Defining the Problem
Oct 23rd, 2009 | 15 responses
What’s the Obama administration’s problem with Fox? asks Joe Klein:
Let me be precise here: Fox News peddles a fair amount of hateful crap. Some of it borders on sedition. Much of it is flat out untrue.
But I don’t understand why the White House would give such poisonous helium balloons as Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity the opportunity for still greater spasms of self-inflation by declaring war on Fox.
Answer: This is not about Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. They’re talk show hosts. This is about Fox News.
A few quick things:
1.) Fox is not a news organization. Period.
2.) Fox news helped to organize and promote partisan political rallies, including situations in which their producers were caught rallying the crowds and their rabble was shouting down and ACTUALLY intimidating reporters from other networks.
3.) Fox is not a news organization. Period.
“The problem with war,” Klein advises, “is that it diverts attention from the actual news.”
Well, sort of. But not exactly. The problem is that Fox diverts attention from the actual news because Fox is not actually a news organization, and the rest of the corporate media plays the role of enabler by going along with the polite fiction that Fox is anything other than an entertainment and talk show media outlet. As Steve Benen points out, the “war” was launched on the day Pres. Obama took office, but the mass media took very little notice — until the White House decided to drop the pretense that Fox was actually in the business of news reporting:
Maybe now would be a good time to look at this debate from a different angle. What would Klein or Ruth Marcus or Ken Rudin encourage the White House to do about its Fox News problem?
… Fox News, as of Jan. 20, effectively launched a war against President Obama, his administration, and his party. There hasn’t even been a pretense of seeking the truth and reporting the news — it’s a full-on, network-wide offensive intended to help the network’s Republican allies and undermine the president and his party. It’s a campaign that has included supporting right-wing rallies, presenting Republican Party talking points as network research, and 24-7 propaganda.
Nonsense that starts on Fox News invariably spreads to the rest of the discourse, so the White House frequently finds itself on the defensive, for no real reason, because a cable network functions as a communications arm of a political party. With that in mind, simply ignoring Fox News’ work isn’t really an option.
So, in all seriousness, what’s a White House to do? The pushback from journalists at legitimate outlets this week suggests the White House is just supposed to take it. No matter how many nonsensical controversies Fox News creates, no matter how often it lies, no matter how much the network poisons the body politic, the argument goes, the White House is supposed to maintain the pretense that Fox News is a legitimate, non-partisan news network — even though grown-ups everywhere know this is plainly false.
[...]
All week, there’s been talk that the White House has launched a “war” against the Republican network. The claim itself misstates the case — Fox News launched a crusade against Obama and Democrats, and the White House has felt compelled to respond. How? By acknowledging reality and encouraging others to do the same.There’s no boycott, no punishment, no vendetta — this is just a situation in which the White House is calling Fox News what it obviously is. That’s all.
Media Matters has put together a video of Fox clips to graphically demonstrate what Fox is:
Rachel Maddow provides the context ignored by right-wing critics who asked how come she and Keith Olbermann got invited to a closed-door media briefing at the White House “while Fox was declared not a news organization.”
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15 Responses to “Defining the Problem”
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I thought Obama's complaint against Fox was that it's news reporting was biased apart from it's obviously biased commentators. If so, the MediaMatters clip does not support that contention as it focuses mainly on commentators.
The point that Fox is not a news organization is foolish. Fox may be biased, it may be sensationalistic, it may do a poor job, but of course it's a news organization and a major one. Obama normally tries to take the high road, and I'm surprised he is acting so childish and petty.
Right on Kathy. Time after time, Murdoch's various properties have demonstrated themselves to be totally lacking in even a modicum of objective reporting.
Rick York
You are mistaken, DaGoat. Obama's complaint is that Fox is not a news reporting organization. All news reporting is biased to some extent. But Fox does not report news at all. It's way different from doing a poor job. Doing a poor job is skimpy coverage, or not covering all the angles of an issue, or getting to a story late, or not providing good footage (if broadcast) or good writing (if print). News by definition refers to events or issues that are true, that are really happening, and that are fact-based. “Reporting” that health care reform authorizes “death panels” or that Obama is like Stalin, or any of the numerous other absolutely and totally fact- and truth-free ravings Fox deals in is not reporting the news. I mean,it's not really even open to reasonable argument. Nothing shown on that video was news — not because it happened long ago and had been reported already, but because none of it was true. It was made up, DaGoat — all of it. Made up, invented, out of whole cloth.
And speaking of the video, it absolutely did show supposed on-air “news” reporters in addition to pundits. Megyn Kelly and Neil Cavuto, for example, are nominally news reporters/anchors. There were others, too, whose names I can't remember. And there were also numerous guests brought on for interviews on subjects that were supposed to be serious, and the things they said were total garbage. Again, not just biased, DaGoat. Untrue, inaccurate, and not only not challenged by the Fox interviewers, but encouraged by them.
