Is Fox Losing its' magic?

[faithincowboys]

I love Fox news,don't get me wrong, but don't you think they are fumbling the ball lately. Shep Smith really sucks-- he has been anti-Bush lately. Shep quoted Howell Raines' boy Nicholas Krstoff the other day. Doesn't it look like Hannity wants to beat up Shep every afternoon when Shep says some anti-Bush BS? Also, O'reilly pissed me off a couple of weeks ago when he went after Lynne Cheney like she was Hillary. Funny how the liberal pundits treat the evil Hill like she walks on water, and the so-called conservative O'Reilly was a pit bull with Cheney's wife. Anybody else notice this?

[PhiKapMom]

I agree with you on Britt Hume -- I always watch his show! He reports the facts which is what I like for a news show.

[Freedom2specul8]

I had no idea the owner was liberal until not that long ago. I know some people stay on top of those things..know who is filtering the news for us...why hey, for fox news it's a liberal news owner. Go feeeegure.

[husky ed]

I agree with you. I think at times FNC is trying to out E! the real E!.
Anytime they talk about or bring on Ozzy, Joe M., Nichol or the rest of the trailer trash attracting bunch, I'm changing the channel as fast as I can.
And for the most part I've to the point where I listen to the music station on the sat. during the day and just catch the headlines here on FR. There's not as many FOX NEWS ALERTS thankfully.

[sinkspur]

But you know what..if they're screwing up the local stories, we have to be cautious about the bigones too.

They get their local stories from local people.

I have to kinda chuckle about this. People come on Free Republic and post some pretty outrageous stuff and it's swallowed whole.

It pays to be cautious, but I just can't stand the editorial slant of CNN and MSNBC on many stories. The one major exception was CNN's reporting of the Columbia disaster; it was head-and-shoulders above everybody else, I hear; I never left CNN's coverage during that day.

[PhiKapMom]

Think you just hit on why for the most part I don't like most national news except for Hume. I hate being told something I know isn't true after either watching the event or getting reports of the event from several different sources.

It is like watching someone give a speech and then being told what the person meant. That has always bugged me!

[terilyn]

"Maybe Fox isn't perfect, but they sure as heck beat any of the competition."

A big Amen to that!

Anybody remember Danny Pearle? When CNN and MSNBC were falling all over themselves to announce that his body had been found? They had to be first. A lot of complaining over Fox's lack of breaking news was going on that day. Then when it turned out not to be him, but some guy that had a jacket on that was similar I clearly remember Fox making a statement that they had the story, but were waiting for confirmation to run with it.

You gotta dance with the one that brung ya!

Fox has done more to include the conservative message in their reporting than anybody outside of Rush.

I'll gladly put up with their Fox News Alerts if it means excellent Pentagon reporting and a Managing Editor like Brit Hume.

[PhiKapMom]

Lived outside of San Antonio when I learned to know about Murdoch. Here is a little background on what happened in San Antonio:

"But then, Rupert Murdoch -- the Australian-born chairman and chief executive officer of News Corp. --- bought the Express and the News from Harte-Hanks in December 1973. Harte-Hanks retained the broadcast outlets.

Upping the ante

Murdoch, a graduate of London's Fleet Street school of journalism and long known for his newspapers' flashy packaging, launched a major campaign against the Light.

Although the Express retained its conservative, paper-of-record presentation, the News was redesigned to have a more tabloid-style appearance that featured large, dramatic-sounding headlines. Its content was heavily weighted toward articles about local crimes and fires, and the stories were told with plenty of colorful adjectives."

He ended up buying the Light to put it out of business!

[Freedom2specul8]

WRT:locals reporting.. That's true too..but the national was so in a hurry to beat msnb, because during that particular story I referenced, on the same day..they were running nose to nose trying to cover it....they shot themselves in the foot by reporting too quickly. It was odd..

Speaking of cnn, our local fox station, I rarely watch--they are fox, yet use CNN's breaking news more often than fox..now why is that? YIKES They have tv monitors showing fox national news channel running in the background too.

[Cboldt]

Heheh. It's 10% news and 90% entertainment.

O'Reilly does a sex-related story every show, puffs it out of proportion to justify the presentation.

You hit on the half-baked factual reporting. And, you know where to look for the facts (watch the event on C-SPAN, read the written record, or otherwise research the facts). So naturally, any news show will not hold up.

Hume and company have very good political commentary. So do Kudlow and Cramer. If you havn't heard Kudlow tear Chris Matthews a new a**, you ought to look for it. I caught one exchange last week, channel surfing, and was impressed. Kulow is succinct, and does not back down.

Fox's moring show is the best one on the market. What I mean by that is simply that is is the show that entertains me the best, and gets under my skin the least.

FR Rocks. This is the place to get news.

