Outfoxed

I just bought it earlier today. Here are the memos, too:

http://www.wonkette.com/archives/fox...tch-017613.php

Well I've watched these clips and so far the evil Republican bias consists of...

Clara Frenk says Fox is evil because Brit Hume was wearing a pin in support of Lisa Myers not being censored at NBC regarding a story on Juanita Broderick

Alexander Kippen suggests that evil Fox forced Peter Jennings to get his U.S. citizenship. (Yeah, that sure is... evil?!?) He also says that they carved out a distict profile, and that they catered to the suburbs (but eww... those suburbs are burning because they are ANGRY!)

Jon Du Pre makes a most confusing presentation. Fox is not interested in serving their viewers, but in serving headquarters. He complains basically on what appears to be having to listen to an editor. This editor reminds them that the news has to cater to their viewers?!? whom they don't care about. He also complains about Fox "narrowcasting" instead of broadcasting. He complains that Fox serves a narrow segment instead of a broad audience.

It should be noted that Fox's "narrow" audience is often seen as large or larger than CNN's. Why is the same number (or even larger) narrow when it is Fox, but broad when it is CNN?

Jeff Chester complains about media conglomerates in general. I don't really understand how Fox is any different in this manner than other outlets. CNN is part of TimeWarner which is huge. MSNBC is part of Microsoft and GE, both huge. Why is it suddenly evil when you intone the name Rupert Murdock? Was Ted Turner evil while creating his media empire that he sold off? What about the huge Viacom or Disney?

I watched Peter Hart also complain about the large corporate media machine and how it is not progressive enough, etc. But I don't really see, again how this is a condemnation of Fox and their bias.

It seems more like an associative argument. Big media = bad and Fox is big media. But Steve Rendell, who is interviewed complains that actually Fox is small media here.

He mentions that basically Fox would kill to get the types of numbers that CBS and others get for their nightly news which are 4-500% larger. He also mentions that if Fox is conservative and thus stands alone against that they get beat 30-1 and also make less on their ads than CNN.

So we get this (typical) sort of double-sided argument. Fox is big media, evil and interested only in money. But they charge less than CNN, have fewer quality viewers than CNN, are small media compared to true big media, oh but of course still evil in the end.

Strange...

Nick

Nick are you saying FOX News Channel isn't extremely right-wing? To say FNC is anything but very right-wing is silly.

I forget the specifics, but CNN tends to attract more total viewers and higher advertising rates, but Fox scores higher in the ratings due to its prime-time lineup of conservative talk-shows.


Well, Fox is different for sure. Rupert Murdoch has been a a lot more explicitly ideological about his news outlets (FNC, NYPost, etc) than MSNBC or CNN (where until recently, "news was the star.") Anyway, in Outfoxed, Fox News is a specific part of a general critique against corporate ownership of the media. Again, what distinguishes Fox News from other outlets is its conservative-ideology-driven nature. That should be clear.


There's nothing strange in the fact that network news attracts a far larger audience than the largely niche-cable-news-masquerading-as-mainstream-news you'll find on the prime-time lineups. Fox News exemplifies that, of course. But I guess you can just reduce others' arguments to just "Fox News is evil" and that's a bit easier to attack.

Define "extreme".

But the real point is that this documentary isn't called OutCNN'ed or OutViacom'ed. Both of whom happen to be top ten donors to John Kerry if you take a look over at OpenSecrets.org and both of whom people like you claim are unbiased.



Actually it is just the opposite. Fox continually attempts to portray itself in non-partisan terms. They are specifically not explicit in terms of trying to claim a conservative mantle. It is others who continually claim Fox is conservative. What is clear is that this movie is yet another example of how conservatives, or even perceived conservatism is given an evil intent no matter what the actions are in comparison to others.




Actually what I get tired of is this both sides of the coin are evil-type arguments. It basically shows nothing but pure partisanship and doesn't ever create an environment where sides could come together. With Bush it is, he is as dumb as a door knob but somehow beat Gore with a trick (electoral college) and got all the Senators currently running against to vote for NCLB, loads of tax cuts, the war, etc with very convincing lies, etc. The two aren't congruent. He can be brilliantly evil, or stupidly incompetent but don't try to tell me he is both at the same time.

Likewise, don't try to tell me Fox is evil BECAUSE it is big media, but really little media, but that all the other media is somehow excused from their money grubbing, corporate whoring nature, crush the little guy nature. Those arguments are not logical or convincing. I mean you basically do the same thing. You don't add anything other than , "Well it's Rupert Murdoch and we all know what he does."

