Is MSNBC really just the opposite of FOX?

[MellowDem]

I really don't think so, but I see the comparisons all the time in the MSM. They're treated as two sides of the same coin. Keith Olbermann has been compared to O'Reilly and Maddow to Beck. Seriously. I understand that MSNBC holds a definite viewpoint like FOX does, but I don't feel they use deception and flat out lies like FOX does in their pursuit of news. Not to say that MSNBC doesn't use hamhanded tactics that I don't like, but it's nowhere near as bad as FOX in my opinion from what I've seen. Maddow is honest and quite sane and presents facts, Beck insinuates and salivates. Olbermann definitely can get preachy, but it's over subjects that are factually presented first, so I don't really see the big deal with it as an opinion program.

I would really like to hear from the talking heads and magazine writers how the two are even comparable besides holding opposite viewpoints. The TIME magazine article on Beck was what prompted me to question this.

[Ian David]

1. No. n/t

[Curtland1015]

2. No, for many, many reasons.

First off, MSNBC isn't in the game of making sh*t up.

Secondly, only a few hours a day (and even then only on weekdays) is MSNBC "left leaning". Fox is right wing 24/7.

[NRaleighLiberal]

3. Well, one is endless lies, and one has a few shows that tell the truth.

[Malikshah]

4. Nope. And anyone who makes the argument needs to be publicly shot down

There is ample evidence to prove they are not opposites.

But that is not enough.

To even suggest it is something that needs to be pilloried. We have enough to work on without wasting time on frivolous mental masturbation on the part of common sense- rational-challenged people. :)

[motorcity]

5. Who does Fox News have that is the opposite of Scarborough or Pat Buchanan?

Did MSNBC promote anti-Iraq war rallies like Fox promoted the teabagging?

[RagAss]

6. No...MSNBC was an early Cheerleader for the Iraq War !

[Arkana]

7. You mean the network that has Joey Scar on for three hours a day

and regularly features Pat Buchanan?

[Bitwit1234]

8. And we all know why CNN has dropped

They are trying so hard to be like Fox...people are sick and tired of it and MSNBC which gives both sides to the coin is so refreshing. It is a joy to watch.

[no limit]

40. Let's get real, I doubt that people turn on MSNBC because they think its fair and balanced

During prime time MSNBC is highly left leaning and does not give both sides a equal share (and Im not saying they should).

I love MSNBC's primetime, but lets not pretend that it doesn't have a bias.

[AllentownJake]

9. No

I'm pretty sure as much as the right cries about Keith, Tweety, and Rachel they would survive under much better scutiny of fact checking.

When Keith Olbermann does a segment waving around a baseball bat claiming George W. Bush is planning to whack you than the MSM can get back to me on that argument.

[spanone]

10. m$nbc has joe scarborough, a dinger of a winger....faux has nothing of the opposite kind

[Bonn1997]

34. Not only do they have him, they give him FIFTEEN hours a week

Let me know when Fox gives a liberal that many hours to run his or her show even if it is in the AM.

[bobbolink]

11. The simple difference... MSNBC undergirds its reporting with ...gasp...FACTS.

Is it done with sarcasm? Yes.

Is it done sometimes with deriding the "other side"? Yes.

Would it be preferable to have a news source that doesn't do either of those two things? Yes.

However, Faux and the RW have changed the game, and the only way to gain vieweership now is to have a certain amount of theater.

Luckily, I enjoy that theater when I have the luxury of seeing it.

[FrenchieCat]

12. They are both corporate owned, so they are quite similar in many ways....

The only difference is that MSNBC at least gives us 3 hours a day, while Fox is 24/7 representing the Republican party. CNN represents the Republican party about 23/7....which is why they are last; being Republican lite is never good.

[get the red out]

13. No, I doubt there's a rubber room in the whole place

Fux is simply a collection of insanity unsuitable for the unmedicated.

[MurrayDelph]

14. Only in that they have some

spokespeople who tell the truth.

