McClellan confirms FOX News channels White House talking points
Reported by Chrish - July 27, 2008 -
Scott McClellan confirms on Hardball what we've been saying all along: "Fox News Commentators Use The ‘Talking Points’ That The White House Sends Them."
ThinkProgress reports
"On MSNBC’s Hardball last night, host Chris Matthews asked former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan if he saw “FOX television as a tool” to get the White House’s “message out” while he was in the Bush administration. “Certainly there were commentators and other, pundits at FOX News, that were useful to the White House,” replied McClellan, adding that they were given “talking points.”Making a distinction between journalists like Brit Hume and commentators like Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly, McClellan admitted that “certainly” the White House used Fox News talking heads as “spokespeople” with “a script”:
MATTHEWS: So, you wouldn’t use Brit Hume to sell stuff for them, but you’d use some of the nighttime guys?
MCCLELLAN: Yeah, I would separate that out, and certainly I, you know, they’ll say, that’s because they agree with those views in the White House.
MATTHEWS: Well, they didn’t need a script though, did they?
MCCLELLAN: No, well, probably not.
McClellan later told MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann that “it was done frequently, especially on high-profile issues” and that Fox often gave the White House “its desired results.” Current Press Secretary Dana Perino would only tell Olbermann, “I’m not aware of that.”
More and video at ThinkProgress.
Now, this is not news to us, it's merely a confirmation of what we already knew. This is what's motivated us to maintain this mountain of documentation (over 12,000 entries) over the past four years and to support Robert Greenwald and Brave New Films in their ongoing video productions. The use of a supposed "news channel" to propagandize the population is anti-Democratic. When people are treated like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed manure, they cannot make informed decisions in their own best interests.
