As experiment with himself as guinea pig, John Haggerty watched Fox News for a month:
But now I was aware of Fox’s role as a purveyor, not only of right-wing information but of right-wing ignorance, and I began to examine my mind for things that I hadn’t gotten any information about in the past month. The most notable items that were missing, I realized, were people from other countries and poverty. Aside from the times when picturesque destruction video was available, there was essentially no coverage of foreign affairs. On the poverty side, programs like food stamps and welfare were generally referred to as handouts, and the only time poor people were mentioned was when they were a source of malfeasance. One prominent “Fox & Friends” story, for example, cited a woman who, because of a computer glitch, managed to buy $ 700 worth of food on a food stamp debit card with a balance of $ .47.
The effect of this is interesting. Even in my short time watching Fox I found poverty fading from my mind as a problem. I was surprised one day when, during a discussion of deficit reduction (something that they talk about almost constantly), I found myself nodding in agreement that there was room to cut social programs that had already been radically slashed. Fox couldn’t convince me to care about the issues they are obsessed with (Obama’s treachery and the deficit, mostly), but by simply failing to mention a topic like income inequality, it managed to make me stop caring about the things it would prefer that I ignore.
Blast from the Past. At Daily Kos on this date in 2012—Komen’s hypocrisy: Let us count the ways:
| When an organization adopts a purportedly blanket policy as cover for undertaking a biased action, the natural laws of the universe (at least of the PR universe) mandate that said policy wrap tightly back on an organization like a pink straitjacket woven with threads of hypocrisy and gall.
That the Susan G. Komen Foundation thought it could get away with stripping funding for Planned Parenthood is not surprising. One of the nation’s biggest charities is likely to have some hubris in that regard. That they hired Ari Fleisher to manage the policy rollout and got, well, Ari Fleisher’d is not terribly remarkable either. That the media bought the Komen half-hearted, quasi-sorta reversal as some complete 180 that guaranteed Planned Parenthood funding was also to be expected. What I didn’t expect was that this scandal would still, days later, be a never-ending black hole filled with excuses, contradictions and confusion. It’s a marathon of a scandal, and Komen doesn’t look to be in any shape to finish strong. […] |
Biden: “I said to my granddaughter, ’it’s a broken record.’ My granddaughter said, ‘what’s a record?’”— @EvanMcSan
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show, the morning’s buzz was about CVS, and Sochi accommodations, emphasis on the commodes. In more serious news: Greg Dworkin laments how “serious news” seriously misunderstands the CBO report, and Joan McCarter shares the worst of the worst from the traditional media. Also: the new farm bill, bogus “insurance bailout” claims, and Gop debt ceiling disarray. Plus, Joan outlines a big theme: partisan polarization reversing openness & transparency gains in the legislative process. Lastly, Mark Ames on the passing of former Rep. Otis Pike, the first in Congress to take on the NSA.
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