I’m a Conservative Who Prefers CNN to FOX News
I would rather watch the news on CNN than on FOX.
No, I am not a liberal. I’m a dyed in the wool member of the Religious Right (the metaphor thus being particularly appropriate). And yes, I do appreciate the extent of liberal slant in media news coverage; I own and have read Bernard Goldberg’s Bias.
Rather than wasting time disputing the liberal bent of most media members and outlets, let me point out the benefits we conservatives can reap from interacting with a liberal political philosophy. Watching CNN rather than FOX news can be of benefit precisely because it is more liberal.
1) Apologetics - know your enemy. If you can better comprehend their arguments, than you better understand their weaknesses. Take it from a past debater, nothing helps you argue like knowing your opponent better than they know themselves.
2) Street Cred - if you have little or no personal knowledge of liberal literature than you have not “earned the right” to criticize it. Whether that statement is correct or not is somewhat immaterial; if your goal is to convince a liberal of the error of his ways, than it matters whether or not they will give you a fair hearing. If they feel you’ve put a good faith effort into understanding their point of view, they are more likely to listen to your proposals.
3) Liberals can be right. Conservatives can be wrong. That doesn’t make me a moderate. At least humor me and say that sometimes, maybe, partially, kinda-sorta, liberals might be temporarily right-ish… 
Still, I’ll admit that all things being equal a conservative take on the news is generally preferable to a liberal one. So why do I watch CNN instead of FOX?
FOX News spends more time covering fluff. CNN, on the whole, spends more air time covering real news.
I hope your first reaction is disbelief; you should be questioning whether, and how, I can prove that claim. After all, even if that is my personal impression, why is my opinion any better than yours? That’s a legitimate question and is why I am so interested in empirical studies of the subject.
To prove my contention I will pull a story from last summer’s headlines: the death of Anna Nicole Smith. I would watch the news each day become increasingly annoyed by how much airtime was devoted to Miss Smith’s untimely death. It appeared that one cable news network spent more air time discussing her death than any of the other outlets. That network? FoxNews.
A group called “The Project for Excellence in Journalism” analyzed the amount of air time dedicated by the cable news networks to stories this past summer. Among much other interesting information, PEJ found that FOX spent as much air time on the Anna Nichole Smith story as MSNBC and CNN combined. FOX actually spent almost the same amount of time on Smith (10%) as on the Iraq policy debate (10%). CNN dedicated 4% of its air time to Smith (still too much in my opinion) and 14% on Iraq policy.
Another question might have popped into your head; did CNN spend more time discussing Iraq policy because the network heads wanted to pound President Bush on an unpopular war? Perhaps, though I’d be hard pressed to quantitatively prove it. But that’s not the point. I submit to you that even negative news coverage of Iraq is more worthy of our attention than garbage about Anna Nichole Smith.
So why do conservatives, who tend to prefer FOX News to CNN, pick fluff over substance? There are a great number of possibilities and the answer is not likely easy or neat. One strong possibility is that conservatives tend to be less educated than liberals. Also, it wouldn’t surprise me if some conservatives’ ideological loyalty trumps all else.
Whatever the case, let me enourage you to be conscientious about what news you view and how you watch it. Whether you choose FOX or CNN is not as important as developing the ability to critically evaluate what you hear. Faulty logic, trashy news, and bias bridge all ideological divides.
What is broadcast news, but partially that which the public is interested in knowing about?
Alas, news seems to conform, rather than inform, these days.
Perhaps Anna Nicole is fluff, but I’d rather eat Marshmallow Fluff than anything I’d find in a trash can……. (not a great analogy, but I know you love analogies, so I had to give you one!).
I try to avoid network news altogether, but I have noticed that CNN.com has grown increasingly fluffy recently.
As I told you on the phone, it’s almost like comparing which piece of trash is the best. FOX had more fluff, but CNN and MSNBC still had a lot of it.
Another analogy for ya…magazines…WORLD vs TIME. The answer is no, wrong comparison. Get The Economist.
So I guess my sympathies would lie with Austin in saying maybe it’s best to avoid network news altogether.
The few times that I watch TV news, I also prefer CNN to Fox. But to echo Austin and David, TV news rarely appeals to me. I prefer reading to watching, so I check the New York Times and the Washington Post.
