Foxification-(adj) the process through which formerly respected news outlets are transformed into mediocre propaganda machines for Rupert Murdoch and his gang of cronies.
Joe Nocera has a great dissection of how deep the reach of the evil Australian goes into the American news business. Fox News of course, has long been off the deep end-pretty much since it was stood up. But the Wall Street Journal was for decades a paper given to deep investigation, good research and reporting- and thoughtful inquiry-even if its editoral policies were slightly conservative. It was a good counter part to other major newspapers and was the paper of choice for insight into business matters.
As most of us suspected-that is no longer the case:
Along with the transformation of a great paper into a mediocre one came a change that was both more subtle and more insidious. The political articles grew more and more slanted toward the Republican party line. The Journal sometimes took to using the word “Democrat” as an adjective instead of a noun, a usage favored by the right wing. In her book, “War at The Wall Street Journal,” Sarah Ellison recounts how editors inserted the phrase “assault on business” in an article about corporate taxes under President Obama. The Journal was turned into a propaganda vehicle for its owner’s conservative views. That’s half the definition of Fox-ification.
The other half is that Murdoch’s media outlets must shill for his business interests. With the News of the World scandal, The Journal has now shown itself willing to do that, too.
As a business story, the News of the World scandal isn’t just about phone hacking and police bribery. It is about Murdoch’s media empire, the News Corporation, being at risk — along with his family’s once unshakable hold on it. The old Wall Street Journal would have been leading the pack in pursuit of that story.
Now? At first, The Journal ignored the scandal, even though, as the Murdoch biographer Michael Wolff pointed out in Adweek, it was front-page news all across Britain. Then, when the scandal was no longer avoidable, The Journal did just enough to avoid being accused of looking the other way. Blogging for Columbia Journalism Review, Dean Starkman, the media critic, described The Journal’s coverage as “obviously hamstrung, and far, far below the paper’s true capacity.”
Filthy Lucre. A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier.-H. L. Mencken
I guess if the Dems can’t beat the GOP by actually debating them, and the rest of the public is starting to see through all of the left leanings of the rest of the news media, what better way to ensure that no GOP candidate gets any fair press coverage by discrediting the only network that will actually present their ideas.
I would like to see any GOP candidate get a fair shake on MSNBC or Comedy Central.
Maurice,
I think you should go back and look at the piece again-and some of my previous posts about Fox News and their lack of quality. The issue at the Journal is not one of bias-but one of a decline of once high standards. Compare the paper now-to what it was five or six years ago. It has definitely fallen from what it used to be. The thing that makes Murdoch’s news outlets different is the way it engages its critics. Fox personalities are willing to participate in arguments about its fairness relative to other media sources. But Fox is unwilling to defend its content against the objective standard of accuracy.
Furthermore, as Stewart pointed out a while back-the way Fox has its broadcast lineup set up-what little news that is served up is done so to provide a lead in to their opinion shows. It is not reporting for reporting sake-its reporting to make a particular opinion seem correct.
That’s a big difference.
Whats fairness have to do with it?
Lets face it, across the board, news organizations have become sloppy..
a VERY smal example…last year, CNN reported that Blackwater, it was still Blackwater then, had bought TWo JET fighters,,,and then they procedded to show a photograph of a PROPELLER plane built as a trainer…or when they decribed Russian TANKS and show photos of Russian troop carriers…or that the US has deployed “battleships” to the Korea…
No, the world won’t stop spinning on its axis because of the aforementioned but its just sloppy research..