Obama snubbed FOX. They're the only network not to get an interview this weekend. Now they're angry, and talking about how oppressed they are.Read it all HERE.
Over the past twenty years of working in politics I've learned that you can either control the media or have the media control you. Specifically, when it comes to politicians, and how they should respond to the media when it gets out of control, there are two schools of thought - both are true. The first school is the Democratic school of thought. We simply must be nice to the media, and keep talking to them, regardless of how nasty they are to us, because they'll be even nastier if we DON'T talk to them. The second, equally true, is that the media needs politicians, and thinks it needs the politicians more than it thinks politicians need the media. Thus, the media will do anything to stop itself from losing access to senior politicians in Washington.
George Bush, the son, was expert at controlling the media because he simply cut their access when they got out of line. I remember hearing from mainstream media sources in DC that their colleagues refused to criticize the Bush administration because the reporter in question couldn't afford to lose his job. And lose his job he would if he were no longer granted access to the White House and he was a reporter covering the White House. In today's economy, a big newspaper, or magazine, or network can't afford to be paying a reporter who doesn't have access when they could just fire him and get a new reporter that does have access. And so it went with George Bush - he had the media eating out of his hands, for a while at least.
It's a lot like mainstream news sites dealing with blogs. Or even blogs hiring additional writers. Who is benefiting more, and who should be paying whom? Should ABC, for example, pay me to link to their stuff? Or should I be paying ABC for the right to post their snippets on my blog? Who benefits more? It's all in the eye of the beholder. Same goes for hiring writers. Should you pay new writers to write on your high-trafficked blog, or are you giving new writers a chance to make it big by giving them such a high-profile pedestal, writing on your blog, that they, at the very least, shouldn't expect to be paid. Again, it all depends on perspective, and who spins better.
FOX News wouldn't whine near so much about being snubbed by Obama if they didn't care.
John, Joe, and Chris is Paris are always my first 'must read' of the day.
And so it goes.
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I would think that it is a no-win situation with Fox.
ReplyDeleteI don't even count them as a new source - I suspect they have no objective reality but only an agenda.
The sad truth is that far to many people still get their "news" from Fox. I celebrate Obama for treating Fox as the phonies that they are. In their reach for legitimacy, day by day their reporting becomes more absurd. I hope that more and more people, seeing such extremes of absurdity, will understand Fox as the "comedy channel" that it is.
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