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By Eric Boehlert - it's becoming increasingly clear that Fox's programming and the radical, fear-based agenda it's setting for Republicans is now doing lasting damage to the Grand Old Party.
That's because Fox News isn't simply offering a rightward take on the day's events, or innocently providing Republican-friendly commentary, of course. It's leading an exhausting, day-in, day-out attack campaign against Obama, Democrats and all their liberal allies. (Real or imagined.) Its relentless, paranoid crusade falls well outside the mainstream of American politics, which is why the Republican primary season, so proudly sponsored by Fox News, is shaping up to be such an embarrassment.
Make no mistake, kingmaker Ailes has made sure his channel's profoundly un-serious stamp permeates this year's GOP contest. For more and more spooked Republicans though, it's a stamp of failure and looming defeat.
For Ailes and company, that slash-and-burn formula works wonders in terms of super-serving its hardcore, hard-right audience of three million viewers. But in terms of supporting a serious, national campaign and a serious, national conversation? It's not working. At all.
As Fox News has moved in and essentially replaced the RNC as the driving electoral force in Republican politics today, and with Ailes ensconced in his kingmaker role, candidates have had to bow down to Fox in search of votes and the channel's coveted free airtime. That means campaigns have been forced to become part of the channel's culture of personal destruction, as well as its signature self-pity.
The truth is, the Republican Establishment all but ceded control of the party, or at least the public face of the party, to Fox News (and Rush Limbaugh) in January, 2009. Party leaders, demoralized by John McCain's electoral landslide defeat, faded into the background and obediently followed Fox News' often-hysterical lead as Rupert Murdoch's cable channel unveiled an unprecedented effort to demonize and delegitimize the newly elected president. (In the Fox-led world, it's conventional wisdom that Obama's a foreign, race-baiting Marxist who undermines Israel and is determined to destroy the American way of life.)
With Fox News at the irresponsible helm, the conservative movement in America, including the emerging Tea Party, became first and foremost a media movement, and one that gleefully cut ties with common sense and decency.
How Fox News Is Destroying The Republican Party
Article Source: AlterNet.org
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- Public Discussion (171)
Conservative leaders themselves have freely adopted Fox News' profoundly un-unprofessional rhetoric about Obama, claiming just this week he's "pro-poverty" and his politics are "almost un-American." That's the Fox-ification of the GOP.
As Andrew Sullivan noted this week, the current GOP "purges dissidents, it vaunts total loyalty, it polices discourse for any deviation." That sounds a lot like Fox News.
Two years ago, despondent conservative and former Bush speechwriter David Frum, noting the sweeping power that Ailes was accumulating, observed that, "Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us, and now we are discovering we work for Fox."
An excellent analysis by Boehlert. It's not just the Republican party that the Ailes / Murdoch machine is damaging; it is negatively effecting the whole political process, as well as much of the mainstream media. It is contributing to the lowering of standards all over the place.
- 85 votes
Not only has Fox damaged the political process, it has made mainstream politicians like Boehner (who is actually a moderate) totally ineffective and made American politics the laughing stock of the free world.
My daughters fiancee is English and they honestly thought over there that Glenn Beck was a comedy show, a satire, he said when they realized it wasn't it became even funnier. Fox has done so much damage to what was once a proud party that the chances of winning the Oval Office are practically nil and the prospects of retaining the majority in Congress are diminishing daily. You know the old saying 'You are what you eat', well Fox has been feeding the public and the GOP a bunch of @!$%# and that is the party of today!
Excellent seed my friend! Let's see if anyone on the right will be honest about this or will they spout the Fox party line?
- 70 votes
CPOSharky____Do you remember the time when Fox use to be a pretty fair and balanced news channel? Because I do it was just before the war mongering started for the invasion of Iraq. Before then I use to watch them almost religiously. My favorite person Was Gretta Van Sustrend/but now I would throw-up before I could get myself to even think about Fox News or even channel 9 ever being on my Television. It's really a sad affair. Maria-Lyn
- 37 votes
maria - yes, I actually had some respect for O'Rielly and Van Sustrend back then. Shep Smith isn't too bad still and pretty much does straight news as does Bret Bair for the most part. Hannity, I want to hit him so hard that it would knock that @!$%#ed up hair part to the other side of his head!
- 45 votes
CPOSharky______Boy am I glad your on my friends list/because I sure wouldn't want my part knocked to the other side of my head. But now I might like to join you when it comes to Hannity. Maybe you can stand on one side of him and I on the other. Play ping pong with his part/it's just a thought. Ha Ha Ha
- 18 votes
My daughters fiancee is English and they honestly thought over there that Glenn Beck was a comedy show, a satire
I have witnessed the same reaction, CPO. I am teaching English to adults in Spain. All of my students are business people in their 30s, 40s and 50s. I occasionally showed some of my more advanced students Glenn Beck when he was on FOX and universally the response was laughter, comments like, 'This is not serious, is it?' -- and when I told them it was indeed serious, lots of jaws dropping to the floor.