I struggle to appreciate the kitschy delivery of a televeision news anchor or the “clever” patina of magazine/newspaper editorials. My dedicaton to the auditory delivery of “news” is likely a passing phase since it’s hardly intellectually honest to overlook the elitist, witticism of NPR (not to mention that it smacks of unnecessary logocentrism). Nevertheless, the worst, in my opinion, remains television network news. It’s ironic that the more sensory news delivery becomes the more disproportionate and sensational it seems…
To be honest, I haven’t really watched much TV news, cable or non, since last summer. I will admit a certain fondness for the regular 6:30 evening news; when I was in elementary school my Dad tuned in most every night to CBS Evening News with Dan Rather. Quirky as Dan was, he exuded an aura of confidence and reliability. So although I don’t watch the news much now, I still feel a bit nostagic about it.
Yes, I am a suscriber to The Economist and The Wall Street Journal. I typically check cnn.com, drudgereport.com, slate.com, and bbcnews.com every day to keep up. Like my babe I also listen to NPR on the way to and from work each day. Seriously, talk radio drives me nuts even, no especially, when I agree with the conservative ideologues.
Oh, and I’ve come to enjoy Christianity Today more and more. Many of their articles/editorials are insightful even when I don’t agree.
The best news is now to be found online, much of it free:
The best daily is The Financial Times (30 articles per month after free registration)
The best weekly is The Economist (currently free but I believe it’s currently intended only as a one-year promotion)
A smattering of the sources Paul mentions for the rest. And blogs, of course.
TV news has its advantages for conveying certain stories, but moving images persuade mostly through emotion rather than logic.
I would also stress that anyone interesting in reading the news in the hopes of discovering truth rather than merely confirming his priors should seek to view news from geographically diverse agencies. It’s one thing to talk about the different editorial stances of the WSJ and NYT and quite another to compare the WSJ or NYT to Der Spiegel or Le Monde—or for that matter Al Jazeera.
Also Paul, in the interest of being more cosmopolitan, I suggest that instead of using the term “liberals” to describe those on the American left you use “liberalz.” My international sensibility chafes when good ol’ fashioned liberalism is perverted by its American application–let’s not forget that most American liberalz are quite wary of most economic liberalisation, for example.
Good observations Jeff. I would submit the Christian Science Monitor for consideration as “best daily.” It is insightful and reasonably international, although I’m too cheap to suscribe.
I accede to your distaste of the hijacking of true liberalism. Still, “Liberalz” seems a bit more P. Diddy than T. Kennedy. Even “neo-liberalism” implies a resemblance between primitive liberalism and its modern perversion. We’ll think of something.
I have found myself increasingly hitting the CNN button on my remote more often now. It appears to me that they are more likely to be reporting the news (albeit,most often from a left of center slant) than to be editorializing it. I have found that Fox spends more time on opinion than reporting the “facts”. What I long for is a true news channel. One that reports the news of the day, the NEWS. Now I know the car chase in Meridian, MS might be news in the strictest definition, but I’m not certain that it warrants 3 hrs of non-stop national coverage. Of course, I am dreaming, because it is not likely that we will find someone with the ability and desire to tell the facts, show both, or all sides of an issue and let US decide. But…”I have a dream…”
I get almost all my news on the internets and the radio. I haven’t watched news on TV since I was 9.
And I prefer NPR vastly to any of the Christian stations here. In fact, I change the channel as soon as voices come on the Christian station because I simply can’t handle the inanity. Yes, NPR tends quite liberal, but at least they talk about things I care about, and they usually present at least logical (if, IMO, wrong) arguments and opinions. They make me think. Were I to indict the conservative media I’m familiar with around here, the counts would be as follows:
1. They are not terribly insightful in the topics or stories they choose to highlight. God cares about the poor and downtrodden, which is a significant portion of our population, and an even more significant portion of society’s problems. Yet I cannot remember the last time I heard conservative radio cover a story about life in the projects, subsidized housing, or food stamps. I’m sure it’s happened, but in general they’ve forfeited the conversation on those topics to liberals.
2. They present the issue as though it is completely one-sided and don’t even pretend to have a dialog about it. They are so overt with value-laden terms and characterizations that their news scripts sound like a bad freshman English “persuasive paper.” I know they don’t mean it personally, but it’s hard not to feel insulted when I feel like I’m being told what to think. Further, I think encouraging people to think in those terms is ultimately damaging. When they talk about “the issues” with those of other persuasions, their reactions to alternative viewpoints will tend to be “Well that’s just dumb.” Not very persuasive, IMHO.