Biggovernment.com web master Andrew Breitbart posted an edited video in true Fox-News-fashion on his blog on Monday, which caused an innocent woman, Shirley Sherrod, to be forced into resigning from her position as Georgia Director of Rural Development with the USDA.
Breitbart took it upon himself to search for something to bait the NAACP with, after the organization’s leaders lambasted the Tea Party for being racist and not doing more to control blatantly racist messages on signs carried by their supporters at their rallies for over a year.
As a result, Breitbart did exactly what several commentators on Fox News have done in the past. He edited a recent video tape of Ms. Sherrod telling a group of NAACP members a story-within-a-story of personal discovery that happened in 1985. Breitbart took only a snippet of the video that made it sound as if she were discriminating against a white farmer.
Here is the drastically cut and edited dialog published on biggovernment.com:
"He had to come to me for help. What he didn't know while he was taking all that time trying to show me he was superior to me was I was trying to decide just how much help I was going to give him," she said. "I was struggling with the fact that so many black people have lost their farmland and here I was faced with having to help a white person save their land -- so I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. I did enough."
But that wasn't the whole story.
Breitbart obviously saw the entire video and knew the truth, but he chose to ignore the decent and honorable message she was delivering and made the calculated choice to use 30 seconds of a 15-20 minute tape as a character assassination for someone, who did nothing wrong.
The information-ally challenged Fox News picked up the story right away. They did no independent research on their own. Not a single commentator called Shirley Sherrod for a statement. Based on the dishonest report released by Breitbart, Fox News was culpable in gleefully spreading another lie about racism in the Obama administration.
Bill O’reilly said her comments were unacceptable and she should resign. Newt Gingrich appeared on Sean Hannity and condemned her “viciously racist attitude.”
Furthermore, the NAACP was quick to condemn Ms. Sherrod, without making a single phone call to her for the true story. They referred to her comments as “shameful”.
CNN’s Tony Harris conducted a full report on Tuesday with interviews including Ms. Sherron and the white farmer and his wife that she was accused of discriminating against.
The first thing CNN revealed was the full video. It showed Ms. Sherrod telling a story of personal revelation, which took place 24 years ago, when she worked for a non-profit organization. She started by sharing the fact that her father had been murdered by a white farmer when she was 17 years old. She vowed to stay in Georgia and do everything she could to make a difference in racial issues. But when she was faced with helping a white farmer, who showed a superior attitude, she had a defensive reaction on how much she was obligated to help him. Sherron goes on to describe a moment of clarity that “revealed” to her that poverty is an equal opportunity offender, whether people are black, white, or Hispanic and it she wanted to help the poor, no matter what their color.
Over a 2 year period, Sherrod helped the Spooner’s to save their farm.
Breitbart and Fox News didn’t plan on the white farmer and his wife coming forward for a CNN interview, in which they said Shirley Sherron was not racist in any way.
“They don’t know what they are talking about,’ said Roger Spooner. “She had no racist attitude at all, heck no.” The Spooner’s went on to say that if it weren’t for Ms. Sherrod’s efforts, they would have lost their farm.
The NAACP looked at the tape in its entirety and issued an apology to Sherrod and withdrew their criticism of her. Their statement put the blame where it belonged, on Breitman and Fox News, because their tape “was deliberately edited to create a false impression of racial bias and to create a controversy, where none existed.”
Does Fox have any remorse? Not at all. Even with the full video being distributed, the Spooner’s interview, and the recant by NAACP, Bill O’Reilly didn’t mention any of it on his Tuesday show. Choosing instead to perpetuate the lie and ignore any new evidence to the contrary.
In fact, he bragged that Fox News was the only one that carried the story Monday night and main stream media didn’t cover it. The difference between main stream media and Fox News is that Fox doesn’t care about truth or verifiable facts. CNN chose not to run with the story until more verification could be done.
“Journalism in America is on the ropes,” claimed O’Reilly, in smug seriousness, although journalism is not what anyone at Fox News practices. They are a platform for dishonest diatribes, misinformation, hate-speech, and Obama bashing. They are shameless in their methods.
