Fox vs. CNN in Portland, ME

[VRM]

Two articles about an interesting topic are on CNN and Fox today.
The Fox version is here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,303058,00.html
The CNN version is here: http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/10/18....ap/index.html

What's interesting is the differences in the articles. CNN leads off with how a recent outbreak of pregnancies has prompted this action. CNNs article also mentions how there were 17 pregnancies in the regions 3 middle schools in the last 4 years. This information is not presented at all in the Fox version.

Fox states that the vote was 5-2, CNN states that it was 7-2. My money is on CNN as a couple of local Portland papers also report 7-2.

Fox has sentence or two describing the reasons behind the 2 'no' votes, though they incorrectly spell John Coynes last name (CNN did not). CNN also mentions the two 'no' votes, but adds a couple of sentences for one of the committee members who voted 'yes'.

Both also have for and against quotes from others: CNN has two opinions against and one for. Fox has the same and the quotes are more detailed, but also a bit more dramatic.

I initially read about this in one of my local news sources, and then I looked at this one (which seems to be the most informative): http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/st...&ac=PHnws&pg=1

I then saw the same headline later in the day when on the Fox and CNN news sites, and read both of them. I caught the lack of comment about the pregnancies right off, but only realised the Fox errors after a detailed read of both.

Check yer sources - especially if you are quoting Fox!

Steve

[wtm442]

Steve
Both of those storys say they were from the Associated Press (AP).

Maybe there are two or more stories on that subject from AP, and the difference is in when they were obtained by Fox & CNN.

[VRM]

Warren,
Yep,
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT

Looks like Fox either never fixed their story or CNN double checked the info before posting.

Steve

[wtm442]

Steve

I still would not blame Fox for AP's mistakes. Especially on the web site. There is so much news being written very quickly for the Internet, that there are bound to be mistakes.

No matter, I read 2 newspapers a day. One is very liberal, and the other is extremely conservative. This way I get 2 different "slants" on many subjects.

I do NOT use the Internet for news. I do not think the "people" running the news web sites do as good a job as the printed press when making sure a story is correct.

[cobra de capell]

Steve - keep digging, you are bound to come with something for your lefty treasure chest. I'm just glad that you are doing this sort of thing versus out there scaring citizens. I'll bet you even look like that guy that is on with Hannity.

[VRM]

Originally Posted by wtm442

Steve

I still would not blame Fox for AP's mistakes. Especially on the web site. There is so much news being written very quickly for the Internet, that there are bound to be mistakes.

No matter, I read 2 newspapers a day. One is very liberal, and the other is extremely conservative. This way I get 2 different "slants" on many subjects.

I do NOT use the Internet for news. I do not think the "people" running the news web sites do as good a job as the printed press when making sure a story is correct.

Warren,
I do the same as far as reading a few different sources, I hit the BBC, Fox, CNN and a few others regularly. I also hit some of the ultra conservative and ultra liberal news posting sites. The truth is usually somewhere in the middle.
I also enjoy the Scott Ott stuff that Roscoe posts (and even the stuff he doesn't).

The errors on Fox are really secondary, and they don't alter the gist of the story. What I find most interesting is that all the other AP and non-AP versions of this story floating around out there mention the 17 pregnancies as the reason for implementing this policy. The Fox version is the only one I have read that does not. To me, the Fox version paints a very different picture of what is going on.

Steve

[J. T. Toad]

so maybe instead of shooting the messenger, maybe you should shoot the source.... AP, it's happened before, it'll happen again....

do a google search and you shall see all those who carried the same AP story
http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/10/ma...pproves_co.php

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associated_Press

"Some Associated Press reporters have been accused by bloggers of using fake sources, in particular a purported police captain Jamil Hussein, for their reporting of sectarian violence in Iraq. The Associated Press stood by its reporting, and on January 4, 2007 the Iraqi Interior Ministry recognized Jamil as an active member of the Baghdad police force, and said he now faces arrest for talking to journalists. Ministry spokesman Abdul-Karim Khalaf, who had previously denied the existence of Hussein, acknowledged that the officer was assigned to the Khadra police station.[3]. Though conceding this, the same bloggers countered that the story that had sparked the hunt - that of the destruction of four mosques, the burning to death of six civilians and the failure to act by Iraqi security forces - had failed to hold up to both Washington Post and The New York Times investigations into the alleged event. The AP stands by the story, though in a subsequent AP article the number of destroyed mosques had been reduced from 'four' to one "badly damaged" structure, and no mention was made of security forces' alleged inaction. [4] [5]"

WOW...

