Ignoring Fox’s own reporting, Fox News Watch claims Biden’s AFL-CIO meeting was ‘closed to the press.’
Ignoring Fox’s own reporting, Fox News Watch claims Biden’s AFL-CIO meeting was ‘closed to the press.’
Last week, when Vice President Joe Biden addressed AFL-CIO leaders in Miami, Fox News claimed that the White House was denying the press access to Biden’s speech. Fox backtracked on Thursday when it was informed that a transcript would be made available and pool reporters would cover the event. Despite this report, Fox’s media analysis show, Fox News Watch, featured a segment on Saturday asking why it was “closed to the press.” “We don’t have any idea what he said,” said host Jon Scott. Watch it:
The White House posted a transcript of Biden’s speech on Thursday and various news outlets, including the New York Times, published reports on the address. Perhaps Scott doesn’t “have any idea” what Biden said because he chose to not actually look.
Transcript:
SCOTT: Let’s talk about something else. The Obama — candidate Obama promised an open administration, and yet the vice president goes down to address this AFL/CIO convention in Miami Beach. It’s closed to the press. We don’t have any idea what he said. Is that fair?POWERS: Reporters can find out what he said. They can talk to people who were in the room. I don’t know that transparency means you have to open every meeting you have. There are a lot of people who have complained on the left about what they feel has been a lack of transparency throughout this short time that he’s been in power.
PINKERTON: Here Obama is so eager to have transparency when it comes to John Yoo’s memos about due process in the wake of 9/11 or Cheney’s energy task force. Yet, they’re quiet. They don’t seem to mind at all to get left out of a meeting with the AFL/CIO.
POWERS: You think it is on the same level? A meeting with the AFL/CIO and memos on how he was going to torture people?
(LAUGHTER)
LOWRY: My understanding is that it’s the AFL/CIO’s policy that these executive sessions are closed to the press.
PINKERTON: Reporters have been saying, we want to know what is going on. One of the hottest pieces of legislation in 2009 will be card check, or the EFCA, the Employee Free Choice Act, whatever you want to call it. I guarantee Biden and the union leaders were talking about that a lot.
LOWRY: The Obama people like nothing more than to have every Biden event closed to the press.
(LAUGHTER)
Ongoing, closed on the vice president.
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Damn truth, always getting in the way of Faux’s fractured fairy tales. How in the world are they going to keep their sheep in line if the truth keeps getting out? Oh, wait, their sheep don’t pay attention to any other source but Hannity, Rush and O’Reilly. Never mind.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:08 pmJon Scott doesn’t have any idea what VP Biden said because the VP chose to speak in YIDDISH . .
Mr. Scott doesn’t speak YIDDISH!!
[rolls eyeballs]!
March 9th, 2009 at 12:12 pmWell, Ron Paul gave the most concise vision of why he thought the Biden speech was closed to the press……
March 9th, 2009 at 12:14 pmCan someone refresh my memory? Did Faux News make this big a stink when Cheney’s Energy Task Force was not only closed to the press but its membership went undisclosed?
I don’t recall if they were upset about that…
March 9th, 2009 at 12:16 pmAnd let’s not forget that Fox abhors doing any sort of research or reading; they prefer to just make things up.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:18 pmBut the gullible watch anyway. They wouldn’t know the truth if it bit their noses off. Fair and balanced, my arse.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:21 pmWell it’s only fair — after all, most able-minded Americans don’t have any idea what Jon Scott said because they don’t watch Fox…
March 9th, 2009 at 12:24 pmYeah, this is exactly like Cheney’s secret economic summit, complete with maps of Iraqi oilfields.
Pffft.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:26 pmUnfortunately the middle class couldn’t afford to stay at the most expensive resort in Miami, but at least their hard working “leaders” could, on the backs of the workers of course. Thank God for union dues, what would these thugs do without them?
March 9th, 2009 at 12:28 pmHow do the shills on Faux News keep their heads from exploding?
March 9th, 2009 at 12:30 pmDang. This story must be ironclad if the best TrollAlGore can come up with is to screech about the choice of venue.
Although, to be fair, TrollAlGore is not the most resourceful of trolls.
And trolls are not known as a resourceful lot.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:33 pmUmmm, economic shudda bin energy?
March 9th, 2009 at 12:34 pmSimple: vacuums implode.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:34 pmUmm, please no one tell the GoreImposterTroll that it’s ok to have meetings at hotels…
March 9th, 2009 at 12:35 pmIf it’s not a press release from the Republican National Committee, Faux News doesn’t have any idea that an event is actually “news” and they have no idea how to cover it.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:38 pmAs for algore’s idiotic comment, I suppose a convention of banking leaders should be held at the local Super 8 so their middle class clients won’t be upset.
ralph the wonder llama Says:
Dang. This story must be ironclad if the best TrollAlGore can come up with is to screech about the choice of venue.
