February 14, 2012 /

Fox Shifting To The Left?

Welcome to the crazy world of Politico: The grumblers were picking up on a strategy that has been under way for some time — a “course correction,” as Fox chief Roger Ailes put it last fall — with the network distancing itself from the tea party cheerleading that characterized the first two years of President […]

Welcome to the crazy world of Politico:

The grumblers were picking up on a strategy that has been under way for some time — a “course correction,” as Fox chief Roger Ailes put it last fall — with the network distancing itself from the tea party cheerleading that characterized the first two years of President Barack Obama’s presidency. Lately, Fox has increasingly promoted its straight-news talent in the press and conducted some of the toughest interviews and debates of the Republican primary season. Just last week, it hired the openly gay liberal activist Sally Kohn as a contributor.

All along, Fox watchers warned that it risked alienating conservative true believers as it inched toward the center.

Well, consider them alienated.

“To tell you the truth, a lot of conservatives see Fox News as being somewhat skewed on certain issues,” said Patrick Brown, who runs Internet marketing for The Western Center for Journalism, a conservative nonprofit that features stories questioning the president’s eligibility for office. “We actually did a poll recently that said, ‘Is Fox News actually conservative, or has it moved left?’ And some 70 percent of our readers thought it had moved left.”

So because FOX reports more actual news their readers believe it’s a move to the left? What’s that say about America’s right?

But the thing is that Fox hasn’t moved to the left. Ed Kilgore explains:

But you need to understand the context: The second graph of Keach Hagey’s piece cites as the prime evidence for this “shift to the Left” the current prominence at Fox of Karl Rove and Sean Hannity. Seriously.

Turns out the “shift to the Left” talk is coming mainly from Glenn Beck fans still angry over his departure from Fox, and representatives of various and sundry wingnut media enterprises who are trying to create the impression they are filling recently vacated space. So, no, nothing particularly new is going on at Fox, and any “shift to the left” makes sense only as a relative term for any fixed object that is part of a Republican Party apparatus moving rapidly to the right.

Fox is still very much on the right. They may have moved a bit outside of the right wing crazy, conspiracy theorists that make up the Glenn Beck base, but they are still very much to the right of the rest of America.

More IntoxiNation

Comments