Faux News: Who Says the USA Doesn't Have State TV?

[GreyhoundFan]

"Report on Fox News’s editorial decisions about Trump administration may give insight into GOP’s approval of president" 

Spoiler

If a new report on how Fox News covered one of President Trump’s biggest alleged scandals is correct, then it sheds more light on why so many conservatives continue to give Trump some of the highest approval ratings in the past 40 years.

A new exposé in the New Yorker by one of journalism’s most respected investigative reporters suggests that individuals at the country’s most conservative network may have made multiple decisions to portray the president in the best light possible to its mostly right-leaning viewers.

One alarming assertion in the piece is that Fox employees may have alerted Trump before the network’s debate that Megyn Kelly was going to ask the president some tough questions, including one about the history of his alleged mistreatment of women and details about his conversion to Republicanism. If true, this move was at the very least hypocritical, as Trump was vocal in his criticism of former CNN contributor Donna Brazile when news broke that she resigned from Trump’s most disliked network amid revelations that she leaked debate questions to the Clinton campaign.

But reporting on how Fox handled one of the biggest scandals of the Trump administration might reveal the degree of the network’s commitment to minimizing the amount of negative news that made its way to viewers. According to the New Yorker’s Jane Mayer:

"Diana Falzone, who often covered the entertainment industry, had obtained proof that Trump had engaged in a sexual relationship in 2006 with a pornographic film actress calling herself Stormy Daniels. Falzone had worked on the story since March, and by October she had confirmed it with Daniels through her manager at the time, Gina Rodriguez, and with Daniels’s former husband, Mike Moz, who described multiple calls from Trump. Falzone had also amassed emails between Daniels’s attorney and Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen, detailing a proposed cash settlement, accompanied by a nondisclosure agreement. Falzone had even seen the contract.

“But Falzone’s story didn’t run — it kept being passed off from one editor to the next. After getting one noncommittal answer after another from her editors, Falzone at last heard from [Ken] LaCorte, who was then the head of FoxNews.com. Falzone told colleagues that LaCorte said to her, “Good reporting, kiddo. But Rupert wants Donald Trump to win. So just let it go.” LaCorte denies telling Falzone this, but one of Falzone’s colleagues confirms having heard her account at the time.”

A Pew Research Center study found that consistent conservatives — the group that is most conservative in their worldview and voting patterns — are tightly clustered around a single news source, far more than any other: Fox News. Nearly half of the conservatives surveyed named Fox News as their main source for political news. Even if they do get news from other places, consistent conservatives distrust 24 of the 36 news sources (including The Washington Post, the New York Times, NPR and CNN) cited in the survey. Nearly 90 percent of consistent conservatives trust Fox News.

It was no secret that coverage of the Trump administration on Fox opinion shows skewed heavily pro-Trump. But there had been no reporting before now suggesting that the network had killed stories because the most powerful man at the network — chief Rupert Murdoch — wanted Trump to become the most powerful man in the world.

If this turns out to be an ongoing pattern at Fox, it could help explain why Trump continues to do so well with conservatives who mainly get their news from the conservative news outlet.

It is fair to surmise that much of the general population’s relatively low approval of Trump is shaped by the news they consume about his administration. And recent stories about the demise of conservative outlets such as the Weekly Standard suggest that there is little room for criticism of Trump in conservative media. If news that will cause viewers to view the Trump administration negatively is kept at a minimum, that means that those who get their news about the presidency only from pro-Trump networks will miss out on some of the most important stories. And that editorial decision could have implications on the viewers’ day-to-day lives in ways they may later find inconsistent with making American great.

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

Miss this guy? 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Democratic National Committee rejects Fox News for debates, citing New Yorker article"

Spoiler

The Democratic National Committee has decided to exclude Fox News Channel from televising any of its candidate debates during the 2019-2020 cycle as a result of published revelations detailing the cable network’s close ties to the Trump administration.

In a statement Wednesday, DNC Chairman Tom Perez cited a story in the New Yorker magazine this week that detailed how Fox has promoted President Trump’s agenda. The article, entitled “The Making of the Fox News White House,” suggested that the news network had become a “propaganda” vehicle for Trump.

