Consuming Journalism: Why does Fox News do this?

(It's garbage)

(Note: Updated this a little bit because I stupidly tried to write it while my brain was telling me to shut down for the night. Not my best post, but I’m leaving it up - Fox News should be embarrassed of what it puts out.)

Fox News is powerful. They are watched by millions. A former colleague of mine taught me the lesson of “assume good intentions”. So I’ll assume that Fox employees went into their careers hoping to report fact-based, meaningful, relevant information that helps people make better, informed decisions about what’s going on in the world around them. Somewhere along the way they strayed from the path. I don’t know how they go home at night proud of their work.

Fox has rightly raised questions about Steele’s dossier and FBI methods. Good for Fox. There’s a lot to question there. But Fox is doing the same thing that it has criticized MSNBC for. Sorry, that’s a bad sentence, it’s late. Ending that sentence with “for” would have provoked the wrath of Ms. Cummings, my English Composition teacher. Sorry Ms. C.

Wild allegations from a PI firm in Florida, a firm you acknowledge - at the VERY end of a long (by internet standards) article - has a history of wild allegations.

There is so much wrong in this article, and it’s late. I’m not sure I have it in me right now to continue. Fox News is one of the most powerful media/journalism entities in the country, and they are putting articles on their front page that would get cut by a 6th grade editor. That 6th grade editor would then fire the author - Gregg Re.

Before I continue, I should note that Hunter Biden’s involvement in Ukraine while his father was VP was bad, really bad. So bad that I’ve put it in bold. It reflects so poorly on Joe Biden’s judgment (and Obama’s if he knew) that he should not be running. But the article and the motivations behind it are terrible, too.

The article reveals everything that is wrong with reporting today. Fox put out the article in the same chickenshit way that MSNBC reported on the Carter Page material - umm, we’re just reporting on what’s being said, you know? It’s not on us to actually think about or question the claims.

It’s not journalism. It reads a lot like the weird Facebook articles your angry uncle sends around. I hope Fox and the other media companies stop doing this. It hurts all of us. Instead, do the work. Is there any merit to the PI firm’s claims? Has the PI firm produced any evidence? Is there any legitimacy to their claims? Should we give credence to the PI firm’s claims? If the answers are no, or even uncertain, hold the salacious reporting.

I know I’m repeating myself, but Fox News doesn’t do any actual journalism here. Instead, Fox does the equivalent of recapping a Twitter thread. There is zero added value. I hope most readers can see the problems with this type of reporting, but I worry that many of the people who read it will line up at the water cooler at work and say, “Did you hear about Hunter Biden? He’s being investigated for a $156 million money laundering scheme.” They’ll be basing that statement on a private investigator’s unverified claim in a paternity lawsuit. We all deserve better journalism.