Fox News: Anything But Fair and Balanced!

Now that the election is over, the fairness of the election coverage displayed by the various networks is now the subject of much debate.

Fox News Channel has been touting the results of a Pew Institute Study on the 2008 Presidential Election coverage. The study listed Fox News with the most fair coverage, with the same amount of both negative and positive stories on both McCain and Obama. While the study focused only on the coverage given to the nominees of the two major parties, the coverage Fox News provided during the primary campaign season could hardly be deemed fair.

Last January, the Fox News Channel made the decision to exclude Rep. Ron Paul from their debate, held the Sunday night before the New Hampshire primary. That decision was nothing short of censorship and media bias.

Many conservatives have come to expect bias from the three major networks and most newspapers. However, Fox News has billed itself as being "fair and balanced" and uses the slogan "We report...you decide". Unfortunately, when it comes to truly conservative candidate Ron Paul, Fox News does not want to "report" his views nor do they want us to "decide."

Fox used the excuse that they simply did not have enough room in their mobile studio for Ron Paul to join in the debate. They claimed that Paul did not have enough support to be included. However, Paul finished the Iowa Caucuses with a little over 10 percent of the vote, while Rudy Giuliani garnered only 3.5 percent. Of course, Giuliani is a frequent presence at the Fox studios, as well as good friends with Fox Television Chairman Roger Ailes and was included in Fox´s debate despite his abysmal showing in Iowa.

In regards to the New Hampshire primary, at the time, Ron Paul was polling a full five percentage points ahead of Fred Thompson among likely Republican voters. Of course, the lackluster and slightly comatose Thompson was also included in Fox´s debate.

Contrary to what his neocon detractors may say, Ron Paul was a serious candidate with serious financial backing. During the primary campaign, Congressman Paul set the record for a single day of online fundraising, raising $6 million in one day. During the last quarter of 2007 alone, Paul raised over $19.5 million, which was the same amount that Democrat Hillary Clinton was estimated to have raised during the same period. However unlike Sen. Clinton, Paul received his third quarter donations from more than 130,000 individual Americans.

Their decision was not about candidate viability nor is it about the insulting excuse of "limited space." The only reason Fox News excluded Ron Paul from their debate was his political philosophy and the fact that he would have been the only actual conservative on the stage. Fox does not like the stance Paul has taken against the war in Iraq, though interestingly enough Paul lead all of the Presidential candidates (both Republican and Democrat) in donations from members of the active duty military.

Let´s face it, Congressman Paul would have made the panel of fake conservatives look like the San Francisco Board of Supervisors! Paul was the only candidate who understands or respects the Constitution, and he is the only candidate who spoke about the importance of saving the U.S. dollar. Did you hear any of the rest even mention the steady devaluation of our money, or the fraud being played on the American people by the Federal Reserve?

Another reason why Fox chose to exclude Ron Paul may be found on their parent company´s Board of Directors. News Corp which owns Fox News has a 15 member Board, one of these men is Viet Dinh who is a former Assistant U.S. Attorney General under George Bush and was the main architect of the Patriot Act. Of course, Paul has been a major critic of the Patriot Act and the challenges it presents to our Constitutional rights.

Apparently, Fox News only believes those who are willing to sell-out our founding principles and disregard our Constitution, or start needless foreign wars are worthy of the Republican nomination.

Ron Paul was a viable candidate with true conservative beliefs. The decision by Fox to exclude Paul while inviting a host of neocons, should serve as a wake up call to all regular Fox News viewers who think they are actually receiving an alternative to the mainstream news media...Fox is just as biased as the rest, they have only been better at hiding it.