An innocent woman has lost her job as a result of Breitman’s smear article and edited video. Fox must be so proud.
***Jean Williams 2010
Comments
All mature, responsible, and civil comments are welcome. Offensive, abusive, obnoxious, and vitriolic comments will be unceremoniously deleted
Journalists? NOT! What is with the lack of research going on at Fox? I mean wow! They take Breitbart's nonsense, turn it into a huge deal, then a day goes by and they realize all their cruel claims were totally wrong. How embarrassing! So how do they remedy situation? They turn it into yet another "blame Obama" moment. Incredible! I can't believe anyone takes Fox News seriously! This type of thing happens all the time. False reporting, and they never point out their mistakes unless it's a huge blow-up they can't ignore. Idiots! It's the channel of unfounded fear and horror, and they even devote an hour daily to Beck, who preaches Christianity. This is a freakin' NEWS station. I mean, come on! Act like the NEWS. Shep Smith is the only reasonable person there, but he's right on the edge of being unreasonable like the rest of their on-screen employees. What a joke of an organization, and of "journalism".
Cleese, ditto to what you said! Fox is a joke and a disgrace.
What Fox does is not "news" and I refused to call it that. It's Fox entertainment and it's creating an entire group of misinformed viewers who earnestly believe the crap they see on that entertainment network. It's disgusting and the FCC needs to step in and revoke their license to call themselves a news network. It's absurd.
They also spread the untruth that the Obama administration refused foreign help to clean up the oil spill and when faced with the facts that prove that's not true, Glenn Beck viewers have told me they can't believe he would misrepresent something. Fox is single handedly responsible for a large segment of our population believing outrageous lies by selling what they sell as NEWS when it is nothing but right wing propaganda. Thanks for posting this excellent article, Jean.
P.S. I just got something over the AP wire saying the USDA is conducting a thorough investigation and will probably reinstate the victim of Fox and Breitbart.
Just what we need when we have actual terrible things happening in the world, made up incendiary crap by Breitbart & Fox entertainment.
Fox should be fined by the FCC for this and other things they've mis-reported and lied about. This is getting ridiculous.
Hello all,
A 'victim of Fox News'?
You're kidding right?
The necessary implication of that statement is that the Obama Administration isn't smart enough, or honest enough, or tough enough, or 'E' all of the above, to do a thorough investigation BEFORE jumping to conclusions from a News report, based on an Internet source.
It was the Obama Administration's Agriculture Dept which fired the woman on unsubstantiated evidence nearly a quarter century old.
Yet, what do you Social Progressives do?
You blame Fox for a decision that should have the Secretary of Agriculture on the Hot Seat in the Oval Office.
Yet another example of Obama and SP's shifting the blame from themselves.
Lastly, allow me to point out that you SP's only demand 100% accuracy from Fox News on ALL reports: HuffPo, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC....hey not a problem when make errors, especially INTENTIONAL errors in reporting...THEN you SP's cut them all the slack in the world.
Wonderful Double Standa
Big brother doesn't like it when little brother tells on him!
So many Progressive Liberal Pukes on here today, spewing filth as usual. Fox is the only Trustworthy news today, the rest have sold their lowlife souls to you Obambi and his horde of Demons! The woman deserved to be fired. I never met a Black person, who worked for the government, that actually did any work, mostly just talked and lied. Met a lot of Whites also, the same way. One thing the Prog Pukes hate is the Truth!
Jean Williams,
What's the point of having a double standard if you can't enforce it.
I say good job for showing your hand.
Someday the American Citizen will realize that the war is not Republican VS Democrate.
The real war is Government VS Citizen, and the media is just a tool of the Government.
Wake up citizen
As a conservative, I'm disgusted to learn of what Fox has done. However, I'm not one to be all up in arms about this being "another example" about how Fox disorts the real truth or manipulates news to fit their agenda. After all, MSNBC ("the PLACE for politics"--yeah, right!) does the same thing to fit their liberal agenda. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Fox's job is to bash the liberals and MSNBC's job is to bash the conservatives. I have seen plenty of "news" from both sides that make me sick that I sometimes wonder who's telling the truth.
