The DNC says no debates on FOX

drummerboy said:
You really just think that Fox and CNN are the same, don't you? Just different points of view.

And you don't understand a darn thing about campaigning. You need to spend your energy on people where there's a reasonable chance of winning them over. By their nature, the number of Fox viewers that are winnable is minuscule - and therefore they are a waste of time. 
To appear during primary season is even dumber, since the number of Fox viewers who might vote in a Dem primary is probably just this side of zero.

On the other hand, by appearing there, a Dem gives Fox an air of respectability that they in no way deserve. So I hope Sanders and the others are proud of the fact that they're helping Fox a lot more than they're helping themselves.

 I do think Fox and CNN and MSNBC are both largely propaganda supporting the corporate establishment. There is so much they leave out of reporting and when they say they are presenting alternative views--the views presented are about 1 inch apart. CNN/MSNBC/NPR/PBS almost never present real Progressive voices--FOX does, so I give them some credit for that.  

I do understand about campaigning--but the time spent on TV is a great way to reach people all over the country without going all over the country. This is also a problem for Progressives because they are treated so poorly on MSM that many people absorb those views.  Hence so many people who tell me inaccurate "facts" about Sanders.  

And I just saw this, which seems to support my view:

Fox News viewers are more likely to support Bernie Sanders than people who watch MSNBC

https://www.businessinsider.com/fox-news-viewers-more-likely-to-support-bernie-sanders-than-msnbcs-2019-5?fbclid=IwAR0wm3-2fsRQdVe-LWyVurW-Uac8hQzjvb-xKGDJtqTdDzydOZtUhvHDaQg


nan said:
I think Warren should have gone on Fox, because it was an opportunity to reach more voters. If elected president, she will be president of Trump supporters also.  
Here is how Bernie's campaign (Briahna Joy Gray-spokesperson) responded to Warren's refusal to go on FOX:
https://twitter.com/briebriejoy/status/1128366069910069248

She's Bernie's spokesperson, so of course she portrays Warren's view as a mistake instead of a difference of opinion.  

For the Democratic Primary, reaching people who only rely on Fox News for their candidate information is not important.  In the general election, the Democratic nominee will have more than enough exposure to this "sola Fox" demographic.  


nan said:

And I just saw this, which seems to support my view:
Fox News viewers are more likely to support Bernie Sanders than people who watch MSNBC
https://www.businessinsider.com/fox-news-viewers-more-likely-to-support-bernie-sanders-than-msnbcs-2019-5?fbclid=IwAR0wm3-2fsRQdVe-LWyVurW-Uac8hQzjvb-xKGDJtqTdDzydOZtUhvHDaQg

I don't know what "view" you think it supports.  Once you get past the headline, there's other information, and a link to the polling company's results page.  "The poll found that 22% of Fox News viewers who also identified as potential Democratic primary voters back Sanders compared to just 13% of MSNBC viewers."  Big deal.  Read further down: "The only candidate with more support among Fox News viewers than Sanders was Joe Biden (42%), but the former vice president also had more support among MSNBC viewers overall (44%)."

The poll results indicate that "the margin of error on sub-demographics range from 1 – 4%", which would include "Fox News viewers who also identified as potential Democratic primary voters" (a percentage which I can't find on the poll results).

The significance is that Biden is doing essentially the same, among the MSNBC and Fox viewers.  For all I know, the extra level of negativity against him from Fox, compared to Bernie, probably helps him, among the viewers who are potential Democratic primary voters.

The whole chart with those results is below.  By the way, Biden's doing better than Bernie among Snapchat, Instagram and Twitter users, also.  Must be all those old fogies Snapchatting away.


An excellent commentary on the substance of Warren's "tweets" rejecting a Fox "town hall", which notes that "Warren didn't just lash out in a politically savvy, base-pleasing way. Even in anger, she's a teacher":

Instead she explained how Fox works. It's not just a hate-and-conspiracy channel -- it recklessly peddles right-wing hate and conspiracies to distract voters from the real agenda of the Republican Party, which is to make the rich richer at the expense of everyone else. She explained that advertisers won't advertise on Fox if the channel seems like a loony bin all day and night, so legitimate-seeming news coverage is worked into the mix to gull ad buyers into thinking that their products are being seen on a high-class broadcast. Democratic town halls are part of the window dressing that bamboozles advertisers (and, I'd add, most media critics from the mainstream press), while the real work of Fox goes on.

These tweets are short and could use more detail, and I hope someone asks Warren to provide it, because I'm sure she'd have no trouble elaborating on what she's written. But this is good. She's rebuffed Fox while outlining a Theory of Fox. Good for her.