- 42 votes
Fox, Beck, Limbaugh, and the like want to tout how great the United States is yet they make it a laughing stock and are just too stupid or blinded by their own ambitions to see it! It is a very sad commentary Carlos. I have seen people here on the vine say screw the rest of the world, we're America and they do what we say or we kick their ass! Same bully mentality they probably displayed in school, pathetic!
- 31 votes
We joke about it being brain washing, but if you only get your news from conservative radio and television outlets what else can you call it? They have an answer for everything, and everything else is liberal media not to be trusted. For Fox and Rush, it's far right conservatives, and everyone else. There are no moderates nor independents in their world.
maria_lyn... Chief Petty Officers aren't just found in the Navy... They ARE the Navy! One of the first lessons you learn is that you want the chief in your corner, and that you listen to them.
- 29 votes
You know, why does it even come to this? Fox News shouldn't even be on the air. Sure Fox News and it's cast of characters are a bunch of whores. But how did the News Whores come to have a show on TV.
Well, our courts said they could. Freedom of speech. Yay!
So why are our courst too stupid to figure out that lying is not protected speech, lying is not even speech. It's the antithesis of speech.
Speech is communication. Communication is passing information. If all communication is lies, there's no need to communicate, everyone would just ignore everyone else. So, lying is the anti-thesis of speech.
Let's protect speech by allowing Fox News to destroy communication...
It's not stupidity at work.
It's greed.
- 23 votes
Messing with a Chief Petty officer of any stripe is like going to McDonald's, calling the cook to the front, telling him his mother is a whore, and then ordering your Happy Meal...
- 14 votes
Comment collapsed by the communityDean,
I thought Spain was in financial trouble because like all the other countries it bailed out banks sticking the public with the bank's bad debt.
- 35 votes
Dean,
I thought Spain was in financial trouble because like all the other countries it bailed out banks sticking the public with the bank's bad debt.
He doesn't like to let the facts get in the way of his grenade rolling, Its just the way he "rolls"...lol
- 29 votes
A seed on FOX News wrecking the GOP, with 9 previous comments on this thread, several other threads with comments, and Dean Moriarty chooses to make inaccurate snark about Spain's economy. One of the most pathetic deflections I've seen in a while, LOL.
- 40 votes
We joke about it being brain washing, but if you only get your news from conservative radio and television outlets what else can you call it?
Fearwashing. Brainwashing would require that vital organ which would have prevented their falling for this crap. What right-wing conservative "news" does is try to channel all the fears of their viewers (and a percentage of those who come in contact with said viewers and buy the hype) into a common cause as a divide and conquer strategy for the general public. Instead of the healthy fears associated with rising inequality, environmental concerns, and a dysfunctional political system, these propaganda factories spin those fears into hate for "the other" and then define the other as anyone not spewing their propaganda.
Those healthy fears would have otherwise spurred honest discussions and a collective effort to find the best solutions and work together to implement them. But the fearwashed citizen will submit to their "trusted source" their ability to think for themselves and discern truth from fiction. They are fearwashing a percentage of the country so that they will not only blindly follow the "job creators" into slavery, but drag the rest of us along.
- 15 votes
It is definitely funny (and soothing) to think of the GOP as a deer in the headlights, mesmerized by it's own approaching doom. But, I think it is also dangerous to forget that, that deer still has the largest concentration of cash in the world behind it.
- 11 votes
He doesn't like to let the facts get in the way of his grenade rolling, Its just the way he "rolls"...lol
More like a loyal Fox News viewer, sure he has the jist of it, but the facts are wrong.
- 16 votes
Sometimes I wish the cartoon character Taz were real.
I'd like to turn about fifty loose on capital hill and tell them that politician's are cheeseburgers...
- 11 votes
There is some scientific evidence that those with a more conservative lean, "fear" more than others... they "fear" change, they "fear" those that are different than they, they "fear" that which they don't understand.
That is why their leaders will tell you first and foremost what to be afraid of and whom is to blame. It works well at the psychological level for conservatives.
- 23 votes
Fly,
It is very often coupled with an inability to be intropective. This leads the conservative mind to believe that the fears it experiences are real and outside of themselves.
Fear is a constant among us. Every person feels it.
The problem is when fear causes you to freeze up.
