fender646

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I read this article in the Washington Post and it showed some statistics of major mis-conceptions about major news events, like Iraqi war, and where they get their news from.

-Fully 48 percent of Americans believed that the United States had uncovered evidence demonstrating a close working relationship between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

-22 percent thought that we had found the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

The fair and balanced folks at Fox, the survey concludes, were "the news source whose viewers had the most misperceptions." Eighty percent of Fox viewers believed at least one of these un-facts."

What the hell is that? What dumb-ass thinks that we found WMD or that Osama Bin Laden and Sadaam were allies?

Well apparantley 85% of the dumb-assess get their "Fair and Balanced" news coverage from Fox News. Who are they kidding when they say "We Report, You Decide" and "No Spin Zone". Oh yeah, Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity are filled with so much right-wing reteric bullsh*t that it makes me want to smash my TV.

Isnt it ironic that the one media that claims that every other news source is liberal and biased is the one media who has to constantley brainwash their viewers with stupid slogans?

Heres the arcticle:http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/w...ode=&contentId=A27061-2003Oct14&notFound=true
 
Actually, Oreilly is not conservative on a lot of issues. I know he cant stand John Ashcroft and his opinion of BushII is fairly low. For one thing he cant stand secretive elitist types.

However, I believe anyone painting this as left vs. right ( or life for that matter) is missing the boat on a lot of things.

For one thing, modern Republicans go completely against what Republicans are suppposed to stand for. And I dont think Democrats for supposed to be Socialists either.

For example, I am a Classical Liberal. Which today is probably considered Right Wing. Give me a break.
 
Originally posted by NeXus
Well apparantley 85% of the dumb-assess get their "Fair and Balanced" news coverage from Fox News.
The study did not account for self-selection bias, so it is worthless for drawing cause/effect conclusions.

If you want to prove that Fox News reported a connection between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, or any other allegation, you'd have to produce the Fox News documents.
 
Below is a transcript from the show Hannity and Colmes, which some of you may know Sean Hannity is the right-wing protege' of Former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich (R).

I picked the first transcript I found and read it over. Now this isnt a clear lie but the point is that Fox goes out of there way to defend the Republicans even when they know they are wrong. They are relentless with their accusations and then when caught in a corner their only defense is change the subject or some other bullshit. If you want accurate, cited, and researched facts about the lies of Fox or any other right wing character, then read Al Franken's Book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look At The Right. He gives specific examples cited and everything.


MACARTHUR: Clearly, if the president of the United States has lied on a grand scale to Congress...

HANNITY: Name me one lie. Name me one lie.

MACARTHUR: Let me finish.

HANNITY: If you're going to call him a liar, back it up.

MACARTHUR: I will, yes. I'll talk about what he said to Bush…Blair at the press conference on September 7 at Camp David. He said…he cited a non-existent report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (search), saying that Saddam was six months away from developing a nuclear weapon and infamously said, "What more evidence do we need?" And from there...

HANNITY: We don't have time for a speech.

No time for a speech, eh? Sound to me like Sean Hannity has no time for the truth. Notice how he dosent even listen or answer what MacArthur has to say and just blows his answer off.

Now you might say that this isnt a lie, and its not. But I dont have time to look through a bunch of transcripts. Point is they always defend the Republican and constantly spin their stories and cover stories that fit the political interest of the infamous right-wing billionaire, Rupert Murdoch.
 
Originally posted by NeXus
Below is a transcript from the show Hannity and Colmes...
Umm, you quoted conservative Hannity, who is balanced on the show by the liberal Colmes.

CNN has their own version of that, Crossfire, or some name like that. Wildly extreme conservative and liberal positions are advocated there as well.
 
Originally posted by NeXus
Fox goes out of there way to defend the Republicans even when they know they are wrong.

