Early Sunday morning, my body clock maladjusted by the end of Daylight Saving Time, I woke up “early”, grabbed a cup of coffee, and began scanning the TV band to find some news. I landed on Fox News, and there were the three weekend newsies, sitting on the couch, doing an interview with two “authorities” about Swine Flu.
One was a parish priest from Boston, the other the head of the Public Health Department for Boston. Hmmm…why Boston? Why not go with a “national” source in D.C.? Or the CDC? Soon I would learn why.
The public health lady was talking about recommendations her department had made, at the request of the Boston Roman Catholic Diocese, on things it could do to help stop the spread of the flu.
She enumerated a short list: don’t have the parishioners drink from a common chalice; suspend the communal “handshakes” during mass; a few other items. The priest confirmed that the Diocese had followed the advice.
Then it came - the FOX QUESTION!!!
One of the anchor-boys said “Father, conservatives are concerned that the H1N1 recommendations of the Boston Public Health Department may be an attempt to alter their sacred rituals. How do you respond to that?”
I didn’t hear the priest’s response. I was busy mopping up the coffee that had spewed from my nose. The coffee went down the wrong pipe as I reacted physically to the inane question.
Fox News bends everything. Everything. Even the most seemingly innocuous interview about H1N1 is bent to the “conservative” point of view. Even the most paranoid among us would find it a stretch that the public health department is trying to alter Catholic rituals. Only the most slanted, bent, spun, sold-out “news person” would even ASK such a question.
Is it any wonder our President won’t give Fox the time of day? Isn’t it somewhat disgusting to you that other “mainstream media” take the President to task under the guise that a slight to one media outlet is a slight to them all? Sort of like the Hollywood crowd that defended Roman Polanski’s “right” to drug and rape a 13-year-old girl. Disgusting.
From sunup to sundown and all night, it’s a constant drumbeat of derision concerning President Obama, an unending parade of hatred for anything that might be construed as “liberal”, all dished up under the guise of “we report, you decide”.
Madisonian Thomas Dixon Jr. wrote a letter to the Capital Times decrying the “gutless media”, saying “you don’t search for the truth but rather seek two contrasting opinions, no matter how crazy one of them may be. You seek controversy over insight. And you do it in a world that depends on you to get it right now more than ever before.”
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Colonel,
ReplyDeleteJust ran across a counterpoint-like column on Fox News written by Larry Elder < http://www.wnd.com/index.php?pageId=115010 >. He makes some interesting points, including the following:
"When I appear on Fox, as I did to promote my latest book, "What's Race Got to Do with It," I get mostly approving e-mail. When I get one that disagrees, the writer points out – using facts, information or analogies – what, in his or her opinion, undermines my position. But when I appear on Wolf Blitzer's CNN show – oh, man! Hundreds of hostile e-mails accuse me of everything but the Lincoln assassination. Only rarely, such as when someone took exception to the book's premise – that white racism no longer poses a potent or even significant factor in America – does anyone argue intelligently, with facts or information. It's snarl, attack, name-call.
"On a recent appearance on Ed Schultz's MSNBC show, I opposed Obamacare – or tried to, given the host's interruptions. The e-mails I received were unprintable."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The White House loathes Fox News. President Obama pointedly excluded Fox while appearing on ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN. Obama's communications director, on CNN, complained about Fox's year-old coverage of Obama's campaign. But a Pew Research Center study found that during the last six weeks of the campaign, 61 percent of CNN's stories on John McCain were negative, compared with 39 percent on Obama. On MSNBC, 73 percent of McCain stories were negative, while only 14 percent of stories on Obama were negative. But 40 percent of Fox News' stories on Obama and 40 percent of those on McCain aired during the final six weeks of the race were negative. So, of the three major cable news networks, who can legitimately claim to be more 'fair and balanced'?"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When the Obama administration claimed 640,000 jobs were 'saved or created' with $159 billion of the 'stimulus,' many 'news' outlets blithely 'reported' this. Do you know that comes to $250,000 per job?! And the administration claimed half the jobs were teachers. How many teachers make $250,000 per year? Very little skepticism. Why didn't 'journalists' immediately challenge this as a matter of who, what, where, when and why? If George W. Bush had done this (God forbid he'd have supported an $800 billion stimulus package), the mainstream media would have – and should have – said, 'Why, that comes to $250K per job!'
"But as to Fox News, it's BMW – bitch, moan and whine. Oh, the humanity!"
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I don't read Larry Elder as a regular thing; I simply noticed this in his archived columns. Does it PROVE anything? No. I certainly have no first-hand experience balancing Fox vs. CBS / ABC / NBC ... or whatever mainstream news outlets one cares to name. I find it hard to believe that the supposed Fox slant countervails the entire bulk of the Obama-leaning media.
Steve Erbach
Neenah
You should know at your age that the "mission" of the media is to cause chaos at all costs. Fox isn't any worse than NBC, CBS, ABC ... or PBS for that matter. There are idiot newsies on all of the channels. They don't write the stuff they report, they only read it. If you think Fox News is BMW, then just listen to Matthews, Olberman, Gregory and the long gone (hooray) Rather.
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