The ghost of Ted Baxter haunts Fox News

[charlie]

Watch what happens when breaking news throws the Fair and Brainless off script.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEiTP8NN96s
(1 minute video)

[pepperbear]

1. at :47: "this is a fascinating story that we're going to get all into place..."

translation: We won't have all the facts until we create them.

[cagesoulman]

2. LOL!!!!!

Looks like the fucking Onion.

[pansypoo53219]

3. no

the onion always knows what the story is about, and covers it ruthlessly.

[cagesoulman]

15. Like the fish sandwich

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/congressman_demands_to_know_who?utm_source=a-section

[pacalo]

8. Onion-gone-wrong. Or, the Onion during a writers' strike.

[pacalo]

4. I like the beginning where the female Ted Baxter asks the correspondent

to "define that, please" & the correspondent gives an incredulous look & asks, "Me????"

I'm not here to think or analyze -- I only report what they tell me to report, so booyah, baby, & go on to Tracey...

[abq e streeter]

5. Love hearing a professional journalist say "its all good"

they do hire some serious intellectuals over there at faux, don't they...:rofl:

[vixengrl]

6. But weren't they all so *cute* while they were floundering?

Professionals! (Models? Mannikins? Some kind of professional.)

[Merlot]

7. Love the "who me" by the first gal before the cutaway! Priceless!

and I hate to use the word "gal" when discussing a professional woman, but there is nothing about her that I can take seriously. The other women were just as bad. Since I don't watch faux, it's shocking to see how they have managed to make all women seem so unprofessional.

Not that "ted baxter" was any better, but at least he was wearing a suit.

I think I'd rather watch the striptease news, at least it would be more honest about how it regards women.

[pacalo]

11. She was just stunned that she was asked a question! Stunned!

I never watch Fixed News, either, so I was as taken aback as you were about the unprofessionalism & lack of broadcasting savvy. This was embarrassing to watch.

[nuxvomica]

9. They hadn't gotten John Moody's memo on it yet

That was just about the funniest thing I ever saw. "Me!"
:rofl:

[Speck Tater]

10. Yes, it's funny, but let's be honest about it...

We've seen bloopers like this on all kinds of TV and radio shows. It could just as easily have happened on MSNBC to K.O.

Ordinary human error on live T.V. knows no party affiliation. Slamming it as something uniquely Fox will leave us looking pretty silly when something very similar happens to Rachel Maddow.

As much as we love to slam Fox, not everything is the result of political affiliation.

(On the other hand Fox themselves do try to make everything about politics. This just in: Fox News historians have discovered that the Roman Empire was doing fine under Republican Caesars, but when a Democrat Caesar got into office the Roman Empire collapsed. You heard it first on Fox News.)

[pacalo]

14. I disagree. A "news network" should be qualified & capable of reporting

breaking news stories on the spot. I've watched Keith regularly for years & I've never seen him at a loss for words during moments when he had to ad lib.

The video posted here is what happens when newsreaders are hired, not broadcasters who are able to think & analyze topics.

[Berry Cool]

18. If a communications glitch happens on a breaking story, KO can backfill

by saying something like "As you may know..." and then lay out an explanation of what has been happening up to that point in the story--in this case just what kind of news was being waited for from the Court, even if he can't say exactly what has just happened or explain what it all means because there's been some kind of a problem in getting the information in his ear.

The thing with these newsbots is, they can't even lay out the backstory. They are not even sure what the words they have been told MEAN. They know it's "something important," but they're not sure what, so all they can do is keep repeating the words and saying "Um, we hope to have more details on this soon..."

KO, given the news of the stay, probably could have not only explained the backstory, but what the stay meant, because he would have been following the story in its complexity all along. If not, he would have said "Bear with me if I'm making some assumptions here or getting the details wrong, but here's what this appears to mean..." He would not have been utterly speechless or saying "Um, I'm gonna have to throw it back to you."

[nuxvomica]

17. I don't think so

The FOX airheads obviously follow a script and have no idea what they are talking about. Your apologia is an insult to real TV journalists who know their stuff and do their homework.

[Berry Cool]

19. Exactly.

When news has to do with the Supreme Court, there's no need to be utterly tongue-tied as to what it means. The case they are to handle has been around for a while and so has news that they have been asked to touch it. There is no excuse for complete ignorance of such a major case.

A newsperson who is more than just a "reader" will have known what "Chrysler stay" means as it relates to the Supreme Court and be able to say something semi-intelligent about what such a stay means, even if only superficially (in this case it had to do with whether or not the Fiat merger would go through). But these bimbos/himbos had no clue.

It's another thing entirely if it were breaking news of the nature of, say, the Holocaust Museum shooting. There's little way to be prepared for that, because it comes out of the blue, and not much you can say before you get more details, other than to repeat what little you have. "We have word of breaking news that shots have been fired at the Holocaust Museum and that one person may be dead" and from there on fill in with what you can--who might have been arrested, what seems to have happened, whether any more are injured or dead, where the museum is, etc. A lot of false news and rumor will inevitably pop up and not much can be done about it, but you do what you can, and the audience knows you can do only so much. Real analysis will come much later.

But when they cannot say anything intelligent about a Supreme Court decision other than that it was a "stay" and had to do with "Chrysler," and that's IT...you KNOW someone has not done their homework. At all.

[Speck Tater]

20. I stand corrected. There is an obvious difference between a blooper and complete incompetence.

Thanks to all for pointing out my error. :)

[lpbk2713]

12. LOL ... I've always wondered whatever happened to Les Nessman.

He's now a Director at ClusterFox Noise.

[BuelahWitch]

13. Psst, FOX, Barbie & Ken can't report the news!

You have to hire real journalists for that!

[cwydro]

16. Hilarious!

Thanks for the laugh.

[woo me with science]

21. ROFL! nt