Hannity does. that doesnt mean Fox does. And Hannity is not really part of the News part of FoxNews. News would be Brit Hume. Hannity, OReilly, Greta,etc are Opinion&Commentary programs. Is Larry King the newsman for CNN? I agree, a lot of people give the administration a pass. Same thing happened for Clinton. Same thing will happen now but with different people. Double standards across the board. Both parties support the Constitution and the spirit of America on a selective arbitrary basis.
 
current conservative thought appeals to people who worry about themselves and those close to them; current liberal thinking is concerned with the wellfare of the country and people in general.

i see conservative politics in their current form as being based on fear, self-interest, and control. the landscapes created by conservatives for the last two and a half decades has been this: bigger government, bear market, recession, ineffective foreign policy, environmental abuse (not so much bush sr. i admit), industrial and corporate glad-handing.

and fox is conservative, so is the washington times, i don't see why this is even worth arguing. nobody denies the new york times are more liberal . . . i don't see why conservative media is so blatant about it's views and always tried to dodge the label it creates for itself. ask your average card carrying hannity and colmes fan on the street what he thinks about liberals, he'll say they hate america. read a book by ann coulter, it's terrifying.

hannity is a moron, he repeates the same couple of opinions on the same few topics over and over and over again, and guess what? he always agrees with whatever conservative power is doing at the moment, without fail. gee, that makes for such an interesting show. bill o'reilly, hannity, ann coulter, rush limbaugh, joe scarborough (he's a little more interesting than the others i would say, he at least knows how to speak with other human beings in logical manner), all these conservative hacks are just well-paid mouthpieces. their audience are not fans of politics or political debate, they're just hard-lining conservatives who like to hear their opinions reenforced over and over again.

o'reilly and hannity tell their guests to shut-up as often as a couple of arguing third graders might do to each other, and thats because they know their audience doesn't want to hear the issues discussed, they just want to see liberals get slammed by a hardcore conservative figure. they seem to have discovered a successful format so more power to 'em i guess. i tend to give people the benefit of the doubt and assume nobody is dumb enough to buy into that kind of bullshit . . .

pick up al frankens new book, even if you hate al franken. he has numerous examples where he catches all of the above media figures blatantly lying, proving it with transcripts, recordings, ect. when confronted they all act like children, some threatening violence, some denying it is their voice, or even better that they ever made a comment that is officially transcribed from their TV show, by their own network.
 
Originally posted by goodbutnotgreat
current conservative thought appeals to people who worry about themselves and those close to them; current liberal thinking is concerned with the wellfare of the country and people in general.


I am not a conservative, I am libertarian. If the above were actually true, I would be more likely conservative. however, modern conservatives are a lot more far reaching than that. They totally disregard the 10th Ammendment for one."Worrying about yourself "(though I wouldnt say "worry", more "self-interest") would be a good thing. That would more describe libertarian thought. Frankly Republicans support policies that reach into private areas that are no one's business and unconstitutional ( such as sex and drug laws). The labels are archaic. As I said, libertarian=Classical Liberal= considered "right-wing"

Your statement also sums up what is wrong with almost all political movements or conventions. They appeal to "emotion" and not "reason." There is such a thing in life as standing for and doing what's right, and not just what feels good or receives emotional support. That (thinking rationally, not emotionally) would cure a lot of the world's problems, including most mental illness.
 
Well put goodbutnotgreat, spoken like a person who can actually form their own opinion. We need more people who can see through their bullshit like you.

I heard that Al Franken might be running for a seat at the Senate. I know the world would be a better place if more people thought him. He's got my vote.

In response to the other two knuckleheads.
If you watch Hannity and Colmes regularly you would know that:

1) Alan Colmes never calls Sean Hannity on any of the bullshit he spits out. He lets him run his mouth even when he knows hes wrong.

2)Hannity gets considerably more time to talk.
In Franken's book he does a chapter on them and picks the show after the State of the Union address and counts how many words the two of them say.
Alan Colmes: 1261 words
Sean Hannity: 2086 words
Sean talks almost twice as much as Alan.
There's a reason why its not Colmes and Hannity.

Of course Sean isnt the whole FoxNews team but hes the second biggest commentator in the network. First being Bill O'Lielly. But the point is that they are all right-wing accept Greta Van Susteran, who's never said anything I can remember to be biased, and Alan Colmes, who I believe, is a wolf in sheeps clothing.

