
MSNBC Suspends Olbermann Without Pay Over Donations
You’re probably wondering two things: 1) why is there a post on FoxNewsBoycott.com about Keith Olbermann, and 2) don’t Fox News personalities frequently support conservative candidates? Answering the second question first, absolutely, which answers the first question.
Apparently MSNBC has decided to suspend political commentator (read not journalist) Keith Olbermann indefinitely, without pay. Olbermann donated the maximum amount to three candidates during the midterm election and someone higher up (MSNBC President Phil Griffin) got their panties in a bunch. Granted, journalists should be unbiased, but as with Fox News personalities like Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, he’s a commentator known for voicing his opinion. The difference, of course, is that his opinion is, typically, far more liberal than the others mentioned and/or Fox News does not have a similar policy covering this issue.
The following statement was released to Politico:
OLBERMANN: One week ago, on the night of Thursday October 28 2010, after a discussion with a friend about the state of politics in Arizona, I donated $2,400 each to the re-election campaigns of Democratic Representatives Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords. I also donated the same amount to the campaign of Democratic Senatorial candidate Jack Conway in Kentucky…I did not privately or publicly encourage anyone else to donate to these campaigns nor to any others in this election or any previous ones, nor have I previously donated to any political campaign at any level.
So, what about Fox News?
Over 30 people on Fox News’ payroll have shown their support of the GOP over 600 times during the midterm elections. Here’s who they are, should Fox News decide to hold their employees up to the same standard that MSNBC did:
- Fred Barnes, Fox News contributor
- Glenn Beck, host of Fox News’ Glenn Beck
- Eric Bolling, host of Fox Business’ Follow the Money
- John Bolton, Fox News contributor
- Tammy Bruce, Fox News contributor
- Elaine Chao, Fox News contributor
- Monica Crowley, Fox News contributor
- Mike Gallagher, Fox News contributor
- Newt Gingrich, Fox News contributor
- Sean Hannity, host of Fox News’ Hannity
- Mike Huckabee, host of Fox News’ Huckabee and Twentieth Television’s The Huckabee Show
- David Hunt, Fox News contributor
- Laura Ingraham, Fox News contributor
- John Kasich, former host and contributor
- Brian Kilmeade, co-host of Fox News’ Fox & Friends and host of Fox News Radio’s Kilmeade & Friends
- William Kristol, Fox News contributor
- Michelle Malkin, Fox News contributor
- KT McFarland, Fox News national security analyst and host of FoxNews.com’s DEFCON 3
- Angela McGlowan, Fox News contributor
- Dennis Miller, Fox News contributor
- Dick Morris, Fox News contributor
- Rupert Murdoch, CEO and chairman of News Corp., parent company of Fox News
- Andrew Napolitano, Fox News senior judicial analyst and host of Fox Business’ Freedom Watch
- Sarah Palin, Fox News contributor and host of Fox News’ Real American Stories
- Dana Perino, Fox News contributor
- Dave Ramsey, listed Fox Business personality and former host of Fox Business’ The Dave Ramsey Show (through June)
- Sandy Rios, Fox News contributor
- Karl Rove, Fox News contributor
- Rick Santorum, Fox News contributor
- Doug Schoen, Fox News contributor
- Andrea Tantaros, Fox News contributor
- Stuart Varney, Fox News contributor and host of Fox Business’ Varney & Co.
Check out Fox News’ GOP Connections here.
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Read MoreFoxNation Terror Attack Fear Mongering
While Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) did ask Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair about the “likelihood of another terrorist-attempted attack on the U.S.,” and Blair did reply that the “priority is certain,” the headline and graphic posted on Fox News’ site, FoxNation.com, was arguably misleading and of the fear mongering variety…
1. The question was about the likelihood of an attempted attack, 2. the response was that an attempt is thought to be certain, 3. the three to six month time line in the question is fairly typical and 4. why the need to invoke the image of 9/11 when there have been numerous “terrorist-attempted attack[s]” on the U.S. that would have been more accurate to depict? Or, show the the senator and/or intelligence chiefs from the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing. They decided not to use a photo of an attempted attack that occurred under Obama’s watch… That wouldn’t be yellow enough for Fox News’ “journalism.”