[Freedom2specul8]

By golly I think you have hit the nail on the head..and I just "know" we can't send "that" to O'reilly for a full investigation. I'll have to bookmark your post for future reference.

[Freedom2specul8]

I love listening to fox's morning show too...

[Freedom2specul8]

I'm starting to butcher my sentences..am too tired I guess. It was good to see you tonight..and keep up the good fight!

[PhilDragoo]

EVERYBODY LOVES FOX BUT HELEN

We enjoy FOX.

One Sunday I went ballistic when Juan Williams kept refusing to admit Arafat is a terrorist to Britt.

I emailed Roger Ailes.

Yes, when he isn't in conference with our president he responds personally to my emails.

Twice in two years--quick, tell Tom Daschle.

At any rate, I enjoyed his reply:

Relax. We don't mind if everyone doesn't agree with us. Brit won the round anyway.

I returned to normal blood pressure, and realized he's right.

And as for O'Reilly being "conservative"--not.

The only time he's replied to me in three years was in response to a certain email making the rounds--you've all seen it.

He defended Hitlery and that Bill Lann Lee character--so, puh-lease, let's not say he's "tough on Hitlery".

He's like buttah, a pussycat, a Harvard liberal.

Oops, the toothpaste is out of the tube.

But Fox rocks, I dig Brit and Sean Hannity.

As for Geraldo:

I emailed Roger Ailes that he should sign Louis Rukeyser and can Geraldo.

His reply:

Lou is good, but Geraldo costs less and has higher ratings.

I think Roger Ailes needs his own show.

Got just the network for it.

[foreverfree]

(FOX NEWS ALERT "Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead" THIS HAS BEEN A FOX NEWS ALERT)

FOREVERFREE RESPONSE ALERT "foreverfree is chuckling" THIS HAS BEEN A FOREVERFREE RESPONSE ALERT

foreverfree

[LaGrone]

I believe the Fox cable news channel has really helped the Republicans with their message to the public through fair reporting.

Having said that, the constant alerts are becoming very annoying. Also some of the prime time shows are becoming tiring. But Britt is still the fairest analyst on any station, and the most informed IMHO. His interviews are equally tough on both Liberals and Conservatives.

[foreverfree]

Rupert Murdoch -- the Australian-born chairman and chief executive officer of News Corp. --- bought the Express and the News from Harte-Hanks in December 1973.

Was this Rupe's first US media property? I thought the NYP was.

Does Rupe still own the Express-News?

foreverfree

[jbstrick]

How typical... If you don't like the show/reporting turn off the TV. For years, you people were complaining & whining about the bias of the other networks. Now that one comes along which is somewhat fair in reporting, we have to complain to their methods.

[pollywog]

In one word, YES!!!!!!! They are stooping to the level of CNN and MSNBC as far as I am concerned.

[arasina]

G-block. Ditto here. Inquiring minds want to know!

A news program is put together in segments called BLOCKS. The show starts with a SNEAK (preview of what you'll see in the half-hour), then after the news from the anchor desk there's the OPEN (self explanatory term). They do the first block, which is given the letter A. They use letters to determine each block because the news stories each have pages that are numbers. So it's A-1, A-2, A-3 etc. When they're ready to go to a commercial break they use what is called a BUMP, which is information about what is coming up in the next segment. I believe the term came about because they "bump" into the commercial rather than just a drastic cut-off.

The blocks are usually organized with most important (TOP) stories in the first segment, then the B Block would have less significant but still newsworthy stories, and so on (not that the news stories get less and less important). They usually have a particular type of news in each block, such as the "Around The World in 80 Seconds" thing. Traditional television affiliate newscasts would just call it World News, but you'll note if you watch local news they all have a segment or portion of a segment devoted to international news.

Most half-hour news shows are really only about 20 minutes of information once you exclude the teases, bumps and commercials. (Sounds a little like a strip tease, which I guess a news program could be in essence...the stripping away of the news of the day.) You'll notice local newscasts usually have entire blocks for sports and weather that may or may not be included in national newscasts.

The name of each story is called a SLUG, and that's usually what you see in the SUPER (the fonts/letters at the bottom of the screen---not the crawl--that are basically a title indicating the story content and they are "superimposed" on the screen by a CG or Character Generator aka Chyron.)

The famous FNC "G BLOCK" came about because that's where the producer decided to put the entertainment news of the day. Evidently Shep started just calling it what was listed on the show's rundown and it got bigger and sillier from there.

I know this is more than you ever wanted to know, but hopefully some will find it interesting. Next week's lesson: How they get video or weather maps to appear as if they're behind the person when it's really just a blue screen. (Just kidding, of course) :)

[Cold Heat]

The two that you mentioned are likely the worst that FOX has.IMHO!

I generally watch neither unless there is something of great interest.