Michael Tracey, Hack Journalist

Some opinions about Michael Tracey from RMN:



News media critic Michael Tracey's Sept. 20 piece, "Fox a threat to national security," represents highly shallow thinking - disappointing for a University of Colorado professor - although perhaps to be expected nowadays from the nation's No. 1 party school.

After beginning with the observation that Fox News has become highly popular, he fails to consider the merit behind that popularity.

Instead, Tracey fumes that Fox's "mood" is a "conservative, jingoistic, chest-thumping rant" thereby fostering international hatred for the United States. Tracey cowardly suggests that we Americans should stand in fear because Fox News is seen elsewhere in the world and Fox's reporting will assuredly cause us Americans to be hated by "feeding a growing resentment of this Republic."

Fox News has made a connection in this country as demonstrated by its meteoric rise in popularity. In my judgment, it is because Fox reports the truth, unvarnished by cynicism, fear and despair practiced by the poor observers who populate much of today's media, including Tracey.

Michael Tracey, as a CU professor, might do well to think this notion through.

I am saddened to think my tax dollars are paying for the kind of fuzzy fear-based thought manifest in Tracey's writing.

Tom Linn

Lone Tree

 

Tracey Screams "Fox News National Threat!"

Fox's voices from left overlooked by critic:

In regard to News media critic Michael Tracey's column of Sept. 20, "Fox a threat to national security," I admit to considerable puzzlement. First, he describes the Fox News network as, essentially, a conservative hack rag. I am assuming Tracey watches little of it, so Alan Colmes, Jane Hall, Neil Gabler and others shouldn't take too much offense at being called "conservatives." Maybe Tracey simply didn't notice them.

Second, Tracey cites the heavy coverage of Pfc. Jessica Lynch's story as a tool of "media pimps" and somehow associates that with Fox News. Last time I checked, Diane Sawyer - who had the exclusive interview with Lynch - does not work and never has worked for Fox News.

Third, he cites Fox News' increase in ratings (20 percent in prime time and 29 percent overall) as an indication that Fox is a security threat. Please forgive me for asking, but is Tracey suggesting that the vast American public is somehow being hypnotized or blackmailed by Fox News to compel them to watch their network? I read the column several times and could find no explanation for the increased ratings.

Finally, if Tracey considers Fox News to be "a national security threat" he must present the evidence to legal authorities immediately. Failure to do so would make him an accessory to this crime.

Stuart Sahl

Fort Collins

 

More...

Tracey proves need:

I was appalled by Michael Tracey's Sept. 20 On the Media column, "Fox a threat to national security." Furthermore, to see that he is a professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder School of Journalism and Mass Communication speaks volumes for the need for more intellectual diversity at our universities.

Fred Humke

Bailey

 

Vengeful Tracey?

Why would Michael Tracey team up with Nancy Krebs and Mary Suma? Could this be why?

Fleet and Priscilla White accuse CU professor Michael Tracey of incompetence

By Matt Sebastian
Camera Staff Writer
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Two key witnesses in the JonBenét Ramsey investigation have asked the University of Colorado to investigate a CU professor over allegations of "gross professional incompetence."

The two, Fleet and Priscilla White, accuse professor Michael Tracey of trying to build public support for JonBenét's parents, who are under suspicion in the 6-year-old's death.

"Mr. Tracey should be encouraged to discontinue any further academic or teaching duties," the Whites wrote in a Nov. 17 letter to CU's Board of Regents.

University officials, though, are backing Tracey, a journalism professor who co-produced a 1998 documentary about media coverage of the unsolved slaying.

"Certainly, given his academic freedom and his research agenda, we don't have any problem with the documentary he did," Vice Chancellor Phil DiStefano said.

Tracey's documentary, originally titled "JonBenét's America" and initially aired in England, featured a rare interview with John and Patsy Ramsey.

Despite Tracey's claims that the film wouldn't be shown locally until after a Boulder County grand-jury inquest, a Denver television aired the documentary about a month before the panel convened to hear evidence in the slaying.

