Fox News: F 9/11 not a "documentary" due to "editorializing"

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

Fox is really reaching, attempting to take Moore to task for not presenting the clips in F 9/11 "objectively without editorializing without inserting fictional matter."

This is a video clip...to watch it go to the main Fox site (http://www.foxnews.com/index.html), look for "Fox News Access Video" on the right, click "Politics," and select "Moore Propaganda? New movie 'Fahrenheit 9/11' makes a splash around the country, but is it an actual documentary?"

1). Golf course scene: Fox plays the "raw feed," says Bush is talking about Palestinian suicide bombers, not Al Qaeda, so Moore is not "presenting the facts" (WTF?)

2). Bin Laden family flights out of US after 9/11: "flights did not occur until Commercial flight restrictions lifted after September 14th." Newsweek's Michael Isikoff: "A window into some of the facts, but certainly not a complete window into ALL of the facts"

3). Bill Wheatley, VP of NBC News: "The work of filmmakers is much more likely to be pointed in a particular direction...filmmakers tend to avoid balance and pursue a particular point of view"

The dictionary definition of "propaganda" is read at the end of the clip, so that the audience can "decide" if it is a more fitting definition of the film.

[Caution]

1. DU: Fox News is not a "News" station due to "bullshit"

[BlueEyedSon]

2. Yup.

It should be illegal for them to use the word "news".

[bullimiami]

3. You beat me to it...sort of.

Fox is not a News station due to LYING.

[Guaranteed]

16. ROFL nice nt

[Cat Atomic]

4. Interesting argument for a company who fought for the legal right to lie.

[Kellanved]

5. Look who's talking

This is almost onionesque; Fox News is a name word-wide known for creative fact bending and lying.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1238901,00.html

[merh]

44. thanks for the link! (n/t)

[SaveElmer]

6. The more they push...the more pathetic they look

Had they kept their pie-holes shut the movie probably wouldn't have been that big!

Democrats ought to apply to the FEC to prohibit Fox News from operating after July 30th...everything they are claiming for Moore's film they do themselves.

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

7. What a pantload!

A documentary that doesn't editorialize is called "a freaking surveillance camera." Since when do documentarians fail to editorialize -- you know, I'm pretty sure that there was a subtle, pro-environment message in all those Jacques Cousteau films. And I saw a documentary at the American Holocaust Museum that seemed really unsympathetic to the Nazi point of view.

Unable to beat Moore on the merits of their case, they're now inventing new rules that he supposedly violated in making "Fahrenheit 9/11."

[fdr_hst_fan]

14. Remembeer, folks: FAUX NEWS

is "fair and balanced-we report, you decide." I'm sorry, but I can't type this with a straight face!

[goclark]

38. That is so cool and so right!

[flewellyn]

8. Well, to be fair...

Fox News really are the experts at presenting news while editorializing and inserting fictional matter.

[whistle]

17. Yes, Fox news commentators appear more like commentators on....

...The 700 Club Network giving slanted interpretations to their audience of sheep and cattle!

[MidwestTransplant]

9. They should know propaganda

[jobycom]

10. That's not reporting the news, that's editorializing

Oh nevermind, they wouldn't understand it anyway.

[aden_nak]

11. Depressingly expected.

This is from a news network that actually CELEBRATED the passing of Bush's absurd deadline for Iraq to destroy its "stockpile" of Weapons of Mass Destruction. They actually celebrated the fact that we were going to war. But clearly, they were reporting "objectively without editorializing".

[MadAsHellNewYorker]

12. Definition of Documentary

John Grierson coined the term in the early 20th centuary as a creative interpertation of reality.

sounds like F 9/11 to me...

[JHB]

13. Hey, FOX! What happened to "You decide"?

Not to mention the pot calling the kettle black compared to normal FOX operating procedure.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

24. That's why they read the definitions of "documentary" and "propaganda"...

...under the flimsy premise of "letting you decide." They spend the entire clip debunking what Moore has presented (even though they're frigging CLIPS...not actors "recreating" the events, REAL CLIPS)...but it is typical Fox strategy. It's like writing a murder mystery, starting with "the butler did it," and weaving a story that supports that conclusion.

[Scooter24]

15. They

are obviously starting the campaign to discredit the film before awards season rolls around. It must kill the Republicans to know that F911 was already accepted and screened by the Academy Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences...

[Guaranteed]

18. Since when do documentaries NOT editorialize?

Documentaries ALWAYS have an angle.

