The Man Who Calls The Elections For Fox News

Posted by on November 3, 2008 at 7:31 pm. 1 Comments :

Tomorrow is election day, children. It is one of the most cherished privileges of being an American citizen, and one of the most solemn responsibilities as well.

Many people take great pleasure from having the ability to help to choose who will lead our great nation, and they believe that by voting they are playing an important role in that choice. However, most are unaware that sometimes this process is not as straight forward as one might think.

After millions of well intentioned consumers citizens have gone to the polls to cast their votes, our friends in the media spend many minutes, and millions of dollars, figuring out who really won the election. They add up numbers given to them from computers and pollsters and other pundits, and when they are certain that they can make a reasonably close guess – BAM! – they announce it on television and America has a new president.

At the nation’s biggest and most dishonest cable TV news network, Fox News, the man in charge of making the final call sits in a busy TV studio with lots of electronic devices and a hotline to Republican campaign operatives. His name is John Moody, and he is also the Executive Vice President of the Fox News Channel. Mr. Moody’s job is so important that he gets to write memos every morning to tell all the news anchors what to talk about on that day (although Mr. Moody downplays this communication making the profound distinction that, “It’s not even called a ‘memo,’ it’s an editorial note.”) In one of these editorial notes that Mr. Moody distributed the day following the elections of 2006, he made some fascinating observations concerning the broad scope of victory enjoyed by the Democratic Party:

  • “The elections and Rumsfeld’s resignation were a major event but not the end of the world.”
  • “…let’s be on the lookout for any statements from the Iraqi insurgents, who must be thrilled at the prospect of a Dem-controlled congress.”
  • “The question of the day, and indeed for the rest of Bush’s term, is: ‘What’s the Dem plan for Iraq?’“
  • “In the House, the newly empowered Dems will shed some fraternal blood before settling in.”
  • “Just because Dems won, the war on terror isn’t over.”

As you can see, Mr. Moody has a cheerful and sunny view of the disastrously rotten outcome produced by the majority of voters who all seem to have made the wrong decisions. We should all be grateful that people like Mr. Moody are on the job and looking out for us, even when we don’t know what is in our own best interest.

Good news, kiddies. Mr. Moody will be looking out for us again tomorrow. He will be the executive in charge of making the final call on all of the state presidential elections, and on the national race as well. This job may be easier this year because it appears that Mr. Moody already made the call. In a posting on his blog last week, he wrote about an alleged attack on a volunteer for John McCain’s campaign by an African-American thug who was also a Barack Obama supporter. Mr. Moody concluded the post saying that…

“If the incident turns out to be a hoax, Senator McCain’s quest for the presidency is over, forever linked to race-baiting.”

Well, it was hoax. That would settle the matter for most people, but at Fox News no one is ever accountable for anything they say. So Mr. Moody will take his place in the studio and prepare to make his call on who wins the presidency as if there were really any doubt.

It should be noted, however, that at Fox News there is always doubt. That comes from being able to make up the news as you go along, something the reporters at Fox News take great pride in. So if Mr. Moody wants to declare McCain the winner after Obama receives the majority of electoral votes, he may just do that. There is historical precedent for this. The man who called the election for Fox News in 2000, when George W. Bush was crowned, was John Ellis, Bush’s first cousin. So, as you see, news is whatever you want it to be, if you work for Fox.

Have fun tomorrow, children, and remember to vote. Just because Fox News doesn’t care about honest reporting or elections doesn’t mean you can’t still exercise your Constitutional rights. And be sure to keep an eye out for Mr. Moody’s morning memo on Wednesday to see how Fox will spin the landslide victory of Barack Obama, if they decide to report it at all.