At the time of this post, MSNBC.com and CNN.com both had photos of the intelligence chiefs answering Feinstein’s question, which is an accurate depiction. FoxNews.com did not have a photo accompanying their article. FoxNation.com was just absurd, like usual, stirring up the emotions and hateful comments (i.e. “If this terror event does happen (and I hope it does not) can they at least take out the White House & congress?”). FoxNation.com was not alone in the headline usage, however – MSNBC.com had a similar one: “Al-Qaeda ‘certain’ to attack U.S. within months.” CNN.com’s headline was better: “Intelligence chiefs: Terror attempts on U.S. ‘certain.’”
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Read MoreFox News Ignores Haiti Benefit, O’Reilly Complains About Being Ignored
While many other channels, including MSNBC and CNN, covered the Haiti Now global benefit, which aired live on Jan. 22, Fox News decided not to. Okay, so they do this from time to time when it aligns with their agenda (i.e. being absent from the gay rights protest). Nothing new… So, why is Bill O’Reilly complaining that he’s being ignored?
O’REILLY: Factor Follow-up segment tonight, getting charity to Haiti. As you may know, a TV telethon last Friday raised nearly $60 million to help the folks at Factor, but now comes the hard part: getting the money to the people who are suffering. Now, we tried to get someone attached to the telethon to speak with us tonight. We were not successful, and that is not a good sign. [...]
I want to be very careful in this discussion. I want Americans to be charitable to the Haitian people. I think they need it. I, myself, have given money to that island nation for a long time. We called up the telethon, which was based out of MTV, and said, Look, we just need somebody to just run through the process where the money goes, how it’s distributed, what the time frame is, all of that. We’ve got DVD albums in play. We’ve got all kinds of stuff coming in.
They could not or would not supply us a spokesperson tonight. And that just worries me.
It’s obvious that Fox News consciously chose not to support this cause, so why on earth should anyone believe they’re surprised when they are not supported in return? They seem to have this backwards – a news channel is supposed to report the news and not ignore certain events and then turn around and demand that they not be ignored. A better question is why don’t Fox News viewers realize this is not how it’s supposed to work?
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Read MoreGlenn Beck Producer Leaves FNC for MSNBC
Gresham Streigel, senior producer on Glenn Beck’s Fox News show, has left the channel and joined FNC rival, MSNBC. Streigel, who has also worked for Fox News for 13 years on shows such as Your World with Neil Cavuto and Fox & Friends, is now working for David Shuster. Beck’s team was, reportedly, trying to push the producer out. It’s probably more likely that it’s someone simply following a paycheck…
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Read MoreFox News Uses Children In Anti-Obama Propaganda
Here is a clip from Countdown on msnbc discussing Fox News’ obsession with what FNC personalities are calling “indoctrination” of our youth. The video shows singing children from February (Black History Month), seven months ago! Keep in mind that the children brought home notices and no outrage was shown before, during, or after, until now, seven months later from Fox News. Then, of course, you have O’Reilly, Hannity, et al claiming this never happened with Bush. msnbc provides the video showing that it did, in fact, happen with Bush too. At about 4:40 into the video, Eric Burns from Media Matters, points out the legal issues surrounding the fact that the original video shown by Fox News did not have the children’s faces blurred.
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Read MoreOther Networks Take On Fox News Over Inaccurate Advertisement
Fox News purchased a newspaper ad on Friday in which they accused competing media outlets of not covering protests. The other networks are taking them to task over its inaccuracy. The ad asks, “How did, ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN miss this story?” Short answer: they didn’t miss it. The ad is undeniably false.
CNN provided live coverage, event organizer FreedomWorks said ABC’s coverage was “fair and honest,” MSNBC had protest coverage and CBS had multiple crews on site at the event. It was even the lead story for CBS Evening News. “Fox News’ ad released today is blatantly false regarding CNN’s coverage of the 9/12 rally,” CNN said in a statement.
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Read MoreFoxNews.com Rankings on Alexa and Compete
According to Alexa.com, which tracks web traffic metrics, demographics, and more, FoxNews.com ranks 10th in the News category. Here is the current top ten web sites, according to Alexa:
- Yahoo News
- BBC Newsline Ticker
- CNN
- BBC News
- My Yahoo
- Google News
- NY Times
- Weather.com
- MSNBC
- Fox News
Contrast the above rankings with those from Compete.com, another web site analytics tool. The web sites from above have been re-ranked depending on number of unique visitors, tracked by Compete:
- Yahoo News – 36,654,823
- CNN – 29,188,144
- Weather.com – 28,356,573
- My Yahoo – 23,930,896
- NY Times – 16,677,000
- Google News – 14,949,452
- Fox News – 10,121,190
- BBC Newsline Ticker – 8,097,821
- BBC News – 5,274,688
- MSNBC – 2,806,653
Keep in mind that both of the above rankings is subject to error and that earlier this year Nielsen Online ranked Fox News sixth behind MSNBC, CNN, Yahoo, AOL and the New York Times.
