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Original poster here...

"I don't think you understand. After working 40-80 hours a week to put food on the table and whatever else we do, nobody has enough time to surf the interweb for 60 hours to find everything out. It's not like everyone can live in mom's basement and lets their parents worry about making a living then complaining about how "not smart" they are."

You hit the nail on the head. You've simply stated that you do not have enough time to be informed. 'nuff said. The rest of this first comment was 4th grade playground crap slinging, how old are you? I listen to NPR in the car, and browse the news sites on lunch, at night after the kids are in bed. Maybe you should turn off your wacky morning show hosts when driving to work? Just a suggestion.

"BTW, when you mention Fox News as a bad site for news, I'm willing to bet that your more misinformed then anyone who has ever viewed fox news. There hasn't been any studies claiming Fox news puts out erroneous information any more then any other station including PBS AND BBC. About the only accurate thing you can say is their we report you decide tag line pretty much hides a slight right leaning. Especially when you take their programs into consideration."

Here's just one (I'll give you more if you wish) that shows outright, that regular viewers of FoxNews have more inaccuracies in their recount of reality than public news forums.

See page 17 for a reality check. WARNING: PDF

"Actually, I have found PBS, the BBC and NPR to be just as lose and reckless as the other stations. I don't have enough experience with CBC to make any judgement calls on them. You obviously, from your statement, don't have your objective or critical thinking hat on. You seem to be doing a bought of fanboyism at best here or you are just repeating the false and inaccurate information someone has told you which makes you every bit as much of a misinformed person as someone who gets their news from CBS, CNN, FOX, or any other commercial news."

Interesting. I have yet to find thoughtful, long, uninterrupted, intelligent discussions about the world's worthy topics by the leaders in their field on Fox, or any other corporate led news station for quite some time. I hear it EVERY DAY on NPR. Using critical thought, I find this to be far more useful. But that's just me and the rest of the thinking world. Sorry...

"Let me guess, your still one of those gullible people who read it on the internet so it must be true, right? Critical thought isn't questioning everything, it is questioning enough to understand when your being lied to. You seem to have failed that test and are in no position to be preaching to others."

Um, you need a dictionary I think. Let me guess... no, I won't. I use critical thought.

Thanks for playing, please move along...

Secondly, obviously you've never seen programs like Frontline, the McLaughlin Group, or Now, or seen the surveys about how well-informed people who take in different sorts of media are. Take, for example, this survey, which found that viewers of PBS and/or listeners of NPR are less than half as likely as readers of print media to have misconceptions about the Iraq war (and less than a quarter as likely as FoxNews viewers). Newspapers and magazines are usually corporate media, and as Goebbels said, a great propaganda news organization should give viewers less and less of a sense of what is going on the more they engage it. I can't tell you how many times I've seen absolute lies spawned or repeated by supposedly progressive and reliable newspapers such as the NY Times and the Washington Post (to which I subscribe). Occasionally, a retraction is later issued, but by then the damage is done. I also can't tell you how many times those newspapers have been complicit in burying or not following up on important stories.

Public broadcasting is only as good as the government will allow it and fund it to be, so it isn't perfect--but it's a damn sight better than any corporate media, print or otherwise, in the US.

Oh christ. He did nto say Fox news caused the war. He blamed Fox news for helping to make a number of bad things possible.

And the fact is that Fox news is misleading and missinforming their viewers, and that the level of this mininformation has been measured and documented. It is asounding the number of Fox viewers who believed that US forces had actually FOUND WMDs in Iraq, or even more amazingly believed that Iraq had actually USED WMDs against us.

Here are the full report and the questionaire of a survey of 3300 random Americans. The numbers are enormously damning to Fox News, and they reflect very badly upon those who consider Fox News to be the most credible and use it as their primary news source.

Each day Fox management sends down The Memo instructing which stories shall be covered (or NOT covered) and what sort of spin shall be applied.

Fox is not a news agency. It is a position machine specifically created by Rupert Murdoch push a political agenda, one that incidentally also dabbles in new. Their trademark "Fair and Balanced" is rediculous, and "No Spin Zone" is comical. Fox news literally went to court in Florida with the argument that they have the right to lie and deceive the public. And while I do agree that people have a First Amendment right to lie and deceive the public, it is absolutely appalling that a major media news organization would actually want and need to take an explicit right-to-lie and right-to-deceive-the-public to court.

About the only thing more comical than a news organisation making a right-to-lie argument in court would be someone standing up in court and arguing that they have the religious freedom right to promote and convert people to a religion and scripture that they themselves believe to be a lie.

By the way, I advise everyone to convert to Scientology immediately and study and worship L. Ron Hubbard's scripture explaining how an inter galactic overlord rounded up all of his political dissidents and shipped them all to earth to be blown up by nuclear-device triggered volcanoes, and that those alien souls are now clinging to our bodies and currupting our thoughts. And I strongly assert my First Amendment rights of Free Speech and Religious Freedom to promote Scientology on teh basis that I have the Right to promote insane bullshit written by a creepy science fiction author.