[underpants]

15. No MSNBC unfortunately reacts to Fox and their MSM followers

half of KO and Rachel's show is refuting the day's talking points

[Rick Myers]

16. Not quite, but it's a start...

[DRoseDARs]

17. FOX News = Fantasy-based partisanship. MSNBC = Fact-based partisanship. Reality has a liberal bias.

Some people just need to grow up and deal with that.

[Canuckistanian]

18. Joe Scarborough.

The defense rests, your Honor.

[hypocrisyandlies]

19. Absolutely not.

As many have already said, MSNBC doesn't go out of their way to mislead. They don't make things up, they don't lie, and when they make a mistake they admit it.

The second reason is that Keith, Rachel, and the others will call Democrats out when they don't think they are doing their job. Rachel has been on Obama hard over his promises to the LGBT community. Keith has been all over Democrats over healthcare. You will NEVER see FOX criticizing Republicans.

[zoff]

20. Opposites on the intellectual and truth spectrum.

[NoSheep]

21. No. And you are right to hope all will ask themselves this question.

[doc03]

22. Actually I think Comedy Central comes closer to being

a legitimate news source than either one.

[TankLV]

23. Two or Three shows for five days a week doesn't equal 24/7/365.

There is NO "equivalency" on ANY channel...!!!

And those TWO or THREE programs always - ALWAYS - tell the TRUTH while FUX constantly LIES most of the time!!!

[Mythbuster]

24. Olbermann, Maddow and Matthews are fact based.

Fox has built their empire on fabricating information or reporting fabricated information, even after it has been fact checked and proven false. They will repeat a story or line over and over again even though it's been exposed as a lie or a gross inaccuracy, remember how they replayed Palin over and over lying to crowds of people? Credibility, that is the HUGE difference between the two entities.

[PHIMG]

25. Yes b/c FOX has a former Democratic Congressman on in the Mornings

Oh wait. No they don't. That and a hundred million other reasons why MSNBC is not a mirror image of Fox "News".

[dreamnightwind]

26. Some similarities, more differences...

I post this only because this point of view is missing from this thread.

Keith and Rachel are most definitely biased partisans who slant the truth to fit their point of view.

I happen to agree with their point of view, but I'm the kind of person who likes to, as an intellectual exercise, dissect things from multiple perspectives, especially when I'm seeing information with such an obvious component of the presenters' perspective.

I watch both of them pretty much every day, love them, so don't get the wrong idea here. But informed people need to see through bias wherever they find it, and it shows up plenty with Keith and Rachel. Very nice and refreshing for someone from the left, it's been a long long time that this perspective has been entirely absent from public discussion.

Enjoy it, learn from it, but also check it out from multiple angles, it's worth the effort.

Now, other than Keith and Rachel, what does MS-NBC have?

Ed Schultz!!! I couldn't stand him at first, or on Air America, his style really puts me off, but I stuck with it because he's a strong voice from the left, and I've really come to love his show. The left needs more of these kind of people putting out our message and taking no prisoners.

Chris Matthews is a tough nut for me to figure. Establishment all the way, he comes from a very conventional and centrist point of view, not one that resonates for me. On the plus side, he'll dig in when he senses BS, sometimes to great effect. On the other hand, he has been an enabler of some of the greatest deceptions of all time, like the Iraq war, WMD's, etc etc.

Ratigan's show can be interesting, if a bit hectic, and his world-view doesn't fit for me very well, but it's probably a decent show overall, and refreshingly different. I like the problem-solving approach, even if I'd choose a different problem-solver than Dylan.

Chuck Todd, wow, can't stand him, he's a total corporate centrist shill with no redeeing qualities, and seems to come at it from the right.


Morning Joe, I watch this fairly often, as much as it hurts me to do so. Sometimes good discussion here, but it all comes from an abysmal world-view that just feels totally wrong. Completely right-wing, and I'm not just talking about Scarborough, the whole thing is 3 hours, every morning, from the right and spun hard. Disgusting, worthy of Fox itself. The format of the show, which allows for actual discussion of issues, is excellent, as are the frequent appearances by leading politicians from both sides of the aisle, but the viewpoints of the hosts and regular crew are vile and disgusting. Their idea of balancing an issue is to have Harold Ford (head of the DLC) on the show. When they let Lawrence O'Donnel on it gets a little better.