You hang on the side of the water tower, fists clenched on the rungs for hours, too afraid to move. You think, "I'll just stand right here until someone comes to help me." The muscles in your legs begin to tremble with tension instead of relaxing...
There is a deep dependancy in the Conservative worldview. It allows them to band together, often against reason and self interest. It is this component that allows the Republican Party to overcome the series of debacles it has conceived. It is this component that allowed Karl Rove.
What the folks behind Fox News haven't realized is that fear burns out. But before it does it gets ridiculuous. You'll know what I'm talking about I'm sure.
I remember this recruit. We were all in basic. I wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of a rythmic pounding. I was pissed, I can tell you; you never get enough sleep early in basic.
I hop down off my bunk and follow the crowd. About four bunks down there's this kid, sitting on his metal framed bunk pounding his forehead bloody on one of the posts supporting the upper bunk.
He was still lunging with his head when the medics arrived to medicate him. Even though about six of us were trying to hold him down.
They told us he was afraid...
Fear is nothing to be afraid of, a loss of dignity is. :)
- 18 votes
Flame.... Fear does get ridiculous... and even dangerous when it turns to paranoia. Tim McVey and the Oklahoma City bombing, the KKK, numerous militia groups and the black helicopters of the one world order are but a few examples.
- 18 votes
Your post touched very close to home! Several years ago I was swept up in a violent tornado, that left the store I was entering in complete shambles. My son was 2 at the time, and I sheltered him as best I could. The wonderful gentlemen shepherded all of us to the parking lot in a hurry, and within about 2 minutes the entire roof crashed down. So grateful just to be alive, but for a long, long time after that whenever I would merely see dark clouds above w/a hint on the t.v. there were "severe" warnings out, my reaction was to grab hold and cling as tightly as I could to anything stable near me. A couple of times I had to be pried/extricated loose. Sheer terror overtook me.
The great news is that I overcame those fears, I can see clearly now, and unless and until there is a real and present danger I remain calm and collected. No longer do I feel threatened by things unseen and basically not even truly real and dangerous.
So, your analogy is a very good one for the GOP. They discern the fear/terror and prey upon it like a vulture on road kill. Thanks for the post! Good one!
- 16 votes
Do you remember the time when Fox use to be a pretty fair and balanced news channel? Because I do it was just before the war mongering started for the invasion of Iraq. Before then I use to watch them almost religiously. My favorite person Was Gretta Van Sustren
I do, I DID actually like Fox, because it used to actually offer SOME sort of balance. Now it is all Anti-Obama, ALL the time. Seriously? There is NEVER anything good to say about Obama? And I liked Greta, even post-move, until she had her nose done. If you're so vain as to have your nose done, you officially surrender your 'news reporter' card. But it fits Fox perfectly, more concerned about appearance than about truth and reality.
Please, Fox Newsies, your show is so tilted it is ludicrous in the extreme that you aren't offended by it, much less can't even see it.
- 10 votes
Please, Fox Newsies, your show is so tilted it is ludicrous in the extreme that you aren't offended by it, much less can't even see it.
yeah it is a bit hard to see around the flaming liberal (Bob Beckel)l on fox every day
it is a good thing the liberal press "other channels" has all those conservatives on their shows huh?
/sarcasm
Hi, can you say TOKEN? I'm just surprised he's not black.
And keep telling your self that those 'other channels' are all liberal, it isn't true, but it obviously will sooth your precious widdle feewings.
- 18 votes
Dean Moriwhatever is the perfect embodiment of rightie snark lies and hatred. and then there is CaptainOblivious LOL ....wrong on all counts - always - is his motto....
- 17 votes
Hi, can you say TOKEN? I'm just surprised he's not black.
Juan Williams -- although he's not Liberal.
- 20 votes
Sometimes I wish the cartoon character Taz were real.
Flame - Taz is on my left arm, and I would just love to go Chief on some of these ass holes, from both parties!!
- 12 votes
it is a good thing the liberal press "other channels" has all those conservatives on their shows huh?
If you watched them you would know that they do very often have them on and not just a token like Jaun Williams, MSNBC and especially CM and RM bring them on all the time to get their take. They may not agree but they are respectful and let them have their say. Try watching something other than Fixed Muese, you might actually say something on here afterwards that is worthwhile.
- 18 votes
Juan William
Some would argue he's not black, as some have said about Obama.
And agreed CPO, the lone liberal on Fox is always shouted down and blatantly made fun of, while on MSNBC they at least let the conservatives finish speaking before jumping all over them.
- 11 votes
it is a good thing the liberal press "other channels" has all those conservatives on their shows huh?
MSNBC features a conservative pretty prominently -- Joe Scarborough every morning. In addition, his show, Morning Joe, as well as the shows of Lawrence O'Donnell and Chris Mathews, regularly have Conservative guests, as does Meet the Press.
