Re: MD Quality and Bias In Commercial Media

From: Mark Steven Heyman (markheyman@infoproconsulting.com)
Date: Thu Jan 27 2005 - 17:19:08 GMT

  • Next message: Platt Holden: "Re: MD Quality and Bias In Commercial Media"

    Hi Ant and all,

    ant:
    “The Special Reports” webpage is endorsed by one Cal Thomas who is
    described as a “National Syndicated Columnist”. This non-committal
    description is indeed true but what the page fails to state is that
    Thomas also presents “Watch After Hours” on Fox’s News Channel and is
    a panellist on the weekly “Fox News Watch”.

    platt:
    Note the ad hominem -- a conservative "hack."

    msh:
    Sigh. Platt, please try to understand the difference between an ad
    hominem attack and a simple insult.

    platt:
    Of course, Neil Gabler and Jane Hall, the leftists on the program,
    which make it a fair and balanced program, are not mentioned. If they
    were, you would no doubt describe them as "driven by reason."

    msh says:
    Here's a good example of precisely how the Fox News Channel is
    anything but fair and balanced, and of the unbalancing effect such
    programming has on people who rely on it for their world view.

    Notice that Platt's idea of a leftist is determined by the
    "balancing" of Gabler against Thomas. Thomas is extreme right,
    therefore, since Fox is fair and balanced, Gabler must be a leftist.

    In fact, if any real leftist were to appear on FNC, assumming he'd be
     permited to complete a sentence, the circuits in the control room
    would go up in smoke, and Rupert Murdoch would drop dead and begin
    his ballistic acceleration toward the right hand of God.

    This is a very clear example of how the mass media present a "full-
    spectrum" of opinion, all the way from A to B.

    Here's a link to an essay exploring this idea:

    http://www.fair.org/extra/0409/not-a-leftist.html

    Platt will be quick to claim that FAIR is a communist front
    organization, but I suggest that we focus on the essay itself for
    further discussion.

    Thanks to all,
    Mark Steven Heyman (msh) 

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