BTW, Fox News if often claimed to be conservative in part because of their viewership. (Even the clip I mentioned notes that they go after their demographic) Let's look at what CNN's and NPR's voters think.

CNN/NPR fans heavily favor Kerry


Seems like those folks know that they can go and hear what they want to have reenforced just like with Fox. If you can't detect it, it is probably because you agree with it, much like with Fox viewers.

So we have old money John Kerry who married into even more money, crushing smaller candidates with personal loans to himself, taking huge donations from TimeWarner and now that is reflected on CNN.

Where is the documentary? I better grab my camera, oh... and a dish to intercept transmissions as well.


Nick

What if I only said they were sort of right-wing. Would I only be sort of silly?

I don't watch cable news, period. I do go to both websites though. I would say the most convincing rich-wing conspiracy of all time is probably be watching much television in general. People watching TV's often look just like cows in feeder stalls. The intellectual level is probably the same as well.

Of course all the people who reap the millions from television all talk a good game about how much they care about the little guy. Meanwhile they tool around spending millions. We can argue about whether the right wing owners or left wing actors are more at fault. But the result is millions of people smiling blankly at a pretty blinking box while doing nothing for themselves.

Nick

Most of that just isn't worth responding to. It's a bunch of argumentative hogwash. And I already addressed the points you did stick to, so I won't repeat myself. You're smart enough to know the difference between marketing and reality and between network and cable news, so don't feign confusion for the sake of argument.

So basically you can't prove how the same criteria that makes Fox bad doesn't somehow make CNN bad. Gotcha. It's not that you won't address it. It is that you can't.

No matter how big Fox is, CNN and Time Warner are bigger.

No matter how biased Fox is with regard to their viewerships polling patters, CNN reflects the same type of bias.

TimeWarner is a top ten contributer to John Kerry.

Three of the last four Time magazine have featured Bill Clinton, Michael Moore, and John Kerry with John Edwards.

Fair and balanced indeed.

Nick

I submit for your consideration:

Is it possible that CNN, MSNBC, and the big 3, ABC/NBC/CBS, are so left leaning that when something fair comes along, it seems one sided,


I would also venture to say that the traditional media is angry and terrified because fox has such a massive following in a relatively short number of years, so they are trying to knock it down, it has nothing to do with politics, it is all business.

Obviously not, even if you believe your fillings when they tell you there's a liberal media Big Brother out to get you.

Fox news openly positions itself as right of the mainstream. CNN openly positions itself as CENTER.

As such, the only way you can say the bias is the same is to propose that there is a hidden agenda, in which case your position would be rational if you applied the same skepticism across the board, both in media and politics, thereby clearly ending up with an even more right wing image of Fox News unless, of course, you think Fox News' hidden agenda is to promote "liberal" ideology.

Silly.

And I submit for your consideration:

Is it possible that CNN, MSNBC, and the big 3, ABC/NBC/CBS, are so poor at sensationalizing their naturally poor coverage of the news that when something aggressive, unfounded, and beligerant comes along, it seems to be fair coverage,

I would also venture to say that the political direction of sensationalization does not matter, that the traditional media is angry and terrified because it is suffering a schism of ideals, that sensational press coverage is simultaneously not a legitimate means of conveying information and at the same time far more satisfying to the smirking viewer (be they liberal or conservative), so someone outside of it all is pointing this out and suffering the blow back from sensational press he wishes refounded, it has nothing to do with politics, it is all buisness.

I submit for your consideration:

Is it possible that when Bill Clinton moved the Democratic party to the center that conservatives, in an effort to distinguish themselves from an increasingly centrist, if not slightly conservative, Democratic party and popular (if beseiged) President, were forced to move farther and farther to the right? Is it possible that, because this happened over the course of 8 years, during which time Limbaugh became huge and Fox News emerged, the transition was so gradual that conservatives didn't even notice they were moving farther and farther to the right? Is it telling that, for instance, the formerly "radical" voice of the right wing, Pat Buchanan, is increasingly at odds with the current state of the right wing? Is it possible that Fox leveraged its very popular sports outlets as a vehicle for attracting its news-viewing demographic? Is it possible that Fox's WWF-like pundits were part and parcel of an increasing public interest in viewing cruelty toward and debasement of others? Is it possible that when Fox amassed a large viewing audience for its screaming head shows, the other major news outlets were forced to compete by hiring blatant conservatives to work as pundits, thereby moving radical voices into the mainstream? Mike "I hope you get AIDS and die" Savage? Ann "We should invade
their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity" Coulter?

