Leaked e-mail shows Fox boss tried to slant 'news' programs

Leaked e-mail shows Fox boss tried to slant 'news' programs

www.rawstory.com

The Washington, DC managing editor at Fox News appears to be caught red-handed in the art of spinning.

As the health care debate was reaching a high point last year, a leaked e-mail shows Bill Sammon asked his news department to refer to the public option as the "government run option."

Later that evening, Fox News flagship news program, Special Report with Bret Baier, used the very phrase Sammon had requested.

(visit the link for the full news article)

"If you call it a 'public option,' the American people are split," Luntz said. "If you call it the 'government option,' the public is overwhelmingly against it."

"It's a great point, and from now on, I'm going to call it the government option," Hannity replied.

Luntz also claimed that the "government option" would be "sponsored by the government." In fact, the proposed public option bills would have funded the program with the fees paid by those who enrolled in it.

I don't think this would come as any surprise to most people here on ATS, regardless of whether you see yourself on the left, right or beyond that false distracting non-sense.

I think most people here on ATS understand that the various MSM outlets are anything but "fair and balanced" and FOX News seems to lead the charge (though the others are far behind, if at all).

However, I do not think that most people understand just how bad it is, and not just by FOX News either. Furthermore, not too many people seem to see the important roles in which these media stations play into the robbery of America by projecting this false left-right paradigm of one dimensional American politics.

Time and time again, we hear about FOX News slanting their stories in a particular way, CNN worshipping Obama or that the pro-Israeli lobbies and Israel itself influencing the American media, yet people still seem to be under the illusion that we have a free press in this country. In fact, we don't and sadly, a "free-press" is paramount to a free country. If you don't have a free press, then chances are that you won't have a free country.

In fact, the only difference between our press and that of Iran or North Korea, is that the people of those countries at least know that they are being fed a line of bull or that their news is being "conditioned" to influence opinion. This wouldn't be such a huge problem if only people wouldn't delegate their critical self thinking tasks to these media outlets.

This is a clear expose' on the media, particularly FOX News, intentionally and deliberately "conditioning" their audience to form an opiion for them. Then again, can we expect anything different? This is an extremely dangerous policy, that goes far beyond this particular instance.



--airspoon


www.rawstory.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Is it surprising ?? at all ??

They clearly have an agenda and have no shame about it.

We can't blame fox news, they wouldnt exist without an audience.

so audience ??

I blame you.

Fox News works closely with Karl Rove to voice the GOP agenda, whether it's for or against the people.

Not a real surprise. I am sure this happens daily, although I am guessing it isn't limited to FOX. News media is becoming sickening to say the least. Best thing you can do is make others aware at this point I suppose.

reply to post by airspoon


I don't know why this would be a real surprise to anyone with half a brain. At this point in time, I believe it would be easier for them to make the necessary spelling corrections to the title of their news program than to change their M.O..

If spelled properly it would be; "FAUX NEWS"

All media outlets are biased to there own agenda. This comes as no surprise. But one " red handed " act, doesn't account for all the leftist media outlets in their continued manipulation for the past 40 years.

Seriously, how many times in the last decade have they been caught doing this?
Nothing unexpected. But lets be honest, if they were ever truly "Fair and Balanced" then they wouldn't need to say so.

reply to post by Whereweheaded


I find it interesting that you felt the need to add this comment to the discussion. Leftist media pretty much get no coverage, and no time with the people they wish to interview. Capitalists will have nothing to do with them for one reason or another, so its very hard for left leaning media figures to get close enough to get a story straight, which of course is entirely the fault of those refusing to deal with them.
Also , they are UNDERDOGS, they have no power. Let leftist media do as it wishes, because no matter what version of right wing politics you adhere to , the extreme of leftist thought is not as terrifying as the extreme right wing views held by the xenophobes and the megalomaniacs who have tried to rule the world before (Hitler) , and not as terrifying as the fact that there are still people thinking like that today (Palin).

reply to post by TrueBrit


Um..? you actually believe that the leftist media has no influence? They practically sold the US on Obama before the primary elections were even over?

