johnny dollar's archive: mar-apr 2009

This is the Fox Haters Week in Review, where we catch up on some of the distortions, lies, and smears that came to our attention over the past seven days.

Think Propaganda
Those wacky guys at Think Progress have done it again (thanks to OS for the heads up). Check out this headline:

Greta Van Susteren Falsely Claims Obama Has Only Visited States He Won: ‘It Looks Like A Reward’

The four states cited by Greta (Indiana, Ohio, Florida, Colorado) were states the President won. Indeed, TP didn't seem to have a problem with the New York Times when they made the same point, citing the same four states. So what exactly was "false"? Sorting through the many TP irrelevancies (e.g. what counties he visited) it seems that they are adding Arizona to Greta's list, and McCain did carry Arizona. The only problem is: Greta's interview with Bill Clinton took place before Obama visited Arizona. In fact, in the interview itself, the upcoming trip to Arizona is openly discussed! So TP's headline? Sort of looks like a lie.

What's Fair Is Fair
Think Propaganda returns for an encore:

‘Fair and Balanced’ Fox News allows only Republicans to debate Obama’s budget. This morning on Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace welcomed Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) to discuss President Obama’s budget plan — with not a single congressional Democrat or White House representative present to defend it.... Fox News gave Obama’s critics an 15-plus minute opportunity to slam the budget without interruption.

The credulous commenters couldn't wait to chime in:

• We’ve got to find a way to take the microphones away from these frauds.
• This just wouldn’t bother me one bit if they simply called themselves “Republican News”.
• Their myopic audience is receiving the radical right viewpoint and the extremist right viewpoint.

Meanwhile, over at the newshounds (where they watch other blogs and repeat their talking points so you don't have to) they picked up the same meme and eagerly added their echo. Now TP doesn't tell you that the first 15 minutes of the show were given over to President Obama's Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman--without a single Republican to give the other side. Neither do they reveal that just two weeks ago, Chris Wallace brought on David Axelrod to discuss the stimulus package--without a single Republican present. And then presented another 15 minutes with two CEOs who support the stimulus. That was a 30-minute opportunity to support the Obama fiscal policy without anyone to give an opposing point of view. We searched, nay scoured, the Think Propaganda and Newspoodles websites--but we couldn't find one headline reading Fox News allows only supporters to debate Obama's stimulus plan. Things that make you go hmmm.

Positive About the Negative
When a gambler has a run of bad luck, he'll often ask the dealer to bring out a new deck. But Fox haters never tire of using their old deck, enitrely made up of race cards. Thanks to alter.net for reminding us as they try to implicate FNC in the infamous chimp cartoon controversy. In the midst of a diatribe posted Monday that's mostly just plugs for a series of unreliable slice-and-dice propaganda videos, the author makes the following claim about the toon flap:

Nor was I surprised to see Fox report nothing of this controversy after it happened.

You'd think ZP Heller would have been aware of Fox News Sunday: the cartoon was discussed in some depth, and it aired a full day before Heller's piece. And even before that FNS, we had Geraldo criticizing the cartoon on Fox & Friends, coverage on The Fox Report, and even a segment on Red Eye. So how can Zeller make such a dogmatic negative assertion (Fox reported nothing) and be so positive about it? Well, he did cite a source for his claim. You guessed it: the newshounds. 'Nuff said.

Tolerance and Understanding
Our racial tolerance moment of the week comes from the newsmutts and a post headlined FOX News' Wendell Goler Suggests That Bush A Better Speaker Than Obama. Anyone who actually reads Goler's article knows he makes no such suggestion. But of course the gullible don't care if the mongrels are lying, and because Mr Goler is African-American, the most charming side of the kennel-dwellers quickly emerges:

• Goler is a Fox chump in the same fashion as Juan Williams.
• Wendell Goler is a lawn jockey for Roger Ailes. This sell-out also reads teleprompters when doing live broadcasts for Fraud News Channel... We bet Obama speaks better than your relatives, and you know what we mean by that. You are nothing but a front yard lawn jockey to Ailes and Shine.
• The white producers scheme, so whom can we use to attack the black president? Why one of our house negroes, of course.

Spot something you'd like to see in the next Fox Haters Week in Review? Send us an email. If we use your submission you will receive a genuine attribution! fox news tp nh