We need a liberal news channel. They can bring on Brad Pitt, Jennifer Aniston, Al Franken, Tim Robbins, DL Hughley, Charles Barkley, Michael Moore, and Jon Stewart to commentate on the vast right-wing agenda. All of them are left-wing or liberal or whatever. All of them are rich but the stick up for the little, middle class average joe who are getting screwed by the billionaires who run this so-called democracy.

Boycott Fox!
 
yeah really, fuck fox. i try to turn a blind eye to things like fox news but they're just so scheisty and coniving, gotta blow the steam off i guess. taking all your news from cable broadcast is a bad idea anyways. if somebody told me they were informed about the world because they watched fox news everyday i wouldn't even bother with them.

bigbutnottoobig - i wasn't referring to you dude, i don't think anyways. you made a good distinction though, about self-interest. of course we're all self-interested. i just think the neo-conservative shitheads are specifically interested in themselves and could give a shit about actually improving the country in all aspects, it's a warped philosophy all the way around.

i don't really agree with libertarian ideals all the way around either, although i do understand the appeal. i always have the intuition that if we were all libertarians that anarchy would prevail. if everybody was smart, considerate, and moral we wouldn't need all the regulation, but, you know, it's not like that. i don't see libertarians as being conservative in anyway though, it's has it's own pedigree as far as i'm concerned.

james madison intended for our government to thrive with a two party system presenting opposing positions fairly close to the middle of popular consensus. he wanted the parties to rotate in power and balance one another, as well as face contest from numerous smaller factions. one thing that really pisses me off about the GOP crowd is their attempt at total domination of governmental politics. it's undermining and short sighted. they also try to integrate the christian right's agenda into national legislation all the time but that's a whole other can of worms. these people rely on fear and anger to push their politics. they dress it up as patriotism, but these same "patriots" attack anybody that criticizes the country, which is one of the fundamental and most important rights given to us by the founders, in all their flawed glory.

i'll say this much, i read a lot of books about politics (and not just liberal perspectives, i read everything i can), and you don't find too many reputable scholars and PhD's who are into this conservative shit. most of the conservative leadership comes from A) industry and old money and B)the religious right - sometimes the military although i think the armed forces leadership is quite a bit more moderate than the current popular flavor of republican madness. conservatives want to maintain the status quo in the face of a dire need for change in order to protect what they feel is the environment most condusive to supporting their lifestyle. they trick a lot of working class americans into thinking they're on their side by demonizing liberals as upper-class dandies who hate america and want to turn the government into a massive public works project at the expense of hard working people. conservatives sling media venom left and right, promote censorship ("the reagans," off the air of course, jesus fucking christ), and rely in disinformation to keep their agendas popular.

i think there's some backlash coming though, slowly but surely. most voters kind of have their eyes half-closed but when the evening news comes on, no matter how dressed up, and shows them the results of electing (sort of electing) a hardcore right-wing administration that has their party's agenda in mind before the welfare of the united states, then at least enough people are going to get the point - get those people the fuck out of the whitehouse because four more years could be the kind of disaster that you never come all the way back from.
 
I consider myself in the middle usually...not extreme conservative or liberal. BUT, the Washington Post is a VERY liberal/left slanted paper. Why would you expect an unbiased non-liberal ....non pessimistic feeback on a more conservative news channel such as Fox News, from the Post??
 
Originally posted by goodbutnotgreat
you don't find too many reputable scholars and PhD's who are into this conservative shit.
Most of the Nobel Prizes in economics have gone to free-market capitalist advocates in the last three decades.
 
it's a common misconception that liberalism equals socialism . . . not so in todays climate, thats more of a prewar ideal when the left actually had some kind of unified power base.

i was also referring to political writers, i would never attempt to say all accomplished academics are liberal, that is ridiculous. i simply meant that most analysts and scholars are highly critical of the neoconservative movement, even thsoe who have right-leaning views themselves.

also, the current conservative atmosphere isn't the capitalist stronghold they associate themselves with. they're more or less just pro-deregulation, which is not a direct reflection of actual market freedom, although superficially it seems so. clinton was the biggest free trade advocate around. our country never has and never will be a totally free market anyways . . . that would be disasterous.just like we're not 100% democratic we're not 100% capitalist either, we just idealize the core principles.
 
