Eric Boehlert: Fox News "purge" confirms network shouldn't have White House credentials

[babylonsister]

Fox News "purge" confirms network shouldn’t have White House credentials
Cut them off
Eric Boehlert
1 hr ago


Moving to eliminate any remaining vestiges of a news operation, Rupert Murdoch's Fox network summarily fired two political newsroom veterans this week. The heavy-handed move was seen as punishment for when the channel angered Trump loyalists on Election Night by correctly calling Arizona for Joe Biden.

Out are senior vice president and D.C. managing editor Bill Sammon, and politics editor Chris Stirewalt. The "purge," as network staffers have called it and included nearly 20 digital staffers, represents yet another confirmation that Fox News no longer pretends to be a journalistic outpost. Instead, facing new competition from the extreme far-right, the network eagerly sinks deeper into partisan, conspiratorial propaganda. And that's why the network doesn't deserve to have White House credentials for the new Democratic administration.

It's simple: Fox News isn't a newsgathering organization, therefore it does not need White House access. Giving them prestigious White House press passes just delays the much-needed Beltway discussion about the crooked network and its place in our political culture.

Today, it’s not possible for anyone in the press to make the argument that Fox News is a legitimate outlet. Dripping in demagoguery, the network doesn't even pretend any more. Last year, Shep Smith left when it became clear his 3 p.m. newscast was no longer welcome there. "I stuck with it for as long as I could and at some point I realized I’d reached a point of diminishing returns and I left," he recently said.

"There is a concerted effort to get rid of real journalists," one departed Fox staffer told the Daily Beast, referring to the recent firings. "They laid capable people off who were actual journalists and not blind followers. It’s essentially the final nail in the coffin for digital journalism at Fox.” The week's purge comes as Sean Hannity's former producer, Porter Berry, takes control of running Fox's digital properties.

more...

https://pressrun.media/p/fox-news-purge-means-it-doesnt-deserve

[The Wielding Truth]

1. FOX NEWS is not factual news and should not be named so. It is propaganda!

[calimary]

33. When were they ever (a factual news network)?

[The Wielding Truth]

36. Right. It's bizarre that they are allowed to portray themselves as News!

[John Ludi]

2. Didn't they

reclassify themselves as "entertainment" a while back to avoid future litigation? If I remember correctly, that was a thing. So would that potentially invalidate any claim they have to have a right to sit at the grownup table?

[John Ludi]

3. Well...I got THAT one wrong

apparently I was mistaken:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-news-entertainment-switch/

[DLCWIdem]

12. Close enough. They said in a legal brief they were entertainment

Their answer when Tucker Carlson was being sued was that they were entertainment and so nobody expected them them to be truthful.

While others find Snopes a good source I do not. In that article I can find no mention of the legal brief. Which, IMO, should have been included.

Another example was that a couple of years ago there was a question about those awful yard lawnboy decorations. People were claiming that they were used to help identify stops by the underground railroad.

Snopes said the claim was falae because the could not find any documented written historical evidence. However, Snopes completely overlooked the fact that the study of history has changed. Historians no longer rely on only written documents they have expanded the research to include the use oral histories and traditions.

[uponit7771]

19. Something had to be done about FAUX News, FAUX is enabling domestic terrorist & white supremacist

[John Ludi]

38. Huh...cool

thanks for pointing that out. I'd think that that would serve as a precedent.

[malaise]

6. Precisely

so they should not have credentials

[Dustlawyer]

17. A court of appeals ruled, in overturning a judgment against Fox News, that

Fox News was “entertainment” and not “News” so it was ok for Fox to lie.

[Danascot]

20. I thought the same thing

I did find this story from September concerning a slander suit brought against Tucker Carlson by Karen McDougal:

U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil's opinion, leaning heavily on the arguments of Fox's lawyers: The "'general tenor' of the show should then inform a viewer that [Carlson] is not 'stating actual facts' about the topics he discusses and is instead engaging in 'exaggeration' and 'non-literal commentary.' "

She wrote: "Fox persuasively argues, that given Mr. Carlson's reputation, any reasonable viewer 'arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism' about the statement he makes."

https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye

The problem with this Trump appointed judges' opinion is that the average Fox viewer is not a "reasonable viewer with an appropriate amount of skepticism'. That's deliberate on Fox' part. They have groomed their viewers to believe all kinds of ridiculous claims over a period of many years.

[calimary]

34. Well then they should call themselves "Fox Entertainment".

NOT “Fox ‘News’.”

