NPR: Shep Smith "Steers Away From Ideology"

NPR: Shep Smith "Steers Away From Ideology"

NPR's "Morning Edition" profiled Fox News anchor Shepard Smith Tuesday morning, focusing on the ways Smith differs from his more opinionated colleagues on Fox News and in cable news more generally. "Fox News has an evening cable news anchor who steers away from ideology," the profile opened.

"Shepard Smith's show is a study in contrast with the old school network newscasts, but maybe not in the way that you think," NPR's David Folkenflik said. "He propels his show with quick-witted, rapid-pattern narration," a tactic Shep compared to "video-snacking on YouTube" and news analyst Andrew Tyndall compared to "Entertainment Tonight."

"What he did is take the style of entertainment news and applied it to serious news," Tyndall said.

The crux of the segment, which can be heard here, is that Fox News "is paying Smith $8 million a year not to take an explicit point of view," and it even cited Media Matters' Eric Boehlert, who described Smith as the fairest anchor on Fox News.

"There are a lot of people on our channel who want you to think the way they do. We just want to give you some information to help you think," Smith said. "I don't much care for ideologues within my news cast. There is plenty of it out there, you don't need anymore.

"Who is better at toeing the Republican line than Sean Hannity? I can't even think of anybody right off the top of my head," Smith continued. "Sean Hannity doesn't host our news. He has never hosted our news. When we have news, I come on."

Listen here.

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