[GinaMaria]

33. absolutely right

docs can explore the director's point of view, prove or disprove a theory, or can be about a topic and when it is put together a theme emerges or a point of view emerges. Why wasn't there this much hoopla about ken Burn's baseball documentary ;-)

[opihimoimoi]

19. Its a FINE FLICK, just fine and well done, get over it and get out of the

WAY. Fox is part of the Problem.

[Bridget Burke]

20. 1st Oscar for Documentary Feature: "Desert Victory"

From the British of Information & 20th Century Fox. All that year's other nominees (including some "unofficial" ones) were similar--outright propaganda to support our war effort. Oh, there's this exception: "We've Come a Long Way", from Negro Marches On, Inc.

www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0148238.html

Apparently the award was created for propaganda films. After the war, the propaganda was less flagrant, but quite a few of the nominees & winners continued to contain opinions.

[the Kelly Gang]

21. get Cheyneyed Fox News

[kentuck]

22. Has FOX ever reported a news story where they have not editorialized?

From each snide remark, to their giggles, jokes, and body language. They do not deserve to be in the news business. Too bad they can't have their license revoked?

[soothsayer]

documentary film = non fiction, thus F911 is a documentary

Anything that has a narrative story is going to have a point of view. All documentaries have an angle, as an earlier poster said.

[DemonFighterLives]

23. They are the Pace Car

They set the pace and the standard for propagandistic editorialism. They should talk. Moore bashers. They're eveywhere, they're everywhere! :puke:

[IkeWarnedUs]

25. Editorializing doesn't belong in a documentary

It belongs in the news - at least the faux variety.

About #2 - here is the transcript from Clarke's testimony to the 911 Commission:

MR. ROEMER: I've been very impressed with your memory, sitting through all these interviews that the 9/11 Commission has conducted with you. I press you again to try to recall how this request originated, who might have passed this on to you at the White House Situation Room, or who might have originated that request for the United States government to fly out -- how many people on this plane?

MR. CLARKE: I don't know.

MR. ROEMER: We don't know how many people were on a plane that flew out of this country. Who gave the final approval, then, to say "Yes, you're clear to go, it's all right with the United States government to go to Saudi Arabia"?

MR. CLARKE: I believe after the FBI came back and said it was all right with them, we ran it through the decision process for all of these decisions that we were making in those hours, which was the Interagency Crisis Management Group on the video conference.

I was making -- or coordinating a lot of decisions on 9/11 in the days immediately after. And I would love to be able to tell you who did it, who brought this proposal to me, but I don't know. The two -- since you press me, the two possibilities that are most likely are either the Department of State of the White House Chief of Staff's Office. But I don't know.

MR. ROEMER: Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

MR. KEAN: Senator Gorton?

MR. GORTON: One more question on that subject. When the approvals were finally made, and when the flight left, was the flight embargo still in effect or were we flying -- or was that over? We were flying once again?

MR. CLARKE: No, sir. No, Senator. The reason that a decision was needed was because the flight embargo -- the grounding was still in effect.

[LTR]

26. Documentaries ARE commentary

At least the good ones are.

Here's a list of the top documentaries of all time:

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?id=documentary.htm

Quite a few of these seem like commentary, aside from the Moore films. These are just some of the ones I'm familiar with:

Super Size Me
Hoop Dreams
Paris is Burning
When We Were Kings
Beyond the Mat
The Eyes of Tammy Faye
The War Room
The Weather Underground
The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl
Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy (sorry, had to include this one)
The Hunting Of The President
Waco: The Rules of Engagement
4 Little Girls

I could go on, but I'm not familiar with many of them. I'm sure DUers have seen quite a few of these.

On a side note, I'd like to see FOX's definition of 'news'.

[POed_Ex_Repub]

27. Oh the SHEER IRONY!

Let's call a documentary an editorial trying to pass itself off as news buy doing an editorial trying to pass itself off as news!... Yet, I doubt the piece changing many minds. Faux doesn't have much credibility outside of ditto crowd (and they're already lost).

[GiovanniC]

32. Great Minds Think Alike, Methinks.

n/t

[niyad]

28. of course, the more they scream, the more people will be interested in

seeing the film. michael couldn't have bought as much publicity as the rightwingnuts are giving him for free.

[Misunderestimator]

29. All that matters, is that AMURKINS are all "Where there's smoke...

there's fire..." and this doc does it. What lame criticisms... um, yeah... doesn't present ALL the facts... that would be literally IMPOSSIBLE in less than at least 3 entire years of footage.