Find us on Google+
Advertisement:

Neil Cavuto Cavorts With Cliff Claven And Plumber Joe

Posted by on November 2, 2008 at 4:41 pm. NO Comments :

Today on Fox News Neil Cavuto, the managing editor of the Fox Business Network, brought in a couple of first string financial pros to discuss America’s economy and politics. The renown expert John Ratzenberger (formerly Cliff from TV’s Cheers) was there to provide his unique insight on world affairs. And even more exciting, Joe the Plumber Ignorant, Lying, Tax-Dodging, Opportunist, showed up to school us all on patriotism:

JOE: McCain has fought and bled for our country, and loves our country. There’s too many questions with Barack Obama and his loyalty to our country. And I question that greatly.

CAVUTO: Well, you’re not doubting that he’s a good American. Or you are?

JOE: Oh you know, his ideology is something that is completely different than what democracy stands for, so I had some question there. In my opinion.

Does the word “Dumbass” spring to mind. And I mean that for both Joe and Cavuto. Even though Cavuto nominally challenged Joe, the fact that he keeps inviting him on the show is enough to dismiss him, his program, and his network. Cavuto frequently hosts such unqualified mental pygmies as Ted Nugent, Jon Voight, and various Hooters waitresses.

This is the kind of credibility that Fox brings to business reporting. The close association between Fox News, the Republicans, and the Bush administration explains a lot. They share the same advisors. It’s no wonder our economy is in tatters.


Could Fox’s Chris Wallace Be More Out Of Touch?

Posted by on November 2, 2008 at 4:02 pm. NO Comments :

Today on Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace interviewed Barack Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe. Most of the segment was standard political talk show fare, but what happened at the end was rather startling:

WALLACE: Well, and that brings us to the second question I wanted to ask you. In fact, you do have a very big event coming and that is not the election. It’s the birth of your second child.

In fact, that’s the reason you’re in Washington. Your wife, as I understand it, was due yesterday. What do you do if you’re in Chicago on election morning and you get the word your wife’s in labor?

PLOUFFE: I will get back as quickly as I can and head to the hospital. First things first, and we’re obviously so excited about that. We’re hoping that our new one will wait till after Tuesday, but either way we’ll be thrilled.

WALLACE: But you’re saying that if election morning you find out that the new one’s coming and isn’t waiting for the election, you’re going to leave Chicago and head off to the hospital?

PLOUFFE: Absolutely.

WALLACE: Boy, there are – a lot of people in the Beltway are going to question your priorities, David.

Why was Wallace so surprised that Plouffe would rush to his wife’s side if their child was about to be born? Wallace was so incredulous he had to ask the question twice, and he was still dissatisfied with the answer. Could Wallace be correct that people in the Beltway would question Plouffe’s priorities? Does he really think that Plouffe should be more concerned with attending a political party – even if it’s a victory party – than with the welfare of his wife and new baby?

Is this a demonstration of Republican family values?


Pundits Make Electoral College Vote Predictions

Posted by on November 2, 2008 at 2:05 pm. NO Comments :

As the 2008 campaign winds to close, the pundit class is weighing with their electoral vote calls. It’s bad news for John McCain when everyone is predicting a Barack Obama win and the Republicans give Obama bigger victory margins than the Democrats. Below are the predicted Electoral College votes for Obama (270 needed to win).

Democrats:
Arianna Huffington: 318
Paul Begala: 325
Hilary Rosen: 333
Donna Brazile: 343
Eleanor Clift: 349
James Carville: 365
Democratic Average: 338.8

Republicans:
Alex Castellanos: 318
Matthew Dowd: 338
Ed Rollins: 352
George Will: 378
Republican Average: 346.5

Media
Chris Cillizza, Washington Post: 312
Craig Crawford, Congressional Quarterly: 333
David Gergen, CNN: 338
Mark Halperin, Time Magazine: 349
George Stephanopoulos, ABC: 353
Larry Sabato, UVA: 364
Media Average: 341.5

If you exempt McCain campaign operatives and rightist pod-people like Hannity, O’Reilly and Limbaugh, there are few Republican advocates expressing much hope. Last week Fox News Executive VP John Moody pronounced McCain’s campaign over. Even Rupert Murdoch predicted a landslide victory for Obama way back in May.

