News should be REASSURING, shouldn't it? SHOULDN'T IT?

Only it's not just the Texans, Tartarin. Isn't Eye-rack also Rumsfeld's preferred pronunciation?

Well, monkey see, monkey do. And really, D'art, these are not people concerned with niceties of pronunciation or history. They just call it as they see it, which makes you wonder about their eyesight.

I lived for years in a town that was named for its first mayor - his first name. Nobody ever knew why.

Tart - can't help you, I'm not following the Kucinich campaign, and I'm not picking up much on him in what I read. I'm not really that interested, in all honesty. Watching Dean, Kerry (who is beginning to come along nicely), Gephardt (whom I like, but I don't believe is up there - even though he was just endorsed by the Teamsters), and Graham, whom I really like, but he seems to be as silent as the grave.

Just another word on the NY Post. Standing in line at the supermarket yesterday, the woman in back of me was reading the Post (I was reading the Globe). I asked her where she got it, and she said the front of the store. She thought it was a tabloid, and was scanning it for news of Afflick and Lopez. Said she reads it every day, and thought the world and NY news was just put there on the front page for other readers. This is the case with so much of Murdoch's pubs. The Australian Morning Herald is pretty much the same way. This is yellow journalism.

CNN's parent company, Time Warner, owns DC Comics. Does that mean I can claim that CNN should be taken no more seriously than a comic book?

Not the same thing at all, scrat. You're reaching, and it's a far reach. Sometimes plain English works better.

Scroll.

Having just completed a journalism program in the Midwest, I have to tell you that from this region journalism is bland and relies on telling the same story over and over again. Very unimaginative stuff. thebBC has always made me chuckle as well as been impressive; it always covers isssues outside of Britain.

But it is the same thing. The fact that two companies have the same parent company does not mean that they are run similarly or have anything in common at all. It's simply not a valid assertion.

Scrat, when I grew up in NY, the Post was a reputable paper. Murdoch bought it and turned it into what it is now. DC Comics are and always have been comics.

Do you really not see a difference?

I did not claim that DC comics has changed, nor did I claim that the Post has not. What I did claim is that the claim that all of Murdock's holdings are crap if the Post is crap is not supportable on its face. Whether or not the Post is a piece of tabloid crap means nothing in a discussion of the merits of any other media entity. The fact that Murdock owns a "tabloid" doesn't mean that everything he owns has the same relative value or quality. You can of course argue that Fox News sucks, if you like, but citing Murdock's ownership of the Post is meaningless in that debate.

Fair enough, Scrat. There are differences, say, between the Post and Fox News. But there are also similarities, too. The example I mentioned earlier in the thread, of the Post's doctored photo of weasel heads on the German and French ambassadors, is a representation of the same slant Fox News had during the same period.

And that's where Murdoch (note spelling) has consistency in his various holdings.

Well, scrat, your reaching is going up a notch. There are two possibilities: either you do not understand what D'art said (which suggests that now is a good time for you to bow out of this), or, you do understand some of it but are simply to stubborn to back down on an invalid argument.

In plain English. What Time-Warner, or any group owns, is a group of constituent items. But we are not discussing a group of what Murdoch owns. We are discussing Murdoch's philosophy of journalism (yellow), and how he, as owner, demands that his philosophy be met. In all he owns. DC Comics are owned by Time-Warner, but are not compelled to publish the same philosophical vein. This is one reason Murdoch's publications are always known as Murdoch publications.

Now do you understand some of this? If not, Comedy Central and the sports channels have some pretty good offerings.

All of Murdocks media holdings are in lock step with each other. That of course is by design not accident.

Fox News ran a photo with weasel heads? :wink:

Look, it's simple. I can find you a news piece from the Post that agrees both factually and in tone with a piece from the NYTimes, CNN, etc.. News being what it is and these sources covering the same news there is going to be some overlap.

I understand the relationship and the meaning you want to draw from it. I simply think it's a lazy argument. If you want to complain of the quality of Fox News' coverage, cite problems with their coverage. This "Fox News sucks and to prove it, just look at what the Post did" is nonsense.

I agree that their are differences and similarities between Fox News and the Post, I just think that they don't mean what some would like to suggest they mean.

Thanks for keeping it civil!

mj - It really seems that you are incapable of discussing anything without turning to insult. Shame.

As to your comments on topic, you assert--as if it is a fact--that Murdock demands "yellow journalism" from all his media companies, then you complain that I refuse to "get" this little factoid you've manufactured out of whole cloth. What can I say? Feel free to pretend that my failure to see things your way is a failing of my intellect if it makes you feel good about yourself.

