For Mr. Johney Friar
Apparently, I wasted my letter to the editor honors with my 'Fun With Grammar Attack on States' earlier this week because I would have loved to respond to this one.
Johney Friar of Auburn claims that criticism of Fox News is not grounded in reality and that the other news networks (he cites CNN) are actually the ones who are biased and don't give the whole truth and nothing but the truth. But his examples defending Fox's 'fair and balanced' approach show exactly why Fox is slanted right anyway!
I can find no better example of why Fox News is gaining popularity than the July 25 newscasts on CNN and Fox. CNN reported the lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania crashed a Marine's funeral and gave out business cards, injecting politics in the solemn occasion.
Fox News with Brit Hume had the same report, but also reported the lieutenant governor's name and the fact she is a Democrat. I find it telling CNN omitted those two important facts.
Also, on the same newscast, CNN reported Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts had an affiliation with the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group, in which he moderated several symposia. Fox News had the same report, but added that icons of the left also participated in symposia, including Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass. and current Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
These are perfect examples of Fox's bias. Any negative news they can find in which they can link to Democrats, they jump at the chance to connect the dots. In the first instance, what is the point of listing this. I caught this story a bit later on Headline News and think it's completely irrelevent what the political affliation is of the lieutenant governor. If she was campaigning at a funeral, that is appalling, but that's not reflective of her poliltical ideology. By revealing the party links, Fox is implying that all Democrats act in this inappropriate manner and all of their conservative viewers bark 'yep, that's right ... damn liberals.' If Fox was really 'fair and balanced' they would have either ignored the party affliation or cited past/recent examples of such behavior from both sides of the aisle.
The latter example is even more puzzling. The story is about John Roberts ... the man is the center of attention because he's just been nominated for the Supreme Court. His connection to the Federalist Society is relevent to the ongoing debate, but the participation of a handful of more left-thinking individuals in similar symposia is completely unrelated to the story. It's a counter-argument for the right - a not-so discreet talking point - masked as news. Furthermore, there is a distinct difference in being a member of the Federalist Society (and even moderating the symposia) than simply participating in the symposia. Lots of folks of all political persuasions participate in symposia sponsored by rival organizations, but typically it takes someone vested in the host organization to moderate one.
Apparently Friar didn't see the contradictions in his own postings ... and he must have missed the numerous other times Fox News has butchered journalism in exchange to get in a few cheap shots at Democrats and advance GOP talking points. Like when John Gibson recently declared that Karl Rove deserved a medal for outing Valerie Plame (7/13/05) ... or Carl Cameron blatantly lying when he said the president would never dismiss the leaker in his administration (7/12/05) ... or Brit Hume saying in the wake of the London attacks that now was the time to buy futures ... or Brian Kilmeade saying that it was good England experienced a terror attack because it would strengthen their resolve in this fight (apparently forgetting the German Blitz of World War II or the constant terror attacks waged on British soil by the IRA through the past two centuries).
If you like Fox News because you like sticking it to liberals, fine. But don't watch Fox for news because you're not going to get it.
Johney Friar of Auburn claims that criticism of Fox News is not grounded in reality and that the other news networks (he cites CNN) are actually the ones who are biased and don't give the whole truth and nothing but the truth. But his examples defending Fox's 'fair and balanced' approach show exactly why Fox is slanted right anyway!
I can find no better example of why Fox News is gaining popularity than the July 25 newscasts on CNN and Fox. CNN reported the lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania crashed a Marine's funeral and gave out business cards, injecting politics in the solemn occasion.
Fox News with Brit Hume had the same report, but also reported the lieutenant governor's name and the fact she is a Democrat. I find it telling CNN omitted those two important facts.
Also, on the same newscast, CNN reported Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts had an affiliation with the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group, in which he moderated several symposia. Fox News had the same report, but added that icons of the left also participated in symposia, including Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass. and current Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
These are perfect examples of Fox's bias. Any negative news they can find in which they can link to Democrats, they jump at the chance to connect the dots. In the first instance, what is the point of listing this. I caught this story a bit later on Headline News and think it's completely irrelevent what the political affliation is of the lieutenant governor. If she was campaigning at a funeral, that is appalling, but that's not reflective of her poliltical ideology. By revealing the party links, Fox is implying that all Democrats act in this inappropriate manner and all of their conservative viewers bark 'yep, that's right ... damn liberals.' If Fox was really 'fair and balanced' they would have either ignored the party affliation or cited past/recent examples of such behavior from both sides of the aisle.
