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Tonight on Fox: 'Moral Decay 101' (Transcript)

by Ethan Lindsey

NARRATION:

"We report, you decide."

"No Spin Zone."

or my favorite for 2003,

SOUND: Details ahead on the channel America trusts for real journalism -- fair and balanced.

NARRATION:

These simple mantras....er...slogans...are repeated ad-nauseum by Fox anchors Shepard Smith, Brit Hume and Tony Snow over the course of a broadcast day. Fox News wraps itself in the label of objectivity, to the ire of Democrats everywhere.

SOUND: When they say go, we go. Our reporters, in my mind, are the best. They're hungry for the story -- they're agressive, they're tireless. Tempers are frayed...the entire Arab world...the peacekeepers...The trouble is not over...U.S. officials tell Fox. Finding both sides, and telling it down the middle. Fair and balanced means that everybody gets a shot. Fair and balanced is a commitment. Count on Fox News Channel. Real Journalism. Fair and Balanced.

NARRATION:

But just because they say they are unbiased doesn't mean they are. While CNN maintains a very international perspective in its coverage, as "America's News Channel", Fox News features the flag prominently and its anchors express outrage over un-American activities. Can a media news source be both objective and rabidly patriotic?

SOUND: France and Germany. What will persuade them to back us?

NARRATION:

And critics say that Fox News sensationalizes sex and celebrity.

SOUND: Tonight, Porn 101 -- classmates cheered while two kids had sex on the school bus. Tonight, on the O'Reilly Factor.

NARRATION:

So the answer is yes, the channel dwells on the lurid and obscene. But so does CNN, MSNBC, and every other television channel for that matter. The difference is that Fox then uses those stories to focus on the moral decay of liberal society, and does it under the guise of "balanced" journalism. Its this idea that brings Democrats to frothing anger: the claim that the channel has no political motives, even as it ran 24-hour coverage of Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky. In the end, one gets the impression that Fox News' calls itself unbiased for the very reason that it gets the goat of those on the left.

NARRATION:

For Columbia Radio News, the news channel America really trusts, I'm Ethan Lindsey.