THIS uncovers THEE conspiracy of the AP fronting false stories specifically targeted at discrediting conservative news reporting agencies by careless fact finding.... AND TO THINK CNN is part of it also!! I am positive this exposure will finally expose CNN as the fraud that they are.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ua9js-wnDo

[J. T. Toad]

I know, maybe foxnews should start their own editing of AP purchased stories without acknowledgment thereof. sure sure. there isn't anything like copy write laws or anything like that.... just ask Rather.

or better yet... maybe there is a pay structure for different stories from AP...

50 bucks for the rough draft

1000 for the corrected version...

or maybe it is by the slant...

2000 for the conservative
free for the Marxists oriented as it furthers our agenda

Steve,
I, probably regrettably, want to ask, What was your purpose of starting this thread?

[J. T. Toad]

do you think, even as this much time has passed, that anyone will care what the vote was (majority wins), or even why (how many pregnancies) it was voted? The moral issue and implementation of policy is all the article is selling.

In CA, there was a passage of a popular vote law by 78% (HUGE by any of today's standards which are lucky to see 66%), and the courts felt they knew better.

The readers, actually consumers of the advertising presented from the information lure, are what drive the information presented in it's style, form, and content. If the consumer really cared, we would have choices for president based on substance rather than presentation. We wouldn't have yahoo pundit's constantly expounding their false representations and being successful at it.

"Shakedown" by Kenneth Timmerman. This book proves, no press is bad press...
just spin it.....

ask OJ, Gore, Clinton(s), Bush, Daley, North, Spears, Bonds, this list could get really long, I will add more later to increase my post count.

[VRM]

JT,
I think you are reading more into this than I meant.
I just sold an article to a magazine. I've never done that before, and it has not yet come out in print. The editor told me that they will edit it for use in the magazine, but I don't know what those edits are yet. It is possible that Fox and One News Now ran the story exactly as AP sent it. But perhaps they did not. One News Now looks like an ultra-right Christian site.

People who do not know the about the pregnancies because they read the Fox or ONN article might assume that Portland is trying to promote sex between 13 year olds. The truth is that the kids are already having sex, and they are trying to reduce the pregnancies (and possibly STDs, but I don't think any of the articles say that).

I've said in other threads that the MSM sells what their readers want. People blame CNN and others for presenting biased stories (another case of shooting the messenger?). Fox is just as guilty as anybody else of not presenting all the facts.

Steve

[wtm442]

Steve
I just read the article in my local paper. It was written by the ultra-liberal New York Times News Service and it also did not mention any pregnancies.

[VRM]

Ok, Warren. Thanks - I guess that blows that theory out of the water.

Do they have the same mistakes in as the other articles?

If you could do me a favour and see if they print an addition in the Friday edition adding extra info. I'm just curious to see if they will.

Did the Portland Press Herald article look overly left or right to anyone? If so, why?

Steve

[Wes Tausend]

Originally Posted by wtm442

Steve

I still would not blame Fox for AP's mistakes.....
.....I do NOT use the Internet for news. I do not think the "people" running the news web sites do as good a job as the printed press when making sure a story is correct.

Originally Posted by VRM

Warren,
I do the same as far as reading a few different sources, I hit the BBC, Fox, CNN and a few others regularly. I also hit some of the ultra conservative and ultra liberal news posting sites. The truth is usually somewhere in the middle....
. ..To me, the Fox version paints a very different picture of what is going on.

Steve

More and more people are using the internet for their news, a bad sign for classical newspaper profitability. Shown here is a suggestive excerpt from an article* on freedom of the press and the newer restricted phenomenon, blogging:

"Government repression in some countries has shifted from journalists to bloggers, with the vitality of the Internet triggering a more focused crackdown as blogs increasingly take the place of mainstream news media, according to Lucie Morillon, Washington director of the advocacy group Reporters Without Borders."

I do have to agree with Warren on the printed press being more accurate.

