Shame on CNN
By Erick Posted in The Courts — Comments (19) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
CNN is often accused of being a left wing news network. Had it wanted to defend itself from that charge it could have easily told NARAL no -- CNN has turned down controversial and/or false advertising in the past. Yet, despite clear evidence that NARAL's attack on John Roberts is, at best, fully misleading and, at worse and probably more accurate, an out and out lie to gin up hostility against Roberts by painting him as a lunatic right wing extremist, CNN is chosing to run NARAL's attack ad.
Here's the irony. CNN has has repeatedly used the Annenberg Political Fact Check site to ridicule and malign false and misleading campaign advertising and statistics. Even without Annenberg, CNN got so dedicated to fact checking political ads, it hired Brooks Jackson, who has thrived on checking facts, to present CNN as a fair arbiter of honesty in politics. Well, the Annenberg Political Fact Check Site says NARAL's "ad is false."
How sad for CNN to reject its own fact checking tradition and willinging allow itself to be used as a propaganda machine of the left to smear a man with lies.
Update [2005-8-9 23:6:10 by Erick]: If CNN running this ad were not bad enough, Fox News is set to run it too.
Update [2005-8-10 10:12:21 by Erick]: Fox News informs me that it is not running the NARAL ad. A local Fox station is running it, but Fox News has declined.
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Shame on CNN 19 Comments (0 topical, 19 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
It has gotten to the point where if CNN does something, it can be assumed to be wrong, where "wrong" means that it will alienate at least some viewers and drive them away, leading to lower ratings and ultimately lower revenues.
CNN is becoming the quintessential case study of how to lose a franchise that had a 20-year head start on its competitors, 100% market share in its segment, and one of the world's strongest brands.
The people at CNN had six years to figure out what Fox News was doing to them, and adapt. They didn't. They just sat there and watched, while Fox caught up to them, passed them, and kept going.
Everything CNN knows must be wrong, because everything they try makes things worse. These people really are dumber than a box of hammers.
The thing is, it isn't any one decision they make. It's how they go about making decisions. Somehow, their decisions all come out wrong, no matter who is making them.
I hope that before they go down the tubes altogether, they let some Organizational Behavior types come in and study that place. It needs to be written up, so that no one ever does that again.
In the world of cable news, $125,000 is not that much money. If CNN is in such dire straits that they need this cash to survive, then this may be their swan song.
How could they abandon their fact checking system? It would not have taken any time or money. The only reason someone does not check facts is because they are afraid of the truth. And since I can't imagine that they needed the money, this decision is purely ideological. They are looking the other way thinking no one can see their ruse.
It will backfire...
...That over the last year, FOX News has seriously gone off-track.
Running this ad is just that latest (confirmatory) symptom.
It's starting to look like it's time for serious ("hard news") conservatives to start thinking about setting up their own cable/satellite news network.
Because FOX News just ain't cutting it, anymore.
24 news networks are just in it for the money, end of story.
Thats why high ratings blockbusters like Natalee Holloway and Michael Jackson get so much airtime
It's just plain sad, really
Erick, I did not see your update.
That just kills me that they would run this. O'Reilly had a debate on this very ad tonight and he opposed it. I can only hope they run the ad that has been produced to counter it as well. One after the other jfwould make me happy..
Fox runs the ad, b-bye bye, Fox. If the report is true that they are going to run it, shame on them.
Enough of catering to lying lefty trash.
CNN is already toast, fast on their way to MSNBC non-viewer status. It is hard to believe that Foc is bing so intimidated by....just who?....that they would do something no one with integrity would do.
Unless they have an incredibly good explanation for this, they will go the way of CNN.
If the fact checkers are accurate and CNN just ran the ad anyway, why does anyone still watch them? The bloggers are changing the world for the better. We are now the canaries in the coal mine. Journalistic Ethics? Go ask Dan Rather!
It is kind of disconcerting that an ad with such blatant slander would run, but maybe if it's aggressively countered it can result in NARAL being discredited and even further marginalized.
No I don't mean that Democratic politicions would stop grovelling to NARAL no matter how vicious and ridiculous their lies are, but maybe some liberal Republicans can be shamed into not playing footsie with such low lifes. But that would require some of their colleagues appealing them on a personal basis, "Have you no shame?" allowing NARAL into their offices when they still refuse to apologize for their libel. I guess I shouldn't be too confident about that.
It's sick what people are willing to do when they are blinded by a political agenda. They falsely accuse him of defending a murderer in their efforts to defend the "right" to kill unborn children.
Is there any reasoning? Any sense of decency?
I do hope that this is NARAL overplaying its hand.
Fox News is, for the most part, as sensationlistic and mindless as the other Fox channels.
It seems to me we're doing just fine to get a pro-American bias and several conservative hosts.
I saw that ad. I'm not sure what the false part is, but it's pretty effective. The WH should release those papers and get this guy out from under the cloud of suspicion that's hanging over him/them.
Interesting to see that Dems are learning from the SVBT issue by putting something controversial out on the cheap and letting the MSM do the rest...probably going to be a lot of that in 06/08, hmm?
That's why it's all Aruba, all the time. If you want serious news, you want the web, at least until it becomes a revenue source also.
Here is an e-mail just sent to FOX News:
I have been a loyal Fox watcher for years now, but I must say that I will be tuning in less and less if you insist on being a sister to CNN by carrying a patently false ad by NARAL against Judge Roberts. The Annenberg Politcal Fact Check site has already denounced this ad as completely false. Why would you want to knowingly mislead your viewers? Is this your idea of "fair and balanced"?
They provide some amusement before they are relegated to The Pile™.
You, it would seem, are not a clever one.
The link in the story to FactCheck.org details the falsity of the ad.
In addition, there was a story and a diary further covering the territory yesterday.
Consider this to be your first and last warning.
In the name of proof I was wondering, when has a network or a 24-hrs cable news station ever not ran a political ad due to a lack of fact or rather misleading facts in the ad?
Just to make sure that there is a precedent for CNN to follow and if they are in fact breaking that precedent.
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