- 19 votes
I LOVE Meet the Press, it was on that show that Dick Cheney solemnly asserted that Saddam had WMD's, pounded the table, and insured us that, 'He has them, and we know where they are!'
Still waiting, Dick.
- 17 votes
I used to love MTP. David Gregory refuses to follow through and consistently gives guests a pass. Chris Hayes is my new favorite. Incredibly interesting.
- 13 votes
but it obviously will sooth your precious widdle feewings.
making a point while attacking another is a sure sign of mental and emotional weakness...
NPD much?
Cheers :)
- 1 vote
Perhaps our good friend mister Moriarty can explain why socialist Germany is kicking our butt in GDP growth.
Why communist china and socialist japan(they have health care) lend the US the most money.
and why the happiest countries on the planet year after year, are the socialist ones and yes while norway has a higher gdp per capita, most of the countries who beat us on the happiness index do not.
- 11 votes
I can tell you why if Dean won't.... we don't tax enough to pay for what we want (both pubs & dems), and we have a military industrial complex that is running the country because they peddal fear. Conservatives thrive on fear.
- 22 votes
Germany also has stronger labor unions and less income inequality. Germanies labor unions have been under attack in recent years though and their income inequality is increasing accordingly.
- 12 votes
Wait, I thought nobody watched Fox News. What happened to that popular narrative? Now they control the entire Republican party? Hyperbolize much?
If the story here is that Fox News doesn't like the Democratic president, that's not news. This old bit of common knowledge has been regurgitated here as if it were a revelation.
Yes, David Gregory has been a big disappointment.
ya know, I hear this from both sides and it's usually within the context of whether or not he's asking the tough questions. People on the Left think he goes too easy on conservative guests and people on the Right think he's unfairly tough on them. That indicates to me that maybe he's actually being fair - or at least more fair than people are willing to credit him.
people on the Right think he's unfairly tough on them.
When merely quoting a republican is considered being unfairly tough and refusing to discuss blatant lies about a democrat is going too easy then the idea of being fair is already off the table.
- 15 votes
NPD much?
Not that I'm aware of, of course, you just did the exact same thing...didn't you?
When merely quoting a republican is considered being unfairly tough and refusing to discuss blatant lies about a democrat is going too easy then the idea of being fair is already off the table.
DING DING DING!! Someone who gets it! It's not a matter of a problem with compromise, so much as a problem with the Dems unwillingness to simply capitulate in toto.
- 8 votes
making a point while attacking another is a sure sign of mental and emotional weakness...
I like how you ignore every other post telling you how wrong you were, and instead focus on this little tidbit as if it exonerates you from any obligation to admit your wrongness.
Wait, I thought nobody watched Fox News. What happened to that popular narrative? Now they control the entire Republican party? Hyperbolize much?
When, exactly, was this a popular narrative? Fox News is like the top-watched news channel on television... which I find incredibly funny when they complain about "main stream media".... they ARE main-stream media.
- 5 votes
Wait, I thought nobody watched Fox News. What happened to that popular narrative?...
When, exactly, was this a popular narrative?
Since...
Fox News Ratings Fall Off A Cliff In 2011
Fox News Viewership Plunges 21% While MSNBC Grows
Declining Ratings Could Put Judge Andrew Napolitano's Fox News Future In Jeopardy
Fox Ratings Reign Endangered by 17% Drop in Audience
Year End Cable News Ratings: MSNBC, CNN Up in Primetime while Fox News Takes a Loss
Jon Stewart's Ratings Are Now Higher Than All Of Fox News
- 4 votes
Actually, the corporate media is a major problem for both parties today - a case in point was watching several "liberal" media personalities in support of the copyright bills .....
- 3 votes
Tell me about it, he was googly eyed for McCain and Thompson, but was a complete dick to Axelrode.
- 4 votes
Well, the Jon Stewart thing can be explained, Jon is just funnier than the faux noise humor network.
- 5 votes
Greg Gutfeld on Fox's "THE FIVE" is alarmingly foolish in his daily remarks.
Infact, this panel is frighteningly silly and totally ignorant on professional commentary.
Clueless....and yet FOX pays them.
- 11 votes
Ladyinred1
#1.22
You are fortunate indeed to have learned you are brave.
<smiles @ Ladyinred1>
Great song, BTW, I was in college when it came out - I think.
- 3 votes
Since...