To me, there does seem to be (or was) a mad political scramble for airwaves ownership since the demise of the Fairness Doctrine. A lot of smaller newspapers were also bought out in the 80's, including my own local Bismarck Tribune. It seems very little effort is made to print, or air, information in a middle-of-the-road position anymore.

My guess is the Golden Rule. Those with the gold will eventually make the "new" news rules and write tommorrows history.

*ARTICLE: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...601843_pf.html .


...

[VRM]

Wes,
I spent a few months in China in the mid 90's. They already had limits to internet access back then, even though there were only 6-10K people in the entire country that had access. I ended up spending some time with my IT guy to set up a jump server just to get to most of the sites I wanted to get to. I suspect now that they have 6-10K people just figuring out what sites to restrict.
I've found blogs to be a good source of information from places like Iraq. Obviously, it has to be taken with a bit of a grain of salt, but it certainly provides a contrast to what we get over here.

I've actually had good luck with local news sites. They usually post the same stories that go in the printed versions, and they are usually a lot more than just the short soundbites that show up on Fox or CNN.

Steve

[imagine2frolic]

Personal experience here with the news. While I still owned a shop in Oakland Ca. all the shops were putting on a tip that whistled. The city passed an ordinance to stop the installlations, and I actually did a little work to help promote this being passed.

The next day after it's passing I was swarmed with about 6 news trucks within 20 seconds. I thought I was being raided, or something. All these reporters jumped out, and bombarded me with questions. One reporter in a smartass way asked why I would even install the tips? I gave my answer, and he made a smartass remark again. I asked him why he shaved his head bald, and all the other reporters laughed. Then I said you see everyone wants a different look, and that's yours.

This BASTURD twisted my interview like I was a rotten thief. Just about everyone I ever knew called me that night, or the next day. So unless you hear it live right from the person's mouth. It may, or may not be the truth.

[J. T. Toad]

congrats on selling a piece. That is a tough thing to do. Would you be willing to post a copy of the article?

I would like to read it.

[RAZOR]

How they report this story is secondary,to the sad story. I would be livid if they offered my child that was eleven, birth control. I wonder if 17 kids had been shot would they offer them bullet proof vests, to solve the problem.

[VRM]

Originally Posted by J. T. Toad

congrats on selling a piece. That is a tough thing to do. Would you be willing to post a copy of the article?

I would like to read it.

JT,
Thanks, it actually was really easy. I wrote up an article for my website and a friend of mine had some more to contribute, so the article ended up being about 2/3 me, and 1/3 him, and I edited the whole thing together. The article is about the Sunray DX Corvette race team. The owner of one of the original cars found it and printed it out. It's the first page in his info binder for his car. I later helped him with some restoration info for his car, and he recognised my name. At the recent NCRS National Convention in Boston a photographer shot a bunch of photos of the car with the idea to do a photo essay, and he forwarded a copy of the printed article to tha magazine. Jay Lamm sent me an email saying that it was very well written, well researched, and asked if he could run it. I just got permission from the co-author, so off we go! It wasn't written to be put in a magazine - it was just for the love of the cars. The article is here:
http://www.v-r-m.com/decals/SunrayDX..._sunray_dx.htm

Pics of one of the Sunray cars is here:
http://public.fotki.com/VRM/corvette..._dx_corvettes/

I encourage constructive criticism - so feel free to let me know what you think.
I would have let him run it for free, but I have no problem with getting paid for it. Ted (co-author) knows it's a paid gig, but I have not told him how much. His jaw is going to be all over the floor when he sees what his half is!

I've written a half dozen or so of the driver bios for Computerworks Cobra site as well. The last time I checked he had only posted two or three of them, though.

Steve

[VRM]

Originally Posted by RAZOR

How they report this story is secondary,to the sad story. I would be livid if they offered my child that was eleven, birth control. I wonder if 17 kids had been shot would they offer them bullet proof vests, to solve the problem.

Razor,
Eleven year olds having sex is bad, eleven year olds getting pregnant is worse. Getting pregnant is a symptom, but it is easier to fix than the cause. How would you propose that we prevent eleven year olds from having sex? Many parents don't want to take responsibility for their kids; too many of them beat up schools for giving their kid an 'F' because they don't want to acknowledge that Johnny isn't the Einstein they think him to be.
I think that there are going to have to be some major societal changes if we want to prevent the cause rather than the symptom.

Steve