When Self-Parody Becomes Hackery

One of the many criticisms of the Rethuglican propaganda network, Fux News, is that it often uses misleading, edited video to spin a story for the consumption of its wingnut viewers. On Fux News Sunday, Jon Stewart was interviewed by "newsman" Chris Wallace, and, to no one's great surprise, what aired was selectively edited to put Fux in a better light:

"If you tuned in to 'Fox News Sunday' over the weekend, you saw an interesting interview with Jon Stewart, host of 'The Daily Show.' What you didn’t see was Stewart’s reference to Fox News vice president and DC managing editor Bill Sammon.. . .[Stewart speaking]'You know, in ideological regimes, they can’t understand that there is free media other places. Because they receive marching orders. And if you want me to go through Bill Sammon’s emails and…'”

Wallace cut him off, realizing that Stewart about to prove his point that Fux's "news" staff did get political marching orders from Fux's DC Bureau Chief Sammon. (One example that might have been cited was a Sammon e-mail telling his reporters to use the phrase "Government-run health care" instead of "public option" when discussing the 2010 the Affordable Care Act).

It was also interesting that Wallace defended Fux as telling "the other side" of the news presented by NBC, CBS, etc. Who knew that there were other sides to factual news reporting? Unless, of course, you're propagandizing and not reporting "news" at all.