“I believe that a key pathway to victory is to continue to expand our electorate and reach all voters,” said Perez in his statement to The Washington Post. “That is why I have made it a priority to talk to a broad array of potential media partners, including Fox News. Recent reporting in the New Yorker on the inappropriate relationship between President Trump, his administration and Fox News has led me to conclude that the network is not in a position to host a fair and neutral debate for our candidates. Therefore, Fox News will not serve as a media partner for the 2020 Democratic primary debates.”

Winning the exclusive rights to televise the 12 candidate debates is considered a prestigious prize in the television business. The debates typically draw large audiences — the first Republican debate in August 2015 attracted a record 24 million viewers — and are a vehicle for promoting the networks’ news programs.

Numerous networks, including Fox, have submitted proposals to the DNC to televise one of the 12 scheduled debates, which will start in June. So far, the organization has only awarded rights to the first two — to NBC (along with sister networks MSNBC and Telemundo) and to CNN.

In a statement, Fox News Senior Vice President Bill Sammon said, “We hope the DNC will reconsider its decision to bar Chris Wallace, Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, all of whom embody the ultimate journalistic integrity and professionalism, from moderating a Democratic presidential debate. They’re the best debate team in the business and they offer candidates an important opportunity to make their case to the largest TV news audience in America, which includes many persuadable voters.”

The network hosted back-to-back town hall meetings with Democratic candidates Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton in 2016, but did not televise a Democratic debate that year.

Fox’s connections to Trump have been documented for years. He had a regular spot on its morning program “Fox and Friends” starting in 2011, and has hired several of its former contributors and executives to work in his administration, including its former co-president, Bill Shine, who is now the president’s deputy chief of staff for communications. Trump has been interviewed many times on the network, and has promoted various Fox talking points and personalities on Twitter.

Some observers have suggested that the network has become a kind of de facto “state TV,” shaping and promoting Trump’s policy agency.

New Yorker writer Jane Mayer added new details about the relationship in her 11,000-word article published earlier this week.

Among other things, she reported that Roger Ailes, the network’s late chief executive, may have informed the Trump campaign about a question involving Trump’s treatment of women that former Fox News host Megyn Kelly intended to ask at the first Republican debate in 2015. Mayer also reported that Trump was tipped by Fox sources to a second debate question about whether the candidates would support the Republican nominee for president, regardless of who won.

In addition, Mayer wrote that a Fox reporter, Diana Falzone, had detailed information about Trump’s relationship with porn star Stormy Daniels prior to the 2016 election, but network officials declined to report the story, apparently on orders from Fox Chairman Rupert Murdoch. Fox has denied this account; it said it was unable to confirm Daniels’s story and didn’t publish anything as a result.

The most startling revelation may have been that Trump ordered his former chief economic adviser Gary Cohn to pressure the Justice Department to pursue an antitrust case against AT&T’s merger with Time Warner, the parent of Fox rival CNN, allegedly as payback for CNN’s unfavorable news coverage of Trump. Cohn purportedly declined to pursue the president’s directive, although the Justice Department did file an antitrust case, which a judge rejected.

The article also said Trump receives advice not just from Fox personality Sean Hannity, but also from lesser figures at the network, such as Pete Hegseth and Lou Dobbs, both of whom have been patched into Oval Office meetings to offer policy advice.

 

[AmazonGrace]

I can't even can't even. 

 

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

32 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

I can't even can't even. 

Shocking, Laura Ingraham has no clue how things work. 

[AmazonGrace]

All Black women are One. 

 

[AmazonGrace]

I was going to say that Lou Dobbs is unhinged but was he ever hinged?

 

[onekidanddone]

4 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

All Black women are One. 

 

 

However it is true, at least to me that all FoxSpews twits do all have the same vapid expression and bottle blond hair, 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Registered Democrat Tucker Carlson: Democrats are ‘actively against America’"

Spoiler

Wednesday was a tough day for those at Fox News who maintain some integrity. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced that it wouldn’t be partnering with Fox News for any of its 12 primary debates — big-money, high-visibility events that often find their way into the history books.

