Wall Street Journal

Rupert Murdoch Epitomizes Hidebound Culture

Posted by on October 8, 2010 at 1:23 pm. 1 Comments :

Dateline: Wall Street Journal, October 8,2010.
If Schools Were Like ‘American Idol’ . . .
BY RUPERT MURDOCH

Over the past few years, I have often complained about a hidebound culture that prevents many newspapers from responding to the challenges of new technology. There is, however, another hidebound American institution that is also finding it difficult to respond to new challenges: our big-city schools.

Is that so? Rupert Murdoch’s op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal is apparently his prescription for improving America’s ailing schools. Unfortunately, he has locked up his own opinion behind a paywall that prevents anyone who has not subscribed to his service from reading it. All you get is two paragraphs that contribute nothing to the public discourse on education.

The irony is that while he is complaining about a hidebound culture, he is simultaneously demonstrating it. The concept of erecting paywalls to secure content online is firmly rooted in the past. Modern media theory recognizes that certain types of information cannot be corralled and apportioned for fees. That is particularly true for news which no entity can own.

What Murdoch has succeeded in proving here is that his paywall not only fails to produce revenue, it suppresses the information he intends to distribute. And he ties it to the success of his own American Idol, a television program that, unlike his newspapers, can be received entirely free of charge. The result of this illogic is that he is making himself less prosperous and less influential at the same time. And he is doing nothing to help our educational system or the young people who rely upon it. Nice work, Rupert.

Fox News And Right-Wing Media Synergy

Posted by on August 21, 2010 at 2:06 pm. 14 Comments :

The Wall Street Journal published an article this morning profiling pollster Scott Rasmussen. The column was written by the Journal’s John Fund, who is also a Fox News contributor. The article’s subject, Rasmussen, is also a Fox News contributor whose surveys lean reliably to the right, which makes him a favorite of the conservative press.

So what we have here is one of Rupert Murdoch’s columnists interviewing one of Murdoch’s pollsters for one of Murdoch’s newspapers to promote contributors to one of Murdoch’s television networks. And wouldn’t you know it, the article was effusively complimentary to Rasmussen. However, it has no more significance than a Keith Olbermann editorial praising Rachel Maddow in the NBC employee newsletter. Here is how Fund leads off:

“Thanks to the shifting tectonic plates of American society, polls have come to dominate our politics as never before, and Mr. Rasmussen is today’s leading insurgent pollster.”

The reason polls have come to dominate our politics is that outlets like Fox News seek to trivialize current affairs by overdosing on horse-race data and ignoring, or misrepresenting, the more substantive issues that people really need to know about. Fox is famous for hyping tabloid fare like the current pseudo-controversy over the mosque in New York. Then they supplement their non-story with polls about the mosque in New York story that adds nothing to their viewers’ store of useful knowledge.

It is that state of polling domination that Fund praises Rasmussen for as the “leading insurgent pollster.” I have no idea why a pollster would be complimented as being an insurgent, but it does tend to certify the widely held view that Rasmussen is an activist with an agenda.

It isn’t hard to find evidence of Rasmussen’s bias. If you take a look at the RealClearPolitics aggregation of polls, Rasmussen invariably reports numbers that are far more favorable to Republicans and conservatives. That predetermined result is built into his methodology. And just to make sure he gets the results he wants, he will also skew his survey’s questions to assure a rightward slant. Markos Moulitsos of Daily Kos has done some detailed analysis on Rasmussen’s (dishonest) game And I previously documented Rasmussen’s phony index wherein he invents something he calls The Political Class, but is really just a fake metric to create artificial comparisons between groups of respondents that don’t exist.

Fund cites Rasmussen’s Political Class index and seems to be impressed with its fantasy results. But Fund is no better at math than Rasmussen. He says that…

“Before the financial crisis of late 2008, about a tenth of Americans fell into the political class, while some 53% were classified as in the mainstream public. The rest fell somewhere in the middle. Now the percentage of people identifying with the political class has clearly declined into single digits, while those in the mainstream public have grown slightly.”

