Fox News: Fox Stops Pretending its News and Shills Hard for Republican Candidates
A condensed overview of 15 hours of Fox News for the week ending 10/16/22
A typical Fox News viewer might think John Fetterman was the most dangerous and radical Democrat running for public office. They might also think that Nancy Pelosi was out of line for wanting to punch Donald Trump after the riot broke out on January 6th and that MAGA Republicans were being scooped up by the FBI after they answered a telephone poll.
The same Fox viewers might not realize that anti-government protests in Iran have stretched on for over a month or that a jury awarded the plaintiffs in a case against Alex Jones nearly $1 billion dollars. Anyone who exclusively watched Fox News might not realize their Social Security benefits would get a sizable boost due to inflation.
Last week Fox News went into full campaign mode. There was no pretense that Fox was even trying to look like a news outlet.
Every anchor on Fox News knew their main goal was to promote Republican candidates while tearing down Democrats.
This is a screenshot from Monday’s episode of Hannity. In some segments Hannity just played Republican campaign ads. The programming was hardly subtle.
Shows covered last week
Fox & Friends - 1st hour
The Five
Hannity
Fox turns into an Informercial Attack Ad Against Democrats
Hannity dedicated to 38% of his airtime to bashing Democrat candidates in key senatorial and governor races. His biggest targets were the incumbent Senator from Georgia, Raphael Warnock, and senatorial candidate John Fetterman in Pennsylvania.
Most of Hannity’s coverage was centered on tearing apart Democrats not lifting up Republicans. Just as Fox News loves to scare its viewers with hyperbolic language, conspiracy theories and doomsday predictions the network goes negative in terms of campaigning.
I can’t prove that Hannity encourages his guests to chime in and basically repeat his talking points but there are several examples of guests echoing Hannity in this montage
This is a collections of clips of Hannity mentioning Warnock and Fetterman last week.
When I searched for words in the giant transcript of all 15 episodes I saw a pattern. When a Republican was in a close race Hannity, a guest or another Fox News anchor would mention the Democrat opponent far more than the Republican.
If a Republican candidate was a long shot in a race, Fox brought up the Republican far more than the Democrat. In states where the race was much closer the angle was to decimate the Democrat rather than lift up the Republican. It was really clearest in the case of Georgia and New York.
Most polls put the incumbant Governor Kathy Hochul several percentage points above her challenger Republican Lee Zeldin. Fox used Zeldin’s name nearly three times as often as Hochul’s.
In the case of Georgia where most polling shows the candidates in a dead heat Fox News used the name Raphael Warnock nearly three times more often than his Republican opponent Herschel Walker.
When all the examples are laid out next to each it appears to be a purposeful strategy on the part of Fox News. I used FiveThirtyEight.com as my source for the closeness of each race. FiveThirtyEight uses an aggregate of multiple polls to come up with their predictions.
The Breakdown *indicates incumbent
GA - Senate race - Extremely close race - Democrat leading by 2 points
Raphael Warnock* - Democrat - 46 - 72%
Herschel Walker - Republican - 18 - 28%
PA - Senate race - Close race - Democrat leading by 2.8 points
John Fetterman - Democrat - 44 - 79%
Dr. Mehmet Oz - Republican - 12 - 21%
OH - Senate race - Close race - Republican leading by 3.8 points
Tim Ryan - Democrat - 21 - 75%
J.D. Vance - Republican - 7 - 25%
AZ - Senate race - Favors - Democrat leading by 5 points
Mark Kelly* - Democrat - 11 - 65%
Blake Masters - Republican - 6 - 35%
MI - Governor race - Heavily favors - Democrat leading by 8.9 points
Gretchen Whitmer* - Democrat - 3 - 50%
Tudor Dixon - Republican - 3 - 50%
WI - Senate race - Favors - Republican leading by 3.4 points
Mandela Barnes - Democrat - 12 - 36%
Ron Johnson* - Republican - 21 - 64%
NY - Governor race - Heavily favors - Democrat leading by 15.6 points
Kathy Hochul* - Democrat - 15 - 30%
Lee Zeldin - Republican - 35 - 70%
Mike Huckabee Pushes Some Serious MAGA Paranoia
When Fox News doesn’t like the polling they just discredit it entirely. In this example former Governor of Arkansas claimed Republicans were too scared to answer a poll.
“I honestly think Republicans are going to have a much better night than anybody predicts, largely because the polling information is simply unreliable. And there's a reason that it's unreliable. Right now, if you're pro-life, if you're a Christian, if you're a conservative, if you are a MAGA Republican, which means you just think that America is a great country and we ought to preserve it and protect it and pass it on that way,” said Huckabee
Huckabee then takes his idea down a dark a conspiratorial path.
