Moderator: Dictators in Training
Mindia wrote:A Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. .
In covering the Iraq war last year, 73 percent of the stories on Fox News included the opinions of the anchors and journalists reporting them, a new study says.
By contrast, 29 percent of the war reports on MSNBC and 2 percent of those on CNN included the journalists' own views.
These findings -- the figures were similar for coverage of other stories -- "seem to challenge" Fox's slogan of "we report, you decide," says the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
In a 617-page report, the group also found that "Fox is more deeply sourced than its rivals," while CNN is "the least transparent about its sources of the three cable channels, but more likely to present multiple points of view."
The project defines opinion as views that are not attributed to others.
Last March, Fox reporter Todd Connor said that "Iraq has a new interim constitution and is well on its way to democracy."
"Let's pray it works out," said anchor David Asman.
Another time, after hearing that Iraqis helped capture a Saddam Hussein henchman, Asman said: "Boy, that's good news if true, the Iraqis in the lead."
Fox legal editor Stan Goldman challenged the hiring of attorney Gloria Allred to represent Amber Frey (Scott Peterson's mistress), saying: "If you want to keep a low profile, Gloria is not the lawyer to represent you."
In an interview, Fox's executive daytime producer, Jerry Burke, says: "I encourage the anchors to be themselves. I'm certainly not going to step in and censor an anchor on any issue. . . . You don't want to look at a cookie-cutter, force-feeding of the same items hour after hour. I think that's part of the success of the channel, not treating our anchors like drones. They're, number one, Americans, and number two, human beings, as well as journalists."
CNN spokeswoman Christa Robinson says the study "reaffirms what anyone watching CNN already knows: CNN's reporting is driven by news, not opinion." MSNBC declined to comment.
The Project for Excellence in Journalism, a Washington-based research group, offers a three-part breakdown of cable journalists voicing their opinions. From 11 a.m. to noon, this happened on 52 percent of the stories on Fox, 50 percent on MSNBC and 2.3 percent on CNN. Among news-oriented evening shows, journalist opinions were voiced on 70 percent of the stories on Fox's "Special Report With Brit Hume," due in part to its regular analysts panel at the show's end; 9 percent on MSNBC's "Countdown With Keith Olbermann"; and 9 percent on CNN's "NewsNight With Aaron Brown."
As for the most popular prime-time shows, nearly every story -- 97 percent -- contained opinion on Fox's "O'Reilly Factor"; 24 percent on MSNBC's "Hardball With Chris Matthews"; and 0.9 percent on CNN's "Larry King Live." King devoted nearly half his time to entertainment and lifestyle topics, twice as much as O'Reilly and more than three times as much as Matthews.
The project describes cable news reporting as pretty thin compared with the ABC, NBC and CBS evening newscasts. Only a quarter of the cable stories examined contained two or more identifiable sources, compared with 49 percent of network evening news stories and 81 percent of newspaper front-page stories.
This, says the study, is in part because cable leans heavily on live reports, 60 percent of which are based on only a single identifiable source ("the White House said today," etc.). What's more, cable news is far more one-sided than other media outlets, with only a quarter of the stories involving controversy making more than a passing reference to a second point of view. By contrast, says the report, the network morning shows, PBS and newspaper front pages were more than three times as likely to contain a mix of views.
Cable networks "have gravitated, particularly as Fox has surged in the ratings, toward programs and somewhat less toward reporting," says Tom Rosenstiel, the group's director. He says opinion-laden journalism "probably is part of Fox's identity, but it's not true of all the programs."
As for the tone of Iraq coverage, 38 percent of Fox stories were positive, compared with 20 percent on CNN and 16 percent on MSNBC, the report says. But war stories were about as likely to be neutral on Fox (39 percent), and more likely to be neutral on CNN (41 percent) and MSNBC (28 percent).
Despite its 24 hours of available air time, cable isn't exactly bursting with new news. Seven in 10 reports involve recycling of the same subject matter, with only 10 percent adding meaningful updates. "The time required to continuously be on the air seems to take a heavy toll on the nature of the journalism presented," the report says.
