I did the same thing with the pages in the NYT. Here’s what this reveals:
Just looking at the content of the pages of the New York times, most of it is news stories. To do this, I turned the pages of the 1/18 NYT and counted what made up each page.
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When we look a little closer at a few things that occurred on Fox News Channel on 1/18/2006, I think it becomes clear why FNC has very few fans in the reality-based community.
Exhibit A:
Brit Hume reported on a story about whether or not John Murtha really deserved his war medals. How dare he disagree with President Bush! Fox’ll get him. Is this news, or is it a smear campaign? I report, you decide.
Exhibit B:
Brit Hume brought up the Hillary “Plantation controversy” again, looooooong after we thought it was over. Brit Hume reported that some folks were denouncing Hillary’s remarks. Those people were Scott McLellan and Laura Bush. I think they were the only ones, not already on Fox.
Exhibit C:
On Neil Cavuto’s show, he claimed that terrorists were making the US run up a huge deficit. This is opinion, of course, not news. Still, it’s a rather dumb one.
Here are Neil’s words: “…this time, it's the terrorists of today who are taking a page right out of President Reagan's playbook and using it against the United States," and if my next guest is right, they're "making us spend so much on the war on terror that it will be our economy that takes the fall."
This is a good one. And my guess is we’ll hear more about it in the future. But you heard it first on FOX! Bush isn’t responsible for our deficit, the terrorists are!
Wow.
Exhibit D:
Later on, in the evening, after I was shaking my head while Brit Hume trotted out the Plantation remark, Hannity and Colmes spent a whole half-hour devoted to it! There was even a segment with three speakers, all three critical of Hillary, and none speaking in support of her. Smear the Dems. The sport of Fox.
Exhibit E:
At the end of Brit Hume’s segment, guess what happened? Brit played a humorous skit from Saturday Night Live lampooning Mrs. Alito’s famous cry. But it was framed as a slam of Senate Democrats. Of course. "Find out why those Senate Democrats wanted to make Mrs Alito cry,” said Brit, with a chuckle.
Exhibit F:
Steve Doorcy, on the “Dayside” program said, after viewing an exerpt of Gore’s speech in response to Bush’s illegal NSA spying program, "I think I read somewhere this morning that Jamie Gorelick, former Deputy Attorney General of the United States said that during the Clinton Administration, Mr. Clinton had the authority and that's why it was ok for him to have the warrantless search, physical search, property search, of Aldrich Ames' place."
This is a blatant falsehood. It’s also a favorite tactic: bring up Clinton. Clinton did not in anyway violate FISA when he authorized the physical search of Ames' home in 1993, nor was Gorelick incorrect when she made the above statement in 1994. Until 1995, FISA did not cover physical searches, and it was actually Clinton that supported and signed the legislation into law.