Originally posted by goodbutnotgreat
i simply meant that most analysts and scholars are highly critical of the neoconservative movement
Academic institutions, especially the political ones, are notoriously liberal, so it is little wonder they bash conservatives.

However, even here we find self-interest at work. Academic salaries are usually paid by big government. So it is in the interest of academics to promote big government -- it helps guarantee their paycheck.
 
again, would say that is just an assumption. many colleges, such as harvard, berkely, yale, and other high profile places have a liberal rep. but there are many schools, georgetwon, holy cross, UVA, that have an equally conservative reputation. and less than a quarter, i believe, of all universites are publicly funded, the rest are private institutions.

i would suggest that high scholars would not adopt a political viewpoint out of mere interest in perpetutatiing abstract job security . . . not to say that none might, but wouldn't you agree it's a bit of a leap to suggest academics paid by the government slant their views as such?

there are plenty of distinguished conservative theorists as well, just not as many prominent or noted. as far as conservative and liberal attitdues go, their are drastic differences in many from one area to another, and often the academic terms are not closely linked to what you and i immediately associate with 'liberal' and 'conservative.'
 
Originally posted by goodbutnotgreat
pick up al frankens new book
Pick up Bernard Goldberg's book, "Biased." He worked for CBS for years, won an Emmy Award for broadcast journalism. In his recent book, he exposes the left wing bias of the "mainstream media". He was there, right in the belly of the beast.
 
it would make a fine companion piece as franken discusses the goldberg book and claims of a left-wing media bias at length, in his book. one chapter contains a good deal of statistical evidence from non-partisan sources that i at least found insightful.

personally, i would say broadcast news is fairly centrist, it might swing depending on who is in charge from one year to the next, but i think it stays close to the paint. it's really biased towards sensationalism and popular momentum, rather than the mroe preferable choice of actual realavence (sic? i need to go back to grammar school i swear).

keep in mind, this conservative/liberal business is all subjective anyways. if you're all the way to the right, like extremely way way right, a moderate right winger is going to seem too liberal for you. likewise for the others. green party folk don't think much of the john kerrys of the world as they see them as being hardly different from their GOP counterparts, from their angle.
 
Bernie Goldberg is a dousche-bag.

I saw him on Tim Russert and Tim frickin grilled him with questions about the inconsistancies of his book and his left-wing conspiracy theory. I hate Bernie because he's just trying to catch the same train that the left is on by creating this false myth of a liberal bias.

He goes on to say that all major college professors are left-wing. Maybe so, but thats only because these professors are some of the smartest people who have MBA's, PhD's and Masters Degrees and they know the truth about the Right.

They know the Republicans run this country and they hate it because Republicans are trying to expand the gap between rich and poor. But their slogan is you can be a fat cat too, but reality is that we cant. Fact is they control the White House, the Senate, House of Reps and Congress.

Did you know that 95% of Nascar fans vote Republican?
My theory is that people who vote Republican are not as smart as your typical NYC left-wing liberal. Think about it, why else would these Republicans be entertained be a bunch of cars going in a circle 500 times in a row? Its like the little kid who turns the Jack in the Box and is so entertained every time the Jack comes up even though he's seen it a hundred times before.
 
Actually, I believe having a lower LOT means that you have more lig to stretch and you should work both tunica and ligs. I don't know if I buy into all that though. I believe you should work them both, no matter what your LOT is.
 
The best TV slipup of all time was on Foxnews by main anchor Shepard Smith.

On a mini-story about Jennifer Lopez and what her neighbors thought about her, he said " These people would rather give J.Lo. a blow-job, I mean, a curb-job." then he said "I dont know how that hapened. it wont happen again."
 
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