In this instance, FOX was wrong, and I'm disappointed. But I'll keep watching both sides to help find out where the truth lies.
Will FOX allow their believers to hear the farmer tell them that he and his wife thanked the former employee for saving their farm OR is this not in the FOX script of what they call news?
Google up fox news racist and they have a youtube video called "Fox Attacks: Black America"
No. Breibart should face criminal prosecution along with fox news and those that manipulated the tape, slandered and ultimately caused debacle because the democratic admin was cowardly when reacting to Tparty psychopathic bullying.
Give it a rest. Atleast the NAACP were the first to apologize and then defend Ms Sherrod. The only other defense came from the white farmer, her FRIEND. Who supposedly was the racist victim according to Evil Breibart.
I've yet to see any TParty members apologize for something that could lead to criminal convictions.
First, the woman's name is "Sherrod", not "Sherron". More important, just how did Fox News cause Ms. Sherrod to be fired when their first airing of the story and the video came AFTER she was already fired? W
Of course, another "victim". Getting tired of it. She said it--on tape. Its done. When the liberal rags start doing their jobs and reporting what Americans need to her, our country will recover. Until then, here's what we have!
Bloodhound, that post was the greatest example of satire I've ever read. You're giving Colbert a run for his money when it comes to playing the part of rightwing, delusional tool. I mean you actually convinced me you were serious, but I'm sure no one's THAT stupid.
Beck reported the story accurately - He reported the video clip as being "out of context". Let's all keep things truthful.
Hurry2012, perhaps if you had heard her whole comment as I just did, you wouldn't be using victim as a pejorative, but since FOX already cherry-picked what it wanted you to hear, you think you have the whole story. Many of your ilk should be thoroughly embarrassed, but since you're incapable of shame, I suspect you'll continue with this disgraceful behavior where your definition of truth is your own opinion, regardless of who is hurt by your astounding level of ignorance.
Sounds to me like someone has a personal vendetta against Fox News. Relax...Fox, CNN, MSNBC...everyone makes mistakes. No news organization is perfect.
Michael, THANK YOU! This is media poo - It's not liberal or conservative. It's just media stirring the big pot of poo and getting just the stink they were looking for!
You're right. Committing an offense against another person based on how they were born, based on the color of their skin is a-ok! Just make sure you learn a lesson from it.
Where did the author of this article learn their concept of morality and justice?
Complete factual news piece this story written by Jean Williams.
Fox is well known for twisting any news..look at even their headlines..how they read. Fox started this phony story..their
interpretation of this story..it is evident in all of their reporting and so called journalists..they do not do ethical journalism..they have a certain agenda only. It is over do and
time the voters of the USA get the ability to know real news..
from hyped up false news that has one agenda only..when as Fox
always does never corrects their own mis information..writes or
gives a correction to one of their own pieces..ie unethical
journalism...
tha
What is wrong with you people. To justify Fox's obvious attempt at making the Obama administration out to be racist by showingan edited video. As an american I am disgusted with just how easy it is for so many to justify a so called news organization putting out DISinfomation in order to further their own agenda. At the same time claiming to be fair balanced and honest. Regardless if its CNN doing it MSN or Fox I am disgusted with the so called honest media. The only thing I am more disgusted with are my fellow Americans position of trying to justify the right or lefts actions by saying the other group does it. Your all getting led down the road instead of being given the honest news and allowing you to make up your own mind. Instead you are fed DISinfomation to forward someone else agends. An you follow like sheep..BAHAAAAAAAAAAA
Sam, Glen Beck OF FOX NEWS covered this only on his show yesterday, reporting that the video clip was "OUT OF CONTEXT". This termination goes much deeper than Fox or any other news organization - Who's going to look into that? We're all too busy busting the media (namely Fox). Isn't anyone concerned over the fact that this woman was fired over a media "segment" that went uninvestigated prior to her requested resignation? And the speech was dated back in March - That's nearly 4 months ago!
