I'm still not over Fox News' exercise yesterday in extreme journalistic malpractice.
If you missed it, on April 26, the American Spectator's Washington Prowler blog -- a right-wing outlet that frequently pushes dubious stories relying on anonymous quotes -- published a column claiming that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) withheld an unfavorable report on health care reform until after the health care vote.
On the next day's edition of Fox News' America Live, Megyn Kelly and Bret Baier ran with the story, acknowledging that they had “reached out to the White House, HHS and actuary's office” but had not “independently confirmed” the Prowler's allegations. An hour later, Baier was forced to return and acknowledge that the author of that report had returned his email, and categorically denied the Prowler report, calling it “completely false.”
It is not unusual for Fox News to run with entirely made-up stories pulled from the depths of the internet -- both a Fox News executive and a federal judge have previously called out the network's on-air “talent” for doing just that.
But those criticisms were directed at the co-hosts of Fox & Friends, who are, let's face it, a joke (just ask Stephen Colbert). This time, it was Bret Baier -- the one Fox points to when it's trying to defend its status as a legitimate news outlet -- dropping this little Zen Koan on the network's audience: “If true, this is a huge story.”
Full stop. If something could be a “huge story,” isn't it incumbent upon actual journalists to determine whether it's true before reporting it?
What exactly was Fox News' hurry? Why didn't they wait to hear back from Medicare chief actuary Richard Foster before running with a story that they acknowledged was based only on the anonymous sourcing of a right-wing rag?
Were they worried that one of the other networks was going to scoop them on the “huge story”? They were certainly first with the story -- NBC News clocked in with their report a full hour after the first America Live segment. On the other hand, that extra time apparently allowed them to debunk the Prowler story (Headline: “DID HHS SWEEP SCORE UNDER THE RUG? NO”).
CNN, for some reason, seems to have completely ignored a dubious, anonymously sourced hit job by a right-wing website. I guess they didn't want to own that “huge story.”
By the by, my anonymous congressional sources are telling me that John Boehner is actually a vampire. I'd like a national cable news network to report on this without scrutiny. Does anyone have Bret Baier's cell number? If true, this is a huge story...