What I’d like to know is how an index with just two options adds up to only 63% (10% Political Class plus 53% Mainstream)? there is no “Other” in the survey. It seems that 37% of respondents fell into a black hole. What’s more, the change Fund cites where the political class has “clearly declined into single digits,” would only have had to move down 1 point. That corresponds to his assertion that the mainstream grew slightly. However, in most polls, that minute a change would be regarded as statistically insignificant and within the margin of error. So what is Fund’s point?

It is also worth noting that the Political Class in Rasmussen’s index constitutes a mere 7% of the total group polled. This makes the comparison even less worthy of consideration. It means that in a poll of 1,000 people, 50% of the Political Class is only 35 people, or 3.5% of the total. Nevertheless, Fund eagerly cites a series of additional results based on this nonsense that Rasmussen says “has real significance.”

Rasmussen has little credibility amongst his peers in the polling game. His entire reason for being is to pump out polls that put Republicans and conservatives in a positive light and to disparage Democrats and liberals. The goal is not to inform, but to influence and shape public opinion. That’s why he is such a frequent guest on Fox News.

And that’s why his reputation is getting polished by his colleague John Fund and the Wall Street Journal. It’s also why Murdoch has gone to such great lengths to own all his own newspapers, TV networks, and pollsters.

The Breitbart Saga Whines On (And On)

Posted by on August 1, 2010 at 10:28 am. 16 Comments :

Poor Breitbart
Cowardly Andrew BreitbartThe chronically choleric Andrew Breitbart now sees himself as the aggrieved party in the Shirley Sherrod affair that he instigated. This pathetic attempt to curry sympathy is uncharacteristic of Breitbart who ordinarily blusters his way through criticism and fiercely attacks his critics. Why the change in behavior? Could he be worried about Sherrod’s forthcoming lawsuit? This is what he told Newsweek:

Newsweek: Can you understand how this has been difficult for her to get caught up in that?
Breitbart: As difficult as it probably was for her, it’s been difficult for me as well, especially to hear her hurl an accusation of racism at me, when my motivation is absolutely pure and is driven by a desire for this country to move beyond its horrid racist past.

Was his motivation “absolutely pure” when he posted a deceptively edited video and portrayed Sherrod as a racist? Breitbart also admitted to Newsweek that the video took Sherrod out of context, and given two separate opportunities to apologize, Breitbart declined and made excuses instead. That didn’t stop him from expressing his desire to meet with Sherrod in private. If she takes him up on that she had better go wired for sound and video. I bet she could get some juicy clips.

The Wall Street Jackal
It’s interesting that Sherrod’s announcement the she intends to sue Breitbart has not been reported as a news item on Fox News, so far as I have been able to determine (if someone has evidence of such a report, please pass it along). But what Fox may be trying to sweep under the rug, the Wall Street Journal has taken on in the form of a defensive editorial by the editor of their online op-ed pages, James Taranto.

Taranto begins by surmising that Sherrod’s lawsuit would probably fail. His reasoning centered on his assertion that she was a public official and involved claims about the performance of her public duties. Sherrod was indeed an employee of the Department of Agriculture. That may make her a public official of sorts, but she was clearly not a public figure. By Taranto’s logic anyone working for the Post Office would be exempt from protection against defamation. Furthermore, Taranto was wrong in stating the the incident involved claims about the performance of her public duties. There was nothing of the sort in Sherrod’s speech before the NAACP. She was relating events that occurred 24 years earlier, before her employment with the USDA.

Finally, Taranto implied that it would be difficult for Sherrod to prove malicious intent on Breitbart’s part. It seems to me that Breitbart’s malice is fairly evident. By his own account, he had the video for months but never attempted to ascertain its validity or acquire an unedited version before posting it. Plus, he confessed to Newsweek that he knew it was out of context. Add to that his lack of remorse and his defiance in the face of evidence that his actions were defamatory, and you have a pretty good case for malice.

Taranto found it strange that Sherrod “issued this threat” of litigation before the National Association of Black Journalists. But Sherrod did not issue a threat. She answered a question. Taranto continued to be confused by the applause Sherrod received when she indicated her intention to sue Breitbart. This spurred Taranto to ask…

What kind of journalist would applaud the threat of a defamation lawsuit?