In a statement, DNC Chairman Tom Perez said the organization had spoken with a “broad array” of media organizations, Fox News included. However: “Recent reporting in the New Yorker on the inappropriate relationship between President Trump, his administration and Fox News has led me to conclude that the network is not in a position to host a fair and neutral debate for our candidates. Therefore, Fox News will not serve as a media partner for the 2020 Democratic primary debates.”

Host Bret Baier, who would have been front and center at a Fox News Democratic debate, tweeted:

Want to know what else is a shame? The way the Democratic Party is framed on Fox News precincts that are out of the control of a guy like Bret Baier. An example arose on Wednesday night’s edition of “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” on which the host addressed immigration, by far his most passionate topic. To Tucker Carlson, the calculations involving this debate aren’t terribly complicated: It’s a matter of prioritizing those who are already here over those determined to enter without authorization. “I’m an American, and my interest is in my country, which is the United States of America, and I don’t believe that having tens of millions of people illegally in your country or using social services is good for my country. It may be good for theirs, it’s not good for mine,” said Carlson on Wednesday night’s show.

That’s a step up from the remark that landed Carlson in trouble with advertisers a couple of months ago: “We have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor, they tell us, even if it makes our own country poor and dirtier and more divided,” he said.

On Wednesday’s program, Carlson invited radio host Buck Sexton to agree with him on the situation at the border. The host asked whether another country would put up with the crisis. No, responded Sexton, who continued, “What you really see … is the Democratic Party is not opposed to illegal immigration. I think that’s pretty blatantly —”

Jumping right on the point, Carlson said, “Well, they are not for America. They’re actively against America. I mean, I don’t think there’s any other — I’m a charitable person. It’s Ash Wednesday, I want to be a good Christian, but I don’t know what other conclusion you reach."

During the 2016 primary cycle, the Erik Wemple Blog, too, argued in favor of a Fox News-DNC debate. The DNC, we contended, could use the gesture as a talking point: The Democrats are looking to unite this country. Look at how we partnered with Fox News!

Too much has changed since then, however. The partnership between opinion-side Fox Newsers with Trump is a disqualifying consideration. But so is the rhetoric from Carlson’s show on Wednesday night. We asked Fox News to clarify the host’s thoughts on the matter. Was he trying to say that the Democrats were traitors? Subversives?

And if they’re such a bad influence, why is Carlson affiliated with them? On Thursday, the Erik Wemple Blog received confirmation from the D.C. Board of Elections that Carlson’s party affiliation remains Democratic, as we noted in the space years ago. Now, the District is predominantly Democratic and runs closed primaries, so a guy like Carlson would be sidelined from meaningful votes if he were to change his registration.

Still — if Carlson were a man of principle, he’d rip up his voter registration faster than the Erik Wemple Blog can say “Mary Cheh.” That’s the lawmaker who represents Carlson on the D.C. Council. We’ve asked Fox News whether it mentioned Carlson’s party affiliation in lobbying the DNC for debate opportunities.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"It’s time — high time — to take Fox News’s destructive role in America seriously"

Spoiler

Chris Wallace is an exceptional interviewer, and Shepard Smith and Bret Baier are reality-based news anchors.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s talk about the overall problem of Fox News, which started out with bad intentions in 1996 and has swiftly devolved into what often amounts to a propaganda network for a dishonest president and his allies.

The network, which attracts more viewers than its two major competitors, specializes in fearmongering and unrelenting alarmism. Remember “the caravan”?

At crucial times, it does not observe basic standards of journalistic practice: as with its eventually retracted, false reporting in 2017 on Seth Rich, which fueled conspiracy theories that Hillary Clinton had the former Democratic National Committee staffer killed because he was a source of campaign leaks.

Fox, you might recall, was a welcoming haven for “birtherism” — the racist lies about President Barack Obama’s birthplace. For years, it has constantly, unfairly and inaccurately bashed Hillary Clinton.

And its most high-profile personality, Sean Hannity, is not only a close confidant of President Trump but appeared with him onstage at a campaign rally last year.

Anyone who was paying the slightest bit of attention knew all of this long before Jane Mayer’s 11,000-word investigation in the New Yorker magazine was published a few days ago.