[Skittles]

30. it's so desperate, the reasoning they have to use for their idiot fans

it would be very funny if it wasn't so g.d. pathetic.

[GiovanniC]

31. I LOVE the Irony Here

Here, a "news" channel famous for presenting their own editorial bias to news stories accuses a documentary of editorializing by way of a news story that editorializes.

That's like the black pot writing "KETTLE, YOU ARE BLACK, SIR!" on itself in black paint.

[Monte Carlo]

34. The GOP wants everything not slanted their way to be bland and neutral...

... and easier to kick around. It lets them dictate the national debate.

They decided Moore was a liar first, and then looked for the evidence. They're not interested in honesty; they have a job to do.

[TrustingDog]

35. Lieing FOX Bastards - that can 'legally' lie... read this.

I suppose most of you already know about this gem. Someone should bring this up for attention to the listening public. Maybe send it in to Jon Stewart or whoever has the balls to throw this in the Fox Faces.

This should shut them up good.
====

FLORIDA COURT RULING SAYS MEDIA CAN LEGALLY LIE **

On February 14, a Florida Appeals Court ruled that there is absolutely nothing illegal in a major media organisation lying, concealing or distorting information. The
court reversed the US$425,000 jury verdict of 2000 that was in favour of journalist Jane Akre, who charged she was pressured by Fox Television management and
lawyers to air what she knew and documented to be false information.

On August 18, 2000, a six?person jury was unanimous in its conclusion that Akre was indeed fired for threatening to report the station's pressure to broadcast what
jurors decided was "a false, distorted or slanted" story about the widespread use of Monsanto's rBGH, a genetically engineered growth hormone given to dairy
cows. The court did not dispute the heart of Akre's claim, that Fox pressured her to broadcast a false story to protect the broadcaster from having to defend the
truth in court as well as suffer the ire of irate advertisers.

Fox argued from the first, and failed on three separate occasions, in front of three different judges, to have the case tossed out on the grounds there there is no hard,
fast and written rule against deliberate distortion of the news. The attorneys for Fox, owned by media baron Rupert Murdoch, argued that the First Amendment
gives broadcasters the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on the public airwaves.

The Court of Appeals, in its six?page written decision, held that the Federal Communications Commission's position against news distortion is only a "policy", not a
promulgated law, rule or regulation.

Fox aired a report after the ruling was handed down, saying that it was "totally vindicated" by the verdict.

more at:
http://www.netfeed.com/~jhill/RupertMurdoch.htm

[LTR]

36. I hope you don't mind, but...

...I posted your original post over at Media Matters.

This should be mentioned, and Media Matters is a phenomenal resource.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

37. Not at all, but where is it posted?

I checked the Media Matters site but can't figure out what you're referring to.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/mediamatters/index.html

[LTR]

39. Go here

The great "Media Matters For America":

http://mediamatters.org/comments/latest/200406140005

A phenomenal site from David Brock!

You'll have to scroll down the page for the post.

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

41. Found it...thanks

...the more people who read it, the better.

[LifeDuringWartime]

40. then fox news isnt news

due to editorializing!!

:wtf:

honestly....

[rocktivity]

42. Rocknation: Fox News not a "news" network due to "editorializing"

This is like Hugh Hefner accusing someone of being a pimp.

:headbang:
rocknattion

[leftynyc]

43. I sincerely hope that when Michael wins the

Oscar for Best Documentary that the first people he thanks are all the right wing shills who undoubtably helped make this movie such a success by bringing all the extra attention. Thanks Rush, Sean, O'Reilly, Fox News, etc...

[sampsonblk]

45. "Murdering Pigs"

I saw that headline on Fox just yesterday! If that isn't editorializing, what is???

This is so funny - especially coming from THEM. Their feeble attempts to refute Moore only bolster his case. No one can refute the actual footage of Bush looking and acting like a stupid dipshit.

They did not dispute: 7 minutes of confusion, Lila Lipscomb, footage of soldiers abusing prisoners and Iraqi civilians, FBI visit of innocent man, "infiltration" of peace group in CA, Bush admin blacked out name of Bin Laden associate in his military records, Bin Laden associate funded Bush's business ventures for years.

The silence on these real issues is deafening.

[Zero Gravitas]

46. Pot, kettle, black

pigs

[LTR]

47. You do realize that some wingnuts are calling "Jackass" a documentary...

...because it had a bigger opening, and diminishes F 9/11.

So, does FAUX consider 'Jackass' more of a documentary than F 9/11?

I guess it plays more to the FOX viewers' intellect.