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Fox News Channel Runs Correction on James Comey Story

Jul 11, 2017  •  Post A Comment

Fox News Channel ran a correction after determining that a story on former FBI director James Comey was mistaken in reporting that memos written by Comey and given to congressional investigators, relating to his conversations with Donald Trump, included “top secret” material. The AP reports that the material instead had a lower-level security classification.

The story aired Monday on “Fox & Friends.” Fox initially described the report as a bombshell that suggested Comey had put national security at risk.

“The correction, however, left murky the question of whether Comey released any classified information to the public. Comey insists he did not,” the AP reports, adding: “It was unclear whether anyone involved in the story on ‘Fox & Friends’ morning show on Monday was disciplined.”

9 Comments

  1. Oh goodness. They had to publish a correction? Just like CNN? Is Fox News like CNN? Sure seems that way… I mean, if you’re going to impugn the reporting of an entire network based upon a mistake they made and had to retract for one particular story, it seems like you would do the same for any network that would make a similar mistake.

    We are approaching third world dictator tactics.

  2. How does either network apologizing and retracting a news story turn into third world dictator tactics. Voluntarily retracting an inaccurate story is the essence of democracy and free press.

    • Our fantastic, awesome president has taken the retraction of a CNN story and used it to batter the network as a whole with claims of Fake News. My point was if he is willing to do that to one network he should do it equally to all, to be consistent with fairness. The fact that he hasn’t — that he is selectively applying these diminishing tactics only to networks that aren’t purely effusive with sycophantic praise for his administration amounts to third world dictator tactics, where they employ the same methods to control the narrative.

      You know, akin to having all governmental agencies tune all televisions to only one channel, to control the narrative. You can’t be this thick, can you?

      • What you are attempting to describe is influence… or manipulation. Dictators (third-world or otherwise) don’t influence or manipulate the media in their countries. Regardless of what such media calls itself, they are not free and independent agencies. They are agencies of the State. Dictators control them directly.

  3. I am not thick. You may want to do more studying of dictatorships. On my recent trips to Washington I have not seen only one news channel on the televisions. The fact that a President favors one channel over another would have made the previous president a dictator also, since there was a channel he also didn’t like. Jumping to outrageous statements like dictator doesn’t help the issues that the country is dealing with.

    • Do you think this conversation we are having is intended to help the issues the country is dealing with? You have some lofty goals for this tvweek conversation.

      There is a difference between only liking one channel and preferring other channels over one. I suspect if you saw TVs tuned to alternate channels you were surrounded by people with common sense.

      @John

      That is a good point, that dictators directly influence the press in their countries because news organizations are not free and are obligated to work toward the interests of the state. So when the president calls the free, independent press enemies of the state, at what point should we, the free people of America, push back against such rhetoric? The transition of the free press to the not-totally-free press to the actually-not-free-at-all press occurs slowly over time as fewer and fewer people remember what the free press actually looks like. With changes in technology already altering the delivery mechanism of fact-checked news, weakening the integrity of journalism (where any website might seem credible to lazy thinkers), we as Americans are at an extremely vulnerable stage regarding how and where we get our news.

      It’s easy to say, “no, we have a different system than they do.” You’re taking for granted that our system has worked for so long. And you’re ignoring the threats to that very system.

      Holy shit, am I trying to help the issues that this country is dealing with?

  4. Cleric, it’s obvious Wwwp is off his meds. Besides, the CNN is Fake News meme holds water because CNN has made MULTIPLE mistakes (willfully or just out of sloppiness). CNN has “earned” their stripes.

    • “Voluntarily retracting an inaccurate story is the essence of democracy and free press.”

  5. Before anyone gets their knickers in a wad, read the last sentence of the article. “The AP reports that the material instead had a lower-level security classification.” This last sentence in the article means the material was classified, “Secret” or “Confidential”. “Top Secret”, “Secret” and “Confidential” are the only 3 classifications (although there are other higher classifications like “Top Secret-Crypto”, etc). It does not mean the material is unclassified. As the AP article reads, he did divulge material of some classification, unless the AP runs a correction and says the material us unclassified.

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