Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right is a
book of political commentary and
satire by comedian and political commentator
Al Franken, published in
2003 by
Dutton, a subsidiary in the Penguin Group. It was written with the help of a volunteer group of fourteen
Harvard students known as "Team Franken." The book's subtitle is an
ironic parody of
FOX News' tagline "
Fair and Balanced". Fox sued Franken over the use of the phrase in a short-lived lawsuit that is frequently credited with increasing the sales of the book.
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them is one of several books published in
2003 written by
American liberals challenging the viewpoints of prominent
American conservatives such as
Sean Hannity,
Ann Coulter, and
Bill O'Reilly. These liberal-oriented books by Franken and fellow authors such as
Joe Conason,
Michael Moore and
Jim Hightower have been described by columnist
Molly Ivins as the
Great Liberal Backlash of 2003.
Lies largely targets prominent
Republicans and conservatives, highlighting documentable inaccuracies in their claims. A significant portion of the book is devoted to comparisons between
President George W. Bush and former President
Bill Clinton regarding their
economic,
environmental, and
military policies. Franken also criticizes several "
journalists," especially those he believes to be the most dishonest, including Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity.
In
Lies, Franken divides American media into two groups, (a) the unbiased "mainstream" and (b) the biased "
right-wing":
"The mainstream media does not have a liberal bias. . . .
ABC,
CBS,
NBC,
CNN,
The New York Times,
The Washington Post,
TIME,
Newsweek and the rest — at least try to be fair."
But the right-wing media —
FOX News,
The Washington Times,
New York Post,
The Wall Street Journal's editorial page,
talk radio — are "biased," the book declares. They have "an agenda." They are "not interested in conveying the truth." They "concoct an inflammatory story that serves their political goals." [
1]
Franken makes this distinction in an effort to debunk the claim, popular among some Conservative journalists and politicians, that most American media are liberally biased. Franken (and a number of other authors) believe that the claim of media "liberal bias" is a myth used by conservative politicians as a way to increase conservative voter turn out and at the same time have those conservatives ignore inconvenient truths they read in mainstream newspapers.
The book also criticizes
Ann Coulter on a number of points related to what Franken alleges as abuses or violations of journalistic ethics in her book
Slander. He specifically attacks her on the basis of the factual accuracy, citing her claims about the reporting of the New York Times. He also makes an issue of her mischaracterization of her books' citations — and accuses her of deliberately misusing citations in order to further a misleading political agenda — by using
endnotes, rather than
footnotes. Footnotes, he observes, are easy to locate, verify, and analyze. Endnotes, he argues, are
obfuscations — especially when there are 720 of them.
Lies itself uses two endnotes, for the sole purpose of illustrating this difficulty. He also points out and assails other methods of circumventing the truth that, he argues, Coulter and her neoconservative ilk frequently use. Franken also criticizes former
CBS reporter
Bernard Goldberg for what he claims is selective decontextualized quoting, and allegedly dishonest material in his book
Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News.
Main article: Fox v. Franken
FOX News sought damages from Franken, claiming in its lawsuit that the book's subtitle violated its alleged trademark rights in the phrase "
Fair and Balanced". The lawsuit was dismissed, and the attempt backfired on FOX News in that it provided Franken with free publicity just as the book was launched. "The book was originally scheduled to be released Sept. 22 but [was] made available Aug. 21," according to its publisher. "We sped up the release because of tremendous demand for the book, generated by recent events."
In the lawsuit, Fox described Franken as "intoxicated or deranged" as well as "shrill and unstable." In response, Franken joked that he had trademarked the word "funny", and that Fox had infringed his intellectual property rights by characterizing him as "unfunny." The publicity resulting from the lawsuit propelled Franken's as-of-then-unreleased book to the #1 sales position on
Amazon.com's best-seller list.
On
August 22,
2003, U.S. District Judge
Denny Chin denied Fox's request for an injunction to block the publication of Franken's book, characterizing the network's claim as "wholly without merit, both factually and legally." Three days later, Fox filed papers to drop its lawsuit.
Franken, and others, claim Fox's lawsuit was brought at its commentator
Bill O'Reilly's insistence, a claim denied by O'Reilly. O'Reilly told NPR presenter Terry Gross that he had considered bringing a separate suit against Franken for defamation, but given O'Reilly's success and fame, concluded that proving actual damages resulting from the Franken book would be too difficult. Following the lawsuit's dismissal, a Fox spokeswoman stated, "It's time to return Al Franken to the obscurity that he's normally accustomed to." Franken, in turn, suggested that the Judge had unwittingly supplied Fox with a more defensible trademark: "Wholly Without Merit". Interestingly, O'Reilly's book "Who's Looking Out For You?" was the first to unseat Franken's from its place atop the New York Times best seller list. [
2]
The lawsuit is described by Franken in the
paperback-only chapter "I Win".
"Al Franken [is the man] of the hour. For years, we have suffered while right-wing bullies hijacked American politics and media — persecuting a president for a consensual sex act; stealing the 2000 election; trashing the country's economy, environment and constitutional safeguards; handing the government over to the highest corporate bidders; deceiving the public into a bloody quagmire; and then brazenly smearing anyone who dared to criticize this orgy of dreadful leadership as un-American. The instant, runaway success of Franken's new book is not just a result of Fox News' inexplicable decision to shoot itself in the foot and head by launching an idiotic trademark-infringement lawsuit, but also the author's bold — and roaringly funny — knack for confronting the Bush presidency and its prevaricating apologists." —
Salon.com[
3]
"Along the way, Franken makes some serious points. If the press is so liberal, why did it kick Gore around? What were the 18 months of Monicagate about? No, if the press has a bias, he says, it's for profits. He compares conservatives to four-year-olds who blindly love Mommy and think anyone who criticizes Mommy is bad; liberals, in comparison, "love America like grown-ups." He examines media coverage of Sen.
Paul Wellstone's memorial service to show how Rush (of course), Peggy Noonan (surprised me) and Tucker Carlson (ditto) didn't do their homework and, with no apparent concern, repeated a libelously slanted account of that event. And he wonders why real conservatives who abhor the culture of hate in the media don't speak out against the Coulters and O'Reillys." — Jesse Kornbluth, Book Reporter[
4]
"In the kicking, spitting spirit of current all-star political discourse, Al Franken gives as good as he gets. His quintessential ad hominem attack title,
Rush Limbaugh Is a Big, Fat Idiot, has already established his flair for the requisite games. Name calling, fact molding, gotcha!: all figure prominently in Mr. Franken's instant best seller
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right, just as they do in most of the books that
Lies attacks. Whatever their partisanship, these sporting diatribes share two underlying attitudes: 'What gray area?' and 'It's all about me.'" — Janet Maslin,
The New York Times.
* ISBN 0525947647 (hardcover, 2003)
* ISBN 047185316X
*
Media bias*
Hostile media effectRebuttals
*
Frankenlies.com: Rebuttal to Al Franken - A research-based website that attempts to highlight alleged falsehoods and errors in Franken's book.
*
"Lying liar" - Criticism of Franken and the book, in a satirical version of the commentator's site.
Counter-rebuttals
*
Franken Smear - Website that refutes conservative smears and allegations against Franken
*
Frankenlies.com rebuttal - Website that challenges some of frankenlies.com
Reviews
*
Al Franken: Throwing Punches and Punch Lines - a book review by
Howard Kurtz in
The Washington Post
