions. With so much News Corp. money invested in the election of Republican gubernatorial candidates, can Fox News be expected to disinterestedly cover those races or Republican politics in general?
News Corp.'s generous gift to the RGA, and its subsequent explanation that "News Corporation believes in the power of free markets, and the RGA's pro-business agenda supports our priorities at this most critical time for our economy," should demolish any continued claims from Fox News and its enablers that the organization operates objectively and in good faith.
When confronted by Nathan Daschle of the Democratic Governors Association about the need for disclaimers to Fox News' coverage of gubernatorial races, the network responded: "Nathan's stunt has run its course. His 15 minutes are up. Time to leave the stage."
This is not how legitimate news organizations respond to ethics scandals. Stonewalling tactics and snide attacks on critics such as these are more suited to political campaigns.
What message does it send to reward a "news outlet" that ideologically and financially supports the Republican Party with a place of distinction in the White House briefing room? How is the country better served by continuing to disregard Fox News' unabashed partisan tilt even as it becomes more and more obvious?
This is an issue that transcends mere ideological squabbling. If democracy demands a free press, then it also demands that partisan political outfits not be treated as legitimate news outlets or rewarded for masquerading as such. It also demands that news outlets maintain strict financial separation from the political parties and candidates they're supposed to cover. The White House Correspondents Association can demonstrate its commitment to preserving the media's role as independent agents of good governance by rescinding Fox News' front-row spot in the White House briefing room.
David Donnelly, Public Campaign
Lisa Graves, Center for Media and Democracy (publisher of Sourcewatch.org)
Ari Rabin-Havt, Media Matters for America
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Shut them down!
News Corp.'s generous gift to the RGA, and its subsequent explanation that "News Corporation believes in the power of free markets, and the RGA's pro-business agenda supports our priorities at this most critical time for our economy," should demolish any continued claims from Fox News and its enablers that the organization operates objectively and in good faith.---From above MMFA letter
I agree and you have yet to refute it.
What the Supremes did was a travesty to everything decent and they sold us out to corporate interest.
"I" the private individual citizen can always bring suit right. I mean if I have the time,resources or live long enough. I can dip into my 401K to fund my research and lawyers to fight my case,right. My 30 or more thousand should be enough to take on the egg lobby or B/P billions since we are both individuals right? It's a level playing field.
Other media conglomerates DON'T have news organizations as a major part of their holdings.
For example, Disney owns ABC, and ABC News is a small part of ABC. But ABC is a tiny part of the Disney empire. And GE owns MSNBC, but it's a tiny part of GE.
FoxNews and the Wall St Journal are the vast majority of the American holdings of News Corp.
THEN, one looks at the contributions "from" GE, or "from" Disney, and realizes that many of THOSE contributions are, in fact, from the employees.
Compared to the $1 million from News Corp that came DIRECTLY and SOLELY from corporate.
NEXT, one looks at the donations from GE and Disney, for example - and they gave about 60% to Dems and about 40% to Republicans. And those donations added up to about $100,000.
The $1 million is 10 times that size (you try to MINIMIZE that difference by talking about 6 figure and 7 figure numbers - don't think we didn't notice that!), and ONLY goes to ONE Party's Governors Association! The $100,000 is 10% of what News Corp gave to Republicans ONLY!
You couldn't be more dishonest if you tried!
1. The parent company of Fox News donated money to one political side and not the other.
2. This demonstrates a bias which would "obviously" carry over into their news reporting.
3. They need to have their front row seats taken away for being so unethical.
4. You should definitely listen to us because we're partisan organizations. But we're the "good" kind of organizations so our opinions count unlike those "evil" guys at Fox News.
Doesn't this, "If democracy demands a free press, then it also demands that partisan political outfits not be treated as legitimate news outlets or rewarded for masquerading as such." apply to MMfA? In short the hypocrisy is almost palpable.
Media Matters for America is a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.
Launched in May 2004, Media Matters for America put in place, for the first time, the means to systematically monitor a cross section of print, broadcast, cable, radio, and Internet media outlets for conservative misinformation — news or commentary that is not accurate, reliable, or credible and that forwards the conservative agenda — every day, in real time.