Fox News Ratings Fall Off A Cliff In 2011
Fox News Viewership Plunges 21% While MSNBC Grows
Declining Ratings Could Put Judge Andrew Napolitano's Fox News Future In Jeopardy
Fox Ratings Reign Endangered by 17% Drop in Audience
Year End Cable News Ratings: MSNBC, CNN Up in Primetime while Fox News Takes a Loss
Jon Stewart's Ratings Are Now Higher Than All Of Fox News
Are all those posts fact, MM?
If so, how does that have anything to do with this:
MartyMoose
Wait, I thought nobody watched Fox News. What happened to that popular narrative? Now they control the entire Republican party? Hyperbolize much?
Sorry, that dog don't hunt.
- 2 votes
According to studies from George Mason University Center for Media and Public Affairs,( students in majority favor Democrats), FOX is the most balanced news.
Where the bias is comming from?
- 1 vote
Huffinton Post.com . FOX number ONE ten consecutives years, O'Ralley number ONE, MSNBC number two, CNN number three. Sorry, check your facts
huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/28/cable-news-ratings-2011-top-programs-year_n_1173415.html
- 1 vote
Fox news is the most unbiased? have you ever watched it? I watch "Real Time" on HBO and Bill bashes Fox news on a nightly basis, at that point I never watched Fox so I decided I would start and be able to form my own opinions. After four months I have one.
Fox news is just sad, it isn't really informative unless you are looking at the issue from a very similar perspective. I can see why British people think it is satire.
- 6 votes
How Fox News Is Destroying The Republican Party
lol, Every time the Repukians open up their mouths, they destroy themselves, don't blame Fox the way people have always been blaming Obama for everything.
The Repukians are good at destroying themselves all on their own.
- 5 votes
Check out the 700 Club; from what I could stomach, it is even worse than Fox.
I've always thought that the majority of couples in the USA who claim to be conservative - that one of those partners is likely to be sick and tired of their far Right partner - and is intentionally canceling their radical partners vote when they get in the voters booth. It wouldn't surprise me if paranoid Right-wingers make their spouse do a "write in ballot" just so they can monitor the other.
Bush 2 got elected using the religious angle - I don't think that will work in the future...I sure hope if anyone tries that route again, that the Dems have a counter plan.
If we are ever to progress - eventually we will have to dis-own both parties - for now the Dems are the lesser of two evils, but we are far from getting the representation we deserve.
- 5 votes
Another desperate, make em up, by the left. Trying to divide. They stay in business, by dividing. The leftist media, is just jealous, because Fox news is #1. The people of this great country got tired of the lies, from the leftist media. MSNBC is catching on slowly but surely. They got rid, of Oberfart, because his lies were becoming to much of a liability, next to go is Madcow, and Mathews, and Schultz, they can work for the National Enquiror, Jugo Chaves version.
Besides, Fox News has the hotties.
back To My Tall Iced Tea & Stogey
- 2 votes
This trend of the right will be to their demise in time. This election cycle is critical to the future of politics, media, and free thought. Voters need to get out in force. Once the right is soundly defeated and/or recalled. The more sane republicans, will/may see the light and the error of their ways. Convincing them to reject the inane ways of the TP, extremist and FOX, and realize it is to their advantage to slide more towards the center for their very survival. I shan't be holding my breath.
- 17 votes
#2 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 5:14 AM EST"In time", Dave.
I sometimes wonder how much time must pass, and how much damage has to be done to this country, before people will realize that this fixation with far-right ideology is bad news.
If their trickle-down, redistribution-up policies went unchallenged, the next 1929 would be inevitable and not far away.
- 14 votes
Rorschach,
I wonder how Reagan rationalized his change of heart concerning unions?
- 2 votes
Well...I can't think of a better party for Fox to destroy than the GOP, as like the Tea Party, they gladly embraced them to the core, and now they are being destroyed by them both.
Love it!
- 19 votes
#3 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 5:30 AM ESTTink - it's kind of like being on one of the old NatGeo expeditions and watching cannibals go at it! They are without a doubt eating their own!
- 17 votes
I totally agee with them eating each other. Go to it righties & Teabags/and put some steak sauce on it. These guys have really gotten sick at their way of talking & thinking. I never even heard of some of the stories or words they call the Prez:
- 13 votes
I am loving the fact that they are tearing the GOP apart, it's about time. Keep up the good work Fox, soon the GOP will be irrelevant as it should be. The sooner the better, as the moderate people of the US realize we can't go back to the same old trickle down crap that hasn't worked for the last 30 years. The GOP will either get into the 21st. century, or be doomed to fade from any power as over and over their ideas are shown to be collosal failures.
- 8 votes
Michelle, Fox and News are two words that just don't mesh together right, correctly.
The contradiction between the two is soooooooooooooo huge it makes my brain hurt.
