Irony alert: Fox News accuses rival of blurring the line ‘between news and commentary’

May 20, 2008

This might be one of the greatest Fox News items of all time.

Last night, Karl Rove appeared on Fox News’s “The O’Reilly Factor” to discuss President Bush’s interview with NBC and accusations that the network distorted Bush’s comments. Rove and guest host Laura Ingraham quickly attacked NBC’s ethics:

INGRAHAM: Yes, well, Karl, this follows on, you know, on primary nights, big nights, when you’re with Brit and everybody here. Over at NBC, they have a couple of their, you know, commentator types Matthews and the like, sitting next to Tom Brokaw and Brian Williams. I mean, there is no line between news and commentary. It’s all blurred.

Rove added that the “journalistic standards of MSNBC, which are really no standards at all,” are now “creep[ing] into NBC.”

Now, on the substance, we’ve already talked about how foolish the charges against NBC are. The report did not distort Bush’s comments, and this manufactured outrage is pretty weak tea.

But more importantly, it’s genuinely comical to hear Fox News personalities accuse anyone of blurring the line “between news and commentary.” That is, after all, the reason Fox News exists.

I mean, really. Consider the context on this one — Laura Ingraham (prominent Republican media personality) was talking to Karl Rove (prominent Republican consultant-turned-media-personality-turned-McCain-advisor) about another network maintaining weak journalistic standards on objectivity and neutrality. Not only were they wrong about the NBC report, but neither Ingraham nor Rove are journalists, neither are objective, neither are neutral, and neither have professional standards.

Indeed, adding to the rich irony, Rove was appearing on camera as some kind of media professional — criticizing NBC’s integrity — while failing to disclose his ties to the Republican presidential campaign.

If you missed it, Amanda Terkel and Matt Corley, two estimable members of the ThinkProgress team, had a great piece in Salon today highlighting Rove’s conflict-of-interest problem.

It has now been more than three months since Karl Rove first appeared on television as a Fox News political analyst on Feb 5. In no fewer than 57 appearances, he has increasingly been welcomed into the Fox News fraternity, even joking that the “Hannity & Colmes” show should be renamed the “Colmes & Rove” show. After departing from a Bush administration in political tatters last August, he has reemerged to hold forth at length on the 2008 presidential race. And he may have plenty of seasoned political wisdom to offer Fox’s audience. Rove, however, is playing a strategic role that he and the network refuse to reveal to viewers.

Fox News hosts routinely introduce Rove as a “former senior advisor to President Bush,” “the architect,” a “political wizard” and a “famed political consultant.” But never has he been introduced as he should be — as an informal advisor and maxed-out donor to John McCain’s presidential campaign.

To political news junkies, a disclosure of Rove’s relationship to the McCain campaign may seem unnecessary. But whether the public simply assumes that Rove supports McCain isn’t the point. The “most influential pundit” in America, as Fox likes to trumpet, should have to play by the same rules as other high-profile political analysts. For example, Paul Begala and James Carville are regularly identified as supporters of Hillary Clinton when they appear on CNN. But Rove has been able to act as an independent observer while criticizing Clinton and Barack Obama, McCain’s likely general election opponent.

There is nothing shocking about Rove’s attacking Democrats, of course. And his operating with a duplicitous air of independence probably isn’t going to make or break Fox’s claim to “fair and balanced” coverage. But will the greater public catch on?

Amanda and Matt present a compelling case, noting Rove’s financial support for McCain, Rove’s work “informally advising” the campaign, the Rove-McCain meetings, and McCain apparently taking Rove’s advice. Rove has become, as Frank Rich noted, a “thinly veiled McCain surrogate.”

Tell us again, Fox News, about the importance of ethics, standards, and the problems associated with blurring the line between news and commentary.

Faux Snooze (of whom Rice spoke with such affection) knows its audience.
Its stupid, flea bitten, Bush loving audience.

  • The Big Lie. So breathtaking in its scope. So outrageous in its false claims.

    It’s the hardest one to refute

  • Whatever happened to the 1/2 hour news hour on fox?

    It was supposed to be comedy, but the viewers didn’t notice a difference between it and fox and friends. So i guess they musta cancelled it.

  • Anyone stupid enough to get their politics spoon fed to them by Fox doesn’t have an opinion of their own. They depend on hate mongers like Rove, Ingaham and Orielly to tell them how to think. It’s hard enough to read what these morons have to say let alone listen and watch.

  • Forgive my naivete, but I find it hard to distinguish journalists from opinionated commentators on NBC, CNN or Fox. Or for that matter ABC, CBS, or PBS. I find it increasingly difficult to make the distinction in the NYT, WaPo or AP. Would anyone care to suggest the name of a respected journalist on any of these outlets, whose opinions aren’t clear?

