Some People Say...

One of the most devious efforts by this White House has been the attempt to eliminate "facts" from the discourse. Indeed, as Frank Luntz recently advised Republicans, "It is tempting to counter-attack using facts and figures. Resist the temptation."

Instead, the right is trying to suggest, like it has with the mainstream media, that there are "red facts" and "blue facts." In essence, it is trying to get people to believe that there are no agreed-upon-facts. I'm amazed by how many conservatives I read who claim that the reality is much different than the so-called "Main Stream Media" is portraying it, even blaming Bush's poor poll ratings on the way news is reported. Essentially, a "who ya gonna believe -- me or your lying eyes?" argument. Eric Boehlert at Salon.com (subscribers only, unfortunately) has written an excellent piece about this effort. Boehlert notes:

The most egregious example of this almost metaphysical chutzpah appears in an
October 2004 article for the New York Times Magazine, in which Suskind
quotes a senior Bush advisor who dismissed reporters for living in the "the
reality-based community." The advisor said, "That's not the way the world
really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our
own reality."

The movie, Out Foxed, does an very good job of discussing how Fox News has become skilled at trying to create doubts about undeniable facts by attempting to make viewers believe there are two sides of every fact, using the phrase "some people say." For example: "Some people have noted how Richard Clarke says that Condeleeza Rice was not attentive enough to the Al Qaeda concerns he brought to her attention, while some people say that Richard Clarke is a disgruntled wacko who can't be trusted. Will we ever know the truth?"

Boehlert has an excellent example of this effort:

One small example, the type that occurs almost hourly on Fox, came during
the recent controversy over comments by CNN's news president Eason Jordan about U.S. troops targeting journalists in Iraq. (The comments eventually led to his
resignation.) On Feb. 14, Fox News host Brian Kilmeade interviewed Reese
Schonfeld, one of CNN's founders, who years ago left the company.

Schonfeld: "But remember that a U.S. tank [in April 2003] rolled up in
front of the Hotel Palestine, which is where all the journalists were, turned
the turret around, pointed its gun, and fired up at the building."

Kilmeade: "That's what CNN reported."

Schonfeld: "No, that's what is reported. The guy from Reuters was killed,
and a Spanish journalist was killed. Nobody knows why. The U.S. Army has never
completed its investigation into that incident."

Schonfeld was correct on the facts regarding the Hotel Palestine incident,
which are not in dispute. But the Fox host wanted to suggest the facts were in
dispute, or subject to CNN's bias, therefore making them easier to set aside.
"They have an ability to confuse an issue and neutralize the facts that aren't
in their favor," says Brock. "When a reader looks at a story and does not know
what to make of it, then Fox has done its job."

The consequences are enormous, says Auletta. "In a democracy, you need a
common set of facts." Suskind notes, "If you believe there is no inherent
value to public dialogue based on fact, then that frees you up to try all sorts
of things other people in power wouldn't have ever thought of. And we're seeing
the evidence of that now."

Fox News and their progeny aren't just an effort to badly skew news to the right through an obvious right-wing bias; it's a concerted effort to make Americans question every negative thing they hear about the right and this Administration. Don't let them get away with it.

- posted by Joshua @ 8:33 PM