The latter example is even more puzzling. The story is about John Roberts ... the man is the center of attention because he's just been nominated for the Supreme Court. His connection to the Federalist Society is relevent to the ongoing debate, but the participation of a handful of more left-thinking individuals in similar symposia is completely unrelated to the story. It's a counter-argument for the right - a not-so discreet talking point - masked as news. Furthermore, there is a distinct difference in being a member of the Federalist Society (and even moderating the symposia) than simply participating in the symposia. Lots of folks of all political persuasions participate in symposia sponsored by rival organizations, but typically it takes someone vested in the host organization to moderate one.
Apparently Friar didn't see the contradictions in his own postings ... and he must have missed the numerous other times Fox News has butchered journalism in exchange to get in a few cheap shots at Democrats and advance GOP talking points. Like when John Gibson recently declared that Karl Rove deserved a medal for outing Valerie Plame (7/13/05) ... or Carl Cameron blatantly lying when he said the president would never dismiss the leaker in his administration (7/12/05) ... or Brit Hume saying in the wake of the London attacks that now was the time to buy futures ... or Brian Kilmeade saying that it was good England experienced a terror attack because it would strengthen their resolve in this fight (apparently forgetting the German Blitz of World War II or the constant terror attacks waged on British soil by the IRA through the past two centuries).
If you like Fox News because you like sticking it to liberals, fine. But don't watch Fox for news because you're not going to get it.
posted by Jmac at 8:22 AM
12 Comments:
Is it what they report or how they report it? It seems from your post that everything they state is factual and true information. Can including true information be biased? Is the implication that they included it even though it had nothing to do with the "point" of the story fair? Is there an objective "point" to news stories?
I guess when you say they are obviously implying something about all liberals by citing a party affiliation seems to be reaching to me. Isn't that pertinent information when you're talking about a politician, no matter what they are doing or talking about. Politicians on TV are always tagged with their affiliation no matter what they are talking about or what show they are on, so it does seem a little weird that CNN wouldn't mention that info.
But, there are apparently plenty of other instances of Fox News being biased, so my comment isn't so much about Fox News on the whole, but rather what Friar wrote about. It just seems like whenever Fox News runs a story, the people who like them like the story and the people who don't like them due to beliefs about them being biased will inevitably find something to call biased. It's kind of the hostile media effect all over again.
I suppose my main point is that I wonder about how reporting factual information can be biased. I can see leaving out info because it would damage a stance or somesuch, but including extra info, especially info that could be seen as relevant, doesn't seem biased.
I'm Captain Italics today!
Hmmmm ... excellent analyis Russ. I hadn't really taken a look at it in that light, and this might make for an interesting discussion over whether or not one could use factually correct information to propagandize. I think it's quite possible to do so.
My particular critique of Fox, and rebuttal to Friar, is fairly shallow in the sense that it's built around existing judgements about Fox News. That is, much of my argument is connected to what people already know of Fox News. So as you noted later in your comment, your analysis might be more suited toward a different news organization (perhaps CNN).
Fox, itself, after reading lots of essays and studies on their coverage - along with watching Outfoxed which features interviews with former Fox employees and memos from inside Fox News - it's hard to apply your very valid points to them. Make sense?
That is, the example of the politician passing out cards at the funeral is telling because the noted she was a Democrat, but the network typically shies away from heavily publicizing damaging or embarassing news of Republicans (their silence on the resignation/scandal of former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland last year is telling).
So them mentioning the fact they are a Democrat is sort of a big deal simply because it is Fox News and because they don't do that type of thing if the perpetrator is Republican. That a bit clearer?
The sheer number of typos and incoherent statements in that previous comment is staggering ...
I don't know, in this case it looks like Fox is supposed to be biased because they give more information than CNN. In that case, I'd have to say that if Fox is biased, then CNN is lazy.
I guess based on their record, your ideas that this shows their bias yet again is warranted. If they didn't have such a track-record, then I wouldn't agree that this shows their bias. Taken alone without looking at any other instances of their reporting, then I think this wouldn't show their bias. But I can see how the history of their reporting could change things.
My understanding of the "funeral campaign stop" story is that the lt. gov made a point of telling the family of the fallen Marine that she is against the war. In other words, she wasn't just a "classless" politician who happened to be a Democrat, she was a Democrat who was doing something classless out of her zeal for a (quasi-)Democratic political position.
