Geez, the quote itself is a hell of a lot less damning than I was expecting:
In other words: We recognize that FOX has a bias, and that they make no attempt to appear unbiased, and will treat them accordingly.
Woo hoo. Grab the pitchforks, everyone.
Just ignore them. Fox is a noise making organization. Talking about them is a waste of time. The president should give them the attention they deserve, none.
Fox clearly has an enemies list. I don’t see why the White House is bound to hold their collective tongue against such poor journalism. Teddy Roosevelt made a speech criticizing the excesses of muckraking journalism, and said a hell of a lot more inflammatory things:
Just what I was going to say.
Often, reading the ACTUAL WORDS spoken takes away from the frothing at the mouth Outrage Of The Week though, so many don’t bother.
It makes sense to point out that Fox is a joke and that people shouldn’t take them seriously, but it doesn’t really matter. Less than 1% of the population watch any cable news outlet, it’s basically for partisans, news junkies and people just passing through when they’re watching TV. An awful lot of cable news, internet news is just a small bunch of people gossiping about each other.
And they are right about Fox News not being news. You get 90 seconds of news every hour and the rest is opinion. The WH should start a campaign to get Fox to rename itself the Fox Opinion Channel, dare them to actually do some news programming.
I think it will have little effect. If you’re a fan of FOX “News”, you already hate Obama’s guts. If you think already thought FOX was a shill network for Republicans, this doesn’t change it. If you didn’t care much either way, you probably won’t take note of any of this.
They weren’t intially though. They were forced into the stance by Fox. They were never fair or unbiased and they’ve been found out.
Personlly, I’d rather my news media wear their allegiences on their sleeves so we can analyze it accordingly. The media prior to Fox were equally as mendacious with their claim to be “unbiased” as Fox ever has.
I just see this as the market winning out and Obama giving yet another boost to Fox.
Stupid.
The media was not biased before Fox. That;'s a myth. The “liberal media” does not exist, and has never existed.
There are still many many people on the fence capable of being swayed by opinion, especially ones rammed down your throat 24 hours a day. Let’s face it, there are fringe groups on both sides that are difficult, if not impossible, to change their minds. But the majority of people still belong to the influenceable masses.
I want Obama to take on the fraud that is Fox News head-on. The status quo is that they constantly spout lies and propaganda. What else can they do that’s worse?
Traditionally the media would have teamed up against the White House. In this case, as Politico puts it, they’ve pretty much just shrugged.
I think conventional wisdom would be correct that criticizing Fox so openly could backfire with all or most media outlets, but I think in this case it’s just so obviously true that nobody has the energy to muster false indignation.
Of course “the media” is biased, because unbaised human beings do not exist.
That doesn’t mean “the media” is biased in a liberal direction, but rather in a status-quo, two and only two sides to every story, corporatist, establishmentarian direction.
Their stated intention is to encourage real news organizations to not take their lead from Fox or regard them as a legitimate organization. But I think the primary purpose is to rile up the liberal base. Liberals and moderates rightly get angry when Fox is regarded as remotely legitimate.
Exactly right, although I’d put corporatist at the start of that.
Yeah. He might lose the support of FOXNEWS. The horror.
From furt’s link:
" STEPHANOPOULOS: Final question. Your colleague, Anita Dunn, told the New York Times this week that Fox News was undertaking a war against the White House and said the White House would treat Fox the way we would an opponent. Here’s what Rupert Murdoch had to say about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUPERT MURDOCH, NEWSCORP: There were some strong remarks coming out of the White House about one or two of the commentators on Fox News. And all I can tell you is it has tremendously increased their ratings.
(END VIDEO CLIP) STEPHANOPOULOS: That does seem to be true. Are you worried that your strategy is fortifying your enemy?
AXELROD: Well, I don’t – you know, I’m not concerned. Mr. Murdoch has a – has a talent for making money, and I understand that their programming is geared toward making money. All – the only argument Anita was making is that they’re not really a news station, if you watch – even – it’s not just their commentators, but a lot of their news programming, it’s really not news. It’s pushing a point of view.
And the bigger thing is that other news organizations, like yours, ought not to treat them that way, and we’re not going to treat them that way. We’re going to appear on their shows. We’re going to participate, but understanding that they represent a point of view.
STEPHANOPOULOS: OK. David Axelrod, thanks very much."
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
Regards,
Shodan
Wow. I haven’t seen you post that bit of insight before. :rolleyes:
**Shodan **has always been using that joke.
I think there are quite a few people in the center who don’t watch FOX, who don’t much care for FOX, and yet might be disturbed by a directed attack on a media organization by the government, because the government doesn’t like what they’re saying.
I remember when Ari Fleischer made an offhand comment about the media ‘watching what they say’, and he was greeted with howls of protest from all quarters, because HOW DARE the White House even hint at telling the media what to do.
Now you have the White House actually telling other media organizations to shun FOX and claiming that FOX isn’t a ‘real’ news organization (it clearly is, and it does a lot of straight up journalism).
If Bush had ever tried anything remotely this blatant against MSNBC or CNN, the screams of outrage would have been deafening - and rightly so.
What this is really about, though, is that the White House is getting hammered by stories which initially break on FOX, and they’re trying to limit future damage by isolating FOX and preventing the stories from spreading into the wider media.
I think this is what the real purpose of the move is. Tell the networks and print media not to react to a message being pushed by Fox News, but to investigate it for truth first. Don’t start talking about “Death Panels” just because Fox says they exist - do your homework and if it’s BS don’t react to it no matter how riled up Beck and Hannity are. A more recent example is Kevin Jennings, who both the Fox commentators and News people falsely accused of having information on a statutory rape that he kept silent. It was a completely bogus story pushed by Fox to try to get a guy fired because he was gay.
They want to keep the bogus claims bottled up in the right wing echo chamber, and not leak out to the rest of the country.