A number of journalists have admitted that the majority of their brethren approach the news from a liberal angle. During the 2004 presidential campaign, for example, Newsweek’s Evan Thomas predicted that sympathetic media coverage would boost Kerry’s vote by “maybe 15 points,” which he later revised to five points. In 2005, ex-CBS News President Van Gordon Sauter confessed he stopped watching his old network: “The unremitting liberal orientation finally became too much for me.

Compared to their audiences, journalists are far more likely to say they are Democrats or liberals, and they espouse liberal positions on a wide variety of issues. A 2004 poll by the Pew Research Center for The People & The Press found five times more journalists described themselves as “liberal” as said they were “conservative.”

Many journalists continue to deny the liberal bias that taints their profession. During the height of CBS’s forged memo scandal during the 2004 campaign, Dan Rather insisted that the problem wasn’t his bias, it was his anybody who criticized him. “People who are so passionately partisan politically or ideologically committed basically say, ‘Because he won’t report it our way, we’re going to hang something bad around his neck and choke him with it, check him out of existence if we can, if not make him feel great pain,’” Rather told USA Today in September 2004. “They know that I’m fiercely independent and that’s what drives them up a wall.

source: www.mrc.org...

And that's just one source. The above statements suggest the influence of the liberal views. Are you suggesting that even the likes of Dan Rather wasn't influential as well?

Dan Rather replaced Walter Cronkite as anchor of the then-top rated CBS Evening News on March 9, 1981. Since then, his on-air liberal bias has become the stuff of legend. For Rather’s 20th anniversary in 2001, the MRC compiled some of Rather’s most quotable bias, along with illustrations of his nearly-nonsensical “Ratherisms” and his equally-comical denials of liberal bias. As ABC’s Peter Jennings and NBC’s Tom Brokaw reached their 20th anniversaries in 2003, Rather was still on CBS each night, a longtime liberal advocate masquerading as a journalist.

March 2005: After the embarrassing scandal involving Dan Rather’s use of forged documents in a one-sided 60 Minutes hit piece aimed at President Bush just before the 2004 presidential election, CBS announced Rather would leave the CBS Evening News on March 9, 2005, a year earlier than planned.

source: www.mrc.org...


What was that you were saying again??

It's not a surprise, but it's rare to have actual evidence. That is why this kind of leak is so valuable. I love it that more leaks are happening outside of Wikileaks as well, TPTB must be really feeling the heat - and insanely angry that they aren't able to stop it!!!

The walls of secrecy behind which the dark cabal works must be torn down.

Wow Fox News is crooked? In related news, water is wet and the sky is blue. Hard for me to believe too.

reply to post by Whereweheaded


Those phoney punks arent leftist. Liberals arent all leftist. I AM A LEFTIST ! I believe that in a fair society you should be paid more if you sweat at your work, if you go home with bits of metal in your hands, than if you push paper at ANY level. I believe the men who "own" crap, and think going to work amounts to "going to the office for a few hours" ought to be the lowest paid in the company, and the men who actualy keep companies running, by being at work ALL damned day , cutting metal, packing boxes, stacking shelves and cleaning the street, are GODS among men , and that the fat useless scumbags who employ them and sit on thier arses all day drinking wine and talking finance and markets are the lowest forms of life on the earth, and should be paid in sandwhiches and forced to sleep on thin carpets of hay on an otherwise unrelenting cobble floor. Thats leftism.
These wishy washy pathetic money magnets in the press these days wouldnt know leftism if it jumped up wrote "aquiring money for its own sake is punishable by death" into thier godamn skulls with a letter punch.
The people I am talking about are leftist, and no , they havent any power, and they dont get interveiws. Mostly because the people they want to interview have restraining orders against them.

Government option is a much more descriptive term than public option (which was itself coined as euphimistic spin).

reply to post by TrueBrit


So with your logic, a person who takes the time to get educated, becomes a entrepreneur, and becomes very successful making a gang load of money, should be reprimanded? How in your delusional world does that make any sense? That goes against the very grain this country was founded upon. Yes it does suck that there are big wealth bankers and what not, but because they chose a different career path than yourself, they should be made to pay consequences?
That is the fundamentally stupid if thats your basis?

