I know most of my blog readers won’t believe that I have never before seen Fox News. I know that I’m not the last person to have seen it. As in Suzuki Roshi’s book Beginner’s Mind, a newbie can have fresh insights.
In San Francisco, the Holy City of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, none of the...
In San Francisco, the Holy City of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, none of the free TV channels carry Fox News. I don’t get cable because TV is of minor importance to me compared to the monthly alternative ways to spend $40. The home I stay in in Tokyo has cable but not Fox News, the same was true of the hotels I stayed in in China last year. I just got to see Fox News.
I’ve learned the answer to two of my previous lingering, but unspoken, questions. First, why doesn’t the Bush administration answer back to the continuous, frenzied and mean-spirited criticism that is leveled at it daily? Second, why have most people come to accept the thesis that mainstream media is heavily biased toward Lefty Fundamentalism?
The answer to both questions is the same: Fox News. Fox is the leader in news audience by a wide magnitude, on TV, Cable and the Internet. Consequently anyone who wants a balanced perspective on the news has Fox to turn to and the Bush administration is happy to oblige on a network that lets the news go through without spin. Or, with positive spin.
Second, anyone who doubts that CNN, CBS and the rest of the mainstream media is wildly Lefty Fundamentalist, only needs to watch Fox for an hour and know that that is true. The mean-spiritedness of mainstream media jumps right out of the screen image when a contrast is available.
Mostly, I was delighted to find that Fox News has a sense of humor and jokes about itself. The same is true of the Wall Street Journal. Religions, certainly Lefty Fundamentalism and Radical Islam, don’t have room for humor or self deprecation; the sky is falling and they are trying with self righteous zeal to stop it.