The irony, of course, is that the right in this country has relied on the rhetoric of oppression for so long that it hasn't seemed to notice it controls loads of major media and all branches of government.

While it is possible, it is not at all what happened. Clinton successfully executed a strategy of triangulation to get elected while the entire country was becoming more conservative in its voting patterns. Gore managed to get the nomination but had to make a hard left to excite the base and attempt to fend off Nader. Lieberman wasn't even in the running this time.

Meanwhile it is Bush has coined the compassionate conservative phrase, been unwilling to restrain spending, and has not even been willing to address issues like immigration. The Republican Party has moved to the left because, for example the same sex marriage amendment couldn't even muster a majority in the Senate.

There are many Republicans that used to be Democrats. They often claim that they never left the party, the party left them. This is the Buchanan pitchfork crowd which is basically white men who are tired of being the evil cause of everything. Union folks and people in trades who are tired of being sold out on issues like NAFTA/WTO. Lastly we have anyone who doesn't want to police the entire world while and believes that we should enforce our own borders both for environmental and cultural reasons. There is no one in EITHER party that is addressing these issues right now. It is these issues that created the Perot candidacy that kept Clinton in for eight years (while never achieving even 50% of the vote) and also helps Nader now. There are populist positions, but neither party will touch them.


As mentioned Buchanan is at odds basically because he advocates the views of white males, trades, unions, and limited or no immigration. For actually attempting to address these he has been called a racist in every possible manner. I'm sure most of these Reagan Democrats and white men would actually vote for an alternative but they are sort of like blacks within the Democratic party, where are you going to go?

The Democratic party could create a majority federally if they changed a very small number of issues. Stop blaming white males for everything, economic affirmative action, immigration reform for national security, for fiscal reasons (to help lower income Americans advance financially, perhaps even unionize) and lastly for environmental reasons. Finally, they could extend to men the same choice to parent that women have and stop trying to get tough on crime by criminalizing sex via child support/divorce, sexual harassment for nonsense like telling a dirty joke. (make it about power, not environment)

If they did even a few of these things they would likely haev a supermajority quite quickly.


Most likely all this has come about because of us all having so many more channels of communication to fill. It takes more to attract attention and once we have it, we still want something familiar. Thus brands (like say a Limbaugh) become huge but in the meantime you still have a hundred channels that need to fill their space so they will put ANYTHING on. (hence reality tv)

You will likely watch this happen with AirAmerica. They don't even need to do particularly well. They just need to stick around long enough to become a brand. That is exactly what Michael Moore has done. Moore is no longer a documentary film maker. He is a brand. You know just what you are going to get served when you see his films, read his books or listen to him speak. I have no doubt it is true with Limbaugh, Coulter, Franken and others as well. They are all working to become semi-political/entertaining brands. Out of all of them Bill Maher still does it best.

But in closing remember the people I mentioned that really have no where to go in terms of political representation, white males, unions, fair traders and anyone who gives pause to record immigration. Their views are not being hit by either party.

Nick

All you have to do is read the Memos over at Wonkette...
it's so blatant... the F'd News Network is an extension of the RNC.
They coordinate their message with what's coming out of the white house.
They slant the news. They spin what is supposed to be factual.

I don't know how CBS, NBC, ABC come off as being liberal... I'm liberal and I don't see it.

And CNN as well as MSNBC thinks Fox is such a hit they try to have a bit of that flavor themselves.

Air America radio is different than a Fox in that it's Talk Radio... it's not news radio.

Is it any wonder that Fox News viewers have the biggest discrepency in understanding reality versus what they've been told. And their most popular guy... O'Reilly... if his mouth is open... there's a lie being set loose.

I really don't know what you're trying to say here, except for the first paragraph (vaguely), which I already addressed. As I said before, referring to the documentary "Outfoxed," "Fox News is a specific part of a general critique against corporate ownership of the media." I would assume that makes all major cable news channels "bad," using that same criteria. Please read more carefully.