On the broadcast front, journalists offered no opinions on 83 percent of the evening news stories, 89 percent of the morning news reports and 97 percent of the pieces on PBS's "NewsHour." The biggest exception: campaign stories, where nightly news correspondents felt comfortable offering horse-race and other opinions 44 percent of the time.
One interesting contrast among the nightly newscasts: CBS was 50 percent more likely than NBC and twice as likely as ABC to air reports on disasters and other unexpected events (Dan Rather loved hurricanes). The "CBS Evening News" was also twice as likely to carry feature stories (such as the ethics of using high-tech duck decoys, or rising credit card debt) unconnected to breaking news .
The morning shows, which run at least two hours, still covered major stories less than the evening newscasts, the project says, devoting much of their time to Martha Stewart, Laci Peterson and other crime, lifestyle and celebrity topics. The morning programs were also more upbeat than not in their Iraq coverage, with positive reports 31 percent of the time and negative 19 percent. By contrast, 32 percent of Iraq stories on the nightly news casts were negative and 18 percent positive, while half were deemed neutral.
The project, which examined 16 newspapers -- from the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and Washington Post to the Bloomington, Ill., Pantagraph -- praised them for offering longer and more deeply sourced stories. Overall, 7 percent of stories contained anonymous sources, down from 29 percent in 2003. But the figure was 20 percent for front-page stories at the biggest papers, compared with 7 percent at the smallest. Stories about the Iraq war were more likely to be negative (31 percent) than positive (23 percent), but just as likely to be neutral in tone (33 percent).
The newsweeklies continued a drift toward softer and broader coverage, the report says. Newsweek did six celebrity and entertainment covers last year to Time's one, while Time did two covers on sports, two on history and one on the environment (the thinner U.S. News & World Report took a more traditional hard-news approach). Newsweek ("The Secret Lives of Wives") and Time ("Low Carb Nation") also ran a number of covers on what the project says might be called "faux trends."
Ugzugz wrote:Yeah - the anchors on CNN don't express their own opinions... they express the editors' opinions.
Mindia wrote:Arlos is almost as stupid as Rust. This is hilarious. No Arlos... you labeling me as as "ignorant," "bigoted," "closed-minded," blah blah blah, etc. is merely your own ignorance shining through. You think anybody who disagrees with you, or your screwed up wacked out political party's platform is an ignorant bigot.
You are making yourself look like an ass with such generalizations. It actually makes you the one who reeks of short-sightedness. Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. I listen very intently to both of them and formulate my opinions based not only on them, but on Bill O'Reilly (who is an independent), Michael Savage (who is a conservative), and several radio talk shows.
I try watching CNN every now and then, but I can only take about 5-10 minutes of Larry King's stupidity, and about 10 minutes of idealogues like James Carville and his typical boring, uninteresting, sheepish leftist rhetoric.
You are the one who needs to open your mind, boy.
Gypsiyee wrote:Mindia wrote:Arlos is almost as stupid as Rust. This is hilarious. No Arlos... you labeling me as as "ignorant," "bigoted," "closed-minded," blah blah blah, etc. is merely your own ignorance shining through. You think anybody who disagrees with you, or your screwed up wacked out political party's platform is an ignorant bigot.
You are making yourself look like an ass with such generalizations. It actually makes you the one who reeks of short-sightedness. Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. I listen very intently to both of them and formulate my opinions based not only on them, but on Bill O'Reilly (who is an independent), Michael Savage (who is a conservative), and several radio talk shows.
I try watching CNN every now and then, but I can only take about 5-10 minutes of Larry King's stupidity, and about 10 minutes of idealogues like James Carville and his typical boring, uninteresting, sheepish leftist rhetoric.
You are the one who needs to open your mind, boy.
oh man, apple juice just came out of my nose.
Lyion wrote:Mindia wrote:A Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. .
