{"id":16085,"date":"2008-07-03T14:35:38","date_gmt":"2008-07-03T18:35:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/16085.html"},"modified":"2008-07-03T14:35:38","modified_gmt":"2008-07-03T18:35:38","slug":"fox-news-stoops-to-digital-graffiti","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/fox-news-stoops-to-digital-graffiti\/","title":{"rendered":"Fox News stoops to digital graffiti"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know I mentioned this briefly<\/a> yesterday, but I’m still flabbergasted.<\/p>\n

It’s pretty common for children to take pictures of people they don’t like and manipulate them, perhaps with crayons. They’ll black-out a tooth, draw a mustache, add glasses, draw earrings, etc.<\/p>\n

What’s breathtaking, however, is when a major news outlet acts the exact same way, only instead of children with crayons, we have Fox News using Photoshop. If you haven’t seen this video, by way of Media Matters<\/a>, be sure to take a look.<\/p>\n

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You’ll notice in the clip that the hosts of Fox News’ “Fox & Friends,” Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade, are complaining about an alleged “hit piece” on the Republican network, published in the New York Times by Jacques Steinberg and Steven Reddicliffe. They showed pictures of both Times staffers.<\/p>\n

However, Fox News digitally altered the images of both, yellowing Steinberg’s and Reddicliffe’s teeth, exaggerating noses, darkening eyes, and eliminating hair.<\/p>\n

I’ve been following Fox News’ travails for quite some time, and this might be the single most ridiculous thing the partisan network has ever done. And given its track record, that’s not a claim I make casually.
\n
\nPlease take a minute to go to Media Matters’ piece<\/a> on this, so you can see the actual pictures of the Times’ journalists and what Fox News did to manipulate them.<\/p>\n

According to a report in E&P<\/a>, the Times’ Culture Editor Sam Sifton called FNC’s photo alterations “disgusting,” and the criticism of the paper’s reporting “a specious and meritless claim.” Asked if the paper planned to respond to Fox News actions, Sifton said the Times would not: “It is fighting with a pig, everyone gets dirty and the pig likes it.” <\/p>\n

And what does Fox News have to say about this? In a striking display of cowardice, the network hasn’t responded to requests for comment, and “Fox & Friends” did not mention the incident this morning.<\/p>\n

In just the past few weeks, Fox News has been forced to apologize repeatedly<\/a> for its on-air antics. First, Fox News contributor Liz Trotta joked that she’d like to see Barack Obama killed. (She apologized and faced no punishment for her remark.) Second, Fox News anchor E.D. Hill said the fist-bump between Barack and Michelle Obama might be a “terrorist fist jab.” (Hill later “clarified” that she didn’t mean it.) More recently, the network characterized Michelle Obama as “Obama’s baby mama,” a slang phrase for an unwed mother who gets no support from a baby’s father. (Fox News acknowledged that this was an example of “poor judgment.”)<\/p>\n

I appreciate the fact that Fox News doesn\u2019t care about respect or journalistic standards, but an apology to Steinberg and Reddicliffe is obviously in order.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I know I mentioned this briefly yesterday, but I’m still flabbergasted. It’s pretty common for children to take pictures of people they don’t like and manipulate them, perhaps with crayons. They’ll black-out a tooth, draw a mustache, add glasses, draw earrings, etc. What’s breathtaking, however, is when a major news outlet acts the exact same […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16085\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}