How about a journalist who takes pride in his work and is offended by pseudo-journalists who tarnish the profession? Taranto went on to make this absurd claim:

Journalists have an institutional interest in maximizing the scope of First Amendment protections, and that means keeping it as hard as possible for plaintiffs to sue for defamation.

I have no idea where he came up with that bit of lunacy. Reputable journalists who refrain from defaming people have no problem with defamation suits. It is part of the process of keeping them honest. Taranto’s argument would have gun owners opposed to laws against murder. But just as most gun owners support laws against murder, most journalists support laws against defamation.

Steele Interrupted
A scheduled fundraising event by Michael Steele’s Republican National Committee that was to feature Breibart has been “postponed.” The event was to be held at the swanky Beverly-Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills in just two weeks. This last-minute cancellation is curious considering the complex logistics in putting together a high-profile affair like this. It may or may not have had anything to do with Breitbart’s participation and the embarrassment that may entail, but when you also know that Steele backed out of an appearance before the same convention of black journalists that Sherrod attended, it does raise suspicions.

Uni-Tea: More Like Whi-Tea
Breitbart was a featured speaker at the Uni-Tea rally in Philly yesterday. The event was designed to promote the racial and ethnic diversity within of Tea Party. They did manage to assemble a pretty diverse roster of speakers, but reports from the field say that the crowd, which was far smaller than expected, contained few people of color. Thus, Breitbart spent twenty minutes assuring the predominately white Tea Baggers that they weren’t racists. I’m sure they feel better now.

Coming Attractions
Look for Breitbart’s highly anticipated appearance at the National Tea Party Unity Convention in Las Vegas in October. This event was originally scheduled for mid July, but was postponed due to lameness. Also appearing will be Sharron Angle, Lou Dobbs and Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily. This lineup up just screams unity.

Following that, Breitbart is amongst the seafarers embarking on a three-hour eight day post-election cruise sponsored by the National Review. If you ever dreamed of being shipmates with Breitbart, as well as Karl Rove, Phyllis Schlafly, Jonah Goldberg, Tony Blankley, Scott Rasmussen, Thurston Howell III, and more, then you probably awoke mopping up sweat. By the way, isn’t Rasmussen supposed to be a non-partisan pollster?

FYI: Here is a composite view of the National Review Cruise’s itinerary and the path of the Gulf oil spill:

Looks like they’re taking the scenic route.

White House May Cancel Wall Street Journal

Posted by on July 30, 2010 at 6:13 pm. 1 Comments :

Rupert Murdoch has been constructing his pay walls as a means to squeeze more revenue from his newspapers. By most accounts it is failing as viewership declines on the web sites of his newspaper properties.

In response to this failure Murdoch has doubled-down on greed by jacking up the price for news clipping services, including the one used by the White House. Politico reports that the Wall Street Journal will raise its fees by half a million dollars. The White House responded by saying…

“Obviously, we’re not paying $500,000. This is taxpayer money,” the official said. “We have no idea how we’re going to handle this. We may have to drop [The Journal].”

Considering the fact that anyone in the White House could subscribe to the Journal for $140.00 a year, this seems like a remarkably shortsighted and stupid policy. What’s more, it could motivate the White House to favor other news outlets, for interviews and other media releases, whose bundled clippings they can receive at a reasonable rate. Why would they want to deal with the Journal if their access to the stories was more difficult to obtain and dissemination might be restricted?

There is a stench of desperation about this. Murdoch has not made a successful business decision in years. The Fox Business Network is floundering; MySpace is almost invisible; the pay wall has not been adopted by peers; even the Wall Street Journal purchase resulted in staggering losses. Without Avatar and Fox News, News Corp would be a basket case. And Fox News has been losing viewers as well.

Now that the Journal is writing off some major clients like the President, it may just be a matter of time before they fall of their own bloated weight. I wonder where people like Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity would go if there were no Fox News to coddle them?

WSJ: The Alien In The White House

Posted by on June 9, 2010 at 12:37 pm. 6 Comments :

The right-wing media long ago cemented its status as a shrill, extremist platform for failed conservative positions, pundits, and politicians. Often it melded all three into its version of super-troopers, peddling partisan rhetoric and propaganda. Fox News, not surprisingly, is the best example of this with their employment of media-politico crossovers like Sarah Palin and Karl Rove.

