Yet another lefty is foaming at the mouth over Fox News. This time, the complaint is that Fox News isn't a news outlet.
Celebrating its 11th year on the air, Fox is a breathtaking institution. It is a lock, stock and barrel servant of the Republican party, devoted first and foremost to electing Republicans and defeating Democrats; it's even run by a man, Roger Ailes, who helped elect Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George Bush senior to the presidency. And yet, because it minimally adheres to certain superficial conventions, it can masquerade as a "news" outfit and enjoy all the rights that accrue to that.
It's always amusing when liberals squeal about Fox News adhering to "certain superficial conventions." I guess that's what liberals call having reporters report news (not make it up). And really. Does anyone take the media seriously after the "fake but accurate" 60 Minutes hit piece?
The breathless accusation that Fox News isn't news is bolstered in the piece by an accusation by Judith Regan.
Regan spent some portion of the dawn of the 21st century having an affair with NYC's then police commissioner, Bernard Kerik. The commissioner was recently indicted by a federal prosecutor in New York for alleged misdeeds dating from his time as a public servant. Kerik is a very close associate of presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani - so close that Giuliani once recommended Kerik to President Bush as homeland security director.
The nomination advanced far enough for Bush to stand at Kerik's side at a press conference. But suddenly, the doors blew open and the allegations against Kerik - that he'd renovated his home with ill-gotten gains, and more distressingly that he had suspected connections to organised crime - ended his nomination quickly. Ever since then, the question has loomed over Giuliani: when did he know that the man he recommended to run America's security was alleged to have mob ties? (A now deceased investigator once suggested that he warned Giuliani, but Giuliani says he has no memory of this.)
Regan, naturally enough given her special knowledge of the man, was questioned about Kerik by federal investigators. And she now alleges that two executives of Fox News instructed her to "lie to, and withhold information from" the investigators about Kerik. Regan charges that Fox executives did this because they feared the inquiry into Kerik might singe Giuliani, whose presidential ambitions, her complaint charges, Fox has long been intent on "protecting".
So, let's get this straight. News outlets don't report on Monica Lewinsky and that was good journalism. Journalists are encouraged routinely to hide facts (like names) from police in a pathetic argument over "freedom of the press" and that is considered good journalism. But Regan alleges the same thing happened to her and now that's prima facie evidence of Fox News not being a news organization?
I don't approve of anyone telling anyone to lie, whether that person is your spouse, your boss or POTUS (you hear that, Bill Clinton?). So, if Fox News executives told Regan to lie, that's wrong. But it's not really different from the obstructions of justice journalists wrap themselves in, then argue they need a federal shield law. Lying is lying, after all.
The liberal whiner continues this way:
In the meantime, Democrats should ratchet up their refusal to pretend that Fox bears any relationship to news. I've always felt they should just boycott the network en bloc. One can be pretty confident that if the situation were reversed - imagine a cable channel that was known as a Democratic house organ and run by, say, Bill Clinton adviser James Carville - Republicans would have done something like that long ago.
A coffee-spitter statement if ever there was one. The truth is, Republicans have faced this for at least the last 40 years, stretching back to the Nixon administration. The left-leaning "gotcha" journalism practiced by many White House correspondents is disgusting and, as the poll linked above shows, the American people recognize the bias of major media outlets even if numb nuts from across the pond don't.
The truth is, Fox News still only reaches a tiny sliver of the American media-viewing public. Its audience is dwarfed by viewers of the three nightly newscasts, not to mention NPR, MSNBC, or CNN. Yet leftwingers can't even allow for a different point of view without going into spasms. I guess the truth hurts, eh?
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