Feingold backed by progressives. Bill O`Reilly will hate him then

[TheresNoMoney]

Wow.

It is a explanation of what Brit Hume said and a transcript of the Olberman interview. Word-for-word. Read it for yourself.

If you consider that somehow biased, then you are beyond reason (like many hardcore Republicans).

Here's more:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200502040010

[A18]

Statistically, actually, Fox isn't biased towards Republicans. In 2004 in fact Fox still tilted slightly left based on the ratio of positive/negative stories dealing with Bush and Kerry.

However, CNN and CBS were in the 3:1- 4:1 range, so in contrast certainly Fox looks conservative.

Can I get a link to that study?

[AuH2O]

I can't find the one I'm thinking of, which had the data very nicely graphed, but here's a related study:

http://www.journalism.org/resources/research/reports/debateeffect/positive%20versus%20negative.asp

You have to look at the .pdf to get the whole thing.

This study doesn't really look at positive/negative, it looks at Bush's positive vs. Kerry's positive (and some at the opposite). But the result-- that Fox just didn't give special treatment to Kerry, and in fact was not particularly positive towards Bush-- remains the same.

[opebo]

Statistically, actually, Fox isn't biased towards Republicans. In 2004 in fact Fox still tilted slightly left based on the ratio of positive/negative stories dealing with Bush and Kerry.

However, CNN and CBS were in the 3:1- 4:1 range, so in contrast certainly Fox looks conservative.

What an hilarious lie!

[ATFFL]

Wow.

It is a explanation of what Brit Hume said and a transcript of the Olberman interview. Word-for-word. Read it for yourself.

If you consider that somehow biased, then you are beyond reason (like many hardcore Republicans).

Here's more:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200502040010

Why read what other people say FDR said when we can read what was actually in the document in question?   (Note that the first part of the speech is not here for the sake of brevity.  The parts in duspite are included and the bits around them to ensure they are in context.)

January 17, 1935

It is overwhelmingly important to avoid any danger of permanently discrediting the sound and necessary policy of Federal legislation for economic security by attempting to apply it on too ambitious a scale before actual experience has provided guidance for the permanently safe direction of such efforts. The place of such a fundamental in our future civilization is too precious to be jeopardized now by extravagant action. It is a sound idea - a sound ideal. Most of the other advanced countries of the world have already adopted it and their experience affords the knowledge that social insurance can be made a sound and workable project.

Three principles should be observed in legislation on this subject. First, the system adopted, except for the money necessary to initiate it, should be self-sustaining in the sense that funds for the payment of insurance benefits should not come from the proceeds of general taxation. Second, excepting in old-age insurance, actual management should be left to the States subject to standards established by the Federal Government. Third, sound financial management of the funds and the reserves, and protection of the credit structure of the Nation should be assured by retaining Federal control over all funds through trustees in the Treasury of the United States.

At this time, I recommend the following types of legislation looking to economic security:

1. Unemployment compensation.

2. Old-age benefits, including compulsory and voluntary annuities.

3. Federal aid to dependent children through grants to States for the support of existing mothers' pension systems and for services for the protection and care of homeless, neglected, dependent, and crippled children.

4. Additional Federal aid to State and local public-health agencies and the strengthening of the Federal Public Health Service. I am not at this time recommending the adoption of so-called "health insurance," although groups representing the medical profession are cooperating with the Federal Government in the further study of the subject and definite progress is being made.

...
In the important field of security for our old people, it seems necessary to adopt three principles: First, noncontributory old-age pensions for those who are now too old to build up their own insurance. It is, of course, clear that for perhaps 30 years to come funds will have to be provided by the States and the Federal Government to meet these pensions. Second, compulsory contributory annuities which in time will establish a self-supporting system for those now young and for future generations. Third, voluntary contributory annuities by which individual initiative can increase the annual amounts received in old age. It is proposed that the Federal Government assume one-half of the cost of the old-age pension plan, which ought ultimately to be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans.

The amount necessary at this time for the initiation of unemployment compensation, old-age security, children's aid, and the promotion of public health, as outlined in the report of the Committee on Economic Security, is approximately $100,000,000.

The bit in bold is the relevant bit.  Did Brit Hume accurately quote what FDR said?  Yes, it is exactly in there.  Did FDR suggest the creation of a private annuity account?  Yes.  Is that similar (though not necessarily exactly like) the current proposals?  Yes, it is.