I think, to save my brain pain, we should call it Fox Un-news, or the de-newsed Fox. Anything but Fox and News.
OMG-here comes another Palinesque headache. Have pity on me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- 6 votes
LOL It is a classic example of an oxymoron.
Fox News... let's just coin it a 'foxymoron'. Someone caught spewing Fox talking points can be said to be 'foxymoronic'. I think we're on to something here...
- 5 votes
To me Foxymoron sound like a sexy moron. But, you are on the right track, faust. :-)
I often refer to them as Fox Mews. Mews is a collection of horse stalls that face out on a back alley or service street in London, and in some ares of the US many years ago before the days of the automobile when horses and carriages were still the popular mode transportation in town. They often spiffied them up a bit so that they would have a pleasant looking appearance and not thought to be unclean or objectionable when viewed by the public at a distance. But, if you got close enough you could smell the manure and urine from the real horses that lived in them.
- 2 votes
Its sad that a "news agency"(used loosely) like Fox could become an unorganized, agenda based hate machine. Also, who pays these people to run their mouths? If it were a sports franchise the GM would get canned for sure. Yeah, "with the first pick Fox selects Ryan Leaf," sorry Ryan, even you're better then that:)
- 2 votes
Tink,
Point well taken, Fox may be a lot of things but 'sexy' is not one of them. I have a client in Wolverhampton, I live in the states and I'm always asking him for translations for his unique vocabulary!
- 2 votes
"I have a client in Wolverhampton, I live in the states and I'm always asking him for translations for his unique vocabulary!"
I bet you do! :-) I have a very good client who lives in Queensland Australia and another in Liverpool. We often collaborate on projects and in the beginning, we all spent most of our time asking each other for translations of our different languages. As I was raised in the South and lived in every Southern state except Florida at times growing up, my collective Southern accent, dialect and euphemisms, was like a foreign language to the other two. And vice-versa. Even now we still have to check with each other on words we haven't used or heard before if we are not sure of the meaning.
- 2 votes
Let Fox and the Republican Party tear themselves apart - for the betterment of this country.
All people need to go out and vote them out, especially the right-fringed tea-nuts.
Democrat 2012 Slogan: We're not perfect, but they're nuts!
- 8 votes
#4 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 6:19 AM ESTDon't stop now fox liars, keep lying; the GOP will love you for it.
- 7 votes
#5 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 6:29 AM ESTit's becoming increasingly clear that Fox's programming and the radical, fear-based agenda it's setting for Republicans is now doing lasting damage to the Grand NO Party.
I do believe the damage is done as for myself, I will never vote GNOP ever again...
- 2 votes
This kind of thing, Journaltainment, has been growing for a long time. It's hard to even pin it down. Maybe it began with Kennedy and the assassination binge we saw through Martin Luther King Jr. I even include Lennon in this as a political figure.
Secret Service sure was in a slump, huh? The personal protection industry in general lost significant market share.
This turn of cynicism is the beginning, I think.
The sixties removed the veil on Uncle Sam's image. TV was getting big...
The natural instinct of an entrepenuer is to provide the best product at the lowest price. So early News Shows were high quality vehicles for passing the word to the electorate. Radio and FDR's fireside chats.
Nixon came along and exposed how easy it was to manipulte journalists. Well, except for those two. But up until then, the Republican Party was carrying on like an intelligence agency.
Entertainment Tonight began to get big. The Today Show. Twenty four hour news.
Cable.
Back in the day, you got your propaganda on the commercial breaks. Cable sold the public on paying for constant commercials, each and every month.
Sometimes it's blatant, like the home shopping network, other times its subtle, like calling the act of compaiging, news. Either way the courts favored the ideal of property by favoring Fox New's petition that lying is speech.
The courts decided that it was more important for Fox New to make money, than it was to have an informed electorate.
Thanks.
- 7 votes
#7 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:07 AM ESTthe ideal of property by favoring Fox New's petition that lying is speech.
It's easy to get them to cut back or stop lying altogether. Implement a "liars tax" and have all the revenues it generates benefit those below the poverty level. Ailes and Murdoch would have simultaneous heart attacks.
- 4 votes
The courts decided that it was more important for Fox New to make money, than it was to have an informed electorate.
That's the crux of it to me. If you look at what we're really disagreeing about it comes back to the right of profit for some who have fixed themselves in crucial positions by hook or crook. They claim that right super-cedes the rights of the public to be free of the toxic byproduct of their business-as-usual, be it the psychological pollution of Fox' 24 hr. propaganda or the environmental pollution of big energy/chem. They use the same arguments by the same mouthpieces. The irony is how they tout free markets while they fight for the exact opposite.
- 5 votes
Free market means unregulated and free to be manipulated by wealth.
