Why don't honest journalists take on Roger Ailes and Fox News?

Amerika wrote: »

All legit and timely questions a good journalist should ask, especially given his past comments on the subjects.

I'd beg to differ but not really interested in it tbh.

Amerika wrote: »

Then why comment tbh???

True lol.
Not much point discussing Fox and Journalism, its like discussing Manchester United and Hurling.

Amerika wrote: »

When Colbert interviews Pelosi and takes her to task regarding her comment about ObamaCare: “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,” then maybe we’ll talk. The current mood of the American people feels our Congress is either too arrogant or too ignorant (as indicated by the low 18% approval rating of the Democrat controlled Congress). And the tough questions need to be posed to our president, who right now appears to be a president of the party, not the people.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoE1R-xH5To&feature=player_embedded

No, I had not seen that. O_o

Amerika wrote: »

Not much more, but a little bit more. It's about 20 seconds into the GB video. Very very very odd, but no other “news” source is reporting anything about this comment from Pelosi. So, how’s that for honest journalistic integrity?
http://video.foxnews.com/v/4106820/in-pelosi-we-trust

What do you think the story is?
The Bill has been available on the internet for months.

This is the one topic that really gets me so completely frothing at the mouth that I'm unable to make an articulate argument about it. I just cannot see how any reasonable person with even a modest education would consider Fox News to have any iota of journalistic integrity, whatever your personal politics.

I don't know what makes me more angry. Their shoddy practises, blatant lies and misrepresentation of the truth, non-stop hate mongering and fear tactics.

Or the fact that they appear to purport to represent the interests of the common man against the elites, when in fact their entire agenda on every concievable issue (apart from perhaps social conservatism) is designed to forward the cause of the "have's." I get why people in the Republican party and business interests love fox news so much. What I don't get is the average conservative voter, and how completely blind they are to the fact that Fox News doesn't give two cents about them and are actively selling them down the river at every opportunity.

Take health care as a straight forward example. The aim is to prevent insurance companies from continuing to ransack their customers. To force them to provide coverage to people who need it most. To stop them from evading their responsiblity to families when they need it most. And to provide healthcare to almost 30 million people who currently don't have access to it in the richest country in the world.

It's the classic example of the interest of big business vs the interest of the general public and the ordinary citizen. Yet some how, from day 1, through constant obfuscation, lies, misrepresentation and fear mongereing fox news has managed to convince these people that somehow, all of them getting cheaper and more reliable insurance coverage is actually going to somehow kill all of their babies.

The only way to fix injustice is to raise awareness and debate the issues that matter in a responsible way and with integrity. Honest journalism is the last true bastion of human freedom. Fox News has destroyed that in America.

But yet there are posters in this very thread defending something that is so manifestly evil and run on the operandi of greed and greed alone. Makes you despair, it really does.

Amerika wrote: »

Examples, examples, examples please.

The last figure I’ve heard is that the insurance companies pay out approximately 96% of the money (premiums) they take in to medical providers. How is that ransacking their customers and evading their responsibilities?

Again, examples of constant obfuscation, lies, misrepresentation and fear mongering would be helpful.

Of course, you wont find the raw footage of the cut on youtube, because fox appears to be yanking them on copyright grounds.

Fortunately, this clip is 100% Viacom: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-february-1-2010/q---o

And who is this honest journalist I keep hearing about? To me, an honest journalist asks the tough questions and allows the subject to answer, without followup opinion on the journalist part. But it is also the job of the honest journalist to NOT allow the subject to NOT answer the question. Bret Bair pretty much represents what I would consider an honest journalist in his recent interview with President Obama recently.

Oh, then by that high standard may I present:

Amerika wrote: »

I’m fairly reasonable, and more than moderately educated, and consider Fox News to have as much journalistic integrity as the next news channel.

And that is really, really scary, and a little sad.

Examples, examples, examples please.

Several posted above. And there have been countless threads about this. Just google it, there are entire websites dedicated to their antics. I WOULD google it and post the links for you, but sadly, I think anyone who already believes fox news has any integrity at all with all the wealth of information available to the contrary has already made their mind up and is unlikely to be persuaded, whatever the evidence. Heck, they themselves have on several occasions argued that they are "an entertainment channel," not a "news channel," and therefore should not be held to standards of journalistic integrity.

Funny, but right now the tea party protesters are about as “common man” as you can get, and I believe they mostly favor Fox News. It’s not about the have’s and have not’s, it about equal opportunity to succeed.

Did you not read my post at all? The above is exactly my greatest gripe. That ordinary common people, who fox are actively selling down the river have been hoodwinked into believing it is some kind of champion for them, when in fact, it is the exact opposite and supports the pilfering of said citizenry at every opportunity. Equal opportunity to succeed is exactly the thing Fox is most against.

The last figure I’ve heard is that the insurance companies pay out approximately 96% of the money (premiums) they take in to medical providers. How is that ransacking their customers and evading their responsibilities?

I'm sure they pay out the majority of the small claims. It's the ones with serious difficulties, people who get cancer or aids in the family who end up losing their homes, having to sue. I think if you are going to not even accept that the system in America as it is is badly broken for many many people(favouring the haves) then I don't see how we can have a debate on this. Hell, even the republicans accept that the situation is unacceptable. Reforming the health service in the States was one of Obamas main campaign promises. You really think all those people who voted for it, didn't care about it or don't have a beef with insurance companies. Also, I'd like to know where you got that 98% statistic from.

Again, examples of constant obfuscation, lies, misrepresentation and fear mongering would be helpful.