“If you're one of those people, you're kind of thinking that any given day the FBI may show up, bang your door down and haul you in. If not, they may put you on a list. They may call you a domestic terrorist threat to democracy. So conservatives simply don't answer polls. So I think we're seeing something that really can't be factored in.
And I was talking to Robert Carley of the Trafalgar Group, one of the few polling organizations that has some credibility. He'll be on. He was very blunt in saying no white men between 30 and 50 will answer a poll question. And for the most part, most all of the Trump supporters simply will not answer a poll. They don't put yard signs up anymore,” said Huckabee
I’m not sure why anyone would have a yard sign of Donald J. Trump right now as he’s been out of office for two years and still hasn't announced he’s running for president in 2025.
They don't put a lot of bumper strips. But they will go vote because they know it's the last line of defense. They have to protect their country and their families,” Said Huckabee.
Fox News has Turned into a Dr. Oz Propaganda Machine
Several Fox anchors have criticized John Fetterman for what they perceive as cognitive shortcomings he’s experienced since recovering from a stroke this summer.
Recovery from a stroke depends on a number of factors - how quickly the patient got treatment, the severity of the stroke, the age of the patient and the number of previous strokes if any.
Absolutely no one on Fox News is qualified to make any grand sweeping statements or even a vague guess about the medical status of John Fetterman. Even with his medical history and detailed records they wouldn’t be able to predict much of anything.
That’s not going to stop them of course as Jesse Watters was just one of many at Fox who felt they could make all sorts of assessments on the health of Fetterman.
“This guy's been campaigning for a critical US Senate seat for the entire summer into the fall. And she's the first reporter to ever sit down with this candidate. That is crazy. And the fact that all this early voting has been going on and he's never, ever answered questions or seen his inability to communicate and comprehend questions is crazy now,” said Watters.
Fetterman hasn’t exactly hidden that he had a stroke and most voters would anticipate he’d need some time to recover.
“The media used to say, this guy is great, everything was fine. And now they're saying you can't attack him because he's disabled. Like this isn't like he's in a wheelchair on crutches. No. Like he can't hear what people are saying. Could you ever sit in a Senate hearing and listen to important testimony and not be able to comprehend it?” said Watters.
So when did Jesse Watters become a doctor? He’s completely out of his depth. Plenty of hearing impaired people live their entire lives without hearing much sound at all and are perfectly capable of excelling at any number of jobs.
They don't they're going to have transcripts going along the bottom of the screen. What if you're in a Senate intelligence briefing classified briefing, and you're not understanding anything that's happened? This guy is not cut out for this job. But here's why the Democrats think he is. Because all he has to do is vote with the Democrats. That's that's what it all boils down,” said Watters.
Again Watters is not a doctor and should be making any assumptions about the health or cognitive ability of John Fetterman. Plenty of devices exist now for people who are hard of hearing that allow them to read words in real time. Transcription technology is not exactly new.
Bogus Expert of the Week
Lara Trump was asked to come on and speak about the Igor Danchenko trial which is part of the Dunham Report. Lara Trump is a repeat offender in this category as Fox News will trot her out for any number of topics.
Her work experience consists of briefly working as a producer at a tabloid news program and attending culinary school. She has no legal training or education. She’s not involved with this trial in any way.
I don’t include a clip of her this week as there wasn’t much she said that didn’t sound like she was reading it directly off a teleprompter.
Pam Bondi, the former Attorney General of Florida, joined Lara Trump during the segment. Bondi is a perfectly legitimate source to discuss a court case given her legal background and experience.
Fox News Responds to the January 6th Committee
The last installment of the January 6th Committee hearing revealed never before seen footage of Senate and Congressional leaders responding to the riot on the Capitol.
In most of the clips Speaker Nancy Pelosi is seen as calm and collected as she valiantly tries to call for additional security from the governor of Maryland and Virginia.
Fox News selected a clip where Pelosi expresses her rage at then President Donald J. Trump for causing the riot. The network seems to have forgotten that at the time Pelosi said she’d love to punch Trump an angry mob had stormed the Capitol and was searching for her specifically.
Comic Relief
The philosopher Cornel West appeared on Hannity last week to discuss how Black voters might be shifting away from the Democratic Party. The full 8-minute segment quickly fell apart into both West and Hannity talking over each other.
The phrase African-American was only used twice and voter only once. The entire segment made absolutely no sense. This is my edit of the jumbled mess.
Stories Fox thought were Newsworthy that were NOT Newsworthy
Tulsi Gabbard left the Democratic Party - I realize this one is a judgement call on my part as some folks might consider this a big story. PBS didn’t even mention it in a 15 or 30 second segment in their News Summary segment.
Fox News dedicated 4% or 21 minutes to Tulsi’s Gabbard.