If anything, it seems to me that any honest attempt at "fair" reporting would have to mention the fact that the lt. gov made a political statement about her opposition to the war in Iraq when she busted in on the funeral. This tells us something of why she did what she did, which seems relevant (Otherwise we might think she is just crazy or retarded, as opposed to a crazy retarded opporunist). Perhaps Fox News should have simply pointed out her political message (anti-war) rather than identifying her party information; but then CNN should have done the same as opposed to only telling us about the "crazy lt gov, shame shame."
CNN's coverage gives the impression that this shocking thing happened, and that it had nothing particular to do with politics (I mean, she's a political leader, and yet CNN didn't even mention her pary affiliation when talking about what she did, which as Russ already pointed out is pretty much the expected thing to do). FOX's coverage gives the impression that she did this because she is a nutty Democrat, when what would have been more accurate is that she is a nutty opponent of the war.
As to the Roberts thing, it's not really accurate to say that he's "on board" with the Federalist Society simply because he moderated a symposium, rather than merely participating in one. Groups that host debates and symposia often bring in third parties to moderate, and often they choose people who are "neutral" on the issue that will be discussed. (Off the top of my head, I watched a debate on CSPAN in 1997 between Jesse Jackson and some other lib against two forgotten conservatives on the question of Capital Punishment. The moderator of the debate was former NYC mayor Ed Koch, who proclaimed his own agnosticism on the issue at the start of the debate.)
In any case, while it is true that it should be expected that Roberts will get a lot of attention put on his various affiliations, it is not true that that attention should be filtered through a quick shutter which makes Roberts or the affiliation in question look like something it is not. If people from all sides of the political spectrum participate in these symposia, then it is rather silly to say present "Roberts participated in these symposia, full stop" as the news story.
This relates directly to the question Russ asked, "Is it possible to propagandize by using factual information?" I think the answer is clearly "Yes!", and CNN comes closer to doing it on this Roberts story than Fox does.
You can lie by technically telling the truth. (I believe this is a Doug Wilson example, to give appropriate credit) If I come home and say, "Katie, I had a great day at work today, the boss came in sober," have I slandered my boss? If he always comes in sober, then yes, I have (biblically, not legally). Because I have given the impression that he doesn't normally come in sober, and that today was an exception. But I didn't actually say that, see. Very clever.
CNN ran a story about Roberts that is the equivalent of saying "he's a right wing nut". They didn't come out and say that, but it is the clear impression based on what they chose to say and what they chose not to say. Fox is not to be blamed for adding information which actually gives the more accurate impression of the symposia. Lots of people are involved in these things, not just right wing nuts. So just saying "John Roberts is affiliated with the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group" is close to "lying by telling the truth", while Fox is actually being fairer with the truth.
And calling Fox's story a "conservative counter-argument disguised as news" misses the point here as well, I think, because CNN was providing a "liberal argument disguised as news" in the first place.
Again, if the ABH runs a story that says "Johnathan McGinty, hopeful city councilman, didn't beat his wife yesterday: Neighbors pleased", then the fact that Johnathan is a public figure hardly justifies their slander (again, I'm not talking about actual legal definitions of slander here). And if the Flagpole then runs a story that says "Johnathan McGinty didn't beat his wife yesterday, and as far as we know never has", I hardly think it would be "fair or balanced" for a zealous defender of the ABH to say that the Flagpole is just providing a "pro-McGinty counter-argument disguised as news."
But, absolutely, Fox has problems in general. I really do agree there.
Some interesting points by all. I'll try to sort through my agreements, disagreements and the like ...
I guess since Xon had the lengthiest comment, we'll work through there.
I understand your points, but I still think it's hard to judge Fox News by the same standards and guidelines Russ alluded to in his initial posting. Fox, ultimately, is a conservative news network. It was founded in the 1990s specifically as a response to the 'liberal media bias' they claimed existed throughout the country (though numerous studies have shown the exact opposite, that Fox exhibits a conservative bias while CNN, MSNBC and the like generally stay neutral in their reporting).
So it's hard to evaluate the accuracy of Fox's 'fair' reporting through this prism. The volumes of evidence detailing cases of poor journalism or explicit conservative biases tend to color everything. I concede that both of your concerns are valid, but probably more accurate to reflect criticisms of other existing news networks.
