I have to remind my friends who are avid watchers of the FOX “News” channel that just because they have the highest ratings of the big 3 opinion cable channels doesn’t mean what they present is true. FOX peddles in what is called Argumentum ad populum. Facts and the truth isn’t subject to popular choice. FOX could have 300 million viewers a night and their race baiting still would not be factual.
The fact is the total audience that watches FOX, CNN, and MSNBC only number about 1 to 3% of the entire TV watching population. For example last Thursday FOX “News” was available to 98 million homes but only had about 2.4 million actually watching.
On Friday night, August 6th, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow had an excellent segment on FOX and how they use Argumentum ad populum and race bait in their stories:
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Of course there will be people who will say “But, Doug MSNBC is partisan on the liberal side why should we believe them?”
The answer is that MSNBC doesn’t create controversy or make up stores like FOX. MSNBC uses facts and the truth to tell their stories even if it looks bad for liberals. You NEVER see FOX reporting news that looks bad for conservatives.
The only black eye for MSNBC is the misogyny of Chris Matthews and allowing blatant bigot Pat Buchanan to offer his warped view of the world on the air. That is much different than the factless coordination of conservative talking points served up on the FOX “News” channel every hour of every day.
How true Doug. Fox news and the Republicans in general use the Argumentum ad populum fallacy all the time. For example "It's clear Americans think we should drill, drill, drill" –the "taxpayers want a flat tax on all Americans" or "the Europeans hate us." Number one, it's not true that "all" of anything thinks any thing of the kind. Two, even if there is some poll showing a slim majority favors some Republican slogan, it does not make it true or good public policy.