‘Pox News’ joke was wrong, PBS ombudsman says

By Daniel Tencer
Thursday, November 5th, 2009 -- 9:42 pm
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oscargrouchsesamestreet Pox News joke was wrong, PBS ombudsman saysThe ombudsman for public broadcaster PBS says that the long-running kids' show Sesame Street was wrong to run a joke at the expense of Fox News.

A skit in which a character declares her intention to stop watching Oscar the Grouch's news channel and watch "Pox News ... a trashy news show" should never have been made, says Michael Getler, the ombudsman for PBS.

As Raw Story reported Wednesday, the conservative Big Hollywood blog raised a fuss over a two-year-old repeat of a Sesame Street episode in which Fox News is mocked as "Pox News."

"The message is clear," an unidentified blogger wrote. "I can’t even sit my kids in front of Sesame Street without having to worry about the Left attempting to undermine my authority."

After receiving letters of complaint -- though admittedly "not many of them" -- Getler announced that PBS had been wrong to make the joke.

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"I don't know what was in the head of the producers, but my guess is that this was one of those parodies that was too good to resist," Getler wrote on the PBS ombudsman's Web site. "But it should have been resisted. Broadcasters can tell parents whatever they think of Fox or any other network, but you shouldn't do it through the kids."

Getler added:

Now, on one level, Pox News as an alternative and competitor to the Grouch News Network would seem to be a clever and appropriate title. But you would have to be anesthetized as a producer not to assume that many parents will hear this, or assume this, to be a clever shot at Fox News. It's a parody, a play on words, and has a timely feel to it at this time, especially, because of the battle now going on publicly between Fox and the White House. So it's probably not surprising that last week's showing got more people's attention.

For its part, the Christian Science Monitor tried to figure out the political leanings of Oscar the Grouch, the runner of the "Groucho News Network" that lost a viewer to "Pox News."

All that we could come up with is that he’s kind of a cross between Bill O’Reilly and Keith Olbermann. His personality is more like O’Reilly. Yet he’s green. So that would make him Olbermann-like.

As for his appearance, Wolf Blitzer probably comes the closest. Not that Blitzer looks like he lives in a garbage can or anything, but there aren’t many TV commentators with facial hair.

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Story comments are below...
  • bozola
    Yes, I agree. "Pox News" is wrong. It's not "news" at all!
  • truthops2010
    I've spoken personally a few times to PBS's ombudsman, and I won't again. She is a right wing hack, who, according to her own words during an interview with our local KPBS station, stated that she believes that NPR reporters should refrain from the word "torture" in reporting on, well, torture. That she would lean over backwards to satiate some FOX freaks is consistent with the right wing trajectory of the CPB, who's directorship has been firmly Republican since the era of Clinton, who appointed a Republican to direct the CPB to out-Centrist himself.
  • rickpetes
    Yeah, the Bush administration went out of their way to destroy any objectivity at PB/NPR. If you are a long time viewer/listener you can tell there's a difference in the reporting and the stories they choose to cover, but it's hard to point to specifics, though I often find that they seem to no longer have the tough follow on question when their doing interviews. Things seem to slide by that I don't think would have 10 years ago.
  • smallbear
    And, like the rest of the corporate media, they always frame the discussion toward favoring the right, while ony represent the left with light-weights and wimps.
  • alverant
    They made fun of CNN too. The fact that it's just Fox playing the victim says a lot.
  • Max_1
    Even more telling is who comes to their defense and rescue.
  • hippie1367
    I notice CNN didn't complain about being parodied as grouchy. Guess FOX like all rethugs is a bit thin skinned...
  • Max_1
    FOXPRAVDA is NOT a News Network...
    ... FOXPRAVDA is a Political Station.

    (It occasionally covers some news!)

    .
  • Chescores
    Unbelievable.

    Once again we are reminded of two truths in America.

    1. Conservatives have NO, I repeat, NO sense of humor.

    2. Progressives can really be spineless candy asses.

    How about this as a response from the ombudsman?