But because Mayer is so highly respected, and the piece so thorough, it made an impact. Within days, DNC Chairman Tom Perez announced that Fox wouldn’t be chosen as one of the hosts of the Democratic primary debates.

This was a mild, reasonable step that recognizes the reality that Fox News shouldn’t be treated as an honest broker of political news. It was not censorship as some bizarrely claimed, merely a decision not to enter into a business relationship.

Some of the reactions, though, missed the point spectacularly.

Here, for example, was NBC political reporter Jonathan Allen on Twitter, careful to say this was only opinion:

“There are plenty of quality journalists at Fox, some of whom have been excellent questioners at past presidential debates. And really, if you can’t answer questions — especially if they’re not the questions you want asked — maybe you don’t have good answers.”

Others took it a step further, saying that Democrats are running scared. And President Trump, predictably, vowed retribution in an overheated tweet.

Given First Amendment protections, Fox News can do pretty much what it wants on the air. It can shrug at Hannity’s excesses. It can allow Tucker Carson’s misleading rants on immigrants and crime. It can constantly undermine special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation of Trump.

But for mainstream journalists to suggest that there be no consequences or even recognition is willfully blind — and smacks of an unseemly inside-the-Beltway solidarity.

What Fox News has become is destructive. To state the obvious: Democracy, if it’s going to function, needs to be based on a shared set of facts, and the news media’s role is to seek out and deliver those facts.

Most news organizations take that seriously, though they may flounder badly at times. When they do, they generally try to correct themselves — that’s why you see editor’s notes, lengthy corrections, on-air acknowledgments, suspensions and even firings of errant news people.

Not at Fox News.

The rule at Fox is to stonewall outside inquiries, and to close ranks around its rainmakers.

And, of course, to double down on its mission, described aptly by my colleague Greg Sargent: “Fox News is fundamentally in the business of spreading disinformation, as opposed to conservative reportage.” And that disinformation “is plainly about deceiving millions into believing that core functionings of our government — whether law enforcement or congressional oversight — no longer have any legitimacy.”

Sometimes, as with Hannity’s rally appearance or the Rich reporting, there will be a passing acknowledgment that standards haven’t been met.

But we never know what those standards might be. Unlike most news organizations, Fox News doesn’t seem to have a department in charge of ethics and standards, and it certainly doesn’t publish its guidelines as some do.

So, yes, Fox News can continue to function as something close to Trump TV. It can go on spreading disinformation.

But everyone ought to see it for what it is: Not a normal news organization with inevitable screw-ups, flaws and commercial interests, which sometimes fail to serve the public interest.

But a shameless propaganda outfit, which makes billions of dollars a year as it chips away at the core democratic values we ought to hold dear: truth, accountability and the rule of law.

Despite the skills of a few journalists who should have long ago left the network in protest, Fox News has become an American plague.

 

[JMarie]

It's 7:40 PM EST. CNN and MSNBC are discussing Paul Manafort and his sentencing. Fox News is talking about Michael Jackson.

One of these things is not like the others.

(and after the commercial break, they'll be talking to the 4th grader who was forced to wash the ashes off his forehead on Ash Wednesday - not nearly as important as Manafort)

[JMarie]

Now it's prime time. CNN and MSNBC are still discussing Manafort. Tucker Carlson is crying about how the DNC doesn't want airtime on Fox News.

Sigh.

 

[JMarie]

 Chris Cuomo is talking about Manafort. Saint Rachel is talking about Manafort.  Hannity is whining about Evil Democrats.

I'm done for tonight.

[AmazonGrace]

These people want you dead 

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[apple1]

OMG I was at the home of one of one of my husband's relatives, visiting with family members who were visiting from out of state. Faux was on the TV. During the time we visited, both Michelle Malkin and Jeanine Pirro were on. I definitely wasn't trying to listen or to follow. However - both of those women have the most shrill, loudest, most annoying voices. Not sure how anyone can actually listen to them.

Edited March 10, 2019 by apple1

[AmazonGrace]

In other news, Carlson is a nasty mothertucker 

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[fraurosena]

"[...] caught me saying something naughty [...]"

Naughty? Naughty? 

Fucking wanker. What you said was not naughty. Naughty is what little children are who don't listen to their parents.

