11 Responses to “Nobody Likes a Critic”

1. RickA says:

   June 21, 2011 at 1:23 pm

   Very interesting – thanks for the link.
    
   I thought it was interesting how they both talked past each other (a little).
    
   Chris Wallace didn’t get Jon’s point that he shouldn’t need to be the same as Chris Wallace, and that his network doesn’t need to be the same as Fox News.
    
   I think this is a very fair point.
    
   Comedy central is not a news organization.
    
   I thought Jon didn’t get Chris Wallace’s point that the other media outlets are just as biased as Fox News.
    
   I think that is true.  Fox News is biased, MSNBC is biased, CNN is biased, The New York Times is biased.  Aren’t they all biased?
    
   Every journalist brings their own biases to every story they touch – and it is really impossible to be truly objective (in my opinion).
    
   Keith – what is your take on my previous statement – as you are a journalist, I am curious what you think?
    
   As to Jon’s point that Fox News is the most biased – I think that is personal opinion and not really a fact – but that is just my own personal opinion.
    
   I would agree with Jon Stewart that MSNBC is trying to be the liberal version of Fox News.
    
   It is pretty hard for me to say that Fox News is more biased than MSNBC, or visa versa – as they appear to me to both be very biased.
    
   On the other hand, I do agree that before Fox News, there was no real TV outlet for the center right and right point of view, and Fox News sprang up to present that point of view.
    
   I think when Fox News touts “Fair and Balanced”, what that really means is we cover the other side that the main street media won’t cover.
    
   I don’t take Fox News to be literally fair and balanced, but to cover news with a conservative bias, just like MSNBC covers the news with a liberal bias and ABC, CBS and NBC cover the news with a slightly less liberal bias than MSNBC.
    
   What do you think Keith?

2. Keith Kloor says:

   June 21, 2011 at 1:35 pm

   I think Jon Stewart pretty well characterized it: MSNBC, trying to be the (liberal) mirror of Fox. And 24-hour mainstream media broadcast outlets thriving on conflict and scandal, but not driven by any activist/ideological agenda, the way Fox news and MSNBC are.

   Too bad that Chris Wallace played the good soldier for Fox, since he’s smart enough to know that there is no equivalency between his network and Comedy Central.

3. Jeff Norris says:

   June 21, 2011 at 2:56 pm

   What are your thoughts on Stewart’s statement that both NYT and Wapo engage in sensationalism and lazy journalism?

   I think Zurawki put up some valid criticism.
   http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/zontv/2011/06/jon_stewart_chris_wallace_fox.html

4. Marlowe Johnson says:

   June 21, 2011 at 4:06 pm

   speaking of critics, thought you might find this interesting Keith

5. Keith Kloor says:

   June 21, 2011 at 4:35 pm

   Thanks for the link, Marlowe. Very interesting, indeed. Rapier’s experience is by no means unique, as I’ve heard others make similar complaints.

   That said, beware of argument by anecdote. Lots of newspaper stories get published every day. Are most them sensationalistic and biased?

6. Jeff Norris says:

   June 21, 2011 at 5:29 pm

   Keith
   Let’s look at the first para on every story at the Wapo Newspaper today.
   The Supreme Court on Monday blocked the nation’s largest-ever sex discrimination case, ruling in favor of Wal-Mart in a decision that raises significant hurdles for other class-action suits brought against big corporations.  Ruling does not affect small business or public institutes?
   The White House and congressional leaders are accelerating negotiations over the biggest debt-reduction package in at least two decades amid mounting concern that the effort is running out of time. I could nitpick and it might undermine my argument still editorializing no
   The first showdown between the two Mormons running for president will take place this week in Utah, where Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman Jr. will hold competing fundraisers only a couple of hours and a few blocks apart.  Not bad but the actually headline seems a bit much don’t know if there has been a headline about Obama pandering toward Wall street or any other group on page 1
   Congressional Country Club in Bethesda spent two years reworking its venerable Blue Course, moving tees and traps, altering the shape of fairways and re-engineering all 18 greens, equipping them with sophisticated drainage and cooling technology.  Got Nothing
   The choice of the London A-list, St. John’s Wood is a neighborhood of ethereal wealth, its leafy avenues lined with the ample mansions of Paul McCartney, Ewan McGregor and Kate Moss. And yet, they share the most unlikely neighbors “” the Kastrati family.  Got nothing other than a very interesting story
   

   To answer your question no but if enough are slanted on certain issues it can have an impact. Anecdotal, but up until recently my wife thought Bush’s handling of Katrina was at the least negligent and she thought race may have come into play. She based this mostly on how the media portrayed his actions and being African American.
    

7. lucia says:

   June 21, 2011 at 6:51 pm

   Chris Wallace doesn’t think South Park is funny. Talk about no sense of humor!

8. Zeke Hausfather says:

   June 21, 2011 at 7:24 pm

   Jeff Norris,
   Actually, its hard to think of a case where class action lawsuits would be particularly applicable to a small business or non-profit.

9. Jeff Norris says:

   June 21, 2011 at 7:54 pm

   Zeke
   Class action is normally a large group of people collectively bring a claim to court and/or in which a class of defendants is being sued.

   Students are currently suing University of California in two different cases.
   Small business is defined in different ways, reasonable 500 employees or less.
   Class action against SB are normally by customers alleging discrimination but sometimes employees
   I’ll admit that how the ruling would apply to a SB is tenuous, HR or other decisions would have to be local but I f you have empowered your managers and 2 or 3 go rogue the whole chain gets the hit even if the other store’s have been in the right.
   My point is not that it is not an important part of the story just the use of the phrase BIG Business in the lede.  It is reinforcing a theme that could be bad for our country.  Once we lose respect and trust for the rule of Law it will be our end.  
   Same with Journalism too.

10. DeNihilist says:

    June 22, 2011 at 12:39 am

    Well to me, what bugs most of the main stream media, about Jon, is that he has that key demographic, 20-35 year olds getting their news from him, and not from them.

    I watched him on the Rachel Maddow show just recently, and guess what? He brought up the same points, that he is a comedian, whose comedy is informed by his bias and the news of the day. IIRR, he even took a couple of shots at MSNBC about being somewhat vacous.

    The gist of all this is though the quote he used from Will Rogers.

11. willard says:

    June 27, 2011 at 9:49 am

    Jason Stanley:
     
    > The Fox channel engages in silencing when it describes itself as “fair and balanced” to an audience that is perfectly aware that it is neither. The effect is to suggest that there is no such thing as fair and balanced “” that there is no possibility of balanced news, only propaganda. The result is the silencing of every news organ, by suggesting a generalized gross insincerity.
    http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/25/the-ways-of-silencing/
     
    Now, reread #1.