To state that the media is either "liberal" or "conservative" is a wild oversimplification....yet another black and white outlook on the world. To make another simplification...but not quite so sweeping, look at it this way: the lowest layers of the media...that is field correspondents, camera-people, reporters etc. are often politically liberal. I now this because I've talked to hundreds of them. As you go a little way up the heirarchy into lower management, editorial and staff writers, etc, the political balance becomes more even. Going further up the ladder into top management and senior editorial staff...and the bias becomes noticeably conservative....and at the topmost layers, ie the owners of the major media companies...most are conservative or very conservative businessmen...as one would expect. And how does the big corporate media function, and to whom do they answer? One word: advertising. It is all about making a profit, not educating the public in a rendition with accuracy, balance and fidelity, of current affairs. Exactly as one would expect.

In a similar way to any younger aspiring Congresspersons who end up in DC hoping to change the world, and finding themselves unable to function having to conform and answer to armies of K Street lobbyists just to avoid being spat out by the DC machine, similarly ambitious rookie journalists end up in a similar situation...."if ya want to publish that kinda stuff...get a job at Mother Jones, Adbusters or The Nation....ya can't put that progressive shit out with us. And that is true.... "progressive" content in the corporate media is not the norm, and if present, is often offered as a token gesture. I know this is also an over-generalization...but its a wee bit more to the point that saying "the media is liberal", or "the media is conservative".

The political stance of the media is determined not so much by what copy is included, but more like what is excluded or self- censored. Big corporate owned newspapers, TV and radio stations tend to avoid publishing material that may detract from the public reputation and business standing of major advertisers, as well as material that runs against the political leanings of the ownership of the media companies. We all saw this happening to a (incredibly) blatant extent during the run up to the war in Iraq.

Well there is that whole DIFFERENT part you keep bringing up.


Obviously this is where you assign it a different criteria.

Nick

One thing you can in Fox News' favor is that they are open and up-front about where they stand. They are in your face and obvious. If you don't like it, then tune into the other networks. ...but there lies the catch....the "other networks" share a similar political agenda as Fox but in a much more devious, underhanded, and subtle way. Taking the networks' spin during the buildup to the Iraq war as a recent example, a survey by the BBC found that out of a sample of 848 analyses, commentaries and opinions on network television, 844 were pro-Bush/pro-war, and a paltry four were against which was the "token" opposite viewpoint, presumably to counter any accusations of "totalitarianism" re. content. "Lookie here, says CNN, we gave Janeane Garofalo some airtime....therefore we're fair and balanced too". (!!) Similarly with radio...with Clear Channel owning some 1200 radio stations and being overtly pro-war/pro-Bush.

The worst thing to happen to the US media happened under President Clinton's watch. He signed into law the 1996 FCC deregulation which allowed the "sovietization" (or Walmartization) of the US media, favoring opinion-herding dinosaurs and monopolies over free competition between thousands of diverse and varied media outlets.

So with Clinton, as with Bush: Diversity = bad...Uniformity and conformity in lockstep = good.

Watching this right now...it's interesting stuff. They have Jeremy Glick (the kid who made Bill O'Reilly lose his shit on the air) on, he said he was urged to leave the green room by Fox staffers after the segment because they were afraid O'Reilly was going to assault him.

What is particularly interesting is the number of (current and former) Fox employees who fully realize how screwed up and insanely biased the network is but go along with it because it's just a job.

The montage of 'flip-flop' comments is hilarious..."John Kerry: flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop, flip-flop."

Of course, it becomes scary when you realize how many people actually believe it...

No-- when measuring multiple things against the same criteria, you'll probably find similarities and differences among those things. It doesn't mean I'm using different criteria if I find differences. (Please point out examples to the contrary). So for instance, all major cable news channels are owned by large corporations (which have considerable media holdings). This includes Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC. In my view, that's a negative quality they all share. So, ownership is one criteria. On the other hand, Fox News is far more ideological (read: conservative) than the other channels. So then "objectivity" is another criteria-- and one which Fox News fails miserably-- and far more consistently than the other channels.

I love it how people love to hate Fox News. Personally, I don't give a shit about the slant of a news show, since I have my own opinions about politics and world events, and it's not likely that some slightly-off-center show is going to change my opinion.

Fox News has pretty anchors and reporters. Hence I will watch Fox news over CNN. It's that simple. You can call me shallow, but I prefer the term "lonely."

That's part of their entire marketing strategy.

I've shown you proof that CNN, and NPR's "objectivity" is nothing more than a veneer, a facade. You can go to websites like MediaResearch.org and watch them compile the very clearly slanted talking point, suggestive phrasing, passing comments and so forth that show their biases.

But let me ask you this Shawn. You keep mentioning that Fox must be slanted in part, because it is owned by Murdoch who would demand that they slant their news. Is there any disagreement that Ted Turner is anything other than abashedly liberal? He founded CNN for goodness sakes.