"Mr. Tracey was attempting to deflect suspicion from the Ramseys on the eve of the grand jury investigation," the Whites wrote.

"Of course I tried to influence the public," Tracey responded. "But not about the case. Rather, it was about the way the case has been presented to the public.

"One of the jobs of an academic, in my view, is to raise ideas and make people think. That's why I made the damned thing."

 

Absolutely, Lurker

A man is only as good as his word and clearly Tracy cannot be trusted.

Thank you for providing the refresher........it is a bit interesting if you try to cut and paste from it though........says something about shark bait.

Go figure-
RR

 

Just the fact that MT is teaching journalism at a university shows how low "higher education" has sunk.


Even though Fox News can grate on the nerves, I think it's long past due to have a news network that puts a conservative spin on things (and they do). Fox is kicking the other networks' butts because people are fed up with hearing the same old 60's aging hippy liberal crap on other networks. It's cyclic! It's almost refreshing hearing a cranky old buzzard like Bill O'Rielly rant and rave for a change.

I think the whole liberal press thing started out with good intentions but after 40 years, my entire life, I personally feel hearing these same stale viewpoints has gotten really old. I don't think the news establishment understands that the whole world has changed, but the press really has not.

I feel that the OJ Simpson verdict was a watershed moment. That verdict was as ugly as anything that happened to blacks in the deep South in the early sixties. It was the same thing in reverse but almost no one in the press had the balls to say that. Instead it was one reporter after another falling over themselves to make excuses for what was very plain.

911 was the final nail in the coffin. We went through our time of ever increasing permissiveness, and now it's time to wake up.

 

Re-Post

I'm bringing this over from "SueSwamp's Transcripts" because I think it can use some more discussion:

Banquet of the Bottom-Feeders

Posted by SueSwamp: …..Lin made the tapes available to CBS and to Mills and Tracey - they took what they wanted for their programs. I made a copy of the tapes available to AMI - they paid to have it transcribed and they used whatever parts they wanted - - Lin and I didn't have any say in what they cut out......

Michael Tracey is writing a column for the Rocky Mountain News on “ethics†in the media….proving once again that the Peter Principle (In a hierarchy, people tend to rise to their level of incompetence)…is as valid today as it was 30 years ago.

This is the same Michael Tracey who produced two pro-Ramsey infomercials that he has profited from and now it looks to me that he has been able to suck at least another $20,000 out of JonBenet’s corpse. This puts him right at the banquet table with LinWad (who claims he has made more money from the Ramsey case than Darnay has made in his life), Charlie Brennen (who collected $500/week for 2 years from both the Globe and the Star PLUS $$$$ from Schiller PLUS his salary from the Rocky Mountain News), and of course Sue Bennett who received $40,000 for the interview tapes BUT I will bet that she didn’t keep the all the tab cash. IMO it is very likely that she split it with fellow bottom-feeder Michael Tracey. If true, the irony of this is over-whelming. It means that Tracey took the tabs money to produce an anti-tab TV show. Isn’t he the perfect guy to be writing a column on ethics?

A challenge to SueSwamp: Please affirm or deny that you split the $40K with Michael Tracey. AND if not Tracey, did you split the $40K with anyone?

A note to SueSwamp: I am so confident that my info about Charlie's greed is accurate that I suggest you talk LinWad into taking Charlie's case and trying to shake me down. Make my day!

 

"Fox News has made a connection in this country as demonstrated by its meteoric rise in popularity. In my judgment, it is because Fox reports the truth, unvarnished by cynicism, fear and despair practiced by the poor observers who populate much of today's media, including Tracey."

Anyone with an IQ of above 20 knows that Fox New's "We give you the news and you decide" is total BS. The "truth" as presented by Fox is not "unvarnished" - it has a conservative/Republican slant. However, I agree with BobC about there being nothing wrong with Fox presenting the news from a conservative and/or Republican viewpoint. I watch Fox News and the networks with the same skepticism - one has to separate facts from "slant." The fact that 59% of the American people think Saddam had something to do with 9/11 tells me lots of people are buying Fox's "slant."