What you said was horrible and misogynistic and, yes, paedophilic. You're a white-privileged millionaire funded by billionaires to spew your fucking hatred. 

Karma is a bitch and I hope she bites you in the ass with sharp, very pointy teeth.

[GreyhoundFan]

"Fox News couldn’t care less that Tucker Carlson is a misogynist"

Spoiler

They’re freshly “unearthed.” They’re setting Twitter aflame. They’re alarming. They’re offensive. They’re unforgivable.

Oh, and there’s one thing that the misogynistic comments made by Tucker Carlson years ago on a radio show: They’re in character. Because Carlson, the table-setting host of Fox News’s 8 p.m. hour, has long established himself as insensitive to women, sexist, misogynist — the whole putrid scale of scorn.

On Sunday, Madeline Peltz of Media Matters for America surfaced a bunch of comments that Carlson made when he called in to the radio show hosted by Bubba the Love Sponge between 2006 and 2011. After the radio host talked about girls at Carlson’s daughter’s boarding school engaging in sexual experimentation with one another, Carlson said, “If it weren’t my daughter I would love that scenario”; he slimed Arianna Huffington, calling her a “pig”; he referred to Alexis Stewart, the daughter of Martha Stewart, with the c-word; he said, “If [Hillary Clinton] could castrate you, she would.” And many more.

The commentary sounds as if the person saying it doesn’t fear accountability. You know — pick up the phone, spout some misogyny on a radio show and then proceed with your day. That’s just how fluid and glib Carlson sounds in the radio recordings.

And we know from the published record that the Tucker Carlson on the audiotapes is the real Tucker Carlson. There’s a lot more where they came from, in other words. Fox News, too, knew all about it — or, at the least, should have.

Weeks ago, the Erik Wemple Blog reported out a story wherein Carlson nearly a decade ago referred to then-Salon Editor in Chief Joan Walsh with the c-word. Ethan Strauss, an intern at Salon, was entrusted with recruiting Carlson to write a piece on then-President Barack Obama. In Strauss’s account, he established a rapport by talking with Carlson about their common roots in Southern California. When the topic shifted back to Salon, that’s when Carlson let loose. “He says at one point that Joan Walsh is such a c---, she’s such a c---.” He also said, in Strauss’s recollection, that Walsh needed to “get f---ed.” See this podcast for Strauss’s version of events.

The Erik Wemple Blog asked Fox News about these comments. We never received a response.

The point, though, is that Fox News was on notice about this incident, and many, many more. They were on the notice about the time when Carlson was working as the top editor of the Daily Caller, that he and his brother teamed up to heap misogynistic scorn on the spokeswoman of New York Mayor Bill de Blasio; they were on notice about the many times that the Daily Caller, under Carlson’s guidance, published sexist stories and blog posts; they were on notice when Carlson heaped sexist condescension on Teen Vogue writer Lauren Duca; they were on notice when Carlson talked about how wonderful it must have been for a 15-year-old boy whose teacher performed a lap dance on him.

On Sunday night, Fox News issued a statement attributed to Carlson himself: “Media Matters caught me saying something naughty on a radio show more than a decade ago. Rather than express the usual ritual contrition, how about this: I’m on television every weeknight live for an hour. If you want to know what I think, you can watch. Anyone who disagrees with my views is welcome to come on and explain why.”

Brazen stuff from one of the least accountable people in the country’s ruling class. Instead of reckoning with the offensive comments, Carlson seeks to parlay the underlying controversy into better ratings. In doing so, he is following the lead of Fox News’s founder, the late Roger Ailes. Over the years, Fox News has built its audience in scandalous increments: A host or contributor says something dumb or distasteful; liberal America screams its denunciations; Fox News benefits from the conservative counter-reaction to the backlash.

We’ve asked Fox News if it has any statement regarding Carlson’s behavior. It is, after all, Carlson’s employer.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, GreyhoundFan said:

 

Woman with hijab opposes the Constitution? Wake up Sleepy Jennie!!!1111!!!!  It means she is the living example OF the Constitution. How did you ever get through law school? Sleepy Jennie you must have been snoring through the Constitutional law classes