Again... I don't see the point of this, because the information is out there in such an obvious manner that you have to have taped your eyelids shut to not see it... but.. I am a glutton for punishment... here is just one example...

http://foxnewsboycott.com/resources/fox-can-lie-lawsuit/

Jane Akre and her husband Steve Wilson are former employees of Fox owned-and-operated station WTVT in Tampa, Florida. In 1997, they were fired from the station after refusing to knowingly include false information in their report concerning the Monsanto Company’s production of RBGH, a drug designed to make cows produce more milk. They successfully sued under Florida’s whistle blower law and were awarded a US $425,000 settlement by jury decision. However, Fox appealed to an appellate court and won, after the court declared that the FCC policy against falsification that Fox violated was just a policy and not a “law, rule, or regulation”, and so the whistle blower law did not apply.
The court agreed with WTVT’s (Fox) argument “that the FCC’s policy against the intentional falsification of the news — which the FCC has called its “news distortion policy” — does not qualify as the required “law, rule, or regulation” under section 448.102.[...] Because the FCC’s news distortion policy is not a “law, rule, or regulation” under section 448.102, Akre has failed to state a claim under the whistle-blower’s statute.”[1]
In 2001, Jane Akre and her husband won the Goldman Environmental Prize as a recognition for their report on RBGH. [2]
In 2004, Fox filed a US$1.7 million counter-suit against Akre and Wilson for trial fees and costs. Akre and Wilson both appear in a major portion of the 2004/5 critical documentary, The Corporation.
In 2007 Jane became the editor-in-chief of the national news desk at InjuryBoard.com.

Appellate Court Rules Media Can Legally Lie.
By Mike Gaddy. Published Feb. 28, 2003
The court did not dispute the heart of Akre’s claim, that Fox pressured her to broadcast a false story to protect the broadcaster from having to defend the truth in court, as well as suffer the ire of irate advertisers. Fox argued from the first, and failed on three separate occasions, in front of three different judges, to have the case tossed out on the grounds there is no hard, fast, and written rule against deliberate distortion of the news.
The attorneys for Fox, owned by media baron Rupert Murdoch, argued the First Amendment gives broadcasters the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on the public airwaves.
In its six-page written decision, the Court of Appeals held that the Federal Communications Commission position against news distortion is only a “policy,” not a promulgated law, rule, or regulation. Fox aired a report after the ruling saying it was “totally vindicated” by the verdict.

The above example is really the essence of Fox News. Giving falsifying or misleading information to the public, usually in favour of big business/corporations. Then doing their very best to tear to shreds, ANYONE who dares to speak the truth about what they do. And finally when it came down to it, they argued in court, that actually, there is nothing wrong with lying and they should be allowed to do it, and to hell with journalistic ethics and all that malarky. After all, they're only ethics, not law.

And who is this honest journalist I keep hearing about? To me, an honest journalist asks the tough questions and allows the subject to answer, without followup opinion on the journalist part. But it is also the job of the honest journalist to NOT allow the subject to NOT answer the question. Bret Bair pretty much represents what I would consider an honest journalist in his recent interview with President Obama recently.

Try watching BBC's Question time or Hard Talk. Now that is real current journalism. Want an example of a good tough interview? Try watching any of Katie Couric's interviews with Sarah Palin. She interviewed her exactly the same way she does any other politician. She simply asked open ended questions and gave Palin the time and space to answer.

Fox does not conduct interviews.

If the interview subject is "hostile," i.e. one who's viewpoint they want to show in a negative light. They will constantly interrupt, mid sentence. Not allow the person to make a single point. They will constantly shift the subject of the questioning if it at all looks like the person is succeeding in getting their point across. They will use false information and statistics with little or no credibility to try and debunk any real facts presented by the interviewee. And last but not least present veiled attacks under the guise of bonus questions. "Some people would say that..." "but critics have argued that" (when most of those some people and "critics" are just fox news shills themselves)

What I find especially hilarious is when they get one of their shills on and pretend to have a debate about whether Obama is actually evil or just stupid. Where the Fox news anchor usually takes the later tone in order to appear moderate.

I hope my blatant evilness doesn’t make you despair too much. Remember it takes all kinds to make the world go round.

I don't think you are evil, not one bit. To me, there are only two categories of people who actually believe a word of fox news.

1) Those who have something to gain. i.e. the "haves," / "gop" who's cause Fox news so furiously battles for day in and day out.

2) People who are brainwashed and haven't made the effort to look at independent sources of information or verify independently anything that Fox News have said. Who rely solely on Fox News for their information.

What Fox have done brilliantly is label "everyone else," as some kind of extremists, there by positioning their own extremism as some kind of moderate stance by comparison and by the looks of it, it has worked spectacularly well.

Here's an honest question you should ask yourself. The way you are asking for evidence in this thread for proof of Fox's bias. Do you ever question Fox's reporting similarly?

In the UK there are many competing, reputable news outlets. There's the Guardian, considered to lean left, The times, considered to lean right, and BBC who are generally considered to be pretty unbiased. (Hell, the BBC conducts independent reviews to assess whether it is being fair in its coverage and adhering to journalistic standards and it then makes these reviews public. Name ONE other news organisation that has done this). But no one accuses any of them of deliberately misleading or trying to falsify the news. Whatever their politics. Then there are the tabaloids, such as the "Daily Mail," that everyone recognises as being "news" in only the thinnest sense of the word.

That's what fox is, "Daily Mail," on TV.