CNN's Brian Stelter Claims Fox News Has 'Portion Control' Problem, and Things Went Downhill From There

CNN

CNN chief media correspondent Brian Stelter said the quiet part out loud in October when he proclaimed it was the media’s job to “protect the public” from certain things politicians, candidates for higher office, and the like say.

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In media-speak terms, that was code for “it’s our job to control the message and to prevent audiences from hearing things we don’t like.”

So knowing that, I wasn’t super surprised to read his latest Oliver Darcy-inspired rant about how media coverage of stories that are damaging to Democrats – like the Eric Swalwell and Hunter Biden stories – must be kept “in proportion” to alleged scandals involving President Trump because Orange Man Bad and related left-wing narratives.

This was another on a long list of “why is Fox spending so much time on this story?!” rants by various CNN figures, but what set it apart was Stelter’s rank hypocrisy and poor choice of words.

He literally said Fox News “has a big problem with portion control”:

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This set off a well-deserved firestorm of criticism about his network’s actual portion control problems, especially as it relates to their four-year-campaign of peddling the Russia collusion scandal nonsense:

As I’ve noted before, to say Stelter’s position on “protecting the public” and “portion control on stories” are dangerously stupid ones for him to take would be quite an understatement. Reporters are not supposed to be in the business of “protecting the public” from what politicians, candidates for higher office, and the like say and do. Nor or they supposed to suppress stories that might interfere with the political aspirations of their preferred political candidates. Period.

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If they want to do fact checks, fine. If they want to include a note about putting something in context, fine. Let readers and viewers see the original comments and read/watch the fact checks and contextual links if necessary in order to decide for themselves.

But to keep it from them altogether or “in proportion” simply because they don’t like what they’re reporting on? No. That is not – I repeat – not the media’s job. Not at all.

The irony here is that in advocating that the MSM shield readers and viewers from stories they find uncomfortable to report, it’s Brian Stelter himself who is contributing to “why our info-verse feels broken.” A better title for him would be something like “chief media propagandist” or “chief minister of disinformation” because that’s exactly what he’s turned into over the years.

Related: Adam Housley Schooled Brian Stelter on What Journalism Is and Isn’t During Rudy Presser, and It Was Glorious

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