I recently learned that Fox is so afraid of Ron Paul that they’re singling him out for exclusion in their upcoming (January 6th) candidate forum in New Hampshire. They have apparently invited Giuliani, Huckabee, McCain, Romney, and Thompson, but not Paul and Hunter. This despite the fact that, in New Hampshire, Paul outright outpolls Thompson and is within the margin of error plus “Not sure” numbers of both Huckabee and Giuliani. In some measures (Q4 fundraising and internet presence), Paul is the top tier.
Though I rarely wonder about media bias (it’s obvious), I decided to take a few minutes to see how the biggest national TV news outlets are doing. Here’s what I found on the main politics pages (or “more politics headlines”) of some of these outlets, as well as some data on their blogs:
CNN’s “more headlines” page: Nothing on Paul, lots of articles and links about other candidates, including low-pollers Biden and Richardson.
CNN’s Political Ticker: Numerous articles mentioning Romney, Huckabee, Thompson, Obama, Clinton, McCain, and even Dodd. Nothing on Paul and a seemingly strange silence about Giuliani, too.
CBS’s main politics page: No articles about Paul. Numerous and multiple articles about others.
CBS From the Road and Horserace: Paul not listed anywhere.
ABC News: Nothing on Paul but lots of news on the other candidates.
ABC Blogs: Only the link to Paul’s blogs page, but stories about others, including low-pollers Richardson, Dodd, and Biden,
MSNBC: No easy to find mentions of Paul, but lots about the other candidates.
Fox News You Decide page: No stories on Paul.
Fox News blogs from the Embed producers: 1 entry for Paul, 1 each for Keyes, Richadrson, Dodd, Kucinich, Biden, and Tancredo. 21 or more entries each for Obama, Clinton, McCain, Huckabee, and Romney.
For years, CNN held the honor of being my least favorite TV news outlet. Fox, once upon a time, I thought was actually above average (CBS, ABC, and NBC representing the ‘middle’). Fox’s behavior lately has me moving them down to the bottom.
Fox News has the slogan “We Report, You Decide.” Given their exclusion of Paul from the upcoming candidate forum, and heavily favoring the so-called popular candidates, it appears clear that Fox News doesn’t actually report. Fortunately, you can still decide and so can I.
I decided: due to Paul’s exclusion from the upcoming forum, no more Fox News for me.
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