Breaking: Pigs Fly
Via Mustang Bobby, we learn that WaPo's Howard Kurtz finally admits that Fox news isn't, er, "fair and balanced."
In covering the Iraq war last year, 73 percent of the stories on Fox News included the opinions of the anchors and journalists reporting them, a new study says.On another day I might be tempted to file it under "no shit, Sherlock" and let it go at that. But I guess I'm not finished bitching about Faux News this week. I haven't read the 617 page report, but nobody with a lick of sense really needs to spend that much time determining that Fox delivers anything but "news" -- all it really takes is 5 odious minutes with, say, Shep Smith.
By contrast, 29 percent of the war reports on MSNBC and 2 percent of those on CNN included the journalists' own views. These findings -- the figures were similar for coverage of other stories -- "seem to challenge" Fox's slogan of "we report, you decide," says the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
And how do all Fox broadcast personalities know to stay "on message"?
[A] Detroit News story last week called it "consciously biased" -- without attribution -- and quoted onetime Fox producer Dan Cooper as saying: "In the morning, everyone is told what today's key issues are and how those issues are viewed by Fox News. The entire staff understands how the organization feels about them."The sad thing is that people really think that what Faux is presenting is news. People like several in my (extended) family, who will look at you with a straight face and tell you Faux is the most unbiased of all the networks. And they are, not surprisingly, people who just haven't had the type of education that fosters critical thinking and media awareness.
Which is just where David Horowitz and NCLB want everyone to be.
If you haven't seen the superb Robert Greenwald documentary Outfoxed, which exposes the media's "race to the bottom" lead by Faux News, I can't recommend it highly enough. If you are a teacher and want to use Outfoxed for a class, Robert will send you a copy for free if you drop him a note through his website here.
posted by Jane Hamsher @ 3/16/2005 12:00:00 AM
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