I never was much of a watcher of the Rupert Mudoch owned Neo-Conservative propaganda machine.
Perhaps this is why.
Quote:
Like most working journalists, whenever I type seven letters — Fox News — a series of alarms begins to whoop in my head: Danger. Warning. Much mayhem ahead.
Once the public relations apparatus at Fox News is engaged, there will be the calls to my editors, keening (and sometimes threatening) e-mail messages, and my requests for interviews will quickly turn into depositions about my intent or who else I am talking to.
And if all that stuff doesn’t slow me down and I actually end up writing something, there might be a large hangover: Phone calls full of rebuke for a dependent clause in the third to the last paragraph, a ritual spanking in the blogs with anonymous quotes that sound very familiar, and — if I really hit the jackpot — the specter of my ungainly headshot appearing on one of Fox News’s shows along with some stern copy about what an idiot I am.
Yeeesh, charming people. 😮 🙄
Oh Wait, there’s more:
At Fox News, media relations is a kind of rolling opposition research operation intended to keep reporters in line by feeding and sometimes maiming them. Shooting the occasional messenger is baked right into the process.
As crude as that sounds, it works. By blacklisting reporters it does not like, planting stories with friendlies at every turn, Fox News has been living a life beyond consequence for years. Honesty compels me to admit that I have choked a few times at the keyboard when Fox News has come up in a story and it was not absolutely critical to the matter at hand.
But it cuts both ways: Fox News’s amazing coup d’état in the cable news war has very likely been undercovered because the organization is such a handful to deal with. Fox is so busy playing defense — mentioning it in the same story as CNN can be a high crime — that its business and journalism accomplishments don’t get traction and the cable station never seems to attain the legitimacy it so clearly craves.
Yikes, sounds like a McCarthy type mentality, if you ask me. I mean, blackballing people? Wow.
This Gets Better, trust me…. remember the altered Photos that I posted about last week? It turns out, that it is supposedly standard policy to do that, so says Faux Noise. Oh Yes, I am not kidding…
Quote:
The accompanying photographs were heavily altered, although the audience was probably none the wiser. Mr. Reddicliffe looked like the wicked witch after a hard night of drinking, but it was the photo of Mr. Steinberg that stopped traffic when it appeared on the Web at Media Matters side by side with his actual photo. In a technique familiar to students of vintage German propaganda, his ears were pulled out, his teeth splayed apart, his forehead lowered and his nose was widened and enlarged in a way that made him look more like Fagin than the guy I work with. (Mr. Steinberg told me that as a working reporter who covers Fox News, he was not in a position to comment. A spokeswoman said the executive in charge of “Fox and Friends” is on vacation and not available for comment but added that altering photos for humorous effect is a common practice on cable news stations.)
But you have to remember, you are dealing with Fox News here or as I just love to call them; Faux Noise, with those guys, Up is down, Right is left, and George W. Bush is the greatest President, ever. Stop Laughing! I didn’t say that I thought he was.
Again, as I have said a thousand times, in my time as a Political Blogger, I just do not watch Fox News, because, quite frankly, I find it to be an insult to my intelligence. I mean, the whole damn Network is a giant propaganda machine. It’s humorous, but borderline insane. But then again, are not most Neo-Conservatives?
Others:
The Carpetbagger Report, Think Progress, News Hounds, TVNewser, Philly.com and Political Punch
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