Voice of reason

The Baltimore Sun ^ | June 2, 2003 | David Folkenflik

[Cincinatus]

Brit Hume has the Voice. Perhaps you've heard it before. Deep and unwavering, at once assuring and assured, it instantly conveys authority. The Voice is one you might secretly long to hear from an airline pilot or surgeon.

Hume is the chief Washington anchor for Fox News Channel, a calming presence for the cheeky ratings king of cable television news - a grown-up among fraternity boys.

[Cincinatus]

Brit Hume is not only the best newsman on the staff of FNC -- he's the finest newsman in TV journalism today. Nobody else even comes close.

[Drango]

Fox Rocks

bump for a good read...

[7thson]

At the risk of being labeled a conspiracy theorist, I always wondered about the connection of his son's suicide and the Clinton administration.

[maica]

So did lots of us.

I am reading this right now in the paper. The author is the SUNs television critic. So far it seems evenhanded. Could it be that the Baltimore SUN is trying to compete with the Washington Times that Baltimoreans can get by home delivery now?

Every week the Times gets fatter, and the SUN shrinks!

I recommend reading this article to the end. The author's quotes of Eric Alterman's take on Fox is particularly funny.

[wimpycat]

"...David Folkenflik..."

Good heavens, what a name to have to go through childhood with.

[submarinerswife]

I love him on Fox News Sunday when he slaps Juan Williams around.

[backhoe]

Media Research Center CyberAlert -- 02/25/1998 -- Networks ...
... >>> Some sad news. Sandy Hume, the 28-year-old son of FNC's Brit Hume, died
Sunday in his Arlington, Virginia apartment, apparently from suicide. ...
www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/1998/cyb19980225.asp - 38k - Cached - Similar pages
[ More results from www.mediaresearch.org ]

[capt. norm]

"I love him on Fox News Sunday when he slaps Juan Williams around"

I second that. You can see it build up to where Juan is about to go into one of his liberal tangents. Seems like he never remembers what happens to him when he does it, and I'm sitting here saying "No Juan..you're just digging yourself a deeper hole".

Kinda' like in the "Lone Ranger" episodes when Tonto would go into town and you knew the red-necks would beat him up, but he'd go back every time.

Brit is so cool about it, with a low, calm, factual voice he straigthens out Juan like an adult explaining something to a 4th grader.

[syriacus]

Brit's voice is the Voice of Reason and of Reliability.

I think Brit does a great job of analysis. And I know I can depend on him. He's passed my test for reasoned and realistic analysis with flying colors.

I often watch other news channels, in order to try to make sure I am getting enough information to form an opinion. When I read or hear something (from other news sources and C-Span) and analyze it myself, I almost always find Brit's analysis corresponds with what I had already observed with my own eyes and ears.

Nina Totenberg's warped analysis of the Clarence Thomas hearings is what drove me out of the Democratic party, (along with the analysis of other, more familiar TV commentators, most of them on PBS) The liberal attempts to mold public opinion backfired in my case.

I like to hear the truth from people who are paid to do reporting, so fair and balanced (and truthful) analysis is very important to me. (In case you didn't gather this from the large, red letters, this is really, really important to me)

Even Maxine Isaacs thinks Brit can be trusted.

Maxine Isaacs, Mondale's press secretary and deputy campaign manager in 1984, says Hume was among the fairest journalists she encountered. "We had reporters who would put a tag at the end of every story that would imply what we were saying was spin," she says

Hume, by contrast, "was willing to hear our explanation of what happened and take it into account," says Isaacs, now an adjunct lecturer at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. "When I see him on Fox, I don't agree with him politically, but I trust him."

[Drango]

BARF ALERT

For what the left (NPR) thinks about FOX...check out the "What Ailes the Airwaves" audio at the bottom here link

[maica]

bttt

[gcruse]

Reporters continually prove themselves to be
social liberals and economic conservatives, Alterman says

That defines a libertarian.  I see no evidence that the press
tends to be libertarian.  When the networks and fishwraps
begin to uniformly sound like John Stossel, then I'll give
Alterman for having the brains of an amoeba.

[maica]

Eric Alterman is living in some kind of parallel universe, where everyone he knows is "middle of the road", unless they work for Fox or on (some) talk radio.

I was very surprised to read in the article two descriptions of "left-of-center" sources for the author. To identify a person or group as such is really a new departure for the Sun. I think they are feeling the competition, too.

[gcruse]

Someone once did a Lexis search on the relative frequency of left-wing and right-wing. You can guess which showed up overwhelmingly more than the other. Maybe times are changin'.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Thank you for posting this wonderful article.

It's posted here as well (fun blog):

http://www.terpsboy.com/archives/001082.html

aka: 'Curmudgeonly & Skeptical', aka: Rodger Schultz

 

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The American Media in Wartime
Speech delivered at a Hillsdale College seminar in Dearborn, MI ^ | Apr. 28, 2003 | Brit Hume