MSNBC vs. Fox; Who's Smarter?

I thought I would do a little background research to see if education had an influence on  reporting in the media narrative. MSNBC is generally considered to be the liberal cable station (though I would argue that they are the ‘normal’ news organization), and Fox is the Rupert Murdoch Republican conservative media outlet. I picked the journalists from each network’s daily line-up. I omitted the morning shows (because both of them are nuts) and I also included two outliers that used to work at the networks: Keith Olbermann and Glenn Beck. I wound up with one extra MSNBC journalist so I eliminated the beautiful, ebullient Alex Wagner since her show just recently debuted (call me, Alex, we’ll talk).

Here is the breakdown of the education level of all of the journalists on both networks. Unless otherwise noted, all degrees were finished.

MSNBC

• Chuck Todd – Four years at George Washington University, Political Science (did not graduate)
• Chris Jansing – Oberlin College, Broadcast journalism
• Andrea Mitchell – University of Pennsylvania, English literature
• Tamron Hall – Temple University, Broadcast journalism
• Martin Bashir – Winchester University, English, History
• Dylan Ratigan – Union College, Political Economics
• Al Sharpton – two years at Brooklyn College (did not graduate)
• Chris Matthews – College of the Holy Cross, Some graduate work at the University of North Carolina
• Ed Schultz – Minnesota State
• Rachel Maddow – Oxford PhD. Rhodes Scholar, Philosophy, Public Policy
• Lawrence O’Donnell – Harvard
• Chris Hayes – Brown University, Philosophy
• Keith Olbermann – Cornell University, Communication Arts (enrolled at age 16)

FOX

• Brett Baier – DePauw University
• Sheppard Smith – Four years at University of Mississippi (did not graduate)
• Bill O’Reilly – BA Marist College, History. MA Boston University, Broadcast journalism. MPA, Harvard, Public administration
• Sean Hannity – New York University (did not graduate), Adelphi University (did not graduate)
• Greta Van Susteren – University of Wisconsin, Geography, Economics. JD Georgetown
• Megyn Kelly – Syracuse University, Political science. JD Albany Law School
• Glenn Beck – No higher education
• Bill Hemmer – Miami University, Mass Communications
• Martha MacCallum – St. Lawrence University, Political science
• Chris Wallace – attended Harvard (unclear whether he finished)
• Britt Hume – University of Virginia, English
• Jon Scott – attended University of Missouri (unclear whether he finished)
• Neil Cavuto – St. Bonaventure University, BA. American University, MA

Not sure I can make any definitive conclusions based on this information. I was expecting to find a gap between the level of education at MSNBC and Fox but almost everyone has an undergraduate degree; save Glenn Beck, Chuck Todd, Sean Hannity, Al Sharpton. and Sheppard Smith (Chris Wallace, Jon Scott?). It appears that Fox has fewer journalists with degrees than MSNBC. But not by much.

Bill O’Rielly has a couple of Master’s degrees but there is only one Rhodes Scholar, Ph.D: and that’s Rachel Maddow. Fox has two JD’s or lawyers (Van Susteren and Kelly) and two Graduate degrees (O’Reilly and Cavuto).

I can’t draw any conclusions here. Chuck Todd and Shep Smith didn’t finish their degrees yet they both exhibit outstanding journalistic qualities. Bill O’Reilly; despite his educational CV, is seriously warped. Al Sharpton has the most amazing life education and how do you quantify that? I mean he’s an ordained Reverend, he was James Brown’s tour manager, a civil rights activist, Presidential candidate, talk show host. You can’t buy that kind of education at a University.

Glenn Beck? No problem there. He’s an idiot. An uneducated, sanctimonious, conspiracy theory rube from rural Washington State. We don’t get those out here on the left coast often, but this is the exception to the rule. Olbermann? Obviously a prodigy but lately he’s becoming a ‘get off my lawn’ kind of curmudgeon.

So garner what you will from this info. Just don’t think Fox News is peppered with the uneducated. They may be obstinate but they’re not uninformed.

Fox has been dropping in the ratings and MSNBC has been rising (past CNN most recently). The classic argument has been that all conservatives watch Fox (35%) while everyone else (65%) has a wide selection of news sources to choose from.

But then, we’d have to get into what qualifies as news, wouldn’t we?

Related articles

• In up and down year for cable news, Fox dominates (pbpulse.com)
• Cable News Ratings: Fox News Down, MSNBC Up (huffingtonpost.com)
• Why MSNBC Is Not Fox News for Liberals (slate.com)