Time: What Hath Fox Wrought?

[question everything]

Friday, Oct. 06, 2006

What Hath Fox Wrought?

Fox news, which is about to celebrate its 10th anniversary, has changed the face of television. You're watching it, even if you don't think you are
By JAMES PONIEWOZIK

(snip)

Even with its ratings down, Fox remains the network against which competitors define themselves. And not just news competitors. After Bill Clinton got off an on-camera harangue against Fox News Sunday anchor Chris Wallace, for an aggressive line of questioning about his administration's anti-terror efforts, the New York Times reported that prominent Democrats, from Howard Dean to Paul Begala, had begun an open campaign of attacking Fox as a covert Republican shill.

The fight was a win-win. Mainline Dems can bash Fox to win points with the confrontational Daily Kos wing of the party. (Including Clinton, whose wife is vulnerable on the left for her support of the Iraq war.) And Fox? As the Times noted, "The news channel has highlighted the contretemps on many of its programs, boosting the ratings in the process." Say what you want about Fox: in this midterm year, no one is out there campaigning against CNN or MSNBC.

So is Fox a covert Republican shill? Shill, yes, sometimes. Its opinion shows blatantly tilt right. The news plays straighter, though as I write I'm looking at a Fox News chyron that reads, "If Rumsfeld left amid criticism, would America be at risk?" Covert, not so much. The network famously calls itself "fair and balanced," but "fair and balancing" would be a better description: Roger Ailes repeatedly describes his news network as a counterweight, on the right, to the rest of the news media. His argument that nearly every other mainstream media outlet slants left is self-serving and mostly wrong. (The MSM really slant toward the institutional, establishmentarian center, which is a bias as dangerous as any other.) But while "fair and balanced" may be propaganda, it doesn't seem to be fooling anyone. Conservatives see Fox as a comfortable haven for their worldview; their opponents pretty much agree. The balance here is that Fox winks just as broadly to both sides.

In the end, that wink—that is, the Fox gestalt of insouciance, attitude, and even playfulness—has had a bigger effect on the news media than any Bill O'Reilly rant. Fox taught TV news that voice, provocation and fun are not things to be afraid of. And for better or worse, probably every TV news program outside of PBS has been Foxified by now. The explosive graphics on your newscast: that's Fox. The "freeSpeech" opinion segments on the new CBS Evening News: that's Fox, too. Anderson Cooper yelling at a FEMA official or crusading in Africa: that's Fox. Keith Olbermann ranting at George W. Bush and O'Reilly on MSNBC's Countdown: that's Fox through and through, whether Olbermann would like to admit it or not.

Fox's ratings, in other words, may have declined for its 10th anniversary. But there are ratings and then there are ratings. You may tell yourself you don't watch Fox News. But as they used to say in the old Palmolive commercials: You're soaking in it.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1543610,00.html

[brettdale]

1. What about

The out and out lying by Faux?

What about there play in Election Fraud?

Its one thing to be bias, but they go further than that.

[Berry Cool]

2. This article gives Fox way too much credit.

As if Keith Olbermann needed to learn how to do what he does from Faux! As if the guy who used to talk about "premature jocularity" on SportsCenter needed anyone to teach him about insouicance, attitude and playfulness!

Also, I don't think this article says anything about the bitter nastiness that is the soul of Faux News. Namely, the "winning is not enough; you must spit on the grave of your competition" philosophy that can be seen in everything they do, from the top on down.

[question everything]

3. I don't care. If Olbermann realized that he can get away with calling

Bush a liar on national TV, because Fox has been doing this to Clinton - so be it. If both Clinton and Olbermann energize us thanks to Fox - this is fine with me. I don't watch them, anyway.

(Will be interesting if Olbermann will mention this story...)