Monday, October 19, 2009

Media Matters Daily Summary 10-19-09

Following criticism of being an "arm" of the GOP, Fox News aired no live coverage of Oct. 17 media "malpractice" tea party
Following White House communications director Anita Dunn's recent critique of Fox News serving as an "arm" of the Republican Party, Fox News did not devote any live coverage to what it had previously referred to as the October 17 "tea part[y]" protests by Operation: Can You Hear Us Now?, an organization that planned "to show the MSM [mainstream media] that we as the American Public are absolutely fed up with their journalistic malpractice." By contrast, Fox News devoted significant promotion and live coverage of the April 15 tax day tea party and the September 12 "March on Washington." Read More

Following Limbaugh, conservative media push baseless charge that Obama administration helped kill his Rams bid
Following Rush Limbaugh's failed bid to purchase the St. Louis Rams football team, the right-wing media have echoed Limbaugh's baseless claim that the Obama administration was involved in torpedoing his NFL ambitions. Limbaugh has claimed that the Obama administration "corrupted" the NFL bidding process because the head of the NFL Players Association, DeMaurice Smith, once served as counsel for Attorney General Eric Holder. Read More

UPDATED: Beck, Drudge, WND, Fox Nation falsely accuse Dunn of admitting White House "control" over news media
WorldNetDaily, followed by the Drudge Report and Fox Nation, falsely claimed that during a January 12 speech, White House communications director Anita Dunn boasted about the White House's "control" over the media. In fact, Dunn was discussing the Obama campaign's strategy for controlling the campaign's message, not the media; moreover, her comments were made before Obama had taken office and before she became communications director. Read More

Why the NFL and corporate America reject Limbaugh and Beck
So much for being "impotent and powerless." Read More

Beck's stated goal: Get administration officials fired, "take down this administration"
In recent days, Glenn Beck has said that something he is "working on" will "take the administration down" and that White House interim communications director Anita Dunn "will have to go away" after "what we show you tonight." Beck and his fellow Fox News personalities have repeatedly called for Obama administration officials to be fired, asked people to dig up information on administration officials, and fearmongered about President Obama, his advisers, and his policies. Read More

The Glenn Beck chart
Glenn Beck's affinity for chalkboard diagrams charting out the frequently illusory "connections" in the growing liberal conspiracy to undermine America is well-documented. In that spirit, Media Matters for America has explored Beck's links to the extremist, unhinged, and sometimes paranoid people and groups that inhabit the world of right-wing political activism and laid them out in a Beck-style chart, but with two key differences: these connections actually exist, and they were spell-checked. Read More

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