Are Republicans in some sort of shock? What does it mean when uber-conservative George Will puts Obama in landslide territory and suggests a stronger outcome for Obama than Democratic icon James Carville? Maybe it doesn’t mean a thing. Most of these people are wrong more often that not, so we shouldn’t put too much emphasis on what they are saying today. Still, it will be interesting to store this for future reference to see how these predictions compare with the actual results.


John McCain Pulls A Double, Reverse Maverick

Posted by on November 2, 2008 at 10:11 am. NO Comments :

Last night John McCain appeared on Saturday Night Live. He follows his running mate’s inexplicably lame guest shot on the program two weeks ago. The best that can be said is that he didn’t bomb as thoroughly as Sarah Palin. At least he participated in the sketches and had a few punch lines.

Still, it is a bit surprising that the jokes primarily centered on his being a cash-strapped also ran. That is generally not a theme that a candidate wants to present two days before an election. Neither is it advisable to reveal your campaign’s closing strategy, which McCain did when discussing the matter on the Weekend Update segment. Asked what he would do if his present strategy were to fail, he offered a couple of notable alternatives:

  • The Reverse Maverick: That’s where I do whatever anybody tells me.
  • The Double Maverick: I’d just go totally berserk and freak everybody out.

In reality, he has already resorted to both of these tactics.

He began his campaign two years ago with the Reverse Maverick as he abandoned many of his long-held positions to suck up to the Bush loyalists and the Christian right. Examples include advocating the Bush tax cuts that he had voted against in the Senate, adopting the Bush position on torture that he had previously opposed, and embracing evangelicals like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell who he once called “agents of intolerance.”

He rushed headlong into the Double Maverick with his selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate. That certainly freaked everybody out. In addition, his behavior in response to the Wall Street meltdown when he promised to suspend his campaign and postpone a debate (neither of which he did), was nothing if not berserk.

A third strategy mentioned on SNL was “The Sad Grandpa.” I can’t say that we’ve witnessed bona fide examples of that, but we have seen verified examples of a close off-shoot, “The Grandpa Simpson.”


Find us on Google+
Advertisement:

Sarah Palin’s Constitutional Frights

Posted by on October 31, 2008 at 2:05 pm. NO Comments :

It’s five days before the election and Sarah Palin has still never held a press conference. But that hasn’t stopped her from bashing the media of which she is so fearful. And the story is getting even scarier.

Having a pet newspaper is apparently not enough for Palin. Now she’s afraid that any criticism of her is a violation of her Constitutional rights:

“If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations, then I don’t know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media.”

No one is infringing on her right to call Obama out, and she does it every day. It’s pretty much all she does. But the fact that she thinks the First Amendment exists to protect her from the media, or anyone else who disagrees with her, is an appropriately scary notion to come up in a Halloween day interview. She is arguing that she be permitted to bark out all manner of scurrilous slurs with abandon. However, she regards it as unconstitutional for anyone else to exercise their own freedom of expression in response. What she is advocating is nothing less than the infringement of the First Amendment rights of her critics.

This is a recurring theme for Republicans. If they are accusing you of something, you can bet they are doing it themselves. The strategy is to identify their own faults and then accuse their opponent of engaging in them. The accusation doesn’t even need to be true. McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, admitted to this tactic. So whether it be negative campaigning, voter fraud, or questionable associations, the McCain camp is knee deep in hypocrisy.

Update: Is this an example of an unconstitutional attack by the mainstream media:
Sarah Palin Got Pranked


A Cry For Approval From John McCain

Posted by on October 31, 2008 at 1:02 pm. NO Comments :

John McCain just released a new ad that features an endorsement from none other than Barack Obama:

More than anything else, this ad refutes McCain’s allegation that Obama doesn’t work across party lines. It shows Obama as collegial and open-minded. It ought to help persuade independents that Obama is a man of reason and fairness who will give credit where it’s due.

As for the issue the ad addresses, environment voters are probably already voting for Obama. Why support a maverick Republican on the issue when you can support a candidate and a party that has been championing it for decades?

