Liz Trotta, a Fox News contributor and former Washington Times editor, drew attention this week (2/12/12) when she suggested that women serving in the U.S. military should expect to be sexually assaulted by their male counterparts: But while all of this is going on, just a few weeks ago, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta commented on a new Pentagon report on sexual abuse in the military. I think they have actually discovered there is a difference between men and women. And the sexual abuse report says that there has been, since 2006, a 64 percent increase in violent sexual assaults. Now, [...]
Feb
14
2012
Bill O'Reilly Admits He Has 'No Blanking Idea'
By 12 Comments
Fox News host Bill O'Reilly celebrated the release of the White House budget by demonstrating on last night's program (2/13/12) that there are a lot of things doesn't understand. Or at least pretends not to understand. He started by making the same point many others in the press have seized on: Obama promised to cut the deficit in half in his first term, and he will fall short of that goal. O'Reilly played a clip of his Fox colleague Chris Wallace putting this to White House chief of staff Jack Lew: WALLACE: The president isn't close to keeping his promise [...]
Feb
06
2012
Bill O'Reilly vs. Reality on Planned Parenthood
By 43 Comments
It was inevitable that Fox host Bill O'Reilly would weigh in on the Planned Parenthood/Komen Foundation controversy. And perhaps just as inevitable that he'd mangle the facts along the way. Here he is, on Friday night (2/3/12): Last year the Komen Foundation gave Planned Parenthood $680,000. Now, that is the source of controversy because as you know, Planned Parenthood is primarily in business to provide abortions, more than 300,000 each year. Later he added: Planned Parenthood does not give women who visit its clinics the other side of the abortion story because again PP is in business for abortion. Here [...]
Jan
19
2012
O'Reilly's Comes to Romney's Aid on Taxes–Armed with Inaccuracies
By 16 Comments
Mitt Romney might need some help defending his considerable wealth or controversial career in private equity. But he doesn't need the kind of help Bill O'Reilly is offering. Mitt Romney's declaration that he pays about a 15 percent tax rate on his income has generated plenty of chatter, in part because it confirms that much of the Republican candidate's yearly income is taxed at a rate appropriate for capital gains and dividend income–much lower than if Romney were actually working for a living. But enter into the picture Fox host Bill O'Reilly, who apparently thought he should rescue Romney by [...]
Jan
10
2012
Newsweek's Surprising Media Advice: Watch More Al Jazeera
By 13 Comments
In its new issue, Newsweek puts this as #4 on their list of "31 Ways To Get Smarter In 2012": 4. Get News from Al Jazeera Don't shut yourself out from new ideas. A 2009 study found that viewers of Al Jazeera English were more open-minded than people who got their news from CNN International and BBC World. That's a nice idea. Someone should tell my cable company, who make me pay way too much for the privilege of having Fox News Channel.
Jan
03
2012
New Audio of Hannity's Homophobic History
By 10 Comments
Sean Hannity got his start in radio on UC Santa Barbara's KCSB in the late 1980s, where he got in trouble for promoting homophobia and disinformation about HIV and AIDS. I wrote about this in a 2003 Extra! profile of the then-Fox News show Hannity & Colmes: After airing for less than a year, Hannity's weekly show was canceled in 1989, when KCSB management charged him with "discriminating against gays and lesbians" after airing two shows featuring the book The AIDS Coverup: The Real and Alarming Facts About AIDS (Independent, 6/22/89). Written by homophobic Christian-right activist Gene Antonio, the book [...]
Dec
21
2011
CBS, Panetta and (Hypothetical) Iranian Nukes
By 15 Comments
The Monday broadcast of CBS Evening News (12/19/11) began with big news, with anchor Scott Pelley announcing: The secretary of Defense says tonight that the United States will not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon. In an interview with CBS News, Leon Panetta says that despite efforts to disrupt their nuclear program, the Iranians have reached a point where they can assemble a bomb in a year or potentially less. To ratchet up the drama, Pelley told viewers that Panetta was aboard "the jet nicknamed the Doomsday Plane. This is the command post where he and the president would [...]
Dec
09
2011
Do as Bill O'Reilly Does and He'll Hit You With His Umbrella
By 29 Comments
Fox News host Bill O'Reilly claims he was accosted by a "screaming" man "armed with a cell phone camera" on December 7 while walking to a media party at the White House in Washington, D.C. On his show the next night (O'Reilly Factor, 12/8/11), O'Reilly explained, I told the guy to get lost, but he came closer and closer, armed with a cell phone camera. When he was about a foot away, I turned to shield myself and my assistant with an umbrella. At this point, we were just a few feet away from the White House gate. According to [...]
Dec
06
2011
Fox News Goes to the Middle (and Other Fantasies)
By 14 Comments
Is Fox News Channel going soft? In an election year? Some media figures seem to think the hard-right channel is going to the "middle," but this seems to be a figment of the centrist imagination. New York magazine's Gabriel Sherman has a short piece trying to make this case. His first bit of evidence is that Fox granted backstage access at its recent Republican debate to a New York Times reporter–as Sherman put it, "Fox's decision to allowTimes scribe Jim Rutenberg into the building to confront the candidates in person." That sounds rather aggressive, and Sherman sees this as some [...]
Nov
23
2011
A Fox News Blacklist?
By 12 Comments
Conservative David Frum writes in the new issue of New York: Back in 2009, I wrote a piece for Newsweek arguing that Republicans would regret conceding so much power to Rush Limbaugh. Until that point, Iâ┚¬Ã¢”ž¢d been a frequent guest on Fox News, but thenceforward some kind of fatwa was laid down upon me. Over the next few months, Iâ┚¬Ã¢”ž¢d occasionally receive morning calls from young TV bookers asking if I was available to appear that day. For sport, Iâ┚¬Ã¢”ž¢d always answer, "I'm available–but does your senior producer know youâ┚¬Ã¢”ž¢ve called me?" An hour later, I'd receive an embarrassed second [...]
Nov
10
2011
Maybe Not Misunderestimated After All
By 7 Comments
Just because he wears cowboy boots and drops his G's doesn't mean he's a dummy. Perry may be a small-town boy who went to an ag school (Texas A&M University), but he's an extremely cagey and strategic politician who has been among the state's most successful governors at getting what he wants. Put another way: Even if he's not book smart by University of Chicago standards, he's plenty street smart – and street smart is still smart. The better lens through which to regard Perry is inside vs. outside, establishment vs. anti-establishment, elitist vs. jus' folks. Don't make the mistake [...]
Oct
31
2011
Up Is Down, Down Is Up: Bill O'Reilly Explains OWS
By 39 Comments
On his Friday night show, Bill O'Reilly took his viewers to a magical place–one where the right-wing Koch brothers have no connection to the Tea Party movement, while Occupy Wall Street is a secret project directed and financed by the likes of Moveon.org, SEIU and George Soros. At the top of his broadcast, O'Reilly wondered if we are now in "phase two of the campaign to undermine America"–this would apparently be the phase where activists protest against police brutality, with an assist from "the radical MoveOn organization, which is funding some of the occupiers." As he explained his conspiracy theory: [...]
