Not News? Fox Carried The Most Health Care And Ft. Hood Weekend Coverage

by Joe Coscarelli | 3:26 pm, November 8th, 2009

mp_main_wide_HoyerPelosiHCR452 As we noticed last night, much of cable news was curiously occupied with taped programming yesterday evening in the midst of giant weekend news. Both the House passage of a health care bill and a live Fort Hood press conference occurred Saturday night, but CNN and MSNBC were locked in with pre-taped shows and thus missed a few big moments.

Fox News, on the other hand — the “not a news network” news network — was live the majority of the day, with the exception of the 1-3 pmET business shows and the 8-10 pmET Huckabee/Beck block, breaking for coverage in the afternoon of President Obama’s speech and the live Fort Hood press conference during the 8 o’clock hour (before cutting back to Huckabee). CNN’s simultaneous Fort Hood special also aired during the 8 pmET slot, inconveniently eclipsing the live news on the matter.

When it came time for Nancy Pelosi to give her floor speech during yesterday’s debates, again only Fox was there, as also noted by TVNewser, while CNN went with taped programming and MSNBC cut in with only a soundless visual. To their credit, MSNBC did provide streaming coverage via an embeddable online player, with intermittent live coverage throughout the afternoon on television before ultimately airing the final vote as it happened.

Those die-hards obsessively tracking the progress of the bill were watching CSPAN, of course, but it is interesting to note how on point Fox News was throughout a hectic news day, especially so soon after their chops were questioned so extensively by the White House. It’s almost as if the passage of the health care bill in the House was more important to Fox News’ generally right-leaning viewers as the opposition than those who might’ve been expected to celebrate Pelosi’s speech and the bill as a historic achievement.

Whatever the case, where were CNN and MSNBC? It will be interesting to see how the weekend ratings play out, but if recent history is any indication, one bet is safer than the others.

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CNN, CSPAN, fnc, Fort Hood, fox news, Huckabee, msnbc, Ratings, TVNewser

3 comments

ImNotBlue says:

November 9, 2009 at 1:02 am

Whatever the case, where were CNN and MSNBC?

Asleep at the wheel… the same place they’ve always been.

DWHarper says:

November 9, 2009 at 11:27 am

Here’s the real story. The cable news networks all get really bad ratings and can’t afford to put up constant live programming. In fact, all news networks and news divisions at the major broadcast networks have slashed budgets over the past 20 years in response to the profit motive now in effect for news organizations. Because Fox covered the House debate and vote doesn’t mean that they are a real “news” network though. The argument against Fox is about their editorializing of the news not whether they have more live coverage. The author knows this but deems his audience too stupid to know the difference.

ImNotBlue says:

November 9, 2009 at 1:03 pm

DWHarper says:
November 9, 2009 at 11:27 am

A) You still haven’t acknowledged your lie in a previous post, so I’m not sure how you can editorialize about ANYONE or anything with some semblance of credibility.

B) You’re, once again, moving the goal posts and mixing arguments to suit your needs. What do ratings have to do with anything? What do budget constraints have to do? Is that your way of saying the 24-hour cable nets were JUSTIFIED in not airing a very important speech and vote? Yikes!

FOX was the only network to do their job, and cover the vote… but as a hater, you are incapable of rational case-by-case thought… only more hate. So FNC does the right thing, provides good coverage of an important event… and instead of being able to praise them for it (just this event, you don’t have to change your mind about the whole operation), you concoct some non-rational as to why they’re still bad. See, that makes you a hack… you’ve made up your mind BEFORE anything happens, and then warp the reality to back up that opinion… it’s backwards… it’s hack.

FNC covered the event… they did the right thing, and devoted resources correctly. Sure they editorialize on their opinion shows (duh), and all the networks do that… you don’t like what they say, so it’s different. But why don’t you man up (or woman up, whatever), and say, “Nice job FOX. I still disagree with the opinions of some of your hosts, but you got this one right.” Your hate seems to be clouding the brain.

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