World News Korner

New book reveals that Fox News head Roger Ailes "tried to get to get a Republican elected President in 2012." I'm sorry was there some doubt about that?

Courtesy of HuffPo:

Fox News already ruled the ratings and boasts annual earnings of around $1 billion. Most network chiefs would be ecstatic. But Ailes isn’t like most –- or really, any -– other top cable news executives. A visionary in the world of political messaging on television, Ailes had advised three past Republican presidents on how to use the medium to their advantage. And now he planned to use his talents for the party once more.

With the exception of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Ailes had privately knocked the 2008 Republican field as the “seven dwarves" and wasn't impressed with the crop of 2012 contenders. He unsuccessfully tried twice to convince Christie to run in 2012 and sent an emissary to Afghanistan with hopes that Gen. David Petraeus would enter the race.

During a meeting at Fox, Ailes told candidate Jon Huntsman, who had a solid conservative record as Utah governor, he was “not of our orthodoxy” because of his views on climate change. He grew frustrated with Fox News contributor Sarah Palin, who ended up sitting out the 2012 race, and had misgivings about the party's eventual nominee, Mitt Romney. Ailes once privately told a Fox host that Romney is "like Chinese food -- 20 minutes after you eat it, you can't remember what you had."

How Ailes tried to get a Republican president elected in 2012 is revealed in The Loudest Voice In The Room, author Gabriel Sherman's sweeping biography of the television luminary, from his humble Warren, Ohio, roots to becoming the “most powerful opposition figure in the country.” The book will be on sale Tuesday.

Those revelations are not exactly shocking, but it is good that they are being presented to the public again to remind them that Fox News has NOTHING to do with journalism and everything to do with partisan politics and the naked attempt to control the narrative.

However there are more than a few tidbits that I found very interesting.

Roger Ailes is just as paranoid and crazed as Glenn Beck:

Fox News dialed up the anti-Obama rhetoric as soon as Obama took office, with Glenn Beck’s 5 p.m. show launching in Jan. 2009. Beck, who turned the network’s afternoon “black hole” into a ratings bonanza, ignited controversy months later by claiming Obama harbored a “deep-seated hatred for white people.” Sherman wrote that Ailes privately told executives he agreed with Beck’s remark.

Ailes, who is prone to fits of rage and appears in the book as increasingly paranoid, holds a number of theories about Obama and the Democrats. Sherman wrote how Ailes “told his advisers that if Obama were reelected, he could be prosecuted and jailed, like a political prisoner.” And a Murdoch family intimate told Sherman that Ailes believed the Democratic National Committee "had targeted him [Ailes] for assassination."

Allowing Palin and Beck to spout their nonsense confused Karl Rove: Ailes' TV instincts proved correct as the anti-Obama right tuned in and ratings shot up. But some establishment Republicans worried about Ailes' political acumen as polarizing figures on Fox News, such as Palin and Beck, began to define the party.

“Why are you letting Palin have the profile?” veteran Republican operative Karl Rove asked Ailes in a meeting, according to the book. “Why are you letting her go on your network and say the things she’s saying? And Glenn Beck? These are alternative people who will never be elected and they’ll kill us.”

Hate to agree with Rove about anything, but he was clearly correct.

Ailes also provided help to Paul Ryan:During the final months of the 2012 campaign:

Ailes helped prep vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan and recommended an adviser to help with his television performance, according to the book.

And was behind an Obama hit piece that aired the day after the first Presidential debate, and served as a huge embarrassment for Fox News, which claimed they were not responsible for its creation.

So I don't know about the rest of you but come Tuesday I will be doing some serious reading. This book looks like just the thing to remind me as to why I hate Fox News so much.

Not that I require much to remind me of course.

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