FOX NEWS MISSES THE POINT…. Even by Fox News standards, yesterday was more embarrassing than most. In the morning, the Senate Republican Communications Center sent Fox News a press release, talking about how the economic stimulus bill grew over time. Shortly thereafter, Fox News’ Jon Scott was on the air talking about the package: “We thought we’d take a look back at the bill, how it was born, and how it grew, and grew, and grew.”
As it turns out, Fox News took the Republicans’ materials and aired it, word for word, without telling viewers that the “story” was a creation of Republican officials. It was so blatant, Fox News’ on-screen graphic included the identical typo made in the original GOP document, making it obvious that the network used a party press release as a news script.
Today, after having been caught serving as a propaganda outlet for a political party, the fair-and-balanced network responded. Jon Scott told viewers:
“Yesterday on Happening Now we showed you how the stimulus bill has grown over time. Our story prompted by a news release from the Senate Republican Communication Center. Their point that a $56 billion proposal in September has grown to $838 billion in five months. In compiling that story, our producers and researchers did what we always do — we verified the accuracy of the material. But in double checking the newspaper quotes referenced in that news release we made the same mistake they did. We labeled a Wall Street Journal article as having run in 2009 when in fact it was 2008. That was our error, and we apologize.”
So, let me get this straight. Fox News ran a Republican press release as news, and Jon Scott apologizes for the typo? That’s a bit like a thief getting caught in a jewelry store, and apologizing for leaving broken glass on the carpet.
Jon, no one cares about the typo. We care that Fox News pretends to be legitimate, but airs Republican propaganda as news content — unapologetically.
Karl Frisch concluded, “I’d question Fox News’ journalistic integrity; that is of course if they had any to question in the first place.”