However, to the extent that some of the more sober purveyors of news sought to maintain an image of seriousness and thoughtful analysis, even that boundary has been breached.

When Rupert Murdoch purchased the Wall Street Journal it was a respected news organization that, at least outwardly, aspired to adhere to established journalistic principles. Murdoch insisted that he was committed to preserving that heritage and that he would not impose his views on the paper’s editorial process. But this morning any aspiration toward ethical journalism was abandoned and replaced with an embrace of the most deranged lunacy straight off of the supermarket tabloid rack.

Dorothy Rabinowitz composed a screed for the Journal that is so devoid of rationality it makes an argument for her family to invoke conservatorship and have her confined to an institution for her own protection. It begins with the title The Alien In The White House. Despite a disclaimer at the end of the fourth paragraph that it has “nothing to do with delusions about his birthplace cherished by the demented fringe,” Rabinowitz has to know that the imagery in her words plants the very message she claims not to be espousing. The demented fringe will devour it with relish. She wants her readers to conjure up thoughts of a foreign, illegitimate, usurper to power.

Fox Nation Obama AlienIn support of this promotion of birtherism, Murdoch’s web site, Fox Nation, republished Rabinowitz’s column with a graphic exclamation point. The visual cues employed here escalate the routine insanity of those who believe that Obama was born in Kenya, to an even more absurd insinuation that he is not even from this planet. At this rate the Weekly World News may sue Murdoch for infringing on their fringiness.

But even the message to which Rabinowitz is laying claim distastefully casts President Obama as something other than a patriotic public servant. In fact, she paints him as borderline treasonous. In her view the President aligns himself with foreigners and pursues their interests and not those of Americans.

“A great part of America now understands that this president’s sense of identification lies elsewhere, and is in profound ways unlike theirs. He is hard put to sound convincingly like the leader of the nation, because he is, at heart and by instinct, the voice mainly of his ideological class.”

Never mind the fact that it was a majority of Americans, not foreigners, who elected him. Rabinowitz imagines that the country has a perception of the President as having a “distant relation to the country.” However, the truth is that she is the one who feels a distance from the mainstream citizens who rejected the policies of her ideological class; the policies that drove the nation into a financial ditch and embroiled it in two costly wars.

Ironically, the first example Rabinowitz offers of Obama’s other-worldliness is that, upon moving into the White House, he failed to find a place for a bust of Winston Churchill. She is literally arguing that by removing the bust of a foreigner Obama is aligning himself with foreigners. That is the level of cognitive disconnect the right suffers from in general. And, of course, had he placed Churchill’s bust on the mantle in the East Room, he would have been criticized for glorifying a foreigner and harassed about why an American didn’t get that spot of honor on the mantle.

It is to be expected that broadsheets like the Weekly World News publish stories about presidents meeting with Venutians, but it represents a devastating collapse of integrity to see the Wall Street Journal treading that territory. And the fact that this nonsense is plastered across multiple Murdoch properties proves that it is his initiative. He cannot pretend to be removed from the hysterical madness that has permeated his enterprise. He is responsible for Rabinowitz’s incoherent daftness, just as he is responsible for Glenn Beck’s fascist evangelism, and Bill O’Reilly’s arrogant racism, and the rest of the crackpot conspiratorialists at Fox.

If Rupert Murdoch ever hoped that by acquiring the Journal he would rehabilitate his reputation, he has fouled that up entirely. Rather than having the Journal’s respected history rub off on him and polish his legacy, he has rubbed off on the Journal and stained it forever. Nice work, Rupe.

ADDENDUM: With regard to the bust of Churchill, Rabinowitz was even more off base than I thought. First of all, Churchill’s bust was on loan from the British embassy and was returned before Obama was inaugurated, so he had nothing to do with it not being displayed. What’s more, Obama put a bust of Martin Luther King in the place where Churchill’s had been. And this is what Rabinowitz is asserting is somehow un-American?

The Right’s Top 25 Journalists?

