At long last the FOX Phonies are being outed by viewers. Judi McLeod tells us: The fact is that Fox News, the No. 1 cable news network, declined 11 percent in ratings in 2010. My beef with FOX has always been its fair and balanced crapola. In truth, FOX initially thrived on a conservative reputation while it was cleverly delivering more conservative ears to the liberal message than did all of the other networks combined. Conservatives do not willingly watch liberals, but they did watch FOX News. Hopefully, that is changing. At the very least, conservatives will now watch FOX News with a jaundiced eye. I especially enjoyed McLeods anecdotal bulls-eye: Fair and Balanced must be a hard road to hoe when theres a bloviating Bill OReilly holding the 8 p.m. slot with Glenn Beck now out there out scooping his former employer. Ive stated my personal objections to Bill OReilly many times in the past. The only thing I can add to McLeods succinct analysis is this: OReilly is to FOX News what Porky Pig is to Loony Tunes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=gBzJGckMYO4 Glenn Beck is another creature altogether. I have to admit he said some good things when he pontificated on the FOX network; however, on balance he was a hustling motivational speaker whose gig was the Constitution. When the chips were down he dumped on conservatives candidates in several elections. Incidentally, The Five is the name of the show that replaced Beck at 5 P.M. http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/30/fox-news-to-replace-beck-with-the-five/ The thought of Juan Williams and Bob Beckel on the same panel should tell every conservative what FOX News is aiming for. CLUE: It aint fair and balanced. To Conservatives, either one of those two guys is as welcome as a Jew at a German picnic; together they are a barrelful of liberal talking points. I doubt if MSNBC has the balls to put those two on the same show and still claim fair and balanced. Moving on McLeod scores another bulls-eye with this shot: Why be a talking head when being a kingmaker is ever so much more fun? There you have it. Roger Ailes is afflicted with Don Hewitt syndrome. Hewitt (1922 - 2009), the creator of Sixty Minutes, bragged about electing two presidents JFK in 1960 and Bill Clinton in 1992. Breaking that record has to be a goal for Ailes and his talking heads. So far the score is Hewitt 2 FOX 0. That means FOX has to play catch-up real fast before it loses all credibility. Then there is this: There are sure to be those who will be titillated by Ailes admission that Oreilly hates Sean and he hates Rush Limbaugh because they did better in radio than he did (The Daily Beast, Sept. 25, 2011) or that he admitted that he wants both Bill and Hillary Clinton to join Fox News. (Huffington Post, Sept. 26, 2011). I said Sarah Palin made a big mistake when she signed up with FOX News. I pray that she will not be tarnished by FOXs slow fall from grace among conservatives. Imagine Sarah and the Clintons being co-workers paid by the same employer. Worse still, imagine what Sarah would look like today had OReilly succeeded in signing up two liberal icons. Finally, here are some folks on FOX that are okay in my opinion. Laura Ingraham, Brit Hume, and Sean Hannity come to mind. Im sure I missed a few who contribute to FOXs false fair and balanced reputation through no fault of their own. I apologize to those I failed to name. Fox News changing direction ahead of Election Year: Buh Bye Bye Fox, Hello GBTV Judi McLeod Wednesday, September 28, 2011 No one has to send this message viral: Fox News is repositioning itself 13 months before the 2012 presidential election. Fox CEO Roger Ailes calls it a course correction quietly adopted at Fox over the last year. Only the timing makes Fox going central a Brutus blow because its been a direction thats been coming for some time. According to Howard Kurtz, First, Ailes dialed back the Tea Party talk. Now hes turning the GOP race into a political X-Factorand steering the election agenda one more time. (The Daily Beast, Sept. 25, 2011). It was part political spectacle, part American Idol, part YouTube extravaganza, a pure Roger Ailes productionand the latest sign that the Fox News chairman is quietly repositioning Americas dominant cable-news channel. Hours before last weeks presidential debate in Orlando, Ailess anchors sat in a cavernous back room, hunched over laptops, and plotted how to trap the candidates. Chris Wallace said he would aim squarely at Rick Perrys weakness: How do you feel about being criticized by some of your rivals as being too soft on illegal immigration? Then I go to Rick Santorum: is Perry too soft? Why be a talking head when being a kingmaker is ever so much more fun? Fair and Balanced must be a hard road to hoe when theres a bloviating Bill OReilly holding the 8 p.m. slot with Glenn Beck now out there out scooping his former employer. Critiquing the cable networks last week presidential debate in Orlando, Kurtz wrote, ...the real eye-opener was the sight of his anchors grilling the Republican contenders, which pleases the White House but cuts sharply against the networks conservative imageand risks alienating its most rabid fans. As sure as they will be out there smearing the Tea Party, swarms of liberal detractors will still accuse conservative enemies of being Fox News drones even though their network has gone central. But its most rabid fans have always known that Fox isnt news but entertainment, Reality Television Supremo. There are sure to be those who will be titillated by Ailes admission that Oreilly hates Sean and he hates Rush Limbaugh because they did better in radio than he did (The Daily Beast, Sept. 25, 2011) or that he admitted that he wants both Bill and Hillary Clinton to join Fox News. (Huffington Post, Sept. 26, 2011). But the increasing number of average people who do not count on cable television for their news will be out as usual plowing the Internet in search of the truth. Fox executives who say the entire network took a hard right turn after Obamas election, but as the Tea popularity fades, is edging back toward the mainstream, are full of it. The fact is that Fox News, the No. 1 cable news network, declined 11 percent in ratings in 2010. According to the Project for Excellence in Journalisms annual State of the News Media (stateofthemedia.org) report, cable news viewership for CNN, MSNBC and Fox News fell substantially in 201013.7 percent in aggregate for a sharper decline than any other sector. (The Hollywood Reporter, March 13, 2011). And the cable news networks declines were sharpest in primetime, where median viewership plummeted 16 percent to an average of 3.2 million, while daytime tune-in was down 12 percent. It must grate Ailes who said he didnt mind if people thought Glenn Beck was fired from the channel (Huffington Post) is routinely out-scooping Fox News with his own television show GBTV. Viewers flocking to GBTV like sparrows to bread crumbs recognize the difference between fair and balanced and the truth lives here. Ailes boast that Every other network has given all their shows to liberals, We are the balance is fast fading to irrelevance in hard times. In todays Obama world, people dont want manufactured balance. They want the truth. http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/40738