Using the website mediamatters.org as the principal vehicle for disseminating research and information, Media Matters posts rapid-response items as well as longer research and analytic reports documenting conservative misinformation throughout the media. Additionally, Media Matters works daily to notify activists, journalists, pundits, and the general public about instances of misinformation, providing them with the resources to rebut false claims and to take direct action against offending media institutions.----MMFA mission statement
Now where in that statement do you see MMFA claiming to be a fair and balanced news agency. Thanks for admitting that Faux News is partisan.
What statement of mine did you misinterpret to mean that I "admitted" Fox News was partisan? Was it If so it should be fairly obvious that I was following the steps of "logic" in the letter in the article, not "admitting" anything.
You can hide behind false accusations of the watchdogs and bake logic pretzels, but anyone who is being honest can watch a few hours of Fox News and simply experience not only the blatant bias in choice of story and tone of reporting, but also experience the degradation of American journalism as they engage in wild speculation and play host to guests with questionable credentials and conflicts of interest.
What's that old expression? "Don't 'pee' on my leg and tell me it's raining. I think it's time to adopt a new one: Don't turn on Fox News and tell me it's "Fair and Balanaced".
1) MMfA is a news outlet. Not because they call themselves that, or because I think that's what they are. They are a news outlet because they disseminate news (information about current events that they claim to be factual in nature) to the public. Their actions show that they are a news outlet.
2) I don't consider MMfA to be the same as Fox News, that's just another strawman you set up. I pointed out that the statements they made about Fox News applies to themselves. I expressed no opinion on the accuracy of those statements. Again, I was simply pointing out the massive hypocrisy in their letter.
3) The fact that you don't go to MMfA to get your world or national news doesn't mean that they are not a news outlet. People don't go to ESPN to get news about the current political debate. That's because ESPN covers the sporting news not the political news.
Using the website mediamatters.org as the principal vehicle for disseminating research and information, Media Matters posts rapid-response items as well as longer research and analytic reports documenting conservative misinformation throughout the media. Additionally, Media Matters works daily to notify activists, journalists, pundits, and the general public about instances of misinformation, providing them with the resources to rebut false claims and to take direct action against offending media institutions.----MMFA mission statement
This is an internal memo from fox News after one of it's newscasters got caught crossing the line from what legitimate news agency is supposed to be:
From: Sammon, Bill
Sent: Monday, September 21, 2009 2:25 PM
To: 005 -Washington
Subject: standards
"...That means we ask questions in a fair, impartial manner. When approaching interviewees, we identify ourselves, by both name and news organization, up front. We seek out a variety of voices and views. We take note of the scene in order to bring color and context to our viewers.
We do not cheerlead for one cause or another. We do not rile up a crowd. If a crowd happens to be boisterous when we show it on TV, so be it. If it happens to be quiet, that’s fine, too. It’s not our job to affect the crowd’s behavior one way or the other. Again, we’re journalists, not participants — and certainly not performers.
Indeed, any effort to affect the crowd’s behavior only serves to undermine our legitimate journalistic role as detached eyewitnesses. Remember, our viewers are counting on us to be honest brokers when it comes to reporting — not altering –the important events of the day. That is nothing less than a sacred trust. We must always take pains to preserve that trust."
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/internal-fox-email-addresses-standards-after-912-flap/
When they fail to adhere to those standards then MMFA reports on it. They are a non-profit media watch dog group that reports on conservative misinformation. In no way are they trying to or need to stick to policies that the Faux memo admonished it's employees to.
You're really overlooking a lot of differences here to take a shot at a website that you have an obvious distaste for.
Fox claims they are "Fair and Balanced" They are not.
Foxnews claims they have both opinion and news shows, however the news anchors can't help but put their personal opinion spin on most every story. That's not journalism. "Fair and Balanced" debates usually consist of a conservative, a conservative moderator, and some token Liberal that both conservative voices brow beat and talk over until the liberal typically gives up. NONE of these Fox clowns would EVER stand a Chance in a True Debate format!
MMFA does not claim they are "Fair and Balanced" In fact, they just come out and say they are Progressive.
Facts. They scare the $h!T out of Neo-cons.