The disaster in Haiti has been riveting to watch on both CNN and MSNBC. Even the networks are providing excellent coverage of this unfolding humanitarian nightmare. But who's coverage is minimal to non-existent? FOX "News" of course. And the LA Times media critic James Rainey calls them out on it
While CNN captures riveting video of an 11 year old girl trapped in rubble Fox's Bill O'Reilly discusses wild horses with Bo Derek.
Bill O'Reilly played his no-Haiti card too, managing a gripping discussion Wednesday with Bo Derek about the threat to the West's wild horses. Not to mention those whales being hunted by the Japanese in the Southern Ocean.
While CNN's Sanjay Gupta puts his much needed skills as a Neurologist to work on a 15 day old baby Fox's Sean Hannity prefers to discuss the supposed "culture of corruption" in the Obama administration.
Why focus on all that misery, if, like Hannity on Wednesday, you can engage conservative virago Michelle Malkin in a soaring conversation about the Obama administration's "culture of corruption."
And it's not for lack of resources or boots on the ground either:
Fox's lack of focus on the subject during its most popular programs was not for a lack of resources. A moneymaking juggernaut, the cable giant had about 20 employees in Haiti by midweek, nine of them on-air personalities.
Based on what went out over the air, though, you'd hardly know. Only one of those correspondents seemed able to get into the heart of the capital, with much of the reporting coming from staging areas and the secure airport.
As the LA Times article points out, prime time is when most of the country is tuned in to TV and gets the the most viewers. To ignore a story of this magnitude during this time period is just wrong.
Randall E. King, a professor of media communications at Indiana Wesleyan University, said he was surprised and disappointed to see Fox devote so little attention to the story. King said the evening hours are crucial because they signal what a TV outlet views as the day's most compelling topics.
"When a real crisis comes and there's an opportunity to really serve as a leading news organization, to make a conscious decision to not cover this is an abandonment of journalistic responsibility," said King. The one-time television reporter said the prime-time hosts, despite their opinion focus, should have paid more attention to the crisis just off our southern border.
Let's call this for what it is. Fox knows that the viewers that turn in to their primtime shows have NO INTEREST AT ALL in what happens in Haiti. Haiti has nothing to offer the US in the way of valuable resources such as oil, so why bother? Plus, it's an extremely poor country populated by black people. Shades of Katrina anyone? Fox knows it's viewers think more like Rush "We gave at the office" Limbaugh and that their interest in news ends at the shore. "If it ain't happenin' in 'Murica who cares?"
With each passing day, Fox ventures further and further away from ANY journalistic credibility it once had, if ever. The one bright spot being Shephard Smith who, in my opinion, they only keep around so they can't point to him and say "Look! We are too fair and balanced!!".
All I can say is thank G_d, FSM, Buddha, Allah, or whatever your preferred higher power is that we still have CNN and MSNBC. Kudos to you for your coverage and for shaming Fox!