Posted by on February 11, 2010 at 4:43 pm. NO Comments :

Tunku Varadarajan, national affairs correspondent for The Daily Beast, has compiled a list of what he and 50 academics, politicians, and journalists, consider to be the top 25 right-wing journalists in America. The most enlightening thing we learn from this list has nothing to do with the ranking of wingnuts in the media. What is truly fascinating is how it reveals their definition of a journalist. Here are the top 10:

  1. Paul Gigot, Editorial Page Editor, The Wall Street Journal
  2. Glenn Beck, Fox News
  3. Rush Limbaugh, Radio Talk Show Host
  4. Peggy Noonan, The Wall Street Journal
  5. Bill O’Reilly, Fox News
  6. Michelle Malkin, Fox News/Blogger
  7. David Brooks, The New York Times
  8. Sean Hannity, Fox News
  9. James Taranto, The Wall Street Journal
  10. Matt Drudge, The Drudge Report

To be fair, placing Paul Gigot at the top of the list recognizes a veteran newsman who spent decades with ink-stained fingers pursuing his vocation as a reporter and editor. While devotedly right-wing in his current role as an editorialist and commentator, he also has the resume of a bona fide journalist. And that makes him the ONLY journalist on the list.

It is nearly hysterical that the 50 unnamed participants in this project elevated Glenn Beck to second place; and Rush Limbaugh to third; and Bill O’Reilly to fifth; and … well you get the idea. What’s more, Varadarajan obviously has a soft spot in his heart for his former employer, Rupert Murdoch. Seven of the top 10 are also Murdoch minions employed by either Fox News or the Wall Street Journal. I wonder if some of the few real journalists at those shops are upset that they were ignored in favor of Sean Hannity and Peggy Noonan?

It is rather telling that an assembly of conservative academics, politicians, and journalists, couldn’t actually come up with names of other conservatives who are actually journalists. One of their selections, Limbaugh, has already responded to the list by declaring that he shouldn’t be on it. At least he is honest enough in this circumstance to admit that what he does is not journalism.

Some of the notable non-journalists on the remainder of the list include raging propagandist Andrew Breitbart (11), serial interrupter Neil Cavuto (14), Coulter clone Laura Ingraham (21), and Marc Morano, a virulent Climate Crisis denier and science skeptic.

Overall, judging from this coterie of cranks, I’m surprised that James O’Keefe and Jeff Gannon weren’t given honorable mentions. Perhaps the panel should be consulted again and made aware of some of these glaring omissions. Remember, Joe the Plumber served as a war correspondent for Pajamas Media. How dare they insult these fine conservatives by failing to honor their contributions to the rightist media.

The Tea Party Delusion

Posted by on December 19, 2009 at 1:54 pm. 2 Comments :

Much has been made this past week about a poll (pdf) by NBC and the Wall Street Journal. It seems that virtually every newsroom in America saw fit to report the astonishing results that showed that the Tea Party movement was viewed more favorably than either the Democrats or Republicans. The poll said that the notorious Town Howlers were viewed favorably by 41% of poll respondents, compared to 35% for Democrats and 28% for Republicans.

First of all, it needs to be noted that establishment politicians are currently about as popular as Rush Limbaugh at a nudist colony (I apologize for the mental image that may have generated). I would venture to say that a Swine Flu Party would be better received than today’s Democrats or Republicans. So Tea Baggers haven’t really got much to be proud of in this respect.

What’s more, in case the press hasn’t noticed, there is no such thing as the Tea Party. It has no candidates or policies to compare with any other party. So the pretense of the comparison is dubious at best.

But the biggest cognitive disconnect in this story is that none of the press accounts that I saw bothered to report the results of another question in the same poll:

14a. How much do you know about the Tea Party movement-do you know a great deal about this, a fair amount, just some, very little, or nothing at all?
  Know a great deal: 7
  Know a fair amount: 22
  Know just some: 23
  Know very little: 25
  Know nothing at all: 23

So 48% of respondents know very little or nothing at all about the Tea Baggers. Boy, they must really be a powerful force in America. I think it’s a lot easier to register positive poll results if half the country hasn’t even heard of you. And this fact was ignored by most of the media as they clamored to position Tea Bagging as a surging movement.

The fact that the Tea Baggers have failed to create a significant presence despite being bankrolled by some of the biggest and wealthiest AstroTurf lobbying organizations in the country (i.e. FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity), and having the promotional backing of Fox News, illustrates just how unappealing most Americans regard that brand of disruptive griping.