Dont you just love it when a media big shot loses it? The joy in making guys like Roger Ailes angry is that the head of a powerful network lets jerk-offs get to him: The second some jerkoff hits a computer key, he thinks hes a journalist. These clowns put out stuff every day to damage people. Fox News Unfiltered http://blogs.thedailybeast.com/spin-cycle/2011/9/29/fox-news-personalities-unfiltered If Ailes and his talking heads attacked the jerk-offs in government the way a free press is supposed to do bloggers would not be doing the job. Ailes is really angry because jerk-offs are not fooled by the media; they know that television is an instrument of government propaganda. So the people jerk-offs damage the most are government stooges like Ailes & Company. In media boardrooms the most galling thing about bloggers is that the Internet replaced Letters to the editor which are controlled by print media. Bill OReilly reading e-mails he selects is the same as print journalisms sop to free speech: You can speak so long as I control it. Notice that OReillys praise or rebuttal is the last word on the e-mails he selects. Print journalism never sank that low. Bottom line: Roger Ailes and his kind see free speech as an infringement on a free press opinion monopoly.
Flanders, from your two post rant, the mentioning of Roger Ailes and others, your obsession is with Fox Cable News and Commentary Shows. The one comment that really got my attention was; During high profile trails in 2010 and 2011, HLN (Headline News) did pick up a share or two of FNC ratings, but the fledgling FBC (Fox Business Channel), picked up much more of the FNC audience than anyone else and today both are doing well, FNC Historically well. Rather than asking for examples of bias (I know SOME exist), arguing back other Cable News and Network News Today are also biased (even more so, IMO), why don't you explain which one Cable News Channel, to your way of thinking is the least biased and why, maybe mentioning your own ideology is NOT biased in that decision. People watch what they want to, believe who seemingly agree with them and ratings tell the storey.
Lol... Sarah Palin took offense at comments made about her on Fox "News" and now Fox "News" finds itself on the sharp end of her pointy stick. Hilarious.
To jackson33: Ill decide what I say. And just for your information, I am as biased for conservatism as liberals are for liberalism. Unlike liberals, I never claim I am unbiased.
Flanders; Are you saying your judgment (opinion) of FNC, Ailes and the others is based on your Conservative Values? My what must you think of Rush Limbaugh? Curiosity, are you an Al Franken fan or does your expertise on this issue, need to ask why? The Slogan "Fair and Balanced", subjective as it's accepted by a viewer, can go either direction from center, but most Conservatives I know, would suggest it's leans slightly left with their guest list. Anyway, I was concerned about your distortion of the 2010 Ratings, not mentioning what were the true cause for a slight drop in early 2010!!!.
Flanders; Of course it might just be me, but this makes absolutely no sense to me, OR you simply don't like any news programming. First; When Roger Ailes left NBC he took many others with him to FOX, certainly not all Conservative but willing to take a chance with Newscorp and the well respected Ailes. Second; Ailes is not known for directing content and most certainly doesn't take marching orders from any Political Party. Third; I'm no longer sure who all owns their own show, but O'Reilly is one and most all content by any show is produced by people that the host can rely on, some but not all, gone over before broadcast. On problems in Government from 1960, then primarily from TV is further silliness, IMO. The Federalist Papers and media of the early day's, Brochures/Pamphlets were just as influential as anything today. I'm sure radio was thought of as the end of '"whatever was", the Motion Picture Industry, then B/W TV, Color TV and the next problem no doubt the Internet or all the other social networking that goes on today, will be blamed. As I feared your not seeing the connection of your first two post and those of Al Frankin; Frankin wrote a book, very similar to your comments "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right.", which FOX sued over it's registered trademark slogan (199. They dropped the suit/charges, when they could not get an injunction to keep the book OFF the market. Frankin also wrote a book "Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations" (1996).
To jackson33: Franken is a flaming, bleeding heart, liberal. As to his comments being similar to mine: Similar is like close; it only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. And what the hell does Frankens opinion of Rush Limbaugh have to do with my premise?
Lets see,,,soooo Fox drops 11% and MSNBC is almost off the air,,,,,sounds about right... The rest is all partisan crap....
Isn't freedom of the press a wonderful thing, esp when viewers can decide what to watch, read and listen to? As long as no one makes me, all is well. I can pick and choose, research until my eyes bleed. Isn't America great?
To Shangrila: It still is, but it won’t be much longer. In fact, there won’t be an America if the press has its way. For the umpteenth time I offer the following as proof of just where America’s free press is at: David Rockefeller, then-Chairman of Chase Manhattan bank, said this at a 1991 Bilderberger meeting in Baden-Baden Germany: "We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost forty years. It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supernational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national autodetermination practiced in past centuries." Note that print press sold out this country in the early 1950s; it’s far worse on television.