John Stewart Strikes Again

It doesn't get any clearer than this:

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Fox News and Health Care Emails to the White House

I'm not going to put up the clip of the FoxNews segment where the supposed "news" reporter harangues the Deputy White House Press secretary over the White House's efforts to disabuse people of myths regarding the health care plan, but you can see the clip here if you are so inclined.

This clip proves to me that FoxNews, as if anybody had any doubts, is NOT a news service, but rather an ideological propaganda outlet masquerading as a news provider. This FoxNews "reporter" did not just seek to get information from the Deputy White House Press Secretary. Rather, it is clear that she brought in a strong ideological agenda. She was out to fight an ideological and partisan battle, not to report news.

Second, I found her criticism to be somewhat schizophrenic. Here she is trying to claim that the right to public free speech is somehow compromised when it is distributed to the most public of sources: government. What is even more ironic is the fact that this FoxNews reporter likely supports the government's ability to intercept private communications secretly and without court approval -- to really put together an "enemies list" that happens beyond the scrutiny of the checks and balances of our democratic system. So, the secret capturing of private communication by people the government itself, and secretly, decides is an "enemy" is somehow acceptable and actually "defends" freedom, while pronouncements intended to be part of a widely-circulated public information campaign against government policy is somehow "chilling" to free speech when this widely-circulated public information campaign is actually presented to the government which is the supposed target of the campaign. These people want to engage in a public whisper campaign against the government and then cowardly want to avoid any kind of accountability for their public "free speech." Maybe they should start wearing masks and bring fake IDs when they attend these town hall meetings on health care so as not to be accountable for their "free speech." It's kind of terroristic, if you ask me. The contradictions of this FoxNews reporter's arguments are astoundingly obvious and make her look not only blatantly partisan, but also insanely stupid.

Third, a news outlet's campaign (a news outlet that laughingly proclaims to be "fair and balanced") to invoke McCarthyite claims that the government is putting together an "enemies list" is breathtaking in its evident insidiousness. And it's abhorrent, too.

The depths to which the rabid, reactionary rightwing has sunk is jawdroppingly stunning. I don't think I have seen anything like it. Ever.