Be nice, I’m sure dear troll was profoundly upset the Unions went to a French-sounding resort.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:42 pmAlGore
I’m guessing you;ve never been to a hotel, because they have these things called conference rooms which can be rented by the hour so that people can have, you know, conferences, without everyone having to book a room and ’stay’ there.
And then its, you know, the union leader’s JOB to represent their members when given the opportunity to discuss their members interests with a high government official and to have the chance to ask questions of him or her.
As opposed say, millionaire white collar employees billing their companies for booze and massages whilst begging for tax-payer funded bailouts–which is what your heroes have done.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:43 pmpd Says:
How do the shills on Faux News keep their heads from exploding?
Answer: Doublethink - the act of simultaneously accepting as correct two mutually contradictory beliefs. It is related to, but distinct from, hypocrisy and neutrality.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:45 pmIf there is a little justice in the universe this economic sh|t-storm will put fox out of business.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:48 pmKey phrase:
“We don’t have any idea…”
March 9th, 2009 at 12:48 pm“We don’t have any idea what he said,” said host Jon Scott.
Mission Accomplished.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:49 pmAre you kidding? Bill O’Reilly sent Fox Security to guard the door, just in case any reporters tried to get in.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:49 pmYeah, what she said, too.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:50 pmPINKERTON: Here Obama is so eager to have transparency when it comes to … Cheney’s energy task force.
really???
i can’t wait for that to come out!
March 9th, 2009 at 12:52 pmSo it’s hunky dory that every 30 seconds an American is forced to contend with a medically induced bankruptcy. More evidence of how much the trolls hate America.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:02 pmA copy of the e-mail that I sent to Mr. Scott over at FOX:
Mr. Scott-
I know you’ve been publicly concerned over Vice President Biden’s “secret” meeting with union heads. To directly quote you, “The Obama — candidate Obama promised an open administration, and yet the vice president goes down to address this AFL/CIO convention in Miami Beach. It’s closed to the press. We don’t have any idea what he said. Is that fair?”
Well Mr. Scott, in hopes that you and your “friends” over at FOX might stop lying about the candor of this meeting, here is a copy of the transcript that has been readily available on the White House’s official website since March 5th:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Transcript-of-Remarks-by-the-Vice-President-to-the-AFL-CIO-Executive-Council-in-Miami-Florida/
Please do some research in the future before you lie to your audience(unless of course deceit was your intent in which case, carry on as usual).
ps- I don’t recall even a touch of concern from the fine reporters at FOX when during the Bush Administration, then Vice President Cheney held an intentionally secret meeting of his “energy task force”, the members of which have yet to be disclosed seeing as VP Cheney had all records of visitors stricken from the official logs.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:07 pmJust sayin’…
AlGore Says:
Vice President Joe Biden told a group of labor leaders Thursday at Miami Beach’s Fontainebleau Resort that he and the president are committed to helping U.S. workers and the middle class.
Wait a minute Al, that was a secret meeting. How on earth did you find out about it?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:08 pmAAAAAchie, My undies is all stretched out again, you ain’t wearing them to work again are you?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:10 pm50% of all bankruptcies are due to medical bills. So wow, a person goes bankrupt from medical bills every 60 seconds then. Wow, what a huge difference from every 30 seconds! Even if his stat happens to be wrong (a big if), it still doesn’t address the problem of the issue. No one gets bankrupt in any other modern country due to medical bills! No one should have to!
March 9th, 2009 at 1:14 pmUnfortunately for Archie, they don’t allow slobs with shirttails flopping and unbearable cigar breath into these conventions.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:15 pmYeah watchdog… a bankruptcy every thirty seconds is good ’cause some must be unrelated to health care… right?
No wonder you guys no longer get to run anything of substance… you’d rather argue that some of the bankruptcies must be caused by other factors than work to stop the alarming increase in bankruptcies… awesome.
Oh, and you realize that since he Republicans re-wrote the bankruptcy laws in 2005 it is now much more difficult for individuals to declare bankruptcy, right?
Which means the actual number of people in trouble financially is likely actually much higher?
Stellar reporting, keep it up watchdog! America needs to be reminded how irrelevant the Republicans insist on being everyday!
March 9th, 2009 at 1:16 pmIt does look to me that Obama’s claim is indeed incorrect and hyperbolic, and I agree that “we should expect that our President gets the facts right, especially if those “facts” are going to be used as a basis for sweeping national policy changes.”