  • Danp, I ‘ll give it a try.

    Is PBS’s Brian Lamb a liberal, a moderate, or a conservative? Is he a Dem, a Repub, or neither? Who does he prefer between Obama and McBush?

  • Is PBS’s Brian Lamb a liberal, a moderate, or a conservative? Is he a Dem, a Repub, or neither? Who does he prefer between Obama and McBush?

    First off, Brain Lamb isn’t with PBS, he’s C-Span. He’s a reliable Status Quo, Broder-esque, village elitist kinda guy…

  • Forgive my naivete, but I find it hard to distinguish journalists from opinionated commentators on NBC, CNN or Fox. Or for that matter ABC, CBS, or PBS. I find it increasingly difficult to make the distinction in the NYT, WaPo or AP. Would anyone care to suggest the name of a respected journalist on any of these outlets, whose opinions aren’t clear?

    This.

    The only news outlet that I can think of that comes even remotely close is NPR. But they have their moments of being Nice Polite Republicans rather than a truly unbiased news source (the fact Mara Liason is still on mystifies me — she’s a freakin’ useless hack).

    Otherwise, one has to go across the pond to the BBC. Although some Brits say they’re also biased … I think, though, one must be familiar with U.K. politics to see it.

  • Suggestion to any NBC wags reading this:

    If you want to do a spoof on Fox’s journalistic ethics… find the most odious Fox news quotes from various sources… And run them in 4-interations… like they did to Jeremiah Wright.

    That would bring the house down… and shut Fox & Rove up for life.

  • In followup to my #5 comment, the WaPo this morning had Candidates Vie to Be The Anti-Lobbyist as the front page headline. The first sentence has Obama accusing McCain of “running a campaign bought and paid for by lobbyists. Then a McCain spokesman, Tucker Bounds responds, “Every moment that Obama spends attacking individual volunteers on our campaign is time he’s not using to address issues of real importance…” After one other paragraph describing how McCain has purged his ranks of several advisors, they conclude “Obama’s attacks on Monday – and the McCain campaign’s fast retort – underscore how both candidates plan to take aim at K Street lobbyists and the influence they peddle at the White House and in Congress.

    I’d would categorize this artical as damage control.

    hermit crab (6) Conservative, Republican, and I will pass on the third, though I could guess. I admit, I do not watch the call in shows, so I’m basing this entirely on the interviews he does on Sunday night Q&A. The most recent example, and I’m pretty sure it was Lamb doing the interview, was this last Sunday, when he interviewed a Fox News guy who had written a book essentially exonerating John Mitchell for his role in Watergate. Lamb never challenged him. With liberal guests, however, he makes assumptions like “everyone thought Iraq had WMD” and he makes it quite clear that those who disagree are outliers.

  • Take it for what it is. People watch all this crap to reinforce what they already believe. These are partisan shows for partisan audiences. If journalism exists at all with any of them it is very piss yellow. And Rove will always just be the same Rove who brought Bush and the Rove brand to Washington — a real curse to America.

  • At least people know where Karl Rove is s coming from. His presence on Faux News is little different from Keith Olbermann, who wears the Angry Liberal hat on Countdown and then dons the news anchor hat on MSNBC’s post-election coverage. Contrast that with Brit Hume, who exploits his position as an ostensibly-neutral news anchor to push a Republican agenda on the Fox audience.

  • But shillary is now “catapulting” rove’s propaganda about the elcction – can’t have it both ways, kkkarl “the math” (and 2 stolen elections, plamegate, and attorneygate) rove and fox are now the main justification of clinton’s campaign.

    The heart of this thread suggests faux, rove, and most of the MSM blurs the line between news and commentary – but some say that is alright if it justifies a rdishonest and racist democratic primary campaign.

  • Fox news and MSNBC are tied as the two most biased news stations.

    Fox news is Rupert Murdoch’s neocon flagship. Sadly, many “conservative in name only” Republicans see Fox as “their” station and they don’t recognize the steady flow of neocon ideology.

    Republican conservative core values used to include less government, greater individual liberties, fiscal responsibility, national security, reduced taxes and the rule of law prescribed in our Constitution.

    Fox news promotes a neocon agenda that see the role of the US as a superpower that must establish and maintain their vision of global order through pre-emptive war, interventionism and nation building. Their policies, and poor execution, have brought our economy to the verge of collapsing and our military stretched to the breaking point.

  • I will have to concede that MSNBC has recently done a lot to make Fox look less extreme and between them, Fox (of course) and MSNBC (somewhat surprisingly) have done a pretty good job of making CNN look almost responsible by comparison. Yikes.

  • It appears that Fox has remade itself in the image of the Colbert Report. I mean, this is sarcasm, right?

    Next thing you know, Brit the Human Harrumph will be griping that McCain is old and crotchety.

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