I imagine it has been a tough week in the halls and offices of Fox News. Those poor bastards seemed determined to do their best to keep a Republican in the White House; alas, good sense prevailed on November 4th. Big time.
Harold Myerson’s WAPO column today is a letter – a letter of thanks – to Roger Ailes and his team of ghouls at Fox. Myerson writes:
During the campaign just completed, you guys [at Fox News] focused on Barack Obama’s allegedly Muslim and alien roots and socialist ideology; meanwhile, in the real world, unemployment rose, foreclosures soared and Wall Street went flooey. Over the past eight years, you beat drums for such causes as state intervention in the Terri Schiavo case. You demonized undocumented immigrants (okay, CNN’s Lou Dobbs gave you a run for your money on that one). You fed the Republican base with a steady diet of bile — and now that bilious base is the biggest impediment to the Republicans’ repositioning themselves so that they can win elections again.
Reach out to Latinos — the inescapably growing segment of the American electorate that voted overwhelmingly for Obama after four years of GOP immigrant-bashing? Not if Fox viewers have anything to say about it. Not after you’ve drummed into their heads that the Latino immigrant population is some looming terrorist threat.
Modify that opposition to stem-cell research? Tone down the ridicule of people in public life who have advanced degrees? Call off the Republican war on science that kicks in whenever science runs counter to right-wing fundamentalism in religion or economics? Not if the Hannity faithful can help it.
You’re not alone in reinforcing those beliefs that marginalize the Republican right, of course. You’ve got plenty of help from Rush and all the little Limbaughs who dominate talk radio. But together with your allies, you haul truckloads of troglodyte garbage to your flock.
Given Obama’s landslide victory, it would appear that Fox and its most enthusiastic viewers are moving farther from the mainstream of American political life. Perhaps the lesson for future Republican leaders is this: instead of trying to tap into the Weltanschauung of “Hannity’s America,” you might want to focus on the real problems that real voters care about. Like this guy did.
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