Come to think of it, maybe that’s how we should write it. Fox “News”.

[lindysalsagal]

4. I'd like to see someone sue that channel to change the name.

[Buns_of_Fire]

5. Can a "Channel Q" be far behind?

After all, a potential of 74 million nutjob viewers is a very attractive demograpnic. I don't know how long any of them can last with only MyPillow and Goya Beans as their main advertisers, though.

[MontanaMama]

7. Does anyone know if OANN has credentials?

Traitor45 allowed them in the briefing room.

[samsingh]

8. there should be boycotts against any advertisers on the network.

fux news is the reason we almost lost democracy in my opinion.

[Lokee11]

10. Agree!

✊!

[Stuart G]

31. ..A boycott against advertisers is a solution that would work. A total list of advertisers needs

to available to all of us. Then in a few weeks, when it starts to really hurt, and advertisers..."bail out"
changes will take place....As many have said before, and many will say again................................

.......MONEY IS THE NAME OF THE GAME.....AND THE ONLY NAME OF THE GAME...........

[samsingh]

35. these must be available. Should we start this from DU ?

[pwb]

9. Chris Wallace has the only real news on fox.

One hour a week. Cable providers need a little regulation.

[uponit7771]

16. +1, even Hemmer is a complete hack now sympathizing with the white supremacist. NewsMax & OAN are

... pushing FAUX News further to the right as if they could go any further.

[librechik]

23. Why is Wallace, an actual sane person and "real" journalist still at Faux???

[bucolic_frolic]

11. FCC Licenses the public airwaves

not the propaganda machine. "Fair and balanced" was always a cover for the exact opposite to see what they could get away with, in my view.

[roamer65]

13. Faux News.

[uponit7771]

14. Anyone else notice FAUX News is openly sympathizing with domestic terrorist & white supremacist?

[dalton99a]

24. +1. It is their favorite network

The only news station they watch

[Silent3]

15. And here I was, thinking there was a (tiny) chance Fox might actually...

...look at recent events and realize it was time to go the other direction, that they might be proud that they'd not only correctly called the election, but had landed on the right side of history when they occasionally challenged Trump.

Silly me.

[DLCWIdem]

21. Yeah. Me too. I was hoping that more liberal son would take over

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

18. A Fox employee at a news conference is there to spread propaganda and back Biden into a corner.

Allowing them to speak only eats up time that could be used for real journalists to ask questions to gain knowledge that informs readers and viewers.

The WH should deny Fox, OANN, NewsMax, etc. credentials and allow only established news sources to be present.

[PirateRo]

22. That link is not working

Would you please repost a proper link to determine provenance?

[babylonsister]

27. I just tried it; it worked for me. nt

[SheltieLover]

25. I would not allow them in

[caballojm]

26. They should be required to call themselves "Fox Newz"

since they don't report actual news. Just as Cheez Whiz can't use the word "cheese."

[rdking647]

28. biden should take 2 steps

rather than pulling their credentials just never call on them at a press breifing
make it clear to any of his appointees that they arent to grnt fox any interviews

[VA_Jill]

29. Faux Noise

is registered as an "entertainment" network, so why should they get WH credential anyway? Inquiring minds &c.

[moose65]

30. They used to have a small group of real journalists

Shep Smith was probably the best thing Fox News ever had.

They used to claim that there was a "wall" between their news division and their "opinion" shows. The "news" was on during the day between 9 - 5 when there weren't many people actually watching. The line between the two has been very, very thin in the age of Trump, though!

The evening shows are just atrocious. They are talk shows, pure and simple. Jerry Springer and Maury Povich. What you're watching isn't news - you're watching actors on a set. They don't even make a pretense of "fair and balanced" any longer.

[Initech]

32. "There is a concerted effort to get rid of real journalists,"

Well duh! We had a president for four years who called everything he didn't agree with fake news, and wanted to replace the New York Times seat at the WHPC with fucking Infowars, so there is that. I could have told you that!

[Skittles]

37. reputable people need to STOP APPEARING ON FOX NEWS

IT'S REPUKE CRAP

[Oneironaut]

39. Fox News will become like OAN, imo.

The new “Republican Party” audience demands Fascist rhetoric rather than facts. Even with Trump gone, we are in trouble. I’m not sure how we stop Republicans’ free-fall into Fascism. The next logical fall downward is types like Josh Hawley and Lauren Boebert being the norm, with even more extreme Fascists as the outliers.