This is typical of how the press distorts trends. They make an observation from a narrowly defined (and usually conservative) vantage point and then extrapolate that to the broadest scope of interpretation. For instance, take a look at how Glenn Beck is viewed within the prism of the conventional media. He is profiled in the mainstream press as a phenomenon who has taken the nation by storm. He is said to command an army of followers and an explosively expanding multimedia empire.

But the truth is he has a program on Fox News that is viewed by about three million people. That’s fewer viewers than SpongeBob SquarePants and less than one percent of the population. Fox News itself is a big fish in a small media puddle with an average daily audience of about 1.3 million viewers. And more to the point as regards Beck’s popularity, or lack thereof, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll (pdf) conducted in September revealed that 42% of respondents didn’t even know who he was.

There may be a level of intensity that is driving interest in the rightist agenda, but it is strictly confined to the squeakiest of wheels. That intensity corresponds to the fervor currently on display in Republican circles that now show a significantly higher intention to participate in the coming elections. While this may be a red flag for democrats, it is also a natural pattern for a party that swept into power in the past couple of years and is now experiencing a season of self-examination. There are bound to be disappointments in the interplay of politics. Still, taking all of the data into account, it is fair to conclude that the characterization of a right-wing ascension is an illusion, or more accurately, a delusion of the media. Reports that Beck or Fox News or the Tea Party are assuming greater sway over the public are not borne out by the facts.

In short, when 40 to 50 percent of the public cannot even recognize you or your movement, you are not much of a player. It would be nice if the media would report that.

Wall Street Journal: Newsrooms Don’t Need More Conservatives

Posted by on December 16, 2009 at 1:53 pm. 4 Comments :

A few weeks ago the Washington Post’s ombudsman, Andrew Alexander, published a notably misguided article in response to criticism that the Post had missed the ACORN story and other right-wing claptrap. In a fit of hysterical myopia, Alexander caved into the carping saying that…

“…traditional news outlets like The Post simply don’t pay sufficient attention to conservative media or viewpoints. “

Never mind that the ACORN story was manufactured by partisan activists engaged in political combat. And forget that the substance of the story was unverified at the time, and more recently thoroughly debunked (pdf). And set aside that even if it were true it was a trivial side issue that affected only a few maladroit volunteers and in no way reflected the views of ACORN’s management or 400,000 members. Nevertheless, Alexander concurred with critics that there was a story there that the paper had missed and that deserved equal billing to real news events like war, health care, and the economy.

All of this makes it all the more remarkable that the voice of reason on this matter has just appeared in the pages of the Wall Street Journal. Thomas Frank’s column today begins with a title that pretty much says it all: “Newsrooms Don’t Need More Conservatives.” The exceedingly reasonable premise is that newsrooms are advantaged by more objectivity, not more partiality. Frank says…

“Craziest of all, though, is the prospect of the Post ditching its decades-long pursuit of the grail of objectivity . . . because it got scooped on the Acorn story. If that is all it takes to reduce the Washington Post’s vaunted editorial philosophy to ashes, what is the newspaper industry planning to do to atone for its far more consequential failures?

“Remember, this disastrous decade saw two of them: First, the news media’s failure to look critically at the Bush administration’s rationale for the Iraq War; and then, the business press’s failure to understand the depth of the subprime mortgage problem and to anticipate its massive consequences.”

Frank correctly points out that having more Republicans on the Post’s payroll would not have produced better reporting for either of the stories he cited. In fact, it would have made things demonstrably worse. Does anyone seriously believe that more conservative journalists would have challenged either President Bush or the Wall Street establishment in a way that would have enhanced the reporting or better informed readers of the impending disasters? Only the most diehard, rightist zealot could answer that in the affirmative. Frank’s answer is condensed in a profound and troubling closing paragraph:

“What the Post seems to be after is [a] form of journalism that offends nobody, that comes crawling to the powerful, that mirrors the partisan breakdown of the population as a whole. If that’s the future of journalism, we can be certain that ever more catastrophic failures await.”

Well said. And he could have added that following Alexander’s advice to pay more attention to conservative media would only result in diverting scarce resources from more pressing priorities and missing even more stories of true significance. Now we just need to get the Post to heed these words. And Mr. Frank may also want to send a copy to his employers at the Journal and his corporate cousins at Fox News.

