Something happened on the way to the presidential forum in Orlando last week, Roger Ailes the CEO of Fox News decided to change Fox News’ ideological course and turn the guns on conservative candidates themselves. Quoting Howard Kurtz, “It was part political spectacle, part American Idol, part YouTube extravaganza, a pure Roger Ailes production—and the latest sign that the Fox News chairman is quietly repositioning America’s dominant cable-news channel…the real eye-opener was the sight of his anchors grilling the Republican contenders, which pleases the White House but cuts sharply against the network’s conservative image—and risks alienating its most rabid right-wing fans.” While this may come as a surprise to many, this “course correction” has actually been underway for some time. The first piece of baggage pitched overboard was Glenn Beck who’s yammering about Barack Obama being a racist was in Ailes words, “a bit of a branding issue for us”. In other words the loss of advertising revenue due to Glenn Beck’s ranting, raving and crying was all that Ailes needed to seal the fate of Beck on the network. Ailes went on to categorize Beck as a “performer” as opposed to a journalist which of course is spot on. Kurtz writing for the conservative leaning Newsweek said of the changes: ” Fox executives say the entire network took a hard right turn after Obama’s election, but, as the Tea Party’s popularity fades, is edging back toward the mainstream…After the Gabrielle Gifford’s shooting triggered a debate about feverish rhetoric, Ailes ordered his troops to tone things down. It was, in his view, a chance to boost profits by grabbing a more moderate audience.” Kurtz goes on to note that Ailes has grown tired of Sarah Palin and her antics as well.
In a scathing attack on Ailes and Fox’s new tack to a less strident tone, Rush Limbaugh proclaimed that “Fox wants these people to tear each other up, ’cause they want approval from the mainstream media.” Limbaugh may be miffed by being left behind as a result of this new course being set by Fox but in the final analysis Roger Ailes is a businessman who just happens to be a conservative. What he isn’t is a hard line blind faith ideologue that’s going to go down with the sinking Tea Party or to allow a crackpot like Glenn Beck to become an all encompassing “tar baby” that traps and encumbers Fox News to the point of completely destroying whatever credibility the network has left while costing the network millions in lost revenue. Ailes, a consummate businessman, played the Tea Party, Beck and the hot rhetoric of the far right like banjoes when he profited from an association with them and moved away from them as soon as their value to the network came into question. It seems to me that Roger Ailes has astutely read the declining fortunes of the Tea Party, the slump in standing of Congressional Republicans, the sinking campaigns of Perry, Bachmann and Paul as well as the stymied political future of Palin for what they are, harbingers of the end of an extremist right wing surge across the landscape of American politics.
I would bet that Ailes, being concerned about the future of the country, as so many of us are, has come to the conclusion that during desperate times like these it is reckless to engage in a campaign of blindly denigrating the incumbent administration to the point that it might hobble that administration’s ability to govern effectively. Ailes may have finally come to his political as well as business senses in seeing much of what has transpired on the far right since Obama was inaugurated for what it is, borderline sedition and that sort of thing isn’t good for business.
Steven J. Gulitti
9/27/11
Sources:
Roger’s Reality Show; http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2011/09/25/roger-ailes-repositions-fox-news.html
They appear to be the only network really putting lots of reporters in the field. Ideology aside, good for them.
…ergo, progressives will ignore the protests due to Fox Derangement syndrome.
The poster thinks it’s all Ailes and top down, but I’m less sure. Beck left to create his own alternative universe on a FCC-free virtual channel. I’ve noticed Shepherd Smith being a LOT harder lately on the right, especially about climate change and corporations. He’s been sounding more and more like libertarian John Stossel and HE’S no friend of the GOP.
Progressives want to think that the TEA Party is a GOP creation, but they really aren’t very sympathetic to Republicans OR Democrats.