BLOODHOUND spouts about respect and need for truth and its importance an than goes on to say this women deserves to be fired I am not sure if its because she is black or because Foxes truth although now a proven lie is more in line with his racist beliefs? One thing blood hound has proven by his comments and that is the truth matters not.
I hope she sues Faux and Breitbart - this will be a great case to follow. I hope she gets big bucks from them.
Listen to this trash. Ms. Williams needs to be sent to a re-education camp and Alaska road gang before she, and her friends, do it to us. Let's close down the Examiner. You reap what you sow.
This is not over. Both sides need to get there facts,and think before talking. That is the BLACK, WHITE and the OTHER. Fox is the best of all news. And it is not over.
Just as the cop in Mass. acted stupid, you once again have the Administration jerking its knee. Foxes fault ? If you believe that then why do we have a couple of left of liberal gals on the Supreme Court and a Marxist in the White House hmmmmmmm? Fox didnt fire this girl and the press didnt cover it until they could throw stones
Facts are facts! The video was wrong and someone should be charged for releasing this edited version no doubt. I watch all networks to include the local news. FOX, MSMBC and some CNN new shows do appear to have an agenda and bias is obvious. What I'm asking everyone who cares to do is, do not be bias when it comes to our United States, all we have is this great country. If we let the conservatives or the liberals divide us this great nation will not ever recover. At this point I do not believe anyone knows what the end results are going to be. However, at this point I am willing to give the Democrats until 2012 with their agenda. So many have forgot; it took eight years to get here and I'm still angry about the men and women who died in Iraq based on a lie about WMD's and the amount of money that has been wasted. I’ve been paying taxes since I was 15 years old, now I’m 52 and even I know the cutting spending and letting the Bush tax cut go is the best way to start this recovery after
Cont: I’ve been paying taxes since I was 15 years old, now I’m 52 and even I know the cutting spending and letting the Bush tax cut go is the best way to start this recovery after the bleeding is stopped. Ask Allen Greenspan, he admitted their error and knows what need to be done! I do not care who is in the White House, along as they get it right and keep our country strong for future generation!
The White House and the NAACP had come down on Sherrod and pressured her into resigning before Fox touched the story. In fact, her resignation appears to be what made it a story for Fox in the first place.
And how do you handle the fact that Beck defended Sherrod and said the portion of the tape Breitbart played was clearly out of context?
And why do you assume this is obvious?
"Breitbart obviously saw the entire video and knew the truth"
Did you practice what you preach and contact Breitbart for comment? Because he says the bit he aired is the only portion of the tape he had, that it is what somebody sent him and he was looking for the whole tape (which the NAACP had all the time but didn't consult until after condemning Ms. Sherrod- and what they released remains edited- aren't you curious about what they left out and why?)
Personally, I think some third party edited that footage maliciously and baited the trap for Breitbart, and he bit. Shame on him. But equal shame on you for this malicious hit piece which gets key points wrong, smears by association, and specifically demonstrates your own double standard.
Deputyheadmistress, aren't you the sanctimoneous one. You are spinning this story so much, you probably work for Fox News. Breitbard is a Tea Party activist. Frothing up controversy using ignorant misinformation and lies is what they do. How do you know that Breitbart didn't have the full video tape? How do you know that someone else edited it and he just played along? Whether he saw the whole tape or not wouldn't have changed anything. He saw his chance to spark a big stink against the NAACP and he did, with Fox News jumping on the bandwagon right away.
DeputyHeadmistress says:
"The White House and the NAACP had come down on Sherrod and pressured her into resigning before Fox touched the story. "
NOPE...you can't have O'Reilly and Hannity demanding her resignation AFTER she resigned...they demanded her resignation, therefore foxnews promoted the false story BEFORE she was forced to resign and probably because foxnews was making a stink over the video.
Anyone who suggests here that Shirley Sherrod got fired for anything other than backlash over this video don't know what they are talking about. She spent her entire life fighting against any kind of racism and it really stinks that Tom Vilsak made her the scape goat of the crap fostered by Breitbart and Fox News. Vilsak only saw what was released by Fox, but after seeing the whole video, he said the damage had been done. He is a schmuck, who didn't want to admit he should have talked to Shirley to get her side of the story before before sacking her.
