I feel a bit silly pointing this out — it’s crashingly obvious, after all — but a 617-page report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism demonstrates that Fox News’ coverage is intensely opinionated, rather than fact-based. For those not looking to do quite so much reading, Howard Kurtz provides an overview in today’s Washington Post:
In covering the Iraq war last year, 73 percent of the stories on Fox News included the opinions of the anchors and journalists reporting them, a new study says.
By contrast, 29 percent of the war reports on MSNBC and 2 percent of those on CNN included the journalists’ own views.
[…]
Last March, Fox reporter Todd Connor said that “Iraq has a new interim constitution and is well on its way to democracy.”
“Let’s pray it works out,” said anchor David Asman.
Another time, after hearing that Iraqis helped capture a Saddam Hussein henchman, Asman said: “Boy, that’s good news if true, the Iraqis in the lead.”
[…]
As for the most popular prime-time shows, nearly every story — 97 percent — contained opinion on Fox’s “O’Reilly Factor”; 24 percent on MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews”; and 0.9 percent on CNN’s “Larry King Live.”
The report isn’t exactly a love-letter to cable news on the whole, but Fox News, in particular, is further exposed for what it is. Not that this study will make an iota of difference in Fox News viewership.