So your analogy of "Johnathan McGinty, hopeful city councilman, didn't beat his wife yesterday: Neighbors pleased" (though quite funny, I'll admit) actually serves to underscore my point in what Fox is doing. That is, in the eyes of Fox being a Democrat or a liberal can be skewed to be the equivalent of being a horrible person. So their labeling of the lt. governor in this case isn't necessarily an attempt to be more accurate or fair in their journalistic practices, but rather the factual slandering you allude to.
If Person X gives money to his church every single week, while Person Y grudgingly refuses, we'd all think X was more charitable, on the whole, from what we've seen. But suppose one week X has little cash on hand and has expenses coming up in the afternoon, but Y chips in $.25 just to spite X and then nudges Person Z sitting next to him, points to X and says 'looks at that cheapskate, he didn't even put anything in the offering plate' and Z howls about how stingy X is. This would be rather unfair and an incomplete judgement made by Z who isn't particularly aware of all of the circumstances, would it not?
I say this because that's what the impression appears to be by Fox News in this particular case. It comes across as if Fox News is all wonderful and the true champion of journalistic equality, but it actuallly isn't the case. There are perhaps some elements of 'fair reporting' to in this particular instance, but deeper research reveals it not to be.
So was CNN committing a liberal bias by not revealing the party affiliation of the lt. governor? I don't think so. Some sloppy journalism? Perhaps. In hindsight, CNN probably should have included the affiliation as it was rather odd not to. But it doesn't seem to me to be any attempt to conceal Democratic wrong-doings. Inappropriate behavior is inappropriate behavior regardless of one's political stripes, and that seems to be what drove CNN in this case.
I'll also add, as a side note, we have to consider who is supplying this particular information for our discussion. We're getting it from Mr. Friar, who - after doing a quick Google search on him - doesn't appear an individual who is overly concerned with journalistic fairness. So it's possible CNN didn't disclose the party affiliation, it's possible they did and he either ignored it or merely didn't hear it and it's possible they did so during a later broadcast of the story. My recollection from Headline News is way too fuzzy to accurately paint the picture.
Anyway, on the whole though Xon, your explanation that she was merely against the war is the best way to look at it and CNN, perhaps to play it safe, should have disclosed her party affiliation (though I'm still not sold on it being relevant).
Regarding Roberts, I still think CNN played the story properly. The disclosed information concerning the other individuals who were there was unnecessary in my view. The story was about Roberts and his connections with the Federalist Society (which, by the by, I don't really give a hoot what group he was in). Saying who else was there doesn't make much sense.
"Xon Hostetter, prospective ruler of Switzerland, was questioned for his ties to St. Mark United Methodist Church's youth group. Guess who else was there? Russ Shearer, Diane Lariscy, Nick Moore, Whitney Fletcher and Katherine Davis."
That would seem to be a tad odd. The story is about your ties to St. Mark, not who else was there. My point in saying it was a counter-argument was again partly grounded in the known background of Fox, which is that the network tends to slant toward a conservative bias. Revealing who else attended the event was more of a way of rebutting the charge that the Federalist Society was a far right organization rather than stress fair reporting.
Of course I still think, regardless of the network, it's fairly irrelevant to disclose the other attendees. CNN's reporting wasn't that Roberts was a 'right-wing nut' but instead that he was a member of this organization and lots of folks are asking questions about his relationship to this organization. Who else was a member - be them conservative or liberal - doesn't mean much. What does is what was the extent of his relationship with this group, and part of that CNN explored in their reporting by saying he had moderated some symposia.
So my larger point, as I stated earlier, was that such criticisms are perfectly valid by probably more appropriate for evaluating the fairness of CNN vs. MSNBC or CBS vs. ABC. Fox News simply has too much baggage and would throw the whole thing out of whack.
""Xon Hostetter, prospective ruler of Switzerland, was questioned for his ties to St. Mark United Methodist Church's youth group. Guess who else was there? Russ Shearer, Diane Lariscy, Nick Moore, Whitney Fletcher and Katherine Davis."
That would seem to be a tad odd. The story is about your ties to St. Mark, not who else was there."
Yes, but why should people think that having "ties" to St. Mark is worthy of a story in the first place? This is the problem: by saying "Hostetter questioned over St. Mark ties" and leaving it at that, clearly gives the impression that St. Mark is some sort of nefarious organization that only a certain kind of person (a nut) would ever choose to be connected with. That's why CNN is doing the story on my ties to St. Mark, and not my 'ties' to Georgia Tech. (which is truly nefarious)
When someone reads or hears that "Hostetter hangs with St. Mark UMC" as a news item, they immediately think that there must be something really controversial about St. Mark UMC. But the reality is that it was just a vanilla youth group, like the thousands of others attended by American high school students every week. There were a wide variety of people there, many of whom are nothing like Hostetter.