And yes as I stated earlier with backing documentation, those examples I used are liberals. What part of the reading that I supplied you don't you get?

this is great documentary about Fox tv and generally for all MSM

OUTFOXED

video.google.com...#

reply to post by Whereweheaded


Your first point. Deciding that gaining education means automaticaly that you have a right to be paid more than people who are going to wind up with osteoperosis later in life because they do menial and hard labour for a job, is not socialy responsible.
Social responsibilty dictates that from a moral point of veiw, everyone is equal regardless of academic achievement or capability , because it is being human that makes us important, not what we know, or what we do. Therefore everyone should be paid according to their equality , i.e. the same cash amount. NO ONE is worth more than a steel worker, a bus driver, a burger flipper, or a cab driver. No matter how smart , or how good at BSing people into part with thier money.

And again, I stand by the idea that the gutless excuse for a liberal media you have , is not LEFTIST, it is weak, spineless, and obsessed with money just as much as all the scumbags they half heartedly attack on thier shows and in thier papers.

Originally posted by TrueBrit
Your first point. Deciding that gaining education means automaticaly that you have a right to be paid more than people who are going to wind up with osteoperosis later in life because they do menial and hard labour for a job, is not socialy responsible.
Social responsibilty dictates that from a moral point of veiw, everyone is equal regardless of academic achievement or capability , because it is being human that makes us important, not what we know, or what we do. Therefore everyone should be paid according to their equality , i.e. the same cash amount. NO ONE is worth more than a steel worker, a bus driver, a burger flipper, or a cab driver. No matter how smart , or how good at BSing people into part with thier money.

Oh boy... first off education doesn't ever mean you automatically get paid a lot (I know Phds who make practically nothing). Secondly, I would not trust a doctor that makes the same as a fry cook (it's probably a pretty good indication that they aren't a very good doctor).

Should a horrible bus driver make as much as a great one? Just trying to understand the depths of your confusion.

Originally posted by TrueBrit
reply to post by Whereweheaded

 

Your first point. Deciding that gaining education means automaticaly that you have a right to be paid more than people who are going to wind up with osteoperosis later in life because they do menial and hard labour for a job, is not socialy responsible.

What fantasy world do you live in? Gaining an education to improve oneself is the very reason why there are millions of students who wish to be successful. With that education, should in fact allow for better paying jobs. What, you think the burger flipper should be paid the same amount as the student whom went to school for 12 years, and figured out how to cure cancer?



" Social responsibilty dictates that from a moral point of veiw, everyone is equal regardless of academic achievement or capability"

Social responsibility dictates nothing? You stated above, from a moral view...moral view has no bearing, nor any relevance on someones desire to be successful. A moral view sounds more like to me your basing your argument on how you "feel" which is in direct correlation to your morals. Someones morals, or sense of " feeling " suggests that because you " feel " it would be nice to pay the labor and the Doctor the same amount of hourly wages, the world would be a better place. In true reality, the Doctor and future predominant figures would be like, screw this...why bother, which goes against the foundation of this country.

reply to post by SevenBeans


I havent got any confusion. Im saying mankind needs less inequality not more. Im saying that working hard at ANYTHING ought to reap the same rewards , no matter what that something is. If you cant make a billion dollars or pounds doing a physical job like stacking shelves at a huge supermarket, or selling newspapers every day of your life, then you shouldnt be able to make a billion dollars doing anything the hell else.
Society needs to learn that ammassing massive personal fortune is NOT the way forward, and does not benifit anyone but the bugger earning the mint. Ergo it is socialy irresponsible to do so. It IS socialy responsible to ensure that everyone who works earns the same money for the same hours, no matter what. There would be significantly more money about to pay for the much vaunted education of a population , if everyone stopped attracting huge amounts of it to private accounts, sitting on it for nearly a life time, and then farming it out to thier children by the million, while dodging as much tax as possible and generaly removing from the ecconomy , money that should be feeding those who work hard but get paid next to nothing because thier jobs are badly paid.