Fox is no more a news organization than is the National Enquirer. Being a huge corporation doesn't make them a news organization. Being powerful and very popular with a certain segment of the public doesn't make them a news organization. There is no reason in the world why Pres. Obama should have to answer questions from, or be interviewed by, Fox on-air operatives, just because they call themselves reporters. Why should he? Why should he do harm to his policy agenda and ultimately to the well-being of this country by cooperating with political operatives pretending to be reporters?
“Answer: This is not about Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. They’re talk show hosts. This is about Fox News.”
When Gibbs was recently asked about Fox's bias, he responded by inviting the questioner to watch Fox around 5 and 9. What shows are on those times? News shows or commentary shows?
Still, I agree that Fox, even it's news shows, can be biased at times as the Media Matters examples points out. But I think it's far beneath the President to get involved and sets a very dangerous precedent. Even the other news media stations understand this and are coming to Fox's defense. Continuing this war only makes the administration look more extreme which will not help in coming elections.
Defining the problem: The administration is unhappy with criticism and is willing to use its power to try and muzzle the media to prevent it.
Kathy,
You should read more history. What Fox is doing now is pretty tame in comparison to what passed for “journalism” in most of American history. And Fox does have a couple of straight news shows – Shep Smith's is probably the best and I think it would be hard for anyone to claim he's a die-hard GoP partisan. Simply stating that “Fox is not a news organization. Period.” is not much of an argument, particular when Fox does employ journalists who report items of interest to their audience – ie. “news.”
The point is that you, the President and the rest of the media do not get to decide which organizations are “legitimate” and which are not. You don't want to go down that road for reasons that should be obvious.
Now the President can certainly forgo Fox interviews and he can certainly complain about what he sees as bias. I've got no problem with that. It crosses the line, however, when his administration is actively attempting to shut them out and encouraging other news outlets to do the same. That can easily be construed as government attempting to limit free speech. You need to be careful and remember that what's good for the goose is good for the gander and if this war against Fox continues, well, then expect MSNBC to be similarly targeted with the next GoP administration. After all, MSNBC's programming isn't much different in character from Fox.
This isn't really about “news bias”. If it were, Obama would call out MSNBC and refuse to deal with them. Conversely, he has a love affair with MSNBC. NBC isn't much better. The others lean left. Fox leans right; but when put next to NBC, Fox looks ULTRA conservative.
Obama refuses to use the same litmus test with other networks. Because Fox actually criticizes him instead of being his cheerleader; he avoids him. That's the same tactic for some of the commentators here.
I have questions about how the white house is handling this, but I also find the kneejerk defenses of Fox to be rather amusing. This is a wealthy and powerful organization that feeds on division and creating controversy. They don't know the meaning of the word, “responsible”, much less “journalism”, or “fair”, or “balanced”. They are a mockery of a news organization and they make their money by being that mockery. That said, they will continue having their voice, nobody is going to shut them down – regardless of how much the country might benefit from having that bar on sane discourse bumped up a notch. We listen to all the voices in this country or at least give them all a say. But does that mean we have to give the shrill and demented ones the same status as the ones who are actually trying to excel and be ethical?
They lean left socially and right economically and militarily so Fox is ok because they are for social conservatives but the others are bad because they do not agree with that one platform? Once you realize they only lean left socially it neuters a good deal of the “bias.” By the way the guy that wrote the book that started all of this, Goldberg, thinks that Fox is way over the line and he is a conservative who was offended by their cheer leading of the Tea Party protests. Also how much coverage did Fox give to the Gay Rights marches, oh yea none.
The bashing of Fox because it's not part of the liberal media establishment is not a surprise.
The bashing of Fox is remarkable not only for how unseemly ObamaCo is about this, but because it is similar to the Commie-style “denunciation” campaigns sought against dissenters at “town hall” meetings.
They're trying to go out of their way to defame dissent. That is an arrogant and imperious kind of elitism as well as showing how out of touch they are not only with the public, but even with the rest of the media, who already resent being stage-managed and manipulated as show props. They may hate Fox as being heretical (not liberal orthodox), but they've experienced precedents themselves, and they know that after Fox, they're next.
Leonidas: That's the real issue, indeed. The town hall meetings are the real clue here.
It's about suppression of dissent. It's not enough to manipulate public image and opinion and operate still in continuous campaign mode (like leftist “revolutions” that never end), even after changing the government.
This is about suppression of dissent. It's the iron fist inside the public-image velvet glove (and charm).
It's about suppression of dissent.
Referring to all the behavior that's been handed down and encouraged from the Beck, Hannity, Limbaugh, crowd as “dissent” is really a stretch, not to mention demeaning to the word. More thinking and less reacting please.
“More thinking and less reacting[,] please.”
Direct that where it correctly belongs, which is to the Obama administration and to the Congressional Democrats, as well as to the people to whom the manipulation of public opinion is especially aimed (the exploitables, still objects of “campaigning”).
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