Guilt By Association With Fox News

Posted by on October 26, 2009 at 4:57 pm. 6 Comments :

Much has been made the past week of the so-called “war” between the White House and Fox News. Never mind the fact that there is nothing occurring that remotely approaches being characterized as even a metaphorical war. The administration merely expressed an opinion that Fox is more engaged in partisanship than journalism, a view most objective analysts would regard as obvious.

Ironically, it is Fox itself that has been the most vocal about the dispute. They have devoted more airtime to it and have enlisted their corporate cousins at Fox Nation, the New York Post, and the Wall Street Journal to pile on. And at the same time that they bemoan their being the target of a presidential smackdown, their own Glenn Beck offers his conspiratorial thesis that it is all an attempt to distract the public from the administration’s attempt to ram what he calls a socialistic, government-run health care bill through Congress. In a double-reverse, pitchback, fakeout, Beck’s accusation that this spat is nothing but a red herring is delivered even as he dedicates the majority of his own program to the fishy story. He is, therefore, a major contributor to the distraction about which he is complaining.

This is the sort of strategic schizophrenia that makes it difficult to even bother trying to engage with Fox. They want people to believe that they are a credible news enterprise, yet they sponsor anti-Obama tea party protests. They want people to believe that they are fair and balanced, but they populate their air with wall-to-wall propaganda and Republican talking points. They want people to discriminate between what they claim is their news and editorial content, but their news is fully contaminated by the right-wing fungi with which their editorial is fatally infected.

It appears that the only way to relate to Fox is to disengage. That is the course that Jane Hall, an associate professor in the School of Communication at American University, and a frequent Fox contributor, has taken. This weekend on CNN’s Reliable Sources she told Howard Kurtz that she has left Fox and gave as part of her reason that…

HALL: I’m also, frankly, uncomfortable with Beck, who I think should be called out as somebody whose language is way over the top. And it’s scary.

KURTZ: Was that a factor in your decision to leave Fox?

HALL: Yes, it was.

I can’t help but wonder why more people haven’t come to the same conclusion. An association with Fox can only bring derision and ill repute to anyone who actually covets a career in journalism. Being yoked to Fox ought to be regarded as scarlet letter that permanently stains any hope of a reputation for ethical reporting.

It is time to start holding people accountable for the choices they make and for the partners with whom they align themselves. If someone elects to be on the same team as Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity, that relationship cannot be swept under the rug. They must expect to be identified as the professional comrades that they are. Just as Jane Hall ankled Fox due to her objection to being affiliated with Beck, any others who share that objection ought to do the same thing.

This is not a case of an aversion to being affiliated with a deviant associate who broke the law or violated rules of the company or society. Certainly Katie Couric should not be held to blame because another employee of CBS News was caught blackmailing David Letterman. In the case of Fox, the deviants are celebrated and highly promoted by Fox. They are regarded as treasures and they contribute significantly to Fox’s success. They are not black sheep, they are leaders and they are the most visible icons of Fox’s identity.

For this reason people like Chris Wallace should not be able to set aside his relationship to Sean Hannity. In fact, Wallace has said of Hannity that “I generally agree with him.” Major Garrett cannot pretend to be a journalist when he shares airtime with Bill O’Reilly. In fact, Garrett, formerly of the Washington “Moonie” Times, is amongst many Fox presenters who has written books that are as overtly partisan as O’Reilly’s. And all the other wannabe reporters who rub shoulders with the likes of Dick Morris, Ann Coulter, Neil Cavuto, etc., should be made to feel the embarrassment they are due.

Most importantly, News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch cannot be permitted to wash the slime from his hands. Rupert Murdoch IS Glenn Beck. They are inseparable and indistinguishable. Murdoch likes to present himself as an old school news publisher, but he is actually a tabloid sensationalist who has done more to tarnish the profession of journalism than anyone before him. His purchase of the Wall Street Journal was intended in part to bring him respect and to co-opt the credibility of the iconic financial digest. But instead of the Journal lending its glow to Murdoch, Murdoch has leeched his bile onto the Journal. From now on the Wall Street Journal is the paper of Glenn Beck. His picture should appear in the masthead. In fact, Glenn Beck’s alternately smirking and scowling visage should grace the cover of every News Corp enterprise. It should be sewn onto the lapels of every News Corp reporter. It should edited into every Fox News program and promo.

