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"If I were the boss at CBS...."

kevtronics said:
This is at least as bad as what the BBC did, yet how many people are going to be fired or resign in disgrace? I predict none.
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This is where the concept of fake news began ten years ago. Fox does this kind of thing weekly. I think something similar is happening in DC. They've invented stories using fake video, and the president believes it because it's on TV. So do people on his team. So no, you won't be seeing any resignations, and you also won't be seeing any FCC investigations. Of course, it could be said that the FCC doesn't regulate cable news, but there is no oversight of what happens there. The president complains about what he calls MSDNC, but Fox News consistently invents stories that are designed to promote the president's agenda. Nobody will get fired for it. Meanwhile, as you say, everyone else has to play under very different rules.

I read a lot of criticism of Norah O'Donnel's interview with the president. People felt she should have argued with him, and corrected all his mistakes. He does interviews with Fox News almost weekly. He just did one with Laura Ingraham. No hard questions. All cream puffs. It was a love fest. Nobody complained, because that's what they do. By now it's expected.
 
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TheBigA said:
This is where the concept of fake news began ten years ago. Fox does this kind of thing weekly. I think something similar is happening in DC. They've invented stories using fake video, and the president believes it because it's on TV. So do people on his team. So no, you won't be seeing any resignations, and you also won't be seeing any FCC investigations. Of course, it could be said that the FCC doesn't regulate cable news, but there is no oversight of what happens there. The president complains about what he calls MSDNC, but Fox News consistently invents stories that are designed to promote the president's agenda. Nobody will get fired for it. Meanwhile, as you say, everyone else has to play under very different rules.

I read a lot of criticism of Norah O'Donnel's interview with the president. People felt she should have argued with him, and corrected all his mistakes. He does interviews with Fox News almost weekly. He just did one with Laura Ingraham. No hard questions. All cream puffs. It was a love fest. Nobody complained, because that's what they do. By now it's expected.
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The first time I heard of members of one side making up stories in order to support the point of view they were selling was a claim made by Pacifica against Fox's Glen Beck back in 2009. While there had been some fake stories in newspapers (the story that, for example, inspired the movie "Saturday Night Fever," turned out to be fake), the reporters for those papers were ultimately fired or otherwise disciplined for their fraudulent work no matter how well it was received by the general public. Nowadays, in some very big circles, beliefs are more important than factual information, especially when it comes to stories about political figures and viewpoints.
 
ted chittenden said:
Nowadays, in some very big circles, beliefs are more important than factual information, especially when it comes to stories about political figures and viewpoints.
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People can believe whatever they want to believe. The problem to me is when the government believes fake stories and then creates policy around them. Spending our taxpayer dollars and using the name of our country to support a false story without using the tools available to them to check the authenticity of that story. That's what's happening now. It's happening at the FCC, where the chairman launched investigations based on stories he believed rather than on facts.

As a judge recently reminded a prosecutor, you have to start with facts before making an indictment, not the other way around. The fact that the FCC has already done this in multiple cases is something congress should investigate. Under a different regime, it would have already begun.
 
michael hagerty said:
Today: Bari Weiss considering shutting down CBS News' Standards and Practices Department:
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Dave Busiek, the former longtime news director at Des Moines CBS affiliate KCCI, foreshadowed this back in September when writing about CBS’s decision to cease editing Face the Nation interviews:

The reason? An interview with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was filled with false statements about Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man Trump shipped out to a hellhole prison in El Salvador.

The interview had been prerecorded and editors at CBS News took out as many unproven statements as possible. Noem immediately cried foul and said the network “shamefully edited the interview to whitewash the truth” about Abrego Garcia.

CBS initially defended the edited interview, saying it “met all CBS News standards.” Those “standards” didn’t stand for long. A day or two later, network executives decided that from now on, all such long interviews will either air live or, if prerecorded, will air in their entirety without any editing.

In an earlier age, it would be a terrible decision. These days? When Trump and his cabinet tell falsehood after falsehood, it gives them license to say whatever they want without any check on what’s factual and what’s not.
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That last graf sums it all up. Editors are, by definition, challenging whatever’s being asserted. The powers that be don’t want to be challenged.

Link: CBS News hits rock bottom – then keeps digging
 
The real question is how does the government back-peddle on it's demonization of the mainstream media, once they control it?

It's easier to portray yourself as a victim than as the people now responsible for maintaining the status quo.


The media industry now finds itself grappling simultaneously with the forces of economics that have been hollowing it out for a quarter-century and the forces of a political movement bent on silencing its critics.
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Mark Roberts said:
Dave Busiek, the former longtime news director at Des Moines CBS affiliate KCCI, foreshadowed this back in September when writing about CBS’s decision to cease editing Face the Nation interviews:



That last graf sums it all up. Editors are, by definition, challenging whatever’s being asserted. The powers that be don’t want to be challenged.

Link: CBS News hits rock bottom – then keeps digging
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Dave is great, I didn’t know he had a substack.
 


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