...RUPERT MURDOCH'S likely return to control of the New York Post may be good for the newspaper's employees, but it is disturbing news for those of us who are concerned with keeping political debate in this city honest and fair. For Murdoch was more than the publisher who, with such headlines as "Headless Body in Topless Bar," began the current wave of tabloid sensationalism in New York City. He was, during his first run as the Post's owner, from 1977 to 1988, unscrupulous in his use of the paper's news columns to advance his political causes.
Almost all American daily newspapers today at least try to keep their editorial opinions from influencing their news coverage. It is a worthy effort, given how few newspapers are left for readers to turn to for news. The Post under Murdoch made no such effort.
Here are some examples from studies I helped conduct:
During the month before the 1977 mayoral primary, the Post's early editions ran no unfavorable stories about Murdoch's candidate, Edward Koch, but many nasty stories about Koch's opponents, such as "The Blond Millionairess Whose Big Bucks Back Cuomo." The Post mentioned Koch favorably in four front-page headlines; the six other candidates were mentioned favorably on the front page a total of once. Koch received 32 inches of favorable coverage on pages 2 through 5, all the other candidates, including the incumbent, Mayor Abraham Beame, a total of 35 inches.
In 1980, Murdoch's support of Ronald Reagan in his race for the presidency against Jimmy Carter spilled all over the Post's news columns, as was apparent in these headlines: "Reagan: I'll Save the Middle Class" - a scoop proclaimed in red ink on the front page. "Israel Fears Carter Victory" - the article referred to by this front-page headline included no quotes from any Israeli, named or unnamed, supporting the charge. "Stars Want Ron to Get the Part" - no stars supporting Carter were quoted. "Khomeini Pulls the Strings," and then in smaller type, "Carter Back on Campaign Trail" - this intriguing pairing of thoughts was given two-thirds of the front page on the day before the election....
http://www.nyu.edu/classes/stephens/About%20Murdoch%20page.htm



The unashamed lustiness and self-congratulatory instincts of American yellow journalism do find their closest contemporary parallel in London's highly competitive newspaper market and, notably, in the Sunday-only News of the World. Its 4 million readers make it the world's largest circulating English-language newspaper, a distinction once claimed by Hearst's Journal.
News of the World is owned by Rupert Murdoch, whose entrance into the New York City newspaper market in the 1970s invited comparisons to the seismic event of Hearst's arrival there in 1895.
Its raunchy, abrasive style and its activist tendencies qualify the News of the World as one of the world's most consistently controversial titles. (Its raunchy fare far exceeds anything published in the Journal, which, in its time, was considered irredeemably decadent.)
http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=13759


Even Rupert Murdoch, who pretends to a point of view somehow associated with neoconservative politics and Christian orthodoxy, gives over his several newspapers and television syndicates to the direction of the market, which cares as little for the Constitution as it does for the Virgin Mary.
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/hearst.htm

Murdoch uses his diverse holdings, which include newspapers, magazines, sports teams, a movie studio, and a book publisher, to promote his own financial interests at the expense of real newsgathering, legal and regulatory rules, and journalistic ethics. He wields his media as instruments of influence with politicians who can aid him, and savages his competitors in his news columns. If ever someone demonstrated the dangers of mass power being concentrated in few hands, it would be Murdoch.

Aug. 7, 2003
The second-dumbest people in the news, By Bret Stephens
By BRET STEPHENS
Let's stipulate from the outset that not everything about Fox News is appalling. Brit Hume is an able journalist. Neil Cavuto is watchable. I like some of their political commentators, Fred Barnes most of all.

The rest of it is bunk. Talk-show host Bill O'Reilly is a self-righteous bully. Anchor John Gibson gives the impression of being not very bright, although that may have to do with his hairdo. Political commentator Monica Crowley was caught plagiarizing by the Wall Street Journal. News items are treated as if they were offerings on Fox's line-up of action shows debuting this fall: "We got the Jakarta explosion, we got the hunt for Saddam!" There is no in-depth reporting, while a great deal of air time is wasted on chit-chat. I hate the use of the term "homicide bombing": All bombings that result in death are "homicide" bombings; "suicide bombing" accurately describes a specific act. And there's something about the way that Fox mixes salacious reporting with censorious commentary that's totally repulsive. Is Kobe Bryant guilty of sexual assault and adultery? Well, we've got the vaginal trauma to prove it!

Simply, Fox News is more of a parody of a news program than an actual news program. Not that this seems to bother the Fox people themselves; part of their almost-redeeming charm is that they are blissfully not in earnest. Beyond all the tub-thumping, the American flag waving in the corner of the screen, this is "news" that seems to have an audience of Bart Simpsons in mind. As such, Fox News comes close to being a parody of America itself.

Would that it went all the way. But thanks to people like Hume and Barnes, Fox retains a patina of seriousness that turns what would otherwise be a good joke into a bad caricature, the very picture of what the rest of the world thinks of as Right-wing America. And because Fox News has leapfrogged over its more staid competitors in the ratings, it is also seen as the journalistic equivalent of 1984, a dystopic universe in which Rupert Murdoch's boot stamps forever on the honest reporter's face. The upshot - depressingly - is an excellent argument for the old behemoths.

