Surprisingly Objective

Before turning on the television to watch both Fox and CNN, I had expected to find some of the worst biases ever, with CNN being liberal and Fox conservative. Well, I just spent the last hour flipping between the two stations, and it really wasn’t that bad. They covered most of the same stories, and really didn’t have much of a difference. There were some stories, such as a Spanish judge trying to prosecute Bush for torture, that one station would cover and another wouldn’t. There was even a story on CNN that praised Bush for his preparation for a flu outbreak, while both of them discussed the Democratic Jon Edwards’ scandal.

There were two main differences that I could sense between the two stations. One was just the style of the two. Fox was much more relaxed, with the two anchors joking around and they seemed to have a friendlier attitude, while the CNN program was more formal. The other difference addresses the partisan backgrounds of the stations. It seemed to me that CNN was more optimistic towards the economy while Fox was not necessarily pessimistic they were definitely more wary.

Now, I know there are biases out there on these two networks, and you can see them with such programs as Rush Limbaugh, but the morning news that I watched was really just the news, with very little commentary. I wouldn’t say I prefer either partisan or objective news, it depends on what I’m in the mood for. If I want commentary I want it to be partisan, if I want just news I want it objective.