We need a fair market.
- 4 votes
Well, what I think we have here is another 'good ol days' fallacy to be honest.
You should read some of the press releases of the early 20th and 19th Centuries. It was pure propaganda, and each news outlet was outwardly dedicated to one particular candidate or another. It wasn't really even taboo then, it's what they did outright. They would edit speeches and debate transcriptions to make it seem like their favorite won, and would even 'spruce up' the language used to make it sound better. They would make the adversary's speech sound poor as well, through creative editing and other means.
This sort of thing has been going on forever, with fits and starts where it's not super bad to it being really blatant.
- 2 votes
"Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us, and now we are discovering we work for Fox."
This quote should be in thousands of ads this fall.
- 11 votes
#8 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:10 AM ESTFox has made "JOURNALISM" a dirty word. It has destroyed the reputation and veracity of everyone carrying a press card.
- 8 votes
#9 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:28 AM ESTagreed - it has forced reputable news organizations to now show "both sides" of every issue, no matter how insane, illogical, unfounded (global warming, evolution, etc) - the news organizations can no longer report the news, the fact and the information from real experts (not "think tank experts"), they now feel that they have to report the spin from both sides or be labeled as liberal media
- 2 votes
This is systemic.
Cops are thugs:
Priests are molesters
Journalistics liars.
In all cases it is the corrupting influence of money and power that debauches our heros.
- 3 votes
Ever major news source has an agenda. They join the bandwagon on some politicians and then jump off and tear up another..it's such a fickle ideaology. All media is developing it's reputation as the National Enquirer..journalism is a joke.
- 3 votes
#10 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:41 AM ESTFLYNAVY1______I'm not sure what you were trying to say to me. Where did I say something bad about any Chief Petty Officer? Is that what you are trying to say is that I was some how rude and not listening to someone you thought I should be listening to? If I was rude to some one that is a Chief Petty Officer I did not know I was doing that. Have a good day. Maria-Lyn
- 2 votes
#11 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:43 AM ESTmaria - easy lady, Fly is a friend and was just explaining what we Chiefs are like. You were not rude at all, Fly was just having some fun and saying that Good Chiefs (yes there are/were bad ones) are a great ally to have. And as for Fly, well those pilots are damn crazy but he is the kind of Officer that Chiefs love to have. Sometimes for lunch, sometimes for dinner! LOL!
- 4 votes
CPOSharky____Thanks for setting me straight /I was just afraid I said something to offend someone. Sorry FLYNAVY1 if you guys thought I was mad/because I was more embarrassed then anything else. Hope you both are having a good day. Maria-Lyn
- 3 votes
I would love to see the GOP drop the social and religious factions of their party and stick to honest fiscal conservatism.
Everything else is just an excuse to spread hate.
- 5 votes
#12 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:12 AM ESTThey are not fiscally conservative, they spend lots of money on military contracts, oil and coal subsidies, and anything that puts money in a few pockets. That part of their platform is long gone. They have always subsidized and favored certain industries with tax dollars, therefore actually steering anything resembling a free market to the monopolies we see now stifling actual choices to consumers and perpetual money to the too big to fails. monopolies stifle small businesses, making it difficult to impossible to compete at all, even with good ideas.
- 5 votes
I talked to a man from England a few months ago. We had a lengthy conversation and he was borned in Ireland. His remarks was that many people in England and Ireland thought that it was a joke when they heard on the news that many people wanted to either do away with social security and medicare or privatize the two. That they wanted education funding stopped and they heard about repealing Obama's healthcare program for everyone. He said that people in both countries were completely shocked when they found out it wasn't a joke. They could not understand what happened to this great country. I informed him it was the GOP who was pushing all this because they are trying to destroy American that the world once knew. He said it was sad and unbelievable that this could happen.
- 5 votes
#13 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:18 AM ESTBTW the title of this seed is wrong.
Fox News is destroying the United States.
The Republicans are just the junkies, sucking on that misinformation crack pipe...
Fox News is the dealer.
Wealth the drug lord.
- 6 votes
#14 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 10:10 AM ESTFux Snooze and Rush Pillbaugh have tried to pull the republican party so far right they have literally pulled it apart.
- 3 votes
#15 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 10:12 AM ESTThe GOP's slide to the radical right has turned into a plunge, thanks to Fox and friends ... IMO
- 6 votes
#16 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 10:19 AM ESTThe most puzzling part is the foxfart inhalers on main street about to choose either a K street lobbyist (Gingrich), or a vulture capitalist on Wall Street ( Romney). they are all out of their foxfart minds.
