Is FOX "News" Dying?

One can only hope!

[Excerpt]

Frank Rich: Fox News Is Dying

. . .In truth, Fox News has been defeated on the media battlefield—and on the political battlefield as well. Even the 73-year-old wizard of Fox, Roger Ailes, now in full Lear-raging-on-the-heath mode as ­portrayed in my colleague Gabriel ­Sherman’s definitive new biography, "The Loudest Voice in the Room," seems to sense the waning of his power. The only people who seem not to know or accept Fox’s decline, besides its own audience, are ­liberals, including Barack Obama, whose White House mounted a short-lived, pointless freeze-out of Fox News in 2009, and who convinced himself that the network has shaved five points off his approval rating. . .

Read more at: Huffington Post

When Conservative Isn't Radical Enough

Frankencandidate, from NYMag

There have been many euphemisms floating around about the GOP 2012 candidates, and not all of them from liberals. Words and phrases like, nuts. Crazy. Crazy train. Clown car. Cartoons. Some worse than that, but it's a common theme. The reason isn't just partisan sniping, these people really seem nuts. Santorum (don't Google me) thinks it's cool if states outlaw private bedroom activities and birth control. Perry wanted to secede. Paul, (the dearly departed) Bachmann and Cain have said too many nutty things to catalogue. 


We hobbyist bloggers try to capture the essence of this sort of thing. But sometimes, you just need to leave it to the professionals. And so. . .


[Excerpt]

The Molotov Party

Even those who loathe Karl Rove’s every word may be hard-pressed to dispute his pre-Christmas summation of the Republican circus so far:  the most unpredictable, rapidly shifting, and often downright inexplicable primary race I’ve ever witnessed. And all this, as he adds, before a single vote has been cast. The amazing GOP race has also been indisputably entertaining, spawning a new television genre, the debate as reality show. Installment No. 12, broadcast by ABC in the prime-time ghetto of a Saturday night in early December, drew more viewers (7.6 million) than that week’s episode of The Biggest Loser. It’s escapist fun for the entire family (Hispanic and gay families excluded). Or it would be were it not for the possibility that one of the contestants could end up as president of the United States. . .

Read more at: New York Magazine

"Bush Legacy Project" Up Against Reality

Image from source, New York Times

I've been a little worried since the whole "Bush Legacy Project" whipped into high gear. I mean, I know that Karl Rove's alternate reality machine is rusty, creaking, and missing crucial parts, but it's worked so well in the past, I was concerned that it might crank out one more doozy of a reality-warping "conventional wisdom."

Thank goodness for Frank Rich. He's keeping it real, for real. With Rich, and political bloggers (like, ahem, me) on the beat, maybe the "Bush Legacy" will be reality instead of fiction.

[Excerpt]

A President Forgotten but Not Gone

WE like our failed presidents to be Shakespearean, or at least large enough to inspire Oscar-worthy performances from magnificent tragedians like Frank Langella. So here, too, George W. Bush has let us down. Even the banality of evil is too grandiose a concept for 43. He is not a memorable villain so much as a sometimes affable second banana whom Josh Brolin and Will Ferrell can nail without breaking a sweat. He’s the reckless Yalie Tom Buchanan, not Gatsby. He is smaller than life. . .

Read more at: New York Times

Frank Rich: McCain Wins in November? Not so Fast!

Image from source, New York Times

It's about time a well-known writer has acknowledged the fallibility of the mainstream media, and of "conventional wisdom." There has been a progressively louder wail, and wringing of hands over the protracted Democratic primary contest. Even one of my favorite pundits, Rachel Maddow, is predicting a John McCain win in November, because of the so-called deep divide in the Democratic Party.

While that theory cannot be discounted, it also isn't necessarily true. Democrats have been turning out in numbers far greater than Republicans for these primaries, even before John McCain was the nominee. Add to that fact that many conservative Republicans were adamantly against McCain until there wasn't anything they could do about it.

And in the excerpted story below, Frank Rich points out yet another fact that goes in the Democrats' favor. So don't get your panties in a bunch just yet, folks! Even if all of those Clinton or Obama supporters who swear they'll vote for McCain if their pick doesn't get in, actually mean it, we still have numbers on our side.

[Excerpt]

How McCain Lost in Pennsylvania

IT’S a nightmare. It’s the Bataan Death March. It’s mutually assured Armageddon. “Both of them are already losing the general to John McCain,” declared a Newsweek columnist last month, predicting that the election “may already be over” by the time the Democrats anoint a nominee.

Not so fast. If we’ve learned any new rule in the 2008 campaign, it’s this: Once our news culture sets a story in stone, chances are it will crumble. . .

Read more at: New York Times