Indeed: Why don’t honest journalists take on Roger Ailes and Fox
Why don’t honest journalists take on Roger Ailes and Fox News?
One question has tugged at my professional conscience throughout the year-long congressional debate over health-care reform, and it has nothing to do with the public option, portability or medical malpractice. It is this: Why haven’t America’s old-school news organizations blown the whistle on Roger Ailes, chief of Fox News, for using the network to conduct a propaganda campaign against the Obama administration – a campaign without precedent in our modern political history?
Through clever use of the Fox News Channel and its cadre of raucous commentators, Ailes has overturned standards of fairness and objectivity that have guided American print and broadcast journalists since World War II. Yet, many members of my profession seem to stand by in silence as Ailes tears up the rulebook that served this country well as we covered the major stories of the past three generations, from the civil rights revolution to Watergate to the Wall Street scandals. This is not a liberal-versus-conservative issue. It is a matter of Fox turning reality on its head with, among other tactics, its endless repetition of its uber-lie: “The American people do not want health-care reform.”
Fox repeats this as gospel. But as a matter of historical context, usually in short supply on Fox News, this assertion ranks somewhere between debatable and untrue. </em>
I have long wondered this myself, and have come to the conclusion that our system- which is based upon a form of faith- doesn’t work when a player in it doesn’t feel bound by the rules. And its not just the knee-pad wearing media- its our entire ruling elites. Notice that Bush, Cheney et al haven’t had to answer for their blatant abandonment of this nations principles, treason, illegal wars, or massive spying on U.S. citizens without warrant. Its because they, like Ailes, know that the “system” won’t take on its own- for fear of the spotlight landing on them at some point. It’s a gutless and revolting spectacle, and one that is going to be the ruin of us all.