It is precisely because the editorial content at Fox is indistinguishable from what they call news, that no one in the Murdoch family of companies should be allowed any distance from the insane ravings of Glenn Beck. From now on it is Glenn Beck’s Fox News, Glenn Beck’s Wall Street Journal, Glenn Beck’s Rupert Murdoch. If Murdoch is happy to sponsor Beck’s program, even as advertisers desert it, then let him be melded to it. If he is proud of his racist and incendiary provocateur, then fasten Beck around his neck and let this be the legacy he leaves. If Beck is what he wants, then Beck is what he gets. And Murdoch will forever be remembered, not as a media baron or press magnate, but as a disreputable exploiter of division and hate. His legacy, in the twilight of his career, is inextricably intertwined with the mugging buffoonery of Glenn Beck. And heretofore, no one will be able to conjure up the memory of Murdoch without being drenched in the spittle and dementia of Beck. Congratulations Rupert.

[Update:] Beck has responded to Jane Hall, calling her “that idiot who left Fox:”

BECK: “Well, don’t let the door hit you on the ass when you leave. I’m going to miss you, I am, whatever your name is.”

Here we have Glenn Beck, a drug-addicted, alcoholic dropout, calling Hall, a Phi Beta Kappa with a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University, an idiot. And Beck doesn’t even know her name although she’s been a Fox News contributor for eleven years. No wonder she doesn’t want to be associated with that network anymore. Why would anyone want to be?

Bill O’Reilly Congratulates Senator Al Franken

Posted by on January 6, 2009 at 1:56 am. 5 Comments :

After a meticulous and prolonged recount, Al Franken has prevailed and will be Minnesota’s new senator. Although the defeated incumbent, Norm Coleman, is still threatening legal action to retain his seat, most observers give him little chance of succeeding. His legal arguments wouldn’t even produce enough votes to alter the outcome if he prevailed on every one.

There are, however, some determined holdouts, including the editorial page of Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal. The Journal itemized what it considers to be grievous errors on the part of the state Canvassing Board. But, while most of their complaints were unfounded, misconstrued, or outright false, it was spread throughout the rightist press by folks like Rush Limbaugh and Joe Scarborough, who characterized it as a news report rather than the opinion piece that it was.

Another Journal disciple is Fox News kingpin, Bill O’Reilly. O’Reilly referenced the Journal’s story in his talking points memo and concluded that…

“Evidence shows that MN Secretary of State Mark Ritchie is not honest enough to run a clean election.”

Of course there was no such evidence in the Journal piece or elsewhere. The attack on Ritchie’s honesty was O’Reilly’s own invention and a trademark of his brand of personal assault commentary. But, as usual, he saved his finest vitriol for Franken himself. It’s classic O’Reilly:

  • “You don’t get any lower than that man, Franken.”
    – So, Charles Manson would be a step up?
  • “That’s the worst thing I’ve ever seen in American politics – is this man maybe becoming a senator.”
    – Really? Worse than Joe McCarthy? Or Watergate? Or Monica Lewinski?
  • “It’s personal with me. He’s lied about me. He’s slandered me.”
    – Ah…Now we’re getting to the heart of the matter. He’s told the truth about you.
  • “The fact that he was even competitive […] depresses me about America.”
    – So it’s America’s fault?

O’Reilly is fond of hyperbole, so it isn’t surprising that he would blast Franken as the lowest and the worst of whatever delusion in which he is presently immersed. However, he is also fond of bashing what he’d call the “blame America first crowd,” so it is a little surprising to see him throw that sucker punch at America – but only a little. It is very much like O’Reilly to be a major league hypocrite. And it is similarly like him to turn against anyone he perceives as opposing his dementia.

O’Reilly has given up on America. They opposed the war in Iraq. They favor universal healthcare. They elected Barack Obama president. And now they have put his nemesis in the United States Senate. So O’Reilly’s message to the nation as Al Franken prepares to take his seat is, “Screw you, America. You make me sad.”