Having suffered through this show a few times, I think it's safe to say 'Colmes' is a goat boy who is on Fox solely because he may be the only liberal commentator worse than Al Franken. Both guys should stick to writing as they couldn't win a debate against Terri Schiavo. Colmes dominates that show.
Fox's 'PRESENTATION" leans heavily right. CNNs presentation leans moderately left. Most would agree with this analogy.
Mindia, I really wonder if all of this is an act. You're an intelligent guy, this seems a facade to me. There's no way you can be that constrained.
Arlos frothingly hates the right, so his arguments make sense. He does them eloquently and tries to present <albeit very schewed> some facts to support his beliefs. His hate does spill over which hurts his discussions, but most of the time he is cognizant and tries to discuss things rationally.
You just go the sledgehammer alienate anyone who doesn't agree with me path. Why? Are you trying to get people not to agree with you? Is this all a roleplaying exercise? I can't believe a person who's smart and educated could present posts of this nature.
I hope you choose to re-evaluate how you discuss things and do so in a manner that presents facts and your opinions in a 'Christian' manner.
Mindia wrote:Knowing you... it was probably sperm.
Mindia wrote:Gypsiyee wrote:Mindia wrote:Arlos is almost as stupid as Rust. This is hilarious. No Arlos... you labeling me as as "ignorant," "bigoted," "closed-minded," blah blah blah, etc. is merely your own ignorance shining through. You think anybody who disagrees with you, or your screwed up wacked out political party's platform is an ignorant bigot.
You are making yourself look like an ass with such generalizations. It actually makes you the one who reeks of short-sightedness. Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. I listen very intently to both of them and formulate my opinions based not only on them, but on Bill O'Reilly (who is an independent), Michael Savage (who is a conservative), and several radio talk shows.
I try watching CNN every now and then, but I can only take about 5-10 minutes of Larry King's stupidity, and about 10 minutes of idealogues like James Carville and his typical boring, uninteresting, sheepish leftist rhetoric.
You are the one who needs to open your mind, boy.
oh man, apple juice just came out of my nose.
Knowing you... it was probably sperm.
Mindia wrote:Lyion wrote:Mindia wrote:A Fox News has a segment called "Hannity and Colmes." You should watch it some time. Sean Hannity represents the general attitude and idealogy of the right, and Alan Colmes... the left. .
Having suffered through this show a few times, I think it's safe to say 'Colmes' is a goat boy who is on Fox solely because he may be the only liberal commentator worse than Al Franken. Both guys should stick to writing as they couldn't win a debate against Terri Schiavo. Colmes dominates that show.
Fox's 'PRESENTATION" leans heavily right. CNNs presentation leans moderately left. Most would agree with this analogy.
Mindia, I really wonder if all of this is an act. You're an intelligent guy, this seems a facade to me. There's no way you can be that constrained.
Arlos frothingly hates the right, so his arguments make sense. He does them eloquently and tries to present <albeit very schewed> some facts to support his beliefs. His hate does spill over which hurts his discussions, but most of the time he is cognizant and tries to discuss things rationally.
You just go the sledgehammer alienate anyone who doesn't agree with me path. Why? Are you trying to get people not to agree with you? Is this all a roleplaying exercise? I can't believe a person who's smart and educated could present posts of this nature.
I hope you choose to re-evaluate how you discuss things and do so in a manner that presents facts and your opinions in a 'Christian' manner.
Well Lyion, I too am trying to understand your viewpoint of my posts. Arlos backs up his arguments with facts? LMAO. Yes, he has the ability to write eloquently... so do I, big deal. It doesn't mean anything. My whole argument is that Arlos is quoting "facts" from a select liberal/socialistic pool of resources. He does nothing but regurgitate what the blind liberal sheep of the left cackle over and over again on their websites, "news" programs, and talk shows. You call that intelligent? You call that "thinking for yourself?" OMG, my side hurts from laughing so hard at this... Maybe you should try to re-evaluate your thoughts before you post them.
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