I often see David Gregory and Pat Buchanan on MS-NBC, more right-wing propaganda, gee thanks MS-NBC.

Lawrence O'Donnell gets plenty of airtime, and he's excellent, should have his own show.

Peggy Noonan shows up pretty often, more right-wing BS.

Their financial voices are mostly from CNBC, which is terrible and basically a right of center corporate propaganda network. I think this is overlooked when people talk about MS-NBC. They put out a wildly biased view of the workings of the financial world, and it's the sort of bias which is already overly represented elsewhere. How about more Krugman, Stiglitz, etc instead?

Andrea Mitchell (Mrs. Greenspan) is also right-wing and corporate. Ugh.

David Schuster and Tamron Hall are respectable and reasonable news people. Not exciting or real insightful, but solid and if they have a perspective it seems to be slightly from the left.

Then there's the show with the 2 women with attitude, Contessa Brewer, and I forget the cute right-wingers' name. Their show is useless to me, shallow and uninformed viewpoints but put out there with conviction, a bad combination.

So, obviously, MS-NBC is much more diverse than Fox (though I don't watch Fox enough to know their programming, I just can't listen to to the liars).

I think it's been a huge shock to many Americans to see actual left-wing views on the tube. Much of America literally has never been exposed to this side of reality. It's something that just hasn't been allowed to happen in my life (and I've been around awhile). That's a wonderful thing, the lies are much more obvious when the other side is given a voice, and until recently, it was all center or right-wing.

Liberal media? The greatest lie of all. I've always had to go to radio or the internet to find any kind of liberal media. Finally, we have a little of it on the tube, and for that, I thank MS-NBC.

[hypocrisyandlies]

39. Well said!

:applause:

[Greyhound]

27. Not at all. M$NBC is a pro-corporate, reich-wing, propaganda factory just like Faux.

The difference is they are owned by corporations with an agenda of maintaining the status quo whereas Faux promotes radical fundamentalism.

They both serve to silence the true voices of the people, however.

[Kickin_Donkey]

28. There is absolutely no equivalency.

Fox's reason for existence is to serve as a mouthpiece for the right. The whole of its operations is to aid the Republican Party.

MSNBC is merely a corporate media organization that has a few liberal personalities in its stable. That does not make it a mirror image of Faux.

MSNBC, which is owned by General Electric, one of the largest defense contractors, is by its corporate nature right of center. MSNBC, like all the rest, was a cheerleader for the war in Iraq. This is the same organization that canned Phil Donahue because he was against the war. This is the same organization that distributed a memo ordering that for every liberal on the screen, there had to be two conservatives on the same screen to counter the liberal.

This is the same channel that regularly features Republican backscratchers like Andrea Mitchell, Tim Russert, David Gregory, Joey Scarwhatever, and Chris "I'm in love with Dubya's package" Mathews

There is no equivalence, no by a long shot.

[Crabitha]

29. Absolutely not. Opinions yes, facts yes. Fox opinions yes, facts no. n.t.

[FlyingSquirrel]

30. Yes

They are opposites in the same way that Truth is the opposite of Falsehood

[Prophet 451]

31. No

Here's an excerpt from an essay I posted a couple of days ago:
"First off, MSNBC isn't half as liberal as you like to think. Yes, Olbermann and Maddow are liberals and Ed Schultz tends to lean to the left. Chris Matthews doesn't have an intellectual stance consistent enough to be called a leaning but he seems to have a crush on Obama right now so let's throw Tweety in there too. MSNBC also has Joe Scarbrough, a guy who has been seriously mentioned as a Republican candidate for president in 2012 (and the GOP could do a lot worse) every morning for THREE FREAKIN' HOURS! OK, Joe's not a batshit conservative like most of the GOP right now but he's a pretty conservative guy. Does Fox put an avowed, outspoken liberal (say, Mike Malloy) on for three hours every morning? Of course they fucking don't. Watch MSNBC for a day and chances are, you'll see Pat Buchannon at least a couple of times. Now, Pat's a weird guy, he's very right-wing and he also happens to be rampantly racist (contrary to some opinion on the left, the two don't automatically go together). But you see him on MSNBC and he's usually treated respectfully. Hosts might disagree with him (I have yet to understand why Pat and Rachel Maddow are good friends when they agree on precisely nothing) but he's treated in a respectful fashion. Pat's so reactionary, he could be nicknamed Paleolithic but he gets treated nicely by this supposedly liberal network.