Here is todays front page for example.


You can spend a little time there and see how all the major outlets fail quite miserably.

Nick

You don't even bother to hide that your talking points come from the center of the "liberal media" crackpot webring.

Guess what. Clinton is a serial killer. I have proof!

And obviously this "MediaReserch.org" site itself is completely "objective" and without bias, as you can plainly see from the quote featured prominently on their front page:
which is attempting to sell this book: Weapons of Mass Distortion: The Coming Meltdown of the Liberal News Media

Hey, is that an echo I hear?

Good for them. But you have to see the bonus in watching 10 minutes of TV a week from someone who's not ugly, rather than from someone who, well, isn't much.

Although CNN has definitely it's fair share of cute anchors, at least on headline news.

Yeah and that Michael Moore, Al Franken and Fair.org are so objective as well.

Check out the site. 99% of what they do is nothing more than compiling quotes from the sources to show the agenda.

Why do I find it so hard to believe that you wouldn't discredit Al Franken who writes from a liberal perspective, speaks on a liberal radio network, stumps for Democratic candidates, even helps with security, but somehow has no agenda behind what he does.

The point is that this website does no where near that and additional makes its point with nothing more than the words out of the mouth of people.

Here's a couple great examples.


Where is the "Senator, you voted for a war you now oppose, why did you change your mind about that?" Anything in there besides softball chitchat?

Compared to questions say... like this?


Another nice one...


Nick

Just incase you have missed it...

this is pretty funny.

http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblo...18.html#001641

Right-- but, again, your thinking is misguided on both accounts.

1) Media Research Council is indeed a right-wing website dedicated not towards objectivity but towards advancing a conservative agenda. Its audience obviously already buys into the "liberal media" charge. The site works more on assumptions of its audience than on any truly critical evaluation. Anyway, FAIR would be kind of a counterweight.

2) "Objectivity" is more of a goal than an absolute description of anything in the mass media. So I'm not saying CNN and NPR are absolutely "objective"-- they're not. I am saying that they are far closer to the goal of objectivity than Fox News-- that *should* be clear to those of us watching the news for things other than boobs. (We have NakedNews for that anyway)


Yes, I think corporate ownership of the news does harm the quality of reporting, story selection, news analysis, etc. In that regard-- they all fail miserably. But you can't make the same case (regarding ideology) for CNN that you can for Fox News. The evidence just isn't there. (Edit: Well, actually you can, but you wouldn't like the results. )

Actually Shawn, I've never been pointed to articles nor even studies that prove Fox is biased. The closest I've read were the voting patterns of their viewers, which I've shown is also just as biased for CNN.

You are welcome to link to some proof of this biased. Most of the proof I see is mentioning Rupert Murdoch, and intoning Fox is biased over and over again.

Nick

I have a better idea. Watch "Outfoxed" for us, and report back your findings.

Trumpt, don't you know why parroting talking points from conspiracy theorists is bad? Short answer: they have to leave out information to make their case.

Regarding your examples:

Jennings. Well, I could just point out his discourse with Clark over Bush's military records during the debate or I could point out any of 1000 babying interviews with Bush during his campaign, but watching Journeys with George will teach you about it while being entertaining.

Buckley interview by solomon. The interview by solomon you are citing was a piece for the magazine and was not the primary NYT interview regarding his retirement and great successes. Not only that, she notes some of the "offensive comments," which include saying that whites are culturally superior to blacks and that aids patients should be tattooed on their backs. It's obviously perfectly legitimate to ask such a question and it's clear why such an interview was needed, particularly after the main NYT piece made no mention of his hate speech. As such, it would be pretty easy to make a case that the main NYT piece was biased in its sugarcoating of Buckley.

If you are going to parrot a conspiracy theory, why not at least use one that's remotely interesting, like UFOs.

Edit: this is amazing. you really did just totally parrot flat-out talking points from a conspiracy site. That's about as far from critical digestion of information as one can possibly get.

As far as I see it:

They are right-wing. Very right wing? In part yes, but not fatally IMO. Extremely right-wing? I would disagree with that. Extreme is a very strong word, and I hardly find them to be extreme as a whole. Hannity is a clown and would fit that mold well. But as a news organization I do not get that sense.

It's not a problem. It's market economics. The problem is that we have a flawed judicial system that entertains silly lawsuits.

Market economics doesn't legally justify age discrimination.