Warren may have had a good chance of winning over some voters. Does everyone in a household have exactly the same views? Are wives, husbands and teens or college age children all in agreement on every issue? If Fox is the usual station viewed, might a discussion ensue after a Town Hall on a few issues?

After a holiday dinner my friend's niece said she liked CNN but her mother only watched Fox. For a young person looking to define their views, listening to the arguments of a skillful and articulate politician, might help her to articulate them in future discussions. A wife, listening to Kristen Gillibrand on Fox, taking on the hard issue of a women's right to chose, might pick her own candidate and when she goes in the voting booth might make a choice that she choses not to share with a pollster or a family member.


nohero said:
An excellent commentary on the substance of Warren's "tweets" rejecting a Fox "town hall", which notes that "Warren didn't just lash out in a politically savvy, base-pleasing way. Even in anger, she's a teacher":


Instead she explained how Fox works. It's not just a hate-and-conspiracy channel -- it recklessly peddles right-wing hate and conspiracies to distract voters from the real agenda of the Republican Party, which is to make the rich richer at the expense of everyone else. 

Correct. Fox peddles garbage. 

Shame on any Democrat who goes on their Town Halls, giving Fox additional gravitas. It helps support the illusion Fox is a reputable news outlet. 

You have to be blind not to see that or not give a damn.


BG9 said:
Correct. Fox peddles garbage. 
Shame on any Democrat who goes on their Town Halls, giving Fox additional gravitas. It helps support the illusion Fox is a reputable news outlet. 
You have to blind not to see that or not give a damn.

this is it in a nutshell.  Giving Fox News credibility is a sucker's game.


I like Tim Black's take on this  https://twitter.com/RealTimBlack/status/1128694060334616576


Elizabeth Warren calling out Fox News isn’t gutsy. Gutsy would be calling out MSNBC or CNN, but then she’d probably get even less coverage than she already receives.


nan said:
I like Tim Black's take on this  https://twitter.com/RealTimBlack/status/1128694060334616576


Elizabeth Warren calling out Fox News isn’t gutsy. Gutsy would be calling out MSNBC or CNN, but then she’d probably get even less coverage than she already receives.


 What does that mean?


nan said:


drummerboy said:
You really just think that Fox and CNN are the same, don't you? Just different points of view.
CNN/MSNBC/NPR/PBS almost never present real Progressive voices--FOX does, so I give them some credit for that.  

 

nan said:
I like Tim Black's take on this  https://twitter.com/RealTimBlack/status/1128694060334616576


Elizabeth Warren calling out Fox News isn’t gutsy. Gutsy would be calling out MSNBC or CNN, but then she’d probably get even less coverage than she already receives.


EW's calling out Fox News (The network you give credit for presenting real progressive voices) is not gutsy.   Got it.  


If you've got some spare time, give Rudy a call.  I'll bet he'd love to have you.  


Red_Barchetta said:
EW's calling out Fox News (The network you give credit for presenting real progressive voices) is not gutsy.   Got it.  


If you've got some spare time, give Rudy a call.  I'll bet he'd love to have you.  

 I don't like FOX news.  But, calling them out is easy when you are a Democrat.  This is no gutsy move.  CNN/MSNBC also deserve to be called out--and they have been criticized for ignoring the female candidates who are running for president.  She could have said something about that.  That' would have been gutsy.  No other candidate has dared to do that, and some of them have good reason to do that. 


Pretty much all of mainstream journalism can be called on the carpet for a wide variety of sins - a profit driven medium is going to have its decisions skewed as a matter of course. It's what we're cursed with here in the U.S.


But to even try and equate Fox with any other major outlet is just delusional.  Their respective sins are distinct in both kind and quantity.  Tim Black's criticism is simplistic in the extreme. And that twitter thread is a laugh riot of imbecility.


STANV said:
To be serious if I were a Conservative Republican I would certainly believe that Ronald Reagan was far far better than Trump. I can only conclude that these people are lying or are complete idiots.

With Republicans, one doesn't exclude the other


When did this mythology about the media ever being fair and balanced arise?  It seems like as a nation, we are poisoning ourselves in our own mythology - the idea that we are a more virtuous country than many or that the media was once fair and balanced or that politicians have ever been anything much more than snake oil salesmen.


