Some Fair and Blanced perspective on Fox News "behind the scenes"

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

For those of you who have read Jim Hightower's "Thieves In High Places," the following quote from WTVT General Manager David Boylan (Fox affiliate, Tampa) will bring back warm memories:

"We paid $3 billion for these television stations. We decide what the news is. The news is what we tell you it is." (page 137)

However, David Boylan doesn't always get his way. He made that statement to reporter Jane Akre when she and fellow reporter Steve Wilson refused to lie under Boylan's orders. The reporters were sacked in December 1997, they took the case to court, Fox made three appeals and Akre was ultimately awarded $425,000 in damages): http://www.populist.com/01.1.krebs.html

Two quotes from this article:

"Not only during their trial but twice since its conclusion Florida trial court Judge Ralph Steinberg has rejected the attorney's plea to set aside a jury verdict in favor of former Fox reporters Jane Akre and Steve Wilson who refused to lie or distort the truth about Monsanto's bovine growth hormone (rBGH)."

"In supporting papers filed with the court, the journalists say WTVT General Manager David Boylan refused to kill the story for fear the viewing public would learn that the station yielded to pressure from special interests. Instead, Wilson and Akre allege, Boylan ordered the reporters to broadcast a version which contained demonstrably false information and he threatened to fire them both within 48 hours if they refused."

The same story from a different source: http://www.organicconsumers.org/rbgh/akre022603.cfm

Court documents on the case: http://www.foxbghsuit.com/fox0828.htm

[Gingersnap]

1. thanks for posting this

I've got to get around to reading one of Hightower's books one of these days. But I think it would just piss me off--I'm already disgusted by the Rethugs and their propagandists, and I don't know the half of it!

[dbt]

2. KICK!

:evilgrin:
dbt