What all this means, really, is that there just shouldn't be a story at all about Hostetter and St. Mark UMC. It's just not newsworthy. But CNN, for some reason you must have to go to journalism school to understand (just a jab), has decided that it is newsworthy. Why?
You are correct that Fox's story was a "reaction" in some ways to the CNN story. IOW, if CNN had never run a story at all, then Fox never would have run its story. The whole affiliation between Roberts and the Fed. Society is simply a non-story, or at least it should be. But CNN decided to make it a story, which left a blatantly false impression (to my way of thinking, anyway). Fox corrected that false impression with its own story.
"CNN's reporting wasn't that Roberts was a 'right-wing nut' but instead that he was a member of this organization and lots of folks are asking questions about his relationship to this organization. Who else was a member - be them conservative or liberal - doesn't mean much. What does is what was the extent of his relationship with this group, and part of that CNN explored in their reporting by saying he had moderated some symposia."
Come on, now. If you are reporting a story on some controversy that already exists, then aren't you "supposed" to give both sides of the controversy? IOW, if all innocent little CNN was doing was doing a story on the fact that a bunch of people are already talking about how Roberts is tied to the Fed. Soc., then shouldn't their story have also included the fact that other people are arguing that the Fed. Soc. is no big deal?
To have fun with more local hypotheticals (which is fun, I must say!), suppose that some micro-organization of local poilitical agitation accused the pastor of my church of being a child molestor. The national media descends upon our fair city, and CNN runs a quick story about "local minister's sexual habits called into question." Suppose also that the organization that made the charge has no evidence, that there is actually good evidence that he is not a child molestor, and that there are many local people making that argument. But CNN doesn't include any of that in its story. It just says, "Pastor Such-and-So, of X Presbyterian Church, is coming under fire from local activists who worry about his sexual behavior with young children." That's the story. The end. Misleading, right? We might even daresay that it is misleading enough to be in need of a correction. (I would!) But if Fox News ran their story in which they mentioned the arguments being made by both sides of the controversy, would we call out Fox for being unfair and partisan in their coverage?
BTW, are you back from Louisiana teachin'? That's much more frequent bloggin' for you. Figured you were back with classes starting up soon and all.
Anywho ...
I still don't see why it's so damning to report that Roberts was a member of the Federalist Society. This is a largely unknown figure in the national scheme of things, so journalists begin investigating his credentials and background - which, considering he's up for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court, is more than appropriate. And it turns out he was a member of an organization whose very purpose is to debate and discuss judicial decisions, typically from a more conservative point of view.
If we're looking to find out some things about Roberts' views and what kind of judge he would be, why is it so horrible to disclose that he was part of an organization which devoted the vast majority of its time to debating these types of issues.
Again, the story is about Roberts and about determing what his views are on judicial rulings, laws, etc. It is appropriate to explore his ties - not others who are not up for the position - to an organization (be it a liberal or conservative one). I would fully expect CNN, when going through a supposedly more liberal nominee, to disclose organizations the nominee had been a member of.
So when you say they should give both sides of the controversy, then what is the other side? How is Fox's reporting that folks of political persuasions were present at the symposia showing both sides? It isn't ... it's merely revealing additional information that I feel is unnecessary and, again using the context of Fox News reporting this, hints at more of a Republican counter-argument than a full disclosure.
That's why your analogy is inappropriate for this part of the discussion - though, yes, I would agree it would be irresponsible journalism if CNN (or any other news network) refused to get comment from locals who defended the pastor.
For it to be an effective telling of both sides of the story, CNN should - and though I can't be certain, probably has - make sure to have people who defend the Federalist Society as an organization devoted to genuine debate of judical rulings and overall legal ideals. Merely saying 'oh yeah, well Bill and Ted who are Democrats attended some meetings.'
Dang it!
Merely saying 'oh yeah, well Bill and Ted who are Democrats attended some meetings' won't cut it.
What the hell, y'all? Isn't the point that Roberts was a member of the Federalist Society, whereas these Democrats who attended symposia likely weren't, and acting as though that's the same thing is a misrepresentation of the issue to make it seem as though the FS is some kind of bipartisan love-in?
Jason says: Does anyone else out there get a kick out of the word "symposia"?
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