- 5 votes
#17 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 11:14 AM ESTMore crying about the GOP from those who never watch it I guess. I will hit the channel maybe once a week just to see what's going on, you know look at more than one news source but called stupid anyway ...
"News has opposing view points. Let’s name just some of the liberals I see consistently on Fox:
Juan Williams (I always listen to him even though I disagree)
Bob Beckel (I really like this guy, he makes me laugh - don't agree with him, but he's always interesting)
Greta Van Sustern
Mary Ann Marsh
Kristen Powers
Alan Colmes (love him, I’ve written him and he was gracious enough to answer)
Marc Lamont Hill (fired but has been appearing on Fox again so obviously is back)
Jane Hall
Neil Gabler
NPR’s Mara Liasson (one of my favs who is on every night)
This is by far not even a comprehensive list because it doesn’t include the non-regulars who do guest spots. I defy anyone to find me five regular conservative commentators on MSNBC, CNN, CBS or NBC. I defy them to find a conservative ever on any of their programming, be it News Commentary or just the News."
#18 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 11:16 AM ESTever? you haven't even looked or you wouldn't say someting so obviously incorrect... Foxbots unable to see actual facts
- 9 votes
I defy them to find a conservative ever on any of their programming, be it News Commentary or just the News.
Joe Scarborough the host of MSNBC's Morning Joe is a conservative commentator and former Republican U.S. Congressman from Florida.
- 2 votes
Joe Scarborough the host of MSNBC's Morning Joe
Onefan: And he comes across as being bought and paid for by the DNC. Can't stand him. He never ever misses a chance to bash his alleged party.
- 1 vote
lisaed
Perhaps you're right. The same can be said of the RNC being controlled by Fox News. Unless Scarborough has resigned from his party, it's not his alleged party. Ex-Georgia Democratic governor Zell Miller should be given a commentator spot on Fox News as a Liberal. Maybe this would help Scarborough appear more conservative.
- 2 votes
The truth is, the Republican Establishment all but ceded control of the party, or at least the public face of the party, to Fox News (and Rush Limbaugh)
Well which is it? Fox News or Rush? From what I've heard of Rush, he seems pretty unsatisfied with the GOP. Obviously he's not going to start voting Democrat, but he complains about the Republicans quite a bit.
an unprecedented effort to demonize and delegitimize the newly elected president
Unprecedented? Riiiggghhhtt. Because we didn't hear - for years - about how Bush was not the legitimately elected president. We didn't hear - even after he was REelected - that the corrupt Supreme Court illegally gave the presidency to Bush. Unprecedented? Yeah, sure.
#19 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 12:58 PM ESTFrom what I've heard of Rush, he seems pretty unsatisfied with the GOP. Obviously he's not going to start voting Democrat, but he complains about the Republicans quite a bit.
Because he thinks they're not far enough right yet. But he's working on that.
- 2 votes
Hmmm....Did Faux news create Radical Regressives or did Regressives create Faux News? I used to vote republican (writhing in shame)...but that was before they really went off the deep-end. I jumped ship when my eyes were opened to just how much they were selling out to their radicals. Being a strong believer in personal responsibility, I blame republicans for bowing down to the least common denominator every step of the way.
- 5 votes
#20 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 1:01 PM ESTCanavan: I watch B. Williams and he presents the news and not lies or distortions like Fox. I have seen Boehner and McConnell and Ryan and Rove and Armey and many others on Meet the Press and listened to their lies for over half an hour. They talked about death panels and that we should stay in Iraq for as long as it talks and we should privatize social security and medicare and etc. I am tired of hearing their mouths run before their tiny brain kicks in.
- 4 votes
#22 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 2:27 PM ESTO' just leave my fox news alone, with their radical racism and liars that they are, can't you see what a wonderful job fox is doing for the GOP,now you bad democrats just leave my fox news alone; pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.
- 3 votes
#23 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 2:29 PM ESTDid you see where FOX news has been number 1 cable news, for ten years
#24 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 2:39 PM ESTFox News followed the same Murdoch methodology to gain political power. In England now we see the result of a single minded methodology that is solely based on power and ratings.
The ethics scandal arise from the lack of ethics built into the Murdoch business model. Fox News has built that model into the GOP. The debt ceiling debacle showed the how deeply rooted that lack of ethics has permeated the new radical right. Any tactic is OK if it achieves their goal.
This same tactical level scorched earth policy is currently playing out in the GOP Primaries. It is all of a piece. The GOP is on a path to the bottom. They are riding in a vehicle that is driven by Fox News. Fox News provides the moral ethical and tactical leadership for the GOP
- 6 votes
#25 - Tue Jan 31, 2012 2:45 PM ESTYou're in Easy Mode. If you prefer, you can use XHTML Mode instead. |