I don't care what your party is. Republicrat or Democan or Tea, you all were screaming something yesterday, and the opposite thing today. I've never seen the Punditocracy so exposed, with its pants down, the clothesless emporers from Scarborough to Hannity to Matthews.
Its time to destroy the fake libertarian neocon-game of the Tea Party, and start a Whiskey Rebellion Party.
Four-Faced says:
"I don't care what your party is. Republicrat or Democan or Tea, you all were screaming something yesterday, and the opposite thing today. I've never seen the Punditocracy so exposed, with its pants down, the clothesless emporers from Scarborough to Hannity to Matthews.
Its time to destroy the fake libertarian neocon-game of the Tea Party, and start a Whiskey Rebellion Party. "
I don't like whiskey, can we make it a Tequila Sunrise Rebellion Party?
If you have any honnor or respect as a reporter or journalist your responsability is to check and re-check your sources and facts before you slander anyone with your story. It is clear that this was NOT done. Breitbart has a RESPONSABILITY as does FOX to report true facts not slander and hurt people. Fox is not a true news agency because they seem to be more interested in an agenda than reporting true news. And for those who say the white house acted first. Do you really feel the American public are that stupid. To all who report lies...... you will have to answer to someone someday....... good luck
I see you conveniently failed to report that the tape in question was in the hands of the NAACP--could that convenient snippet that fell into Mr. Breitbart's hands be an attempt at baiting a trap?; that it was the White House who demanded the resignation of Ms. Sherrod (Fox can demand all they want, they don't have the power to fire anyone in government); and that Fox commenter Glenn Beck and others came out strongly in favor of Ms. Sherrod, pointing out that her comments were taken out of context.
Ms. Jones says:
"I see you conveniently failed to report that the tape in question was in the hands of the NAACP--could that convenient snippet that fell into Mr. Breitbart's hands be an attempt at baiting a trap?; that it was the White House who demanded the resignation of Ms. Sherrod (Fox can demand all they want, they don't have the power to fire anyone in government); and that Fox commenter Glenn Beck and others came out strongly in favor of Ms. Sherrod, pointing out that her comments were taken out of context."
HAHAHAHAHA!
best piece of fiction since palin's last book!
Even today you have Whites hating Blacks, Blacks hating whites and it goes on in every different race there is I believe.
Lets just stop and realize that everybody deserves the same advantages and disadvantages in life. Sure our cultures are different that doesn't mean one is right and one is wrong they're just different. Lets respect that and move on as coamericans.
This Andrew Breitbart should be liable for the damage that he has caused both in Ms.Sherrod's life and in the race relations.
Is it too hard to print nothing but the truth, the whole truth and nothing short.
Not a word came from Fox until after Sherrod's firing. That's right Fox reported the story as it played out and they didnt cause her to be fired. White House jumpy and over reacted assuming Fox would be all over it. And of course liberal media was there ready to pull out the RACIST card.
What makes liberals such liars? Must be a mental illness.
YoTambien, get your facts straight. Breitbard's video went straight to Fox.com. Instead of anyone at Fox News doing independent research or real reporting that might include a call to Sherrod to get her side, all the commentators geared up for a character smear, gleefully thinking they had a case of reverse racism. This all happened Monday morning and word got back to the USDA department, where Vilsack, Sherrod's boss, who vowed to have a zero discrimination policy in his department, jumped the gun too and forced her to resign. He knew that Glenn Beck and all the red-meat talking heads at Fox had their sights set on smearing Sherrod, so he fired her. It was the irresponsible launch of a edited video by Breitbard and the willingness of Fox News to jump on it without any vetting at all that got Sherrod fired. It is conservative hatchet-happy idiots that are the liars and Fox news is full of them. And idiots like you believe everything they report.
I hope she tries to sue Fox News and Brietbart, as well as her previous employer for wrongful dismissal. To do single out just the first two would be .... well, I'll let you guys figure that one out but it starts with R and rhymes with facial.
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