Recently, Fox has tried to draw a dividing line between their "opinion" shows and their "news" shows. That's bullshit too, there is no division. Fox's "news" section is just as biased as their prime-time line-up. This has been proven so many times that you have to be either indescribably stupid, insane or stubbornly resistant to reality to ignore it. Every story, on any show is slanted in a conservative direction. Look up the "Moody memo", go and do some fucking research, they admitted this in fucking court! On MSNBC or CNN, their news shows are straight-up news. If they have a slant, it's slightly to the right (most US news has a rightward slant) but they genuinely try to report on things objectively. On Fox, everything is actively slanted to favour the Republicans and attack Obama. And spare me the outrage about Fox breaking the ACORN or Van Jones stories. I don't carry a flag for either of them but both of those were complete non-stories that Fox went hysterical over until the Whitehouse gave in (I wish they'd stop doing that). From Hannity (who makes no pretence at neutrality) to Bill O'Lielly (who's relationship with the truth has only ever been accidental) to Glenn Beck (I want to stop picking on Glenn because he's so obviously ill), these guys are vastly further to the right than Olbermann, Maddow or Schultz are to the left. Hannity is about two steps from being an outright fascist; Beck is so far gone that he appears to be channeling the ghost of Joe McCarthy and trying to cope by mainlining LSD. Olbermann's a liberal, sure, but he's not sobbing on tv and calling people every name he can get away with (barring George Carlin's famous seven words). There is no equivelency between the two prime-time line-ups. MSNBC's is centre-left, FOX's is frothing right-fringe. And their straight news shows are just as bad, they're just slightly more subtle. Media Matters (yes, I know Bill-O says they're an extreme-left outfit but he says that about anyone who disagrees with him) has loads of stuff on this, showing how Republican talking points get endlessly repeated by Fox in both their opinion AND news shows."

Full essay:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6852204

[emulatorloo]

32. 1. MSNBC is only "liberal" for 3 or 4 hrs a day. 2. The "liberal" shows don't make things up

Maddow, Olbermann, etc can survive a fact check. If they screw something up they apologize.

Beck, etc make things up. If their lies are exposed, they just dig in and repeat the lies.

[ErinBerin84]

33. MSNBC uses the same bullshit beltway narratives during the day

that a lot of the other media uses- watching Fox during the day is like stepping into an alternate universe for me. On the opinion side, remember, Rachel and Ed (or Dylan Rattigan on MSNBC at least ) did not even have their jobs on tv until the VERY end of the Bush administration. Tucker the fucker had a show, Chris Matthews was pretty conservative for most of the Bush administration, Scarborough country, etc.

[LVZ]

35. FYI: MSNBC can also be seen "live" online ...

http://www.lasvegasmixx.com/msnbc-live

To go FULL SCREEN, double-click on the video image.

[sendero]

36. Not even close..

... when they start lying outright and making mincemeat of the right's position on EVERYTHING - because the right has FAILED ON EVERYTHING, then they will be the opposite of Fox.

Having a couple of "left" commentators is not enough.

[City Lights]

37. Not even close.

And a pox on the house of anyone who makes that claim.

[IsItJustMe]

38. No. They have a bunch of right wing idiots on there.

[fauxnewsSUCKKKS]

41. they both have their sides. and as much as it suckkks. fox is killing everyone in ratings...

[Name removed]

42. Deleted message

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[Beaverhausen]

44. not in the demographic that matters

old white people sitting at home aren't who advertisers are after.

[fauxnewsSUCKKKS]

45. what are MSNBC's ratings for younger people?

[Beaverhausen]

43. When MSNBC organizes, promotes and sends it's personalities to Democratic events

then you might be able to compare them. But MSNBC will never do that.

[Name removed]

46. Deleted message

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