[Pikamax]

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000580591



Activists Ask FTC to Take Action Against Fox News

By Charles Geraci

Published: July 19, 2004

NEW YORK On a day when newspapers around the country reported on some of the more than 3,000 local house parties Sunday night promoting the new documentary "Outfoxed," activists from MoveOn.org, Common Cause and other groups in New York announced a drive to strip the Fox News Channel of its "fair and balanced" slogan -- and then marched on the Fox studios in midtown Manhattan.

The group of about 50 organizers and lawyers attempted to present Fox officials with a petition, legal papers, and a copy of the DVD of "Outfoxed," with little apparent success. Some handed out copies of the DVD to Fox employees as they entered or exited the building.

Moveon.org announced at a press conference that it had asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to halt Fox News' use of the allegedly misleading "fair and balanced" tagline. The groups filed the action under Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act, which deals with deceptive practices in the advertising and marketing of cable television programming.

"Fox News is misleading its viewers by calling its partisan programming 'fair and balanced,'" Wes Boyd, co-founder of MoveOn.org, said in a statement. "There is nothing fair about deceptive advertising, and there is nothing balanced about telling only one side of the story. The Federal Trade Commission and Congress must act to prevent this misleading marketing from further harming consumers and public trust in the media."

Fox News has denounced the documentary's own fairness and its use of internal Fox memos, some of which were also quoted in a New York Times Magazine story.

[My2Cents]

BowelMoveOn.org

[Poohbah]

The staffers were trying to peddle DVD's to literally anyone who walked out of the building (which houses numerous other companies) and most people just kept walking and didn't even look at them -- the MoveOn people literally looked like those guys who stand on every street corner in Manhattan trying to peddle discount coupons to strip clubs.

The image is mind-bogglingly funny.

[NativeNewYorker]

The staffers were trying to peddle DVD's to literally anyone who walked out of the building (which houses numerous other companies) and most people just kept walking and didn't even look at them -- the MoveOn people literally looked like those guys who stand on every street corner in Manhattan trying to peddle discount coupons to strip clubs."

I am looking at the NYC Fox HQ building as I type this in midtown Manhattan. The odds of anyone in this neighborhood willingly taking something handed out by some street loafer are not far north of zero.

Idiots and amateurs.

[South40]

If MoveOn is so concerned with truth, where were they when the X-president was LYING UNDER OATH!?

[GSWarrior]

Isn't there a law against filing frivolous lawsuits?

[babyface00]

Moveon.org has a slogan too;
"Democracy in Action"

IMHO, any fair appraisal of their actions would more accurately be called "Socialism in Action".

We should sue.

[mewzilla]

It's so hard to get good rent-a-mobs anymore :(

[spodefly]

This story must be more Fox news slander. I have it on good authority that MoveOn.org and others of their political persuasion represent the "Heart and Soul" of America.

[bikepacker67]

ABCNBCCBSCNN Release all interoffice memos re: programming, and FOX will do the same.

I look forward to seeing who is and isn't balanced.

[Fiddlstix]

BTTT

[Billthedrill]

Hmm...now, wouldn't it be great if Fox just happened to have a camera on these clowns, and just happened to edit the funnier scenes into a "fair and balanced" report?

[DoughtyOne]

Isn't it interesting how much press Move-on.org and Michael Moore get?

[RippleFire]

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