Fox Nation: The Seedy Underbelly of Rupert Murdoch's Evil Empire?

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He's called former Vice President Al Gore an "evil enabler" for speaking at Netroots Nation -- an annual conference that draws thousands of progressive blog enthusiasts. He's likened Markos Moulitsas, founder of the progressive blog powerhouse Daily Kos, to white supremacist David Duke. He's even accused The Huffington Post of using the "same exact tactics that the Nazis used."

To say that Fox News golden boy Bill O'Reilly is no fan of progressive blogs is an understatement akin to claiming the Hatfields and McCoys were mildly displeased with each other.

In fact, just last week, O'Reilly hosted a panel of lawyers who attempted, in vain, to explain that the conservative host's "rights" aren't violated by private criticism.

Back in March, while promoting its newly launched website TheFoxNation.com, Fox News ran advertisements telling viewers that it was "time to say 'no' to biased media and 'yes' to fair play and free speech."

In short, Fox News was jumping headfirst into the blogging world with just the snake oil necessary to cure what ailed O'Reilly -- a fair, honest, bias-free version of what he sees the left serving up.

It didn't take long for The Fox Nation to prove those fancy Fox News promos demonstrably inaccurate -- instead, it seems to have said "yes" to biased media and "no" to "fair play" from Day One.

In its first 24 hours, the website labeled Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) and Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) a "[d]angerous duo," linking to an Agence France-Presse article that simply reported that Dodd and Frank "promised President Barack Obama on Monday they would work with the White House to enact a sweeping overhaul of US financial regulatory structures by year's end."

Visitors to The Fox Nation were no doubt confused when they clicked on the link provided by the website to the AFP article in question only to find that it in no way characterized Dodd or Frank as "[d]angerous."

That was Day One. In the two months that followed the website's launch, The Fox Nation has displayed an uncanny ability to mislead readers, twist the truth, spread wild conspiracy theories, and misrepresent the reporting of legitimate journalists and media outlets.

At times, the website has been downright frightening. In early May, it ran a photo of a rifle pointed in the direction of a photo of Obama's head. The headline associated with the rifle image asked: "Why Are Gun Sales Surging?" One can only imagine what O'Reilly and his ilk would have said if a progressive blog -- or a legitimate news outlet, as Fox purports to be, for that matter -- had done the same thing to President Bush.

Debunked conspiracy theories are also finding new life on the website. A headline in late May asked: "Should Obama Release Birth Certificate? Or Is This Old News?" But contrary to the question, the Obama campaign released a copy of Obama's birth certificate, posting it on the campaign's website last year. It also reportedly provided the original document to FactCheck.org, whose staff concluded in an August 2008 post that it "meets all of the requirements from the State Department for proving U.S. citizenship."

About the use of questions like the one just highlighted: In what appears to be an attempt to ward off criticism, The Fox Nation, like the on-screen text on Fox News, often employs the use of questions for its headlines rather than straightforward assertions. It's as if they are pre-emptively saying, "We made no such statement. We simply asked a question."

What has the website asked its readers? Of same-sex marriage, it wondered, "Are 'Triad' Marriages Next?" Following the reported suicide of a Freddie Mac executive, one headline asked, "Was It Suicide?" After the Department of Homeland Security declassified an April report detailing potential increases in right-wing extremism, the website queried, "Is Homeland Security Targeting Tea Parties?" Of course, these are the very same tea parties that Fox News and The Fox Nation went to great lengths promoting.

The Fox Nation has had loads of questions, especially when it comes to Obama's Supreme Court deliberations and his nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. The website asked, "Why Aren't White Males Being Considered for Supreme Court?" and "Is it Empathy? Or Is Obama Shredding the Constitution?" Of Obama's nominee, the website inquired, "Sotomayor Argued Death Penalty Is Racist... Is She?"

So, is TheFoxNation.com simply the seedy underbelly of Fox News parent company chairman Rupert Murdoch's evil, right-wing media empire?

Boy, that was easy, wasn't it?

Karl Frisch is a Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, a progressive media watchdog and research and information center based in Washington, D.C. Frisch also contributes to County Fair, a media blog featuring links to progressive media criticism from around the Web as well as original commentary.

Comments

[noneIn2008]

You've described most of alledged journalism today "mislead readers, twist the truth, spread wild conspiracy theories, and misrepresent the reporting"

However, one can not imagine an example of a current "legitimate journalists and media outlets". We would welcome one example of a legitimate media outlet? One.

[chlai88]

Fanning controversy and incitement is a way to get attention and with it comes money. It's Fox News business tactics in much the same way as a lawyer will still get a criminal off the hook even if he does know that he did it. I've stopped giving them the attention and if more doesn't take them seriously anymore, then they will probably have to change tactics.

