GOP CONGRESSMAN SEES THE LIGHT!!!

[Edi]

Yeah, looks like we went and hoisted the jolly roger to the mast of this thread right and proper! *grin*

I'll agree to lay the rest of the thread aside, but the news media bit I can't let go. Have you ever taken a look at e.g. BBC World or other foreign news channels? What I've seen of American channels, even CNN can be described as right wing from a European point of view, and we don't have the same CNN that you do in the states, the European version is even more to the "left" than the American because nobody would watch it otherwise.

I have no idea of what MSNBC is like, never seen it. I do know a fair bit about Fox News, though, and about their habit of ignoring any news that is not convenient to the conservative side of American politics (synonymous with Republicans in this day and age) and stacking the deck in any panels and debates. The fact that they employ someone like Bill O'Reilly who routinely cuts the mike from his guests when he starts losing an argument and who unapologetically hurls baseless accusations and abuse at everyone who disagrees with him, that's already indictment enough, but there are numerous other things as well, from putting a spin on things and even outright lying that they have been caught in. Fox News actually went to court once to argue that even though it calls itself a news channel, there is no obligation to tell the truth to viewers.

Fox News has come under attack so badly precisely because of these reasons. It calls itself fair and balanced, but anyone who takes the time to research any of the more contentious issues they report on will find that it is anything but. I know several Americans who used to think Fox News was okay. Quite a few of them are conservatives, several of them conservatives of a more traditional style and not necessarily religious at all. Then they started looking into things themselves and these days their opinion of Fox News can most charitably be described as total contempt. They did not like being lied to.

That's the most damning indictment of all.