There are enough people wondering aloud about the quality of what they are watching that "news" as it is being done now is going to be under pressure to change:
America’s Election HQ is a chummy, vibrating hour packed with flashy graphics, made-to-order partisan conflicts, Fox’s trademark general friendliness to conservatives and two gleaming, youthful hosts in anchors Bill Hemmer and Megyn Kelly.
“Yes,” said Morris, before thinking better of his allegation. “I don’t -- I can’t prove it. I wasn’t there.”
So what exactly was he reporting?
The day I watched, Hemmer led the show with “breaking news”: former Clinton aide Dick Morris heard from an unnamed source that Bill Clinton had recommended to Columbia’s president in 2007 that he would only get a trade agreement with the U.S. by convincing Democrats to support it. According to Morris, 10 days later, Columbia hired the consulting firm led by Mark Penn, the recently-resigned chief strategist of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
“Are you reporting that Bill Clinton got Mark Penn the gig?” Hemmer asked urgently.“Yes,” said Morris, before thinking better of his allegation. “I don’t -- I can’t prove it. I wasn’t there.”
So what exactly was he reporting?
More:
After all, Hannity’s success depends critically on the virtually unlimited obtuseness of his audience. It takes a rare and exceptional mind to fall for the same fallacies over and over again, but Hannity’s viewers are unvaryingly consistent in their credulity.
How does Hannity manage to pull the wool over the eyes of his audience while viewers flock away from liberal commentators? I believe this has something to do with the fact that the politics of fear and resentment has proven a winning strategy for the right wing in the past. Put simply, for a lot of voters it’s easier to imagine things that make them angry than to envision ways of solving the challenges that make them fearful and angry in the first place. Hannity’s genius, and that of his compatriots, is to deftly turn public figures like Al Gore, John Kerry, and Barack Obama into emblems that stir the anxiety and ire of a significant portion of the electorate.
How does Hannity manage to pull the wool over the eyes of his audience while viewers flock away from liberal commentators? I believe this has something to do with the fact that the politics of fear and resentment has proven a winning strategy for the right wing in the past. Put simply, for a lot of voters it’s easier to imagine things that make them angry than to envision ways of solving the challenges that make them fearful and angry in the first place. Hannity’s genius, and that of his compatriots, is to deftly turn public figures like Al Gore, John Kerry, and Barack Obama into emblems that stir the anxiety and ire of a significant portion of the electorate.