OF ALL of Fox's sins, this one is the worst. For those routinely depressed or enraged by the inadequate or biased reporting of CNN or the BBC, Fox News is there to prove that perhaps they don't do such a bad job after all. I don't think much of Jonathan Mann and his "Insight" program on CNN, but next to Shep Smith's "Studio B," Mann looks like Ed Murrow. I was turned off by the BBC's coverage of the war in Iraq, with its ill-concealed gloating over apparent Coalition reversals. But that's nothing next to the embarrassment of, say, watching Fox reporter Wendell Goler unable to get right the name of Palestinian arch-terrorist Abu Abbas. Meanwhile, there is no doubting that some BBC programming is fantastically good - Tim Sebastian's "Hard Talk" above all - as is, in the US, "News Hour with Jim Lehrer," which appears on public television.

The conclusion one is tempted to draw here is that quality journalism and market forces pull in opposite directions, and that any society that wants the former had best devote a subsidy to it. Certainly the BBC makes this argument. Amid increasingly vocal calls to revoke or revise the Corporation's charter - or to privatize the BBC outright - it warns that such a step would mean losing the very touchstone for objective, informed and independent journalism. Privatize us, they say, and there will be nothing but Fox News.

In fairness, there really is something to this. In America, at least, none of the best magazines turns a profit: Commentary, The New Republic, The Atlantic Monthly, and The Weekly Standard all depend on the largesse of wealthy patrons to stay afloat. Meanwhile, People, In Style, Cosmo and Maxim rake it in.

But there is a crucial difference between a magazine like The Atlantic, which is privately supported, and the BBC, which survives on an onerous compulsory tax. Then too, it's an open question just how objective, informed and independent the BBC is. "More and more," writes Labor MP Gerald Kaufman in The Wall Street Journal, "there are accusations from different sections of the political spectrum not that the BBC supports one party or another but that it sets its own agenda on different issues and tailors its presentation to fit that agenda."

The proximate cause of Kaufman's musings is, of course, the David Kelly scandal, where it appears that misrepresentation of Kelly's views by BBC correspondent Andrew Gilligan contributed to the government scientist's suicide last month. But anyone who watches the BBC from Israel could not have been surprised by the affair. According to a study conducted last year by Media Tenor, a Bonn-based media research group, 85% of the BBC's coverage of Israel was "negative"; another 15% was rated "neutral"; none was "positive." This has been going on for decades. Nobody noticed in part because Israel is far away, in part because the negative coverage conforms to existing prejudices. With the Kelly story, however, Israel's once-dismissed complaints about the BBC are beginning to seem like part of a larger pattern of questionable reportage and editorial spinning.

In other words, the journalism on offer from the BBC is often no less tendentious than what you get on Fox. This is not to say that it isn't better than Fox's: the breadth of the BBC's coverage is vastly greater, its biases are not so crudely expressed, and the general tenor of its programming isn't so sophomoric. But these advantages are offset by the fact that the BBC is so desperately in earnest. It really does see itself as an "independent" and "objective" voice merely because it isn't governed by considerations of profit. And it also sees itself as a bulwark of decency, duty bound to enlighten the masses and speak truth to power.

The result is coverage that is deceiving principally because it is self-deceiving. How many BBC reporters come to Israel, for instance, sincerely convinced that the core problem here is "the occupation"? Nearly all of them, I should guess. And how many have stopped to wonder how their coverage would change if they tested the proposition that Arab rejectionism was instead to blame? Probably very few.

I'VE DEVOTED this column to Fox News and the BBC because they are often viewed as being the opposite poles of broadcast news: one baldly partisan, the other scrupulously objective; one populist-conservative, the other high-toned and cosmopolitan; one relentlessly profit-driven, the other "in the public interest." As with most poles, too, they have a great deal in common - political agendas and moral smugness above all. I resent both of them; one for having given a bad name to conservatives, the other for having given it to journalists.

It would be nice to find some middle route. Public ownership is not the way. The fact that the BBC isn't answerable to advertisers only means that its biases run in favor of statism and all that it implies. It also makes the BBC an arrogant organization, which goes far to explain its present travails. Yet a private news organization that seeks ratings above everything else is going to wind up turning reportage into entertainment, which is exactly what Fox News has done.

Ultimately, consumers will seek - and news organizations will provide - content that is reasonably accurate and sober. At least that's true when it comes to business news, headlines, the weather. But the aims of journalism, I've always thought, go beyond establishing basic facts to sifting competing claims about the truth. In this latter task, it seems, the thoughtful news consumer walks alone.

Of course, he can also turn off his TV.

Interesting piece, Au, most of which I'd agree with. One exception: Brit Hume. Now, keeping in mind I haven't seen these guys on the screen since I nuked my screen close to two years ago (except on occasion while agonizing on the Precor at the gym!) I used to watch Hume with interest. He's articulate, well-informed, but his bias leads him to write his reports very carefully, often excluding key issues which one finds in other reports, issues which would dispute the nobility of his heroes. His sin is what I'd called highly polished omissions. He seldom gets himself into a position where he has to defend himself against other, better reporters -- and when he is in that situation, he closes down with the implication that "this is going too far."