    Hey Fox, it's a kids show! Have you considered getting over it?
  • Name
    Undermining his authority? Oh, no! Time to get that kid back in the shower with you, Mr. Dobson, and remind him who's penis is bigger (just barely).
  • aremagen
    Let's all hope that PBS remembers that in order to be fair and balanced we never forget to appease pox news.
  • yoshimum
    Hey, Hamas uses their kids in Gaza to do it, why not here?
  • joze46
    One day, some time ago, while looking at some of my daughters coloring books and extra basic English books from grade school savings, you know stuff saved in boxes in the garage, several conclusions developed fast, stumbling across a Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. specifically Scooby Doo that thing a “Big Dog” that thinks like human but is dumb. But as I looked at it realized something.

    This was a children’s book obviously designed with language that condemned “liberal” leaning in a direction that was counter productive to what is considered Conservative today. Yikes one could see hard politics woven through out. Yes it was a shocking revelation but induced me to view some cartoon shows for kids on cable and realize that here is a whole unregulated area of television cable, wild with political innuendos and programming coupled with mainstream media contemporary K12 school support in comic books coloring books and word learning books that have fill in’s with answers to teach youngsters how to think. A lot of Conservative stuff which is wild and crazy as that which we see on Pox news. Yes Fox news. This is funny for if I was a Conservative in the know at this time I would keep my kids in home schooling for sure. LOL.

    To my surprise this revelation, political bias in grade school, has been going on for decades. Actually after reading Gerald Posners book, Secrets of the Kingdom, advertised on C-span book week, one could tie a horrible treachery that is embedded in our system that has been carried on for decades. It’s only my opinion that America is engulfed in one of the most tragic political corruptions in the history of any country.

    Posner in his book pointed out how the Wahabbi Arabs, that which America buys our primary amount of imported oil, that have through the years with the profits from America developed learning material in Arabic, and likely English, that teach their Arabic children in America to hate Americans. Yes Ladies and Gentlemen of America, not only do these Arabs invest in American business but also dictate what the business process is, especially counter Jewish. Wildly, here, they are the primary financiers of their favorite son Osama Bin Laden that family who is close friends of the Bush family; Jeb Bush who arranged the flying out all those Bin Laden family members secretly flown out of America after all aircraft was grounded in the wake of 911. Plus buying off a lot of international Europeans especially the Germans, French and British.

    My startling conclusion is a relentless media, political, corporate, banking, military, social, economic massive development of chaos patiently developed by the Wahabbi for decades. There is a message here from President Bush; he was wrong America has been at war with these Wahabbi for decades, Bush gave them comfort and ability to do so, and we now realize these Wahabbi are an integral part of America woven into our very political mainstream corrupting mainstream media and Americas basic educational system. We are fighting them here they are now being flushed out a La Fort hood.
  • missskeptic
    Newsflash Einstein: The shooter in Texas was born and raised in AMERICA!
  • rickpetes
    Okay. Now go out and read The Elders of Zion, and you'll be sure it's a Jewish conspiracy. Then, read Mao's Little Red Book and you'll know it's all a Chinese communist plot.

    Yes, The Arabs are geniuses. T^hey have been ploanning to subvert American school children for 50 nyears. Geez. Adjust your tin foil helmet 3 degrees to the north, and you'll know Santa and his reindeer provide gifts that have dark political and social motives...Rule of the World from the North Pole!

    Oh, yeah. Don't forget Pinky and the Brain! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinky_and_the_Brain
  • smallbear
    Bring back Rocky & Bullwinkle.
  • missskeptic
    "I can’t even sit my kids in front of Sesame Street without having to worry about the Left...":

    What good conservative neo-con teabagging patriot would let their kids watch Sesame Street in the first place?!
  • hoosierdaddy
    What!!??? Did they send them one of Glenn Beck's Vicks videos to tug on their heart strings???
    After the proactive comments FOX news made about defunding public television, I would have told FOX and Turdock to go bugger themselves.
  • WJM51
    PBS has gone straight to hell since W fucked with it. He did it on purpose. One thing you can't have if you're a dictator is an honest news outlet.

    The fact that PBS felt it necessary to apologize to the biggest fake "news" network for calling a sham a sham is just pathetic. Get RID of this person IMMEDIATELY and put someone in place who knows lying BS when they see it and will stand up for calling it out, even if it's just on Sesame Street.

    Why apologize for calling a lying sack of shit a lying sack of shit? It's just the truth. Oh, I forgot, the truth doesn't mean shit in this country, anymore.
  • JPMP
    If these kids "get" the joke, their parents have already exposed them to toxic levels of
    FOX.
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