[JoeM78]

As in FNC is the only news outlet to do this? They all take shots at each other. The country is polarized, and people are still surprised that there is bias? I'm not looking at the definition of biased, but...

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/biased
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bias

Do I go to the Left or the Right?

[JoeM78]

My post from this morning was never posted. I tried to think of what I violated, and than it hit me!!! I said that all this bashing from media outlet to outlet was childish. I think I wrote that the media sounds like whiney, little school children to emphasise my point. To further emphasise my point, that comment was followed with a sentence in quotes, suggesting that it was being said by all who subject themselves and us to the childish name calling. The word in the quoted, mocking sentence was ... poopie heads.

I than listed many shows, personalities, publications (including the Oaksterdam News as a joke), and even a former personality who is a newly minted senator as all biased. I asked if all this bias evens it's self out in the end. Than asked if that was American... many view points making the whole.

I than said that my personal opinion about politicians trying to muzzle opposition talk radio as being asinine. Again, I tried to make light of what I was saying and the topic it's self. I did a play on words and said that I wasn't going to name names or party, but the politicians were emulating their party mascot. Get it? Asinine? Too vague?

Well, I ended it with a message to Mr. Karl Frisch by calling him biased. I said, "anyone who alligns them selves with one of the two warring tribes (in our government­(Democrat/­Republican­)) is biased."

[LMPE]

Agence France-Presse? I would have guessed that the yahoos who watch Faux News would never even consider turning to a European news source.

Anyway, Fox has been doing this sort of stuff as long as anyone can remember.

[wehrke]

Media matters doesn't matter. They are not impartial nor are they accurate themselves. Yes Fox leans to the right. MSNBC leans left. SO? Let's not waste our time with mudslinging.

[RS]

Uh, excuse me wehrke--isn't MSNBC owned by General Electric, a perennial war profiteer and a charter member of the military industrial complex? How in heaven's name do they lean left? OK, they're not like Halliburton, but I've just read that GE won a HUGE rebuilding contract in Iraq.

[marshhen]

Wrong! GE is no longer worth crap and is the best friend to George Sorros who runs Media Matters. GE and Soros are both looking for big paybacks from the Obama Adminstration for all the press and money they threw there way.

[CFAmick]

Fox Nation likes to create sensational titles and then link to articles that have nothing to do with the title, like this:

Website promises to make you smarter? > The FoxNation.com

[RexOzone]

Murdock is the embodiment of corporate, laissez-fair, "free" market capitalism and self serving greed.
Any way either he or his products of destruction can be marginalized, "quarantined" we would do well to try. Fox is only a barometer of the sadass attempts by he and his ilk to captivate and dominate the earth like any out of control virus but Murdock's strategy of controlling history and language is as old hat as 1984.

[bayside]

I cannot believe we still have so many gullible americans watching fox news according to the latest ratings. I would like to see how they take those ratings as I smell something very fishy..

[den1953]

The great thing about Fox News is you can turn it off!

[hatmadder]

I would enjoy watching them stew in their own hatred for all the world to see if only there weren't gullible human beings who actually buy what they're selling!

[WinterParkMom]

Any person who watches faux and who reads their site and actually believes anything there is an I D I O T who can't think for themselves.

That is one of THE most biased organizations it's ever been my misfortune to come across. CNN runs a close second.

This is a network that promotes hate, violence, racism and treating women as second class citizens.

[marshhen]

So the DailyKos posting a fantasy about strangling Michelle Malkin isn't hate? Get real. Hate comes in many forms from both sides. Grow up and look in the mirror!

[drumz]

Sorry, the GOP has turned hate into an Art.

[marshhen]

Aren't we calling the kettle black? Bush and Cheny are fascist and evil. Gee, that is and still is the mantra of the left. Can we all stop calling each other names and accusing the other side of evil and demonizing and personalizing every news item? And for once talk rationally, calmly and without all the crap, maybe the right and the left could get somewhere. But as long as there are polarizing articles like this one, and it comes from both sides, we will continue to get no where and everyone loses.

[Davwbaird]

Is Murdoch evil?

[NewsCorpse]

Fox Nation was never intended to be either fair or balanced - just like the TV network from which it sprung. Even today, they have virtually no coverage of the murder of Dr. George Tiller. There is a single text link about 2/3 the way down their homepage. And if you were to click on the link for comments, you would see that there are none - despite the fact that I posted one last night that they have failed to publish (many of my comments have been censored, even though I am always respectful and rely on facts to make my points).

Yhe Fox Nation is even worse than Fox News as a propaganda platform.

[Davwbaird]

o'reilly is justiying tillers death.

[VMA]

I wish there was some way for these people to be held accountable,