Sorry to bring  alittle thing like facts, first hand sources and reality into this.

[AuH2O]

Statistically, actually, Fox isn't biased towards Republicans. In 2004 in fact Fox still tilted slightly left based on the ratio of positive/negative stories dealing with Bush and Kerry.

However, CNN and CBS were in the 3:1- 4:1 range, so in contrast certainly Fox looks conservative.

What an hilarious lie!

Feel free to look up the research Wannabe pimp man.

[danwxman]

    OLBERMANN: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and, at minimum, midwife to the Social Security system, would have endorsed President Bush's plan to partially privatize it. Our third story on the Countdown -- that is the claim, anyway, of at least three conservative commentators and several Republican congressmen. But it turns out those guys pretty much just made it up. In a moment, FDR's grandson, himself a former associate commissioner for Social Security, joins us to discuss the fraud.

    First, the background. It began on television with Brit Hume of FOX News, taking quotes from the three principles of security for our old people that FDR expressed to Congress on January 17, 1935. Not all the quotes, mind you, just some of them, and out of context. I'm reading from the transcript on the FOX website of Mr. Hume's newscast of February 3rd. "It turns out," Hume said, "that FDR himself planned to include private investment accounts in the Social Security program when he proposed it. In a written statement to Congress in 1935, Roosevelt said that any Social Security plan should include, 'Voluntary contributory annuities, by which individual initiative can increase the annual amounts received in old age,' adding that government funding, 'ought to ultimately be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans.'"

    As promised, I'm joined now by James Roosevelt Jr., now senior vice president of Tufts Health Plan, formerly associate commissioner for Social Security, and, of course, grandson of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Great -- thanks for your time tonight, sir.

    ROOSEVELT: Nice to be with you, Keith.

    OLBERMANN: The argument is that Mr. Hume more or less twisted this entirely around. Can you explain it in layman's terms?

    ROOSEVELT: I think I can. And it's really quite an amazing distortion. What they did was that they took a very simple statement that my grandfather made, which said that Social Security, when it was enacted almost 70 years ago, ought to first of all have a part that took care of people who didn't have time to build up a Social Security account. And the government should fund that out of general revenues.

    Secondly, Social Security should have a self-sustaining portion that was funded by contributions from both employers and employees. That's what we know and have known for 70 successful years as Social Security.

    And thirdly, those who wanted and who needed to, as many -- almost everybody -- did, to have a higher income and retirement, should have accounts where they could pay in voluntarily, in addition to the guaranteed Social Security benefit.

    And then my grandfather said that eventually, the self-sustaining portion of the guaranteed insurance would phase out the government-paid portion. That's because we would have a fully functioning Social Security system as we do today.

    What Brit Hume and others have done is take portions of that paragraph and rearrange it so that it says something entirely different from what he intended.

    OLBERMANN: At the risk of doing a little too much reading, just to put it on the historical record, let me read the entire quote from which those quotes were pulled. The ones Mr. Hume pulled, only that he wanted to pull:

    "In the important field of security for our old people, it seems necessary to adopt three principles: First, noncontributory old-age pensions for those who are now to old build up their own insurance. It is, of course, clear that for perhaps 30 years to come fund will have to be provided by the states and the federal government to meet these pensions.

    "Second, compulsory contributory annuities which in time will establish a self-supporting system for those now young and for future generations.

    "Third, voluntary contributory annuities by which individual initiative can increase the annual amounts received in old age." That's one of the Hume quotes there. "It is proposed that the federal government assume one-half of the cost of the old pension plan, which ought ultimately to be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans."

    So, where he raised the prospect of self-supporting annuity plans -- that was not to replace Social Security, it was to replace the money the government was contributing to Social Security for the people born in, say, 1870 and earlier. Is that about it?

    ROOSEVELT: That is exactly it. And he rearranged those sentences in an outrageous distortion, one that really calls for a retraction, an apology, maybe even a resignation.

    OLBERMANN: He may have been the only news reporter who did that. The other people who have made the comment on it were people like William Bennett, also in one of the live circus programs that they have over on FOX, and John Fund from The Wall Street Journal online political commentary Web site. Of course, the president referenced this vaguely in the State of the Union. What do you make, generally speaking, of what we might fairly call revisionist history?