Left Wing nut Michael Tracey's attack on Fox, BTW, sounds very much like Right Wing nuts (O'Rielly, Limbaugh?) attacks on the Liberal media...

And before I am attacked herein as a "Super Liberal" let me say that I am a conservative (but not a Republican) who agrees with a lot of Pat Buchanan's conservative philosophy.

 

That's what I was trying to say Shadow. I think Fox balances out the other stations, so it's kind of refreshing. On the other hand when Bill O'Reilly starts blathering about "secularists" I really do feel like smacking him in the head.

Anyway the left wing and the right wing are pretty much the same thing these days, so thank God for us glamorous moderates.

 

I love FOX News

and I love Bill O'Reilly, mostly because I like their kick-as$ approach. That does not necessarily mean I buy everything they say, and, yes, Shadow, they are not neutral by any stretch of the imagination - they are, as you say - conservative/Republican slanted, very much so. The two guys (Repub/Democrat) that hash it out are fair and balanced, though. Who is it, Hannety and whoever?

Tracey's nuts if he thinks FOX news is endangering this country, though. Our enemies love people like Tracey.

Just because a guy's a professor with a Ph.D. doesn't mean he's got good reasoning skills. I work with professors every day - most of them are highly-regarded and at the top of their fields. There are a couple, though, who should be relegated to the toxic dump site with Tracey.

 

BrennAn

ex- claims she wrote Charlie Brennan about my claims and he pointed out that I had mis-spelled his name. My apologies charlie but IMO you still are at the head of the bottom-feeders banquet table. You took JonBenet $$$ from Star, Globe, Schiller, and RMN. Hope you reported it to the IRS.

Maybe since charlie and tracey work together now, they can find another way to suck more cash out of JonBenet's corpse.

 

Yeah, BobC, I used to think I was a "right leaning" conservative, but now I've no doubt I've become a "moderate" conservative - could be because I've gotten older and appreciate the Social Security/Medicare thingie a little more. The networks, BTW, have become the worse of all worlds - liberal as far as PC is concerned and Corporate as far as not reporting stuff that may Pi** their advertizers. Anyhow, you are exactly right - thank God for "The Middle" wherever it might be!

Lurker - I think you are referring to Hannity and Colmes... god how out-gunned Colmes (the super-liberal) is by Hannity (the arch-conservative). I'd say the liberals need someone with a little more, as you say, kick-a attitude. LOL

I don't like loud mouths, be they Bill O'Rielly or Al Franken. Neither deals in what is needed to make the United States a more civil place to live.

Back on subject - does anyone know what has sent Candy on a tangent?

 

Tracey is anti-American

I have put myself through the drab and trying exercise of reading several of Tracey's columns for RMN. Every one of them has at least one paragraph that can be described as America-bashing.

Nothing frosts my butt as much as an immigrant who comes here to partake greedily at the banquet table of American rights and privileges, and then turns around to bash his most generous host. It is not only rude and self-serving, it is downright immoral.

Michael Tracey is Chris Hitchens writ small, without the humor, without the logic, without the grace, and without the high IQ.

No wonder the BBC unloaded Tracey's a$$ at the first opportunity.

 

Shadow,

I like both Hannity and Colmes. Alan is a true gentlemen, who knows how to disagree without being disagreeable.

I just wish he would stop buying his rugs at the same place Posner gets his.

 

Re: Shadow,

I miss Trafficant.....take a real man to take on this.

 

LOL!!!

 

FUNNIE, Freebird!!! Is that road-kill on Traficant's head? He go to jail for killing defenseless animals to cover his head?

 

Yeah that is some phucked up hair! Trafficant, Posner and Barry Scheck all have the worst hair in primetime TV! Televangelists excluded!

 

LMAO!!! And I thought the Poz's was bad...