Fox News is BP oil spill misinformation clearinghouse

Myths and falsehoods on the Gulf oil spill

Not a bad site for a little extra fact cross-checking. Just in case.

There are some links here and some pretty good analysis. Very interesting.

MediaMatters for America

Sample

Obama "waited 50 days, 55 days to really begin" responding to Gulf oil spill. On the June 17 edition of Fox & Friends, Rudy Giuliani said of the federal government's response to the oil spill: "The government has played a big role in letting us down here as well. And who the heck is -- you know, criticizing President Obama, President Obama's response? I mean, the president waited 50 days, 55 days to really begin a resp- -- he told us in his speech that the federal government was in charge from the very beginning."

reply to post by ~Lucidity


Thank you! S+F!

This is bound to prove helpful as the fall approaches....

It's a hot mess down there. I only trust actual residents now to get the real story and conditions on the Coast. (Maybe Anderson Cooper)


They have no reason to lie, and are my neighbors. I believe them until they give me a reason not to.



[edit on 25-6-2010 by Copperflower]

Thanks, and you're welcome. Have used that site a long time now and they're pretty ethical and sharp. Always good to check a few sources and have them in your back pocket.

reply to post by ~Lucidity


Thanks for the link, an abundance of information.

You're welcome. They're great for other stories too. I find the analysis they do to be pretty thorough.

If someone took the time to actually document just how often the Right is lying in their attempt to label this "Obama's Katrina", it could be quite damning.

It's funny how the SAME EXACT people who defended Bush's complete bumbling of Katrina as being a 'state's issue" are now blaming the Fed for an issue that is essentially BP's issue.

Fun stuff. Thanks for the media matters link, OP. Star and flag as they say.

Originally posted by justadood
If someone took the time to actually document just how often the Right is lying in their attempt to label this "Obama's Katrina", it could be quite damning.

It's funny how the SAME EXACT people who defended Bush's complete bumbling of Katrina as being a 'state's issue" are now blaming the Fed for an issue that is essentially BP's issue.

Fun stuff. Thanks for the media matters link, OP. Star and flag as they say.

the latest news is that Obama and BP conspired to get the "cap and trade" bill passed....it never ends.

okay the site should be renamed,"Down with Fox News and their 'Myths'" instead of "media matters of america".

Stared. CNN announced 780,000 Gallons of Dispersant used UNDERWATER while FOX NEWS stated only 380,000 has been used UNDERWATER. FOX is telling everything at half basis.

reply to post by justadood


I ranted about this very things somewhere. It's like bizarro world. Everytime it happens, my jaw drops. Though I don't know why things like this can still shock me. The most recent HUGE example of this? All the Republican senators coming out against the Iraq was? Wow.

reply to post by jimmyx


Yes and it's a huge deal that BP "authored the bill." When the fact of the matter is that the senators trying to get the bill passed included the oil companies to make the Republican Congress "happy." I'm paraphrasing. But what a huge talking point, eh?

reply to post by SneakAPeek


Makes a person wonder...why.... Goes to show where their true bias might be? With the corporations maybe and not necessarily to any particular (ahem) political party?

reply to post by dragnet53


Are you implying that all they address is FoxNews? Just because I happened to, in lieu of current events, pick this page to post?

reply to post by ~Lucidity


Of course, to be fair and balanced, you should point out that MediaMatters is funded by George Soros, MoveOn.org and the Democracy Alliance.

Media Matters has not always been forthcoming about its high-profile backers. In particular, the group has long labored to obscure any financial ties to George Soros. But in March 2003, the Cybercast News Service (CNS) detailed the copious links between Media Matters and several Soros "affiliates"—among them MoveOn.org, the Center for American Progress, and Peter Lewis. Confronted with this story, a spokesman for the organization explained that "Media Matters for America has never received funding directly from George Soros" (emphasis added), a transparent evasion.

Nor were groups cited by CNS the only connection between Media Matters and Soros. As investigative journalist Byron York has noted, another Soros affiliate that bankrolled Media Matters was the New Democratic Network. In addition, Soros is reported to be involved in the newly formed Democracy Alliance, a partnership of some 80 affluent financiers who each have vowed to contribute $1 million or more in order to build up an ideological infrastructure of leftist thinks tanks and advocacy groups. News reports list Media Matters as a main beneficiary of the Alliance's funding. By August of 2004, Media Matters' operating budget had already doubled to $4 million.

To summarize, Soros and his Open Society Institute pour millions of dollars into the coffers of MoveOn, the Center for American Progress, and Democracy Alliance. In turn, these organizations funnel some of that money to Media Matters.

www.discoverthenetworks.org...

BTW, the Democracy Alliance is:

* Created by Democratic political operative Rob Stein
* Goal is to raise money to fund a leftwing political movement and Democratic electoral victories
* Supported by George Soros and Peter Lewis

www.discoverthenetworks.org...

This is the pot calling the kettle black!

Thanks. And I'm sure he and Rupert duke it out every night at their Super Secret Rich Dude's meeting too.

By the way, I'm well aware of the history and evolution of this.

To be fair and balanced you need to do it yourself and look at MULTIPLE sources, some mainstream and some not, and make use of those and your common sense and logic.