    ROOSEVELT: It is really quite amazing that all of the folks supporting privatization, from the president on down, keep invoking the name of my grandfather, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. I think it's, in a way, it is flattering to him. It's a testimony to how successful the program that he put in place has been and continues to be. And there's -- on the screen you just saw my dad standing next to my grandfather. There he is again.

    OLBERMANN: But you are convinced from all that you know, and if anyone actually literally took all of the words of your grandfather and went through them with the proverbial fine-tooth comb, they would have never found anything in his mind, ultimate privatization, in whole or in part, of Social Security.

    ROOSEVELT: I'm definitely convinced of that. And I'm convinced he never intended to phase it out. That indeed is why some of the greatest supporters of Social Security initially said it ought to be paid for out of general tax revenues. And Secretary of the Treasury [Henry] Morgenthau [Jr.], who headed the commission my grandfather appointed, said no, it has to have a payroll tax that's dedicated to Social Security. Because if it doesn't, it will either get to look like welfare, or it will be traded off against other good things. And the dedicated Social Security tax has been very successful over the years in raising almost all of our elderly citizens out of poverty, where half of them were in poverty before Social Security.

    OLBERMANN: Indeed. James Roosevelt Jr., grandson of our 32nd president, former associate commissioner on Social Security, our great thanks for your time tonight, sir.

    ROOSEVELT: Thank you.

[A18]

What the hell is wrong with you? The actual words were just posted like half an hour ago.

[PBrunsel]

Correct Frodo Fox is an impressive propaganda machine!

At least we know that President Bush will not have to make a new propaganda outlet if he crowns himself emperor.

[opebo]

Statistically, actually, Fox isn't biased towards Republicans. In 2004 in fact Fox still tilted slightly left based on the ratio of positive/negative stories dealing with Bush and Kerry.

However, CNN and CBS were in the 3:1- 4:1 range, so in contrast certainly Fox looks conservative.

What an hilarious lie!

Feel free to look up the research Wannabe pimp man.

Sounds like biased research to me, and by the way the term is John, not pimp.

FOX is mostly made up of right wing talk shows, not 'news', so an analysis of their 'news stories' doesn't even scratch the surface.

[AuH2O]

Actually political talk shows only populate the prime-time evening slots, as they likewise do at CNN and MSNBC.

The morning features light talk, not right-wing at all, then the rest is news. None of the cable stations deviate really from that formula.

What's really hilarious is that most of Fox News' critics have not really watched the channel, or even read transcripts, or in the case of pitiful do-nothing, even know the basic programming content.

[danwxman]

I watch FoxNews all the time...even Fox&Friends is obviously biased. They are all clearly conservative, and support the Republican party. It's just painfully obvious...you're kidding yourself if you don't see it.

American Morning on CNN is somewhat more politically correct, and the main hosts don't take sides at all (much different from Fox&Friends). The old guy (forget his name) does though and seems like a populist more then anything. He tends to say things that are very un-politically correct, which are met with uncomfortable laughter or akward stares by the rest of the cast.

[ATFFL]

I watch FoxNews all the time...even Fox&Friends is obviously biased. They are all clearly conservative, and support the Republican party. It's just painfully obvious...you're kidding yourself if you don't see it.

American Morning on CNN is somewhat more politically correct, and the main hosts don't take sides at all (much different from Fox&Friends). The old guy (forget his name) does though and seems like a populist more then anything. He tends to say things that are very un-politically correct, which are met with uncomfortable laughter or akward stares by the rest of the cast.

Fox and Friends is pathetic.  Terrible piece of programming. 

[Shira]

It has a larger audience than any other news network. Try again.

A friend of my mother, who lived for long time in the Soviet Union, claims that there is strong similarity between Fox News and the Soiviet broadcasts in the seventies.

[Shira]

It has a larger audience than any other news network. Try again.

There is a reason. These people (the Fox audience) fill inferior (and justifiably so) they need some encouragement and strengthening.

[opebo]

The morning features light talk, not right-wing at all, then the rest is news. None of the cable stations deviate really from that formula.

That light talk show is very biased to the right.  The entertainers are always decrying something liberal or approving something right wing.

What's really hilarious is that most of Fox News' critics have not really watched the channel, or even read transcripts, or in the case of pitiful do-nothing, even know the basic programming content.

I watch it all the time as by some misfortune, it is the only American news channel on the cable TV at my hotel.  I think it is provided free in Asia, as there are no commercials, just weather maps and easy listening music during the breaks.