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Read MoreBill O’Reilly’s Poll – Where’s Fox News?
Bill O’Reilly‘s web site currently has a poll asking, “Which news agency do you trust the least?” Fox News Channel is conveniently missing…
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Read MoreMorning Joe Calls Out Glenn Beck for Saying Obama is a Racist
In response to Glenn Beck calling President Obama a racist, MSNBC’s Morning Joe ripped into Beck for an entire segment:
WASHINGTON POST’S JONATHAN CAPEHART: How is it possible that this guy can sit on national television and call this guy a racist? The President is half white!
MSNBC HOST MIKE BARNICLE: In reality, Glenn Beck is just show business. …The larger, dumber statement is that the President of the United States has a deep seeded hatred for white people. Hello Glenn!? His mother was white! He was raised by a white woman, his grandmother! Hello!? Glenn? … Come back down to Earth please!
HOST MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Outrageous is one way of putting it. I would say irresponsible, especially now…selfish, self-indulging.
Host Joe Scarborough wasn’t on the show this morning, but he did tweet that Beck’s remarks were “outrageous.”
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Read MoreDonny Deutsch Calls For Boycott of Glenn Beck’s Advertisers!
Daily Kos user aggregatescience reported that MSNBC / CNBC’s Donny Deutsch has called for a boycott of Glenn Beck’s advertisers due to Beck’s asinine claim that President Obama is a racist. Deutch announced the charge on his show, The Big Idea:
DEUTSCH: He called this president a ‘racist’ and a ‘hatred of white people’, okay? This has to stop. Here’s the only way this stops. The reason this man does this, this Glenn Beck does this, is because it attracts viewers, it creates controversy…
If you’re an African-American or white American who’s tired of this kind of talk, write to the CEO’s of those companies and say: ‘you know what, put it somewhere else on Fox News, I’m not saying take it [your advertising] off of Fox News, take it off this man’s show.
The following advertisers were listed by Deutsch on air:
- General Motors
- Campbell Soup
- Chrysler
- Proctor & Gamble
- Pfizer
- Kellogg
- Walmart
- Kraft Foods
- Nestle
I will make sure those are all included on the Fox News Sponsors List
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Read MoreFox News Hypocritical On Recruiting Center Attack
Remember Bill O’Reilly falsely claiming that CNN did not cover the Army recruiting center attack until Anderson Cooper brought it up? It turns out that Fox News‘ portrayal of media bias was a bit hypocritical. Why, you ask?
Fox News did not air the press conference held by a survivor of the incident, which CNN & MSNBC both offered to cover. Furthermore, it appears that Fox News didn’t even bring it up. I guess it was more important to Fox News Channel and its personalities like O’Reilly, Hannity & Beck to make up claims of liberal media bias than to actually report on the real issue.
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Read MoreFoxNews.com 6th Place Behind MSNBC & CNN
This is becoming an increasingly important indication of global news audience ratings because more and more people get their news online. Nielsen Online has released their ratings for Top Global News Sites, by Unique Visitors for March 2009. FoxNews.com places sixth, behind MSNBC, CNN, Yahoo, AOL and the New York Times. Here are the top ten:
- MSNBC Digital Network – 39,900,000
- CNN Digital Network – 38,724,000
- Yahoo! News – 37,902,000
- AOL News – 23,604,000
- NYTimes.com – 20,118,000
- Fox News Digital Network – 16,791,000
- Tribune Newspapers – 16,513,000
- Google News – 13,668,000
- McClatchy Newspaper Network – 12,508,000
- ABCNEWS Digital Network – 12,189,000
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Read MoreJesse Watters Confronts GE Execs at Shareholders’ Meeting
The O’Reilly Factor producer Jesse Watters, apparently a GE shareholder, attended a meeting in order to confront GE executives about alleged media bias concerning MSNBC and Keith Olbermann. Known for his tactics of ambushing and harassment, Watters had Fox News cameras waiting, but didn’t identify himself as an employee of Fox News.
Why does O’Reilly and his ilk need to sink so low when they claim their ratings are so high?