The trial of Igor Danchenko - is the last gasp of the Durham Report a special counsel set up by former President Donald J. Trump to find evidence of a conspiracy against his administration in the Trump-Russia probe. Although it’s stretched on for three years the Durham hasn’t turned up much of anything.
Most non-partisan news sources haven’t put much focus towards the story.
Danchenko was and FBI informant and part of the largely discredited Russian dossier. He is accused of lying to the FBI. The judge threw out one of the charges against him on Friday which was seen as a major blow to Durham.
Fox News also did a terrible job in explaining the aspects of the trial which might have been intentional on their part. It was just another part of their persecution complex of Donald J. Trump.
Hannity made several attempts to tie in former Trump adviser Carter Page into this case but his attempts were muddled and unclear. Page has unsuccessfully filed lawsuits against various agencies and individuals within the U.S. government as well as several media companies.
PBS NewsHour did not include even a short segment on the week-long trial.
Border patrol agents on horseback were not whipping migrants. Fox has recycled this one a few times. Apparently there was new information released that Fox claimed proved the Department of Homeland Security knew from the start of their investigation that the agents did nothing wrong. I found this a bit suspect as the only other sources I could find on this were from extreme right wing sources.
Stories Fox Ignored
Every week I compare 15 hours of Fox News to five hours of PBS NewsHour and compile a list of all of the stories that PBS included that Fox News did not.
Social Security recipients will receive an increase in payments due to the cost of living increases caused by inflation.
DHS Announces New Migration Enforcement Process for Venezuelans - Effective immediately, Venezuelans who walk or swim across the border will be immediately returned to Mexico under a pandemic rule known as Title 42 authority, which suspends rights to seek asylum under the U.S. and international law on grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19. Any Venezuelan who illegally enters Mexico or Panama after Wednesday will also be ineligible to come to the U.S. under the offer.
Anti-government protests in Iran have spread to all parts of the country and have increased in intensity. The protests started in response to the death of a 22-year-old woman in police custody. She was arrested for allegedly not wearing a head scarf properly. Iran's Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) estimates 233 people have been killed in or after the widespread demonstrations
Elon Musk made a few different statements regarding his financial support for the Starlink internet service that he donated to Ukraine to help the country with their war against Russia. After some back and forth Musk conceded he will continue to support the program. The Starlink service gets funding and support from multiple entities.
NASA’s test mission (DART) was a success. The agency conducted the test to see if they could successfully prevent a dangerous asteroid from striking earth in the future.
Heavy rains have led to massive flooding and evacuations in Australia in the Victoria, New South Wales and Tasmania regions.
North Korea continues to threaten its neighbors - the country fired another ballistic missile and flew warplanes near its border with South Korea.
Hurricane Julia made landfall in Nicaragua as a Category 1 storm.
Israel and Lebanon reached an agreement over their Maritime border. The two countries are technically still at war. This should open up parts of the Mediterranean Sea to oil exploration.
The Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Dylann Roof, who challenged his death sentence and conviction. Roof was convicted for killing 9 Black parishioners in a racially motivated mass shooting at a South Carolina church.
The U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear arguments on an industry challenge to the constitutionality of a California animal welfare law regarding pork production.
Baltimore prosecutors dropped all charges against Adnan Syed after DNA evidence cleared him of the murder of a high school classmate. Syed spent 23 years in prison fighting his conviction. His case was featured in the popular podcast “Serial.”
A federal judge has ruled that former President Donald J. Trump will have to give a deposition in a defamation lawsuit filed by E.Jean Carroll. Carroll accused Trump of raping her in a department store in the mid-90s.
Palestinians strike against Israeli siege on Jerusalem refugee camp.
A bus bombing kills 18 soldiers in Syria while wounding dozens.
Former Federal Reserve chair Ben S. Bernanke, Philip H. Dybvig of Washington University in St. Louis and Douglas W. Diamond of the University of Chicago and were awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences
By the Numbers
Fox doesn’t endorse candidates as much as the network goes on smear campaigns of any tight race against a Republican opponent.
In stark contrast PBS News Hour also featured an extended segment on the senatorial race in Wisconsin. The network featured two close friends with polar opposite political beliefs and used them as a way of explaining each candidate’s history and positions on various issues as well as the race itself.
PBS NewsHour did not favor a candidate.
Coming up…
For this week I’ll be covering the first hour of “Fox & Friends,” “The Five,” and “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” I might have another bonus podcast this week it just sort of depends on what happens in the news cycle. In the next couple of weeks I will publish an interview with Andy Campbell the author of “We Are Proud Boys: How a Right Wing Street Gang Ushered In a New Era of American Extremism.”
Mmmm .... graphs.