"If you're independent, Obama's press secretary Robert Gibbs has a shot at convincing you--even if you're conservative..."

An interesting viewpoint... Clearly, he has no issues or problems with news and opinion outlets being slanted or ideological, and even seems to believe (as I do), that this is the "wave of the future" and we're only going to see more of it in generations to come (now whether I think the fusing of news reporting and analysis is a good thing is an entirely different issue, but just because something is a bad idea doesn't mean we're not still going to see it happen). I suppose this stands to reason for one who is, essentially, a professional opinionist.

But essentially, his argument rests on the assumption that Fox is taking (or did take or would take) its marching orders from the Republican Party (and specifically, the Bush Administration), while left-leaning counterparts (he offers MSNBC, among others) maintain their independence and can't be directed about by the Democratic Party... It would be an interesting social science study to determine the validity of this assumption, although Kaus makes no attempt to do so other than to cite a single piece of anecdotal evidence, so we shouldn't necessarily accept it at face value (remember the mantra of the sabermetricians: "In God we trust.... everyone else must show statistics."). Still, even if it were true, this is a slightly different argument than what has been offered by the Obama Administration, which suggests that Fox is the only institution with an ideology and an agenda and is therefore worse than the "real" news sources... which include, among others, the left-leaning ideological outlets already conceded by Kaus.

I personally think the rise of the "packaged news story" isn't such a great thing. Oh, to be sure, it was always there, but not in the degree that we see today, such that the first time many Americans are hearing about an event, it is coming to them polished, spun, and dressed up to fit within clean partisan boxes-- no critical thinking necessary! I would be willing to grant Kaus's point that an organization that took it to the next level-- i.e., that essentially was an Administration press service masquerading as a news source-- is somewhat "worse" than what the other "ideological, but independent" sources are doing, but want to point out that (a) this is not what I believe the Obama Administration has stated to date, and in any case (b) he made no attempt to prove that assumption and just telling me that "Mickey Mantle was a better base runner than Willie Mays, because I saw them both play" is downright meaningless, if I don't get to see some data behind it. Kaus hasn't earned the right to prove something by fiat... I can't think of anyone who has.

--Bobby

....and its a conspiracy theory.

I think Fox is also not neutral (which, again, doesn't bother me) but it's also not independent (which does). This isn't because it's owned by Rupert Murdoch--moguls are, typically among the more independent sorts. It's because it's run by Roger Ailes. I have zero faith that Ailes is independent of the Republican party or, specifically, those Republicans who have occupied the White House recently--the Bushes. As I said, I think if Karl Rove called Ailes in 2003 and said "We don't want so much coverage of X" it's extremely likely that X would not be covered on Fox. A ... suggestive example of Fox's loyalty is the debate on immigration, in which Ailes' network initially seemed to try valiantly--against the beliefs of most of its audience--to push the Bush White House line in favor of "comprehensive" legalization (while brushing aside its viewers' views).

It's certainly possible, in theory, to have a faux news organization that pretends to be an ordinary, ideologically biased journalistic outlet but that, at the top, is actually taking orders from Moscow, or from Kennebunkport. That news organization might have lots of viewers and money and White House press passes and some great on-air correspondents--it's not as if you could rip off their masks to uncover the alien underneath...

This has it all conspiracy theory wise...

1) Paranoia...
2) The substitution of "Its POSSIBLE!" for real evidence or proof
3) Its unfalsifiable in that Kaus is claiming "They may look normal, but they are ALIEN UNDERNEATH!!!" (I swear, Kaus souds like David Icke here, the only difference being Icke believes he's talking about actual aliens.)
4) Where are the whistleblowers? Murdoch has been around for how long? What, has no one ever left his employ? Is he bumping them off?

You can see at the end of Kaus' piece that he has nothing evidence wise, because he contradicts himself. He begins by saying that he isn't talking about the parts of Fox that are opinion based, but his "evidence" that they were in the bag for Bush concerning Harriet Miers (at Murdoch's secret bidding mind you) is???? The opinion panel section of Brit Humes show! (Does Kaus not read his own stuff as he's writing?)

On the one hand, I can't help but to agree that I find fox news to be far more representative of the Republican party line than other outlets are of the democratic part line. IMO, it's impossible to miss.

On the other hand, conservatives are a somewhat more monolithic bunch. The democratic party has been historically and is now composed of a coalition of special interest groups much more so than the GOP. That puts them at odds more, and makes them more fractious and prone to fragmentation.

This difference could by itself account for most or all of the difference Kaus seems so enamored of. Maybe Fox just has an easier choir to preach to... . And that makes sense to me. Becuase as offputtingly toadyish as Fox News seems to me, they really don't seem any more sanctimonious and plain old full of sh!t as Keith Olberman.