Fair and Balanced, My Ass! The Bizarre Reality of Fox News

By Joseph Minton Amann and Tom Breuer, Nation Books. Posted June 21, 2007.

The following is an excerpt from Fair and Balanced, My Ass!: An Unbridled Look at the Bizarre Reality of Fox News, by Joseph Minton Amann and Tom Breuer (Nation Books, 2007).

Well, that's your opinion!

Those of us who watch Fox News professionally, or simply to unwind at the end of the day with a few well-earned belly laughs, dismiss the network at our own peril.

While there may be a considerable measure of Schadenfreude involved in tuning in to, say, The O'Reilly Factor, it's hard to overlook the fact that he influences millions of people nearly every day. Indeed, watching Fox can be a little like watching Jeopardy! During kids' week. Even if you know more than they do -- and you probably will -- it's hard to feel good about yourself for the experience. But it's not like the leading lights at Fox actually enjoy turning America into a nation of fatuous morons. If they could accomplish the same goals by not making their viewers morons, they'd probably do so, just as the tobacco companies would probably prefer their products didn't cause cancer, and Ann Coulter probably wishes the sound of her voice didn't make young men's and small animals' testicles shrivel. But none of that is going to stop any of them from making their money and spreading their propaganda. To be sure, Fox News' sensationalistic brand of personality and opinion-based journalism is a well-crafted sales strategy. And whatever else you want to say about them, they're excellent salesmen. Indeed, with just about any story on Fox, you can ask yourself three questions: Are they pandering to their viewers, peddling right-wing propaganda, or both?

Now, preaching to the choir can be quite lucrative, particularly if the choir has an almost unlimited budget for Rascal Scooters and Civil War chess pieces. And there's not necessarily anything wrong with that. Lots of media outlets preach to the choir. For some, it's their bread and butter. The Nation's not going to solicit a commentary on Social Security privatization from Grover Norquist, after all, and Us Weekly is certainly not going to report that Brad and Angelina aren't hot.

But most people who are engaged in some form of advocacy journalism -- be they Rush Limbaugh or Al Franken -- have the decency to admit it. Fox not only doesn't admit it, it famously cloaks themselves in a tawdry veil of objectivity, endlessly shouting their "Fair and Balanced" and "We Report, You Decide" slogans until their viewers are finally programmed, Clockwork Orange-like, to believe them.

But again, by objective measures, Fox does a demonstrably poor job of presenting the cold, hard facts in a spin-free fashion. For instance, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism's 2005 State of the News Media report, 24 percent of the stories on MSNBC's Hardball With Chris Matthews contained the host's opinion, compared with 97 percent on The O'Reilly Factor. The report also analyzed coverage of the war in Iraq, finding that 73 percent of Fox's Iraq war stories contained opinion, compared with 2 percent for CNN and 29 percent for MSNBC. Fox was also around twice as likely as its competitors to run positive stories about the war and far more likely to run positive stories than negative ones. So what we're seeing more and more in today's news business, and particularly at Fox, is that personality and opinion sell. Not reasoned and informed opinion but blustering, loud, obnoxious, in-your-face opinion. Archie Bunker opinion. We're right and you're wrong. We're going to heaven and you're going to hell. We're patriots and you are traitors. We're men who love women, while you, my good sir, are a homo.

Of course, Fox News' one saving grace is that it's hilarious. Watching Hannity pummel Colmes won't make us better people, but it's kind of like seeing the school bully beat up the really irritating kid. It's not right, but you don't really want anyone to stop it. Seeing O'Reilly get his panties in a bundle when someone questions his ratings is always a good laugh. And having those three loons on Fox & Friends spout hateful lies with racist overtones is like music -- sweet Clay Aiken music.

But Fox can be frustrating, too, because its employees are so unswervingly dedicated to denying their true nature. If your local weatherman dressed up as a Viking every day, called himself Hjørt Bjornsen, and told you there was a 60 percent chance of snow flurries and a 30 percent chance that Thor would rain fire and canned hummus from the sky during midmorning rush hour -- all the while claiming he absolutely was not dressed as a Viking -- eventually it would stop being cute. That's essentially what it feels like to be sane and reasonably intelligent and tuned in to Fox News. It's hard to look away, because there's a guy on TV making a complete ass of himself while saying obviously untrue things. But it would be nice to get the forecast every once in a while. So we understand your pain.

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Joseph Minton Amann and Tom Breuer launched sweetjesusihatebilloreilly.com in the spring of 2004. They are the co-authors of Sweet Jesus, I Hate Bill O'Reilly.

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