Fox News has notably declined to present important live events that feature President Obama or other Democrats. They even cut away from a live Republican gathering when Obama appeared to be getting the better of his GOP hosts. But Fox happily broadcast the entirety of their own Sarah Palin’s address from the Tea Crusaders convention in Nashville.
On the surface this seems to be more of the blatant partisanship that you expect of Fox News. But there may be something more nuanced in the bias of Fox’s programming.
For two days now Fox has resisted cutting to live speeches by celebrity conservatives at CPAC like Dick Cheney, Scott Brown, and Michelle Bachman. To be sure there were plenty of remotes with Carl Cameron from the conference, but nothing like the hour devoted to Palin two weeks ago.
Until tomorrow. According to a tweet from Glenn Beck, his closing night keynote will be aired live on Fox News:
“Been working this morning on cpac keynote. Still haven’t decided which message to bring. I guess we’ll find out together tomorrow. Live fnc”
If that’s accurate, then Beck will be the only speaker from CPAC to be broadcast live. They missed prospective presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty. They missed congressional leaders John Boehner and Jim DeMint. But they’re covering Beck. Just like they covered Palin. The connection? They are both Fox News employees. So maybe Fox is just expressing their bias for self-promotion.
Update: Fox News has confirmed that they will broadcast Beck’s CPAC speech live. They are also airing Newt Gingrich’s speech live – for fairness and balance.
I think newt and beck both work for fox, wouldn’t you expect them to show their employees? You can’t possibly expect anyone who reads to think you really care that much, do you?
If Fox were actually a “news” network they would not be devoting program time to promote their employees. That’s what interstitial promos are for. They would be making editorial decisions based on their news value. But since Fox is NOT a real news network, I guess you’re right – it doesn’t really matter.
What does matter is that journalism has devolved to the point where people regard Fox as news despite the evidence to the contrary. That’s what I care about.
This is why I only use MSNBC as my only trusted news source. They’re non biased approach to journalism is hard to come by now a days. Yes I am 1 of the 6 viewers that actually watch MSNBC. The way I look at it is the rest of America is insane and us 6 are the only hope we have as Americans.