Obama’s source was an independent Harvard study over a year old.
We should ALSO expect our media to gets its facts right.
FOX got its ‘fact’ wrong WITHOUT any study. They just invented their ‘fact’.
The comparison between the two is unequal.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:22 pmJust returned from working in Texas, where the hotel cafe had Fox News running. I have never watched it, but I was appalled by the constant headlines that read in 4 or 5 variants, that “Obama’s economic plan has failed”. Already. In my hotel room, I then turned on CNN, which essentially shouted the same thing, including yelling at budget Director that the plan was failing, Obama should ’stand up’ to the earmarks in the spending bill he was not a party to. Worst was their yelling at Obama for ‘not filling Treasury positions” — when of course, Republicans have put “holds’ on two of his most important, including Goolsbee. I was shocked at how rigidly slanted against his admin the TV media is
March 9th, 2009 at 1:23 pmWatchdog, you left out the statistics for Chapter 11.
Very convenient for you isn’t it.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:26 pmDo you care if Fox is wrong about the meeting being closed?
’cause they were…
Let’s compare… Obama said a bankruptcy is caused every thirty seconds due to health care costs… We have a bankruptcy in this country every thirty seconds… every sixty seconds someone declares bankruptcy due to health care costs… do you think his point would have been substantially altered in the minds of any American by substituting sixty for thirty?
Fox said the meeting was “CLOSED” to reporters and “We don’t have any idea what he said,” When the transcript was POSTED online… Fox doesn’t have the google? No that mistake DOES significantly alter the point FOX was making, doesn’t it?
As long as Fox says it, who cares what is said, right?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:30 pmRUCerious Says:
Unfortunately for Archie, they don’t allow slobs with shirttails flopping and unbearable cigar breath into these conventions.
Actually, Archie, in the show, was a union member:
http://socialistworker.org/2008/06/11/archie-bunker
And he probably would have been welcome. my experience with union members is that they’re often very conservative politically-think reagan democrats. didn’t the teamsters endorse reagan?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:32 pmDo you have any evidence whatsoever that the meeting was not open? Anything?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:34 pmFox is our very own “ministry of truth” — the not only re-write history, they report their unique version of the news of the day.
March 9th, 2009 at 1:43 pmTheir braindead audience believes their word is gospel and Fox continues to have the audience they need. The worst of it is that their lies and distortions creep into the mainstream media as if they were a legitimate source of news.
As long as the intentions are good, who cares what is said right?
I’m glad to hear you admit Obama’s intentions were good, watchdog.
What do you think were Fox’s ‘intentions’ when they made their ‘mistake’, watchdog?
March 9th, 2009 at 1:44 pmCare to answer my question, watchdog?
March 9th, 2009 at 2:07 pmThank you for proving my point!
Your point was that Fox’s mistake misleads and misdirects (one could argue, intentionally since the mistake was so egregious and easily de-bunked…) Americans while Obama’s point still stands regardless of his (relatively minor but unfortunate nonetheless) misquoting of the data????
Well, I misunderstood you.
March 9th, 2009 at 2:08 pmDo you know how expensive it is to investigate and report actual news facts? Just making sh!t up as you go along is free.
March 9th, 2009 at 2:14 pmDumb Question:
If Faux News is so bad that even Faux News doesn’t watch their own programs, what does that do to their Nielson ratings ?
March 9th, 2009 at 2:22 pm“Ignoring Fox’s own reporting, Fox News Watch claims Biden’s AFL-CIO meeting was ‘closed to the press.’”
Faux News will never use their brain, what little that they have left, to go to the White House website for information. I trust a 10 year old to go on the White House website before Faux News. Faux News just want to spin and distort information for ratings. Pass the popcorn please…
March 9th, 2009 at 3:02 pmAnyone hear about a communist that was on fauxnews last night? I was called on the phone by someone who said that there was a communist on faux and they were going to show that the POTUS was moving us toward communism. Told them I dont watch faux news because they dont tell the truth about anything.
March 9th, 2009 at 3:14 pmWhy would any intelligent person spend any time watching fox news?
March 9th, 2009 at 3:44 pmArchie B Says:
You really are an ignorant brainwashed moron. The NYTimes isnt discredited just because they dont conform to rightwing propaganda. YOU are just stupid. Monumentally stupid. The NYTimes is among the most respected and influential newspapers in the world and you are among the most ignorant morons I have ever seen.
March 10th, 2009 at 5:39 amWhen are these clowns (FOX) going to be put out of business.
March 10th, 2009 at 4:04 pmThey have NO idea what is going on in the world. They are all about ‘THEIR’ opinions and nothing else.