Finally, you know you’re on thin ice when you have to rely on the endorsement of your opponent. If McCain really thinks that Obama is an inexperienced, untested, dangerous, risky, Socialist pal of terrorists, why is he so anxious to have his approval?

Thanks for the kind words, John. Please play this ad everywhere.


Barack Obama Uprising / John McCain Pushing Daisies

Posted by on October 30, 2008 at 11:27 am. NO Comments :

Last night Barack Obama aired a 30 minute advertisement showcasing the struggles and hopes of four American families, while summarizing the policies he has been articulating throughout his campaign. The ad was considered an expensive and risky proposition. Nothing like it had been attempted since Ross Perot’s economics lessons 16 years ago. So how did he do?

The Obama-mercial was seen by 26.3 million viewers watching CBS, NBC and Fox, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings. This doesn’t take into account additional viewers on Univision, MSNBC and BET. The Hollywood Reporter’s analysis reveals that:

“The entertainment programming that usually runs in the slot on those three networks has averaged a cumulative 23.1 million viewers each week since the start of the season — 12% lower than the Obama ad total […] Obama improved NBC’s rating by 43% and CBS by 10% compared with last week. And keep in mind Obama was competing against himself.”

By all objective measures, the risk paid off in spades. The slickly produced special has been receiving positive reviews from everyone but Sean Hannity, who called it “embarrassing.” Ordinarily I would defer to Hannity’s assessment on embarrassment seeing as he is so well acquainted with it, but not in this case. The ratings domination of Obama’s ad was so complete that it totally destroyed McCain’s competing program, “Pushing Daisies.”

Wait a minute … Apparently Pushing Daisies was not a McCain production after all. Sorry for the error but with a title like that, how was I supposed to know?


Sarah Palin Pines For Pet Press

Posted by on October 30, 2008 at 1:38 am. 1 Comments :

Just when you thought that irony had reached peaks that would not be revisited for a generation or two, along comes a contender that exceeds all expectations. Sarah Palin is such a contender, and today she demonstrates why the great ones can never be counted out.

The latest fake controversy to be heralded by right-wing media is the so called “discovery” of an article that was actually published six months ago in the Los Angeles Times about Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi. Barack Obama was reported to have attended a party for Khalidi where some Palestinian guests made some incendiary remarks about Israel. Of course there is nothing tying Obama to the statements or the speakers, but that hasn’t stopped the press from latching onto the story and making irresponsible and unsubstantiated allegations.

At the front of the line is Fox News, where Brit Hume, Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, etc., are already barking their patented phony outrage at Obama and the L.A. Times. At the crux of their complaints is their dismay that the Times will not release a video tape they have of the event. The Times issued a statement explaining that they received the tape from a source with an agreement that it would not be released. If Fox and its spokesmodels were actually journalists they would understand the concept of confidentiality and the privilege that exists between reporters and their sources. But we’re talking about Fox here, so an understanding of journalistic ethics may be too much to ask.

It’s not just Fox who is fanning the flames. John McCain and Sarah Palin have taken up the call and are using this affair to further pound on the press. This is where the irony comes in as Palin said this at a rally today:

“It must be nice for a candidate to have major news organizations looking after his best interests like that. Maybe some politicians would love to have a pet newspaper of their very own.”

This statement, coming from a woman who has coordinated her entire campaign with Fox News, is really a remarkable exhibition of chutzpah. She is herself a candidate with a major news organization looking after her interests. And she even has pet newspapers in Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post and Wall Street Journal. She and McCain have a relationship with a media company that is perhaps more intimate than any in history. And yet Palin is implying that Obama is being protected by the liberal L.A. Times who endorsed him for president. Did I mention that the Times has never before endorsed a Democrat for president? That’s right, despite having the words “Los Angeles” in the name, the Times has never been a liberal paper.

And by the way, Khalidi, that subversive professor that Obama was palling around with – he also received funding by a foundation that was chaired by, you guessed it, John McCain.

Ironic, huh?