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Journal pudge's Journal: Reason Why I Dislike Fox News 18

Journal by pudge

I like some of the programs and people on Fox News, especially Brit Hume's Special Report and Fox News Sunday.

But I dislike most of Fox News, and this story is a great example of why.

On The Big Story With John Gibson, they show a poll taken April 18-19, 2006. According to the graphic, the poll asks: "The U.S. should have" either "Right to restrict immigration," or "Open, unrestricted borders."

Of course, the poll finds overwhelmingly for the first option 91 percent to seven percent: it's only extremists in any country who thinks that a country should not have the right to restrict its borders. Frankly, I am surprised it was seven percent who disagreed, and I'll chalk it up to confusion over what "open borders" means in light of the recent immigration debate.

So the question is stupid and useless. We will never have open borders, not in our lifetimes. But then the graphic on the next screen is incredible. It says, "FOX POLL: 91%, U.S. SHOULD RESTRICT IMMIGRATION."

But that's false. Ninety-one percent said the U.S. should have the right to restrict immigration, not that it should do so.

Every news outlet does this sort of sloppy work. For example, I remember way back in 1998 there was a CNN story about a poll they did that claimed Bush and Gore were the frontrunners for the 2000 election. I looked at the actual poll: the very first question asked who you would vote for between Bush and Gore. Gee, you think that might have skewed the results when they later asked "which of those candidates you would be most likely to support for the Democratic nomination for president?"

That was obviously a really bad poll. But the idea wasn't terrible, and the article about it was accurate (modulo the fact that it did not note that the poll was skewed). Here, however, the whole idea of the Fox poll is wrong-headed, and the reporting about it misrepresents what the poll actually says.

And that happens on Fox News a lot. They'll quote someone saying something they didn't, they'll misrepresent a poll or press release, and so on.

Politics and bias completely aside, I simply dislike Fox News because it is generally poor journalism.

This discussion was created by pudge (3605) for no Foes, but now has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Reason Why I Dislike Fox News More

Reason Why I Dislike Fox News

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  • we should destroy them. ;)
  • It was always too chatty between stories. BBC News is always right to the point, little to no cruft :P

    I do have one simple question though... what did the 2% vote?

    NeoThermic
    • I never liked US news anyway...

      It's no better anywhere else.

      It was always too chatty between stories.

      False. Indeed, the U.S. news program I watch has no chatter at all, on most nights.

      If the UK had the same breadth of *options* in TV news, it would have lots of bad programs, too. This is evidenced by the fact that the UK has lots of terrible newspapers.
    • It was always too chatty between stories. BBC News is always right to the point, little to no cruft :P

      I suspect you're comparing US news channels with the BBC's news programmes there? (A little unfair: obviously, a 24 hour news channel has far more time to fill and less flexibility to do so.) Given their track record (Gilligan denying - by phone - the presence of US troops at Baghdad airport, claiming to be there himself - while more honest news organisations were actually showing live footage of the trut

      • >I suspect you're comparing US news channels with the BBC's news programmes there?

        Nope, I'm more reffering to the 6 O'clock BBC news vs [FOX|ABC|etc] News broadcasts in the US. Things might of changed since I was last there in 2003, but it is still far far chatty between stories. The presenters always seem to like to get their opinion in after a story most of the time.

        NeoThermic
        • Nope, I'm more reffering to the 6 O'clock BBC news vs [FOX|ABC|etc] News broadcasts in the US. Things might of changed since I was last there in 2003, but it is still far far chatty between stories. The presenters always seem to like to get their opinion in after a story most of the time.

          Ah - two things: first, the 6 o'clock news lasted 28 minutes yesterday: much less space to fill. Looking for an equivalent from last night's listings, CBS and NBC have 90 minutes of news from 5pm; PBS the same (the first

  • It's a bad poll, but purposedly so. Pollers know what they are doing, so they push-poll. They ask the questions in a manner and order to suggest the answer they want to get. The actual interviewers have a script, and they can't go off it. Next time they call, try giving them an oddball answer. The media reports the results, and stupid people beleive it. It's a deliberate attempt to change election results by either motivating people to go to polls (if they think they might lose), or to stay home (if there

  • Right Winger Prefers Left Wing News
    • Who prefers left-wing news?

      Or which news is left-wing?

      The news I prefer is not left-wing. NewsHour is ... moderate, I guess you could say.

      Besides, WFB said recently that it's his favorite news program too, so I am in good right-wing company.

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