And Fox News should have as much credibility after making a right-to-lie argument in court as I have with my right-to-lie religious argument. We both have those rights, but that does not exactly make us trustworthy.

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Oh christ. He did nto say Fox news caused the war. He blamed Fox news for helping to make a number of bad things possible.

And the fact is that Fox news is misleading and missinforming their viewers, and that the level of this mininformation has been measured and documented. It is asounding the number of Fox viewers who believed that US forces had actually FOUND WMDs in Iraq, or even more amazingly believed that Iraq had actually USED WMDs against us.

Here are the full report and the questionaire of a survey of 3300 random Americans. The numbers are enormously damning to Fox News, and they reflect very badly upon those who consider Fox News to be the most credible and use it as their primary news source.

Each day Fox management sends down The Memo instructing which stories shall be covered (or NOT covered) and what sort of spin shall be applied.

Fox is not a news agency. It is a position machine specifically created by Rupert Murdoch push a political agenda, one that incidentally also dabbles in new. Their trademark "Fair and Balanced" is rediculous, and "No Spin Zone" is comical. Fox news literally went to court in Florida with the argument that they have the right to lie and deceive the public. And while I do agree that people have a First Amendment right to lie and deceive the public, it is absolutely appalling that a major media news organization would actually want and need to take an explicit right-to-lie and right-to-deceive-the-public to court.

About the only thing more comical than a news organisation making a right-to-lie argument in court would be someone standing up in court and arguing that they have the religious freedom right to promote and convert people to a religion and scripture that they themselves believe to be a lie.

By the way, I advise everyone to convert to Scientology immediately and study and worship L. Ron Hubbard's scripture explaining how an inter galactic overlord rounded up all of his political dissidents and shipped them all to earth to be blown up by nuclear-device triggered volcanoes, and that those alien souls are now clinging to our bodies and currupting our thoughts. And I strongly assert my First Amendment rights of Free Speech and Religious Freedom to promote Scientology on teh basis that I have the Right to promote insane bullshit written by a creepy science fiction author.

And Fox News should have as much credibility after making a right-to-lie argument in court as I have with my right-to-lie religious argument. We both have those rights, but that does not exactly make us trustworthy.

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If you look toward the end of the study, they did attempt to look at differences that may be due to political bias. However, there were differences within political groups. Bush supporters who primarily used Fox had higher rates of misperception than those who used NPR/PBS (78% to 50% in this case). Exposure was also an issue: Republicans/Bush supporters who pay "very close attention" to the news had higher rates of misperception than those who didn't pay much attention. See the part of the report beginning at page 19 under the heading "Political Bias Not Full Explanation".

Although I agree it is possible that those who rabidly wish to be misinformed might gravitate to Fox, there is support for the notion that Fox's misleading reports have a deadly effect.

Here's the link again: http://65.109.167.118/pipa/pdf/oct03/IraqMedia_Oct 03_rpt.pdf

That specific example actually is bullshit. The stats for thinking WMDs were found was 33% (Fox viewers) and 11% (NPR listeners). These stats are from October 2003 (8months after the beginning, 6 months after "mission accomplished") so surely those misguided Fox viewers have stepped back into reality by now. The one where Fox viewers really botched it was the "Evidence Hussein worked with Al Qaeda". 67% Fox and 16% NPR. The other statistic they looked at was "World Public Opinion" is it for or against our war in Iraq. 35% Fox and 5% NPR. Now... The best is the cumulative statistic. 1 or more misperception vs no misperception. Misperceptions: 80% Fox and 23% NPR. So basically if you watch Fox News (aka the White House mouthpiece) you'll have an inaccurate view of reality. Here's the study:

http://65.109.167.118/pipa/pdf/oct03/IraqMedia_Oct 03_rpt.pdf

This study by PIPA at the University of Maryland is prima facie proof that Fox News is inaccurate.

They polled a large number of people about three common misperceptions about the War. Of those, 80% who watched fox news as their primary news source had one or more misperception. Only 20% of those who watched PBS/NPR had one or more misperception. The difference is astounding.

35% of fox news viewers believed the majority of the people in the entire world supported the war, compared with only 5% of PBS viewers. (The correct answer is that opinion polls show a vast majority against)

33% of fox users believed the US has found Iraqi WMDs since the end of the war, but only 11% of PBS/NPR viewers believed that.

67% of fox viewers believed the US has found clear evidence that Saddam Hussein worked closely with Al-Qaeda, compared to only 16% of PBS/NPR viewers.

The results of this study are astonishing. I encourage you to verify their methodology by reading the whole report.