Never did I state that this should be the only place you go. And I still maintain that they in all my years of experience using them have a far superior record of factchecking than say the subject here, FoxNews.

For one thing, they actually seem to DO it.

Question for You: Who funds DiscovertheNetworks?


[edit on 26-6-2010 by ~Lucidity]

reply to post by ~Lucidity

And I still maintain that they in all my years of experience using them have a far superior record of factchecking than say the subject here, FoxNews.

Of course, beauty, and politics, are both in the eyes of the beholder.
"Facts" are based upon who observed, what they observed, what they failed to observe, what they chose to report, and what they deliberately left out.
One need only look at history books of World War II, one published in the old USSR, and one published in the US to experience that. Of course, the entire AGW issue is another example of that experience.

reply to post by ProfEmeritus

They fact check. It's very clear when organizations and when they don't.

And again, I hope you are not assuming that simply because this is the topic under discussion at the moment that is all someone might use?

Feel free to debate any article about BP from any source here. The ones I checked in the subject article seem to be substantiated. To me. If they don't seem to be to you, then please point those out for us.

Our only interest is the truth, not this tedious and endless left vs. right bantering, and anything from any directional ideology that gets us there is welcome.

reply to post by ~Lucidity


Are you kidding me? Media Matters?

The Soros backed, wanker group-think epicenter?

Media Matters is not credible. It never has been. Get that trash off this webzone.

reply to post by ~Lucidity

Our only interest is the truth, not this tedious and endless left vs. right bantering, and anything from any directional ideology that gets us there is welcome.

Please explain where my explanation of how "facts" are recorded, ever mentions left versus right. My point is that facts and "fact checking" are only as reliable as the methodology used. I mentioned the AGW issue, not because of a left versus right debate, but because people chose to ignore certain data which did not "fit" their assumptions. I saw this done by some academic colleagues, and quite bluntly, it disgusted me, because it is dishonest, and fails to get at the truth. Research and findings should be published, REGARDLESS of what they end up implying. I certainly hope you agree.
To answer your implied question, of course, I understand that one needs to look at multiple sources. Of course, sometimes even with that, there is not enough convincing information, to draw ANY meaningful and honest conclusion.
As to what actually happened at the BP spill, 11 of what would have been the best observers of the "facts", are quite unfortunately, unable to ever tell their story.

reply to post by justadood


was it just BPs issue and NOT Obama's issue when HE, make no mistake, OBAMA, turned down help from other nations to come help contain the oil spill? Weird doesnt sound like BP there, sounds like criminal negligence on Obamas part.....

How bout when he refused to rescind the jones act, yeah, guess that was BP too....



Im sorry, I dont buy into willful ignorance when it comes to the "in your face" crap thats coming from Obama.......if he wants to sue someone im all for it......we can sue BP

Then we can file a class action against him for blatant CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE!

*end rant*

[edit on 26-6-2010 by ManBehindTheMask]

[edit on 26-6-2010 by ManBehindTheMask]

[edit on 26-6-2010 by ManBehindTheMask]

reply to post by ProfEmeritus

I appreciate the information but already knew it.

I never said your explanation mentioned left vs right. I brought that up as a subject, and only because there's been a battle on online decrying and dismissing information from this source that one because ________ for years now, and it's generally a left vs right argument. Rupert funds this one, Soros funds that one blah blah. That was the only reason I brought that up at all and it was probably unthinking.

Oh I agree that the facts should be written and reported. But no corporately funded media outlet is going to publish any hard hitting facts. And while there's some progress being made on the alternative news front, it has a long way to go. Investigative journalism is dying. Fact checking has gone by the wayside. Media access is being denied.

"News" shows read information directly from the internet or some other source, with whatever slant they need put on it, and we have to dig for the source. Analysis is so one-sided that the average reader or listener if they want more have to go dig for it, and most don't. Accusations of this-leaning or that-leaning are thrown, the radical fringes spind the stories with their slants. And most people just typically decide to settle on one outlet.

Hardly any source takes the time to do background together to put a story into context and perspective for the reader. Followups tend to go by the wayside once a story is beat to death. They assume we have short attention spans, and for the most part they're right.

Freelancers journalists don't have the backing or are systematically discredited or worse if and when they do get the word out. Bloggers who are credible face opposition from thousands who are not. And I shudder to thing about how many people get their news solely from blogs. And for the most part probably bloggers they agree with.

As to fact checking in specific? Methodology is not the issue so much as motivation and manpower. Even our largest newspapers have cut staffing to the bone. And new people coming into the business, even if they've been taught it at journalism school, soon find out it's no longer important. What's important is getting the numbers up. The emphasis is to get it out there first and fast and go back and fix it later, if we remember.

And as to BP, I agree. I have a photographer colleague who is attempting to chronicle the happenings in the gulf. He managed to get press access, but it's still controlled and very limited. And it's funny, but even when he gets the photos out? He's met with cries of "faked pics!" It's a sad state, and I'm afraid the day is coming, if not already upon us, when we will never really know what the facts are.

reply to post by tetrahedron

Originally posted by ~Lucidity
Not a bad site for a little extra fact cross-checking. Just in case.

Please READ before you post. Thank you.

[edit on 26-6-2010 by ~Lucidity]