Now, they’re telling independent Democratic pundits to stay off the network:
At least one Democratic political strategist has gotten a blunt warning from the White House to never appear on Fox News Channel, an outlet that presidential aides have depicted as not so much a news-gathering operation as a political opponent bent on damaging the Obama administration.
(…)
Patrick Caddell, a Fox News contributor and a former pollster for Democratic President Jimmy Carter, said he has spoken to Democratic consultants who have been told by the White House to avoid appearances on Fox. He declined to give their names.
Caddell said he had not gotten that message himself from the White House. “They know better than to tell me anything like that,” he said.
Caddell added: “I have heard that they’ve done that to others in not too subtle ways. I find it appalling. When the White House gets in the business of suppressing dissent and comment, particularly from its own party, it hurts itself.”
If this was a Republican administration telling conservative pundits not to appear on MSNBC or CNN, how do you think the media would react ?
This is stupid, it’s appalling, and it has to stop.
November 7th, 2009 at 1:01 am
First, not knowing the “battles” that have taken place to call this a “war” against Fox, I wonder if people are making more of this than it is. Refusing to grant interviews to persons you feel don’t represent you honestly, fairly, and in a balanced way isn’t a war. It’s good sense. Highlighting the overwhelmingly evident bias that a channel has against you isn’t a war…There’s been no censorship, no attempts to bring down Fox News. But remember, Fox News is a channel, not a news program. Fox News the channel only has approximately 7 or so hours of news a day. The rest of time it’s opinion programming, although I do think opinions leaks thru the news anchors…
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/10/30/daily_show_on_fox_news__white_house_war.html
As for a reaction had a member of the Republic party taken this kind of approach to a network (per Thinkprogress.com):
In May 2008, then-White House counselor Ed Gillespie publicly sent a scathing letter to NBC News President Steve Capus, accusing them of deceptive editing and blurring the lines between “news” and “opinion.”
In fact, two Fox News contributors, filling in for Bill O’Reilly, suggested that the Bush White House should have considered freezing out NBC and MSNBC all together:
– INGRAHAM: Now Karl, why would the White House agree to do an interview with Richard Engel? I mean, this is the guy who, you know, really didn’t want to give the surge any credit and NBC, an organization, obviously that’s called this a civil war. Now it’s kind of not gone back and changed his view on that. We’re in a recession, etcetera, etcetera. I mean, why bother really at this point? [The O'Reilly Factor, 5/19/09]
– E.D. HILL: You know, I’m sure you know from watching this program that, you know, Bill has, you know, has been reporting for more than a year on a pattern suggesting that NBC News basically panders to the left and is, in essence, in the pocket for Barack Obama. Why go on a venue like that to begin with?
GILLESPIE: Go on a venue like MSNBC?
HILL: Yes.
GILLESPIE: I don’t know. It’s — you know, the – you know, there are elements there who are clearly advocates for a candidate or a point of view, not even commentaries or commentators really or analysts. So I don’t know why he would. [The O'Reilly Factor, 5/22/08]
Gillespie appeared to be supportive of freezing out NBC at the time. On his radio show, Glenn Beck asked Gillespie about Democrats “trying to blackball Fox,” adding, “You don’t see Republicans doing that to NBC, do you?” “No, and sometimes I question why,” replied Gillespie. “It is beyond me frankly.”