Inside Memo Shows How Fox News Deliberately Skews its Coverage of Political News

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Fairly early on in the debate over health care reform, proponents found that a public insurance option that would compete with private insurers was one of the more popular provisions. Republicans were intent on changing that. In August 2009, GOP pollster Frank Luntz told Fox News' Sean Hannity that the "public option" polls well, but "government option" does not. Those hoping to kill the proposal should avoid the former and stress the latter.

Soon after, as Media Matters reports this morning, Fox News employees received a memo from their boss.

At the height of the health care reform debate last fall, Bill Sammon, Fox News' controversial Washington managing editor, sent a memo directing his network's journalists not to use the phrase "public option."

Instead, Sammon wrote, Fox's reporters should use "government option" and similar phrases -- wording that a top Republican pollster had recommended in order to turn public opinion against the Democrats' reform efforts.

Journalists on the network's flagship news program, Special Report with Bret Baier, appear to have followed Sammon's directive in reporting on health care reform that evening.

Sources familiar with the situation in Fox's Washington bureau have told Media Matters that Sammon uses his position as managing editor to "slant" Fox's supposedly neutral news coverage to the right.

Sammon's "government option" email is the clearest evidence yet that Sammon is aggressively pushing Fox's reporting to the right -- in this case by issuing written orders to his staff.

Sammon's email had a subject line that read, "friendly reminder: let's not slip back into calling it the 'public option.'" He urged the network's on-air staff to "use the term 'government-run health insurance' or, when brevity is a concern, 'government option,' whenever possible. He added that if it's "necessary" to refer to the public option by name, Fox News staffers should "use the qualifier 'so-called,' as in 'the so-called public option.'"

And since Sammon's edict was a "reminder" to the staff, it seems likely Fox News employees had been told about using Republican-preferred rhetoric before.

Media Matters' report added, "Fox executives regularly defend the network by claiming that the right-wing propaganda on Hannity and its other opinion shows is entirely separate from its news programming, which they insist is objective. But Sammon's email gives credence to allegations that news from Fox's Washington bureau is being deliberately distorted to benefit conservatives and the Republican Party."

Yep, it sure does. Indeed, just to be clear here, Sammon's marching orders were sent to the network's news division, not its opinion shows.

What's more, it worked. After the memo, Fox News employees did as they were told, and stuck to the GOP-friendly script.

Howard Kurtz had a good report on this, and asked Sammon for an explanation. The Fox News editor said the poll-tested phrase preferred by Republicans was "a more neutral term," which is why he sent the directive. Sammon added that he didn't know Republicans were pushing the same phrasing.

To a certain extent, this is about as surprising as a sunrise -- of course Fox News slants its coverage deliberately. Of course it's a partisan propaganda outlet. Of course its Republican editors tell their so-called journalists to stick to GOP talking points. Anyone surprised by these revelations hasn't been paying attention.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/

[ready4ONE 5,400]

I am shocked! Not really...

[Danno 1,228]

Steve get serious now.

Your concerns about a memo concerning terminology is weak.

If you are really concerned about "skewed" angles being presented why did you not mention the "This Week" programing recently?

I tuned in to catch their "Debate" on DADT and instead of a fair minded debate.....

It turned out to be 2 voices against DADT...... and 6 voices for it (some by Satellite).

Given that everyone gets roughly equal speaking time..... how even handed was that?

Oh I should add, the host, Christiane Amanpour, who is in favor of repeal also loaded snippets of video clips favorable to repeal throughout the segment...... which further reduces the speaking time of the two guest against repeal of DADT.

Hey it's their show they can present or misrepresent the news as they want.

YOur problem is not so much that news comes with an angle.... it's that the Left does not have that monopoly anymore.

Edited December 9, 2010 by Danno

[Obama 2012 1,714]

Steve stretching a bit much man?

Of course your drive-by posting never ceases to amaze me either.

So a network is supposed to call something based on what "polls" right??? cmon....

"Change" polled right as well and they used that ####### and look at the ####### we ended up with...

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

If you are really concerned about "skewed" angles being presented why did you not mention the "This Week" programing recently?

I tuned in to catch their "Debate" on DADT and instead of a fair minded debate.....

It turned out to be 2 voices against DADT...... and 6 voices for it (some by Satellite).

So there were three proponents of a DADT repeal for each opponent? That's overrepresesenting the opposing position, actually, since the country is in favor of DADT repeal at a much higher margin. 4 to 1 to be exact. And this has been the case for some time. It would appear, then, that the reason you can't put that many opponents of the repeal in front of the camera is because they're just very hard to find. ABC did a pretty good job if they managed to dig up the last two opponents of this ridiculous policy.

A full 78 percent of respondents said that "people who are openly gay or homosexual" should be able to serve in the armed forces. The results are similar to what CNN found in December of 2008 (81 percent) and May of 2007 (79 percent).

[Ban Hammer 13,355]

from the link provided by big dog above:

When you interview 80% Gay's, you will get at least 78% say it's a damn good deal.

BY BIGDOG on 05/25/2010 at 12:21

[mawilson 2,133]

"Government option"? "Government-run health insurance"? I watch Fox News and I never heard them use these terms.

[Ban Hammer 13,355]

not much of a public option when there is a fine imposed by the government for not having health insurance. call it public all you want, but it's still run by the government.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

not much of a public option when there is a fine imposed by the government for not having health insurance. call it public all you want, but it's still run by the government.

The mandate to carry health insurance and the offer to get such insurance from a public plan (public option) are two different issues.

[Jenn! 918]

It's not surprising, nor is it wrong. Most news reporters select their words carefully so as to evoke a particular reaction.

[Ban Hammer 13,355]

The mandate to carry health insurance and the offer to get such insurance from a public plan (public option) are two different issues.

government offer to get such insurance, government fine if you don't....yeah, i can see how those are different.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

It's not surprising, nor is it wrong. Most news reporters select their words carefully so as to evoke a particular reaction.

Indeed. All of these media organisations do this. The trick (as we've seen in the death for blasphemy thread) is to be able to recognise it.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

government offer to get such insurance, government fine if you don't....yeah, i can see how those are different.

Chuck, it's not that difficult.

There are different carriers that offer insurance plans. Many felt that a publicly administered plan should be added to that mix as an option to choose from for coverage. There was no debate about making it mandatory to obtain insurance coverage from such public plan. The choice on which plan to subscribe to was always to be with the individual.

Then you have the mandate to obtain coverage since uninsured individuals add to the cost of insurance plans - i.e. the insured pay haigher premiums because providers build unreimbursed expenses (from the uninsured) into their fee schedules. It's designed to disallow the free-riding that has been going on for far too long. File that under personal responsibility. That mandate, however, has nothing to do with the publicly administered insurance plan - or the public option - that was also debated as part of the heath care reform measure.

The easiest way to see how these are two different issues is by looking at the health care reform act that has actually been signed into law. While it does contain the mandate to carry insurance, it lacks a public option. If it was one and the same, then either both or neither would have made it into the law.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

It's not surprising, nor is it wrong. Most news reporters select their words carefully so as to evoke a particular reaction.

But to the degree that a managing editor is telling them what terms to use because he/she wants to persuade readers to particular political viewpoint?

Edited December 9, 2010 by 8TBVBN

[Jenn! 918]

But to the degree that a managing editor is telling them what terms to use because he/she wants to persuade readers to particular political viewpoint?

Why do we have an expectation that a private news corporation has a duty to provide unbiased coverage?