"I really do think Warren loses a lot of leftist street cred by earnestly hating Republicans. You’re supposed to hate Democrats and consider Republicans to be the natural byproduct of Democratic failures, and their voters are merely socialists who have lost their way."

https://twitter.com/agraybee/status/1128536462880903169?s=20


nohero said:
"I really do think Warren loses a lot of leftist street cred by earnestly hating Republicans. You’re supposed to hate Democrats and consider Republicans to be the natural byproduct of Democratic failures, and their voters are merely socialists who have lost their way."
https://twitter.com/agraybee/status/1128536462880903169?s=20

 kind of a dumb tweet (unless he's being ironic).  There are a lot of "leftist" Democrats who aren't the "Bernie bros" the centrists like to bash.  And it's not at all inaccurate to point out that the failures of neoliberals in the Democratic Party have served to strengthen the Republicans' position among white people, and leave them open to the racist overtures of someone like Trump.


ml1 said:


nohero said:
"I really do think Warren loses a lot of leftist street cred by earnestly hating Republicans. You’re supposed to hate Democrats and consider Republicans to be the natural byproduct of Democratic failures, and their voters are merely socialists who have lost their way."
https://twitter.com/agraybee/status/1128536462880903169?s=20
 kind of a dumb tweet (unless he's being ironic).  There are a lot of "leftist" Democrats who aren't the "Bernie bros" the centrists like to bash.  And it's not at all inaccurate to point out that the failures of neoliberals in the Democratic Party have served to strengthen the Republicans' position among white people, and leave them open to the racist overtures of someone like Trump.

 No, I think he's being sarcastic about the "more progressive than thou" types ( and the argument that a significant number of Trump voters would have been Bernie voters if given that choice), not saying that every "leftist" Democrat subscribes to that.


nohero said:
 No, I think he's being sarcastic about the "more progressive than thou" types ( and the argument that a significant number of Trump voters would have been Bernie voters if given that choice), not saying that every "leftist" Democrat subscribes to that.

 we've been through this dozens of times.  The polling data that's out there suggests Sanders supporters were no more likely to cross party lines than supporters of any other past presidential candidates.  Progressives were no less supportive of Hillary Clinton than Clinton supporters were of Obama.  

That said, it's certainly not going to help in '20 if centrist Democrats start insulting progressives before the debates even begin.


ml1 said:
 we've been through this dozens of times.  The polling data that's out there suggests Sanders supporters were no more likely to cross party lines than supporters of any other past presidential candidates.  Progressives were no less supportive of Hillary Clinton than Clinton supporters were of Obama.  
That said, it's certainly not going to help in '20 if centrist Democrats start insulting progressives before the debates even begin.

 I know what that polling data suggests, but we can disagree on how definitive the conclusion may be.  I'm more focused on behavior in 2020.

We're already getting advice from 2016 Jill Stein supporters on who is "progressive" enough to be the Democratic nominee.  They use criteria which essentially eliminates all but a narrow one-or-two person band of "progressives".  I think that's what the tweet was satirizing.

And as for "insulting progressives", if someone is whining that they won't help defeat Trump if their fee-fees are hurt during the primaries, then they should take off their "progressive" badge and give it to someone else, a real progressive.  


It's all quite bizarre.  Domestically, by any measure, HRC would have been better than Trump, so I would expect Democrats to pull together once the primaries have concluded.

In international relations, who knows.  North Korea would probably be about the same.  Iran better.  Venezuela I would hope better (in terms of us getting involved).  Russian relations - similar.  

Relations with China - well, that bring up the whole TPC thing which many people reject but was/is needed to have negotiating power versus China.


tjohn said:
When did this mythology about the media ever being fair and balanced arise?  It seems like as a nation, we are poisoning ourselves in our own mythology - the idea that we are a more virtuous country than many or that the media was once fair and balanced or that politicians have ever been anything much more than snake oil salesmen.

 

tjohn said:
It's all quite bizarre.  Domestically, by any measure, HRC would have been better than Trump, so I would expect Democrats to pull together once the primaries have concluded.
In international relations, who knows.  North Korea would probably be about the same.  Iran better.  Venezuela I would hope better (in terms of us getting involved).  Russian relations - similar.  
Relations with China - well, that bring up the whole TPC thing which many people reject but was/is needed to have negotiating power versus China.

 Thank you for adding a moment of calm sanity and order to this thread.


nohero said:
 I know what that polling data suggests, but we can disagree on how definitive the conclusion may be.  I'm more focused on behavior in 2020.
We're already getting advice from 2016 Jill Stein supporters on who is "progressive" enough to be the Democratic nominee.  They use criteria which essentially eliminates all but a narrow one-or-two person band of "progressives".  I think that's what the tweet was satirizing.
And as for "insulting progressives", if someone is whining that they won't help defeat Trump if their fee-fees are hurt during the primaries, then they should take off their "progressive" badge and give it to someone else, a real progressive.  

 you are responding to a small fringe group who are at most only weakly connected to the Democratic Party. 

But it's important not to obsess over "electibility" at the expense of finding a candidate who can excite the base. 

The last two electible candidates on the Democratic side were Kerry and Clinton. 


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