dagblog - Comments for "Dennis Kucinich joins—Fox News?"

I suspect Fox's interest in

Ramona — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 16:35:12 +0000

I suspect Fox's interest in Kucinich has more to do with his relentless Obama-bashing than with his opposing liberal tendencies. Yes, any successful opinion venue needs some spirited opposition, but I doubt they'll get it with Dennis. They'll be sure to keep the emphasis on Obama and not on the poor or the working class, which Kucinich really does care about.

I won't be watching, but I hope he can get a few licks in for the underclass every now and then.

(And--nothing to do with this topic--but I, too, would like to see more commenters blogging here at dagblog. It seems a shame to limit good conversation to the comment section. It so easily gets lost)

They've made it a headline

artappraiser — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 11:23:05 +0000

In reply to Sarah Palin out at Fox News

They've made it a headline story:

Sarah Palin and the End of an Era
By Jill Lawrence, National Journal, Jan. 27, 2013
The former Alaska governor's split from Fox News highlights the fade of the Tea Party as well as her own diminishing role.

Sarah Palin out at Fox News

artappraiser — Sun, 27 Jan 2013 21:43:04 +0000

In reply to Dennis Kucinich joins—Fox News?

Sarah Palin out at Fox News (Jan. 25). Betcha anything: ratings pfffft! Enough of mindless tea-babble! You do have to read the news once in a while to do this job, too, babe...unless you got sources, but nobody of import will have anything to do with you anymore...etc.....

Yeah, you're probably right.

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 20:03:07 +0000

In reply to I wonder if the reason we

Yeah, you're probably right. Needs to be some dramatic tension, for the majority who might consider watching. Need to remind myself more that not many of us citizens seem to think or act predominantly like civic republicans. Not meant as a holier-than-thou comment, just seems to be the way it is.

I meant that the Fox powers

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 19:24:21 +0000

In reply to I doubt Kucinich will be the

I meant that the Fox powers that be may have picked Kucinich if they believe--correctly or not TBD--that he will be easy to marginalize, through his own comments as well as what others may say or write. Kucinich is as you say likely to be a lot more aggressive (awake? sentient?) than Colmes was. Kucinich as Fox's appointed "face of progressive America 2013"? Like I said, I hope he'll turn out to be more than they bargained for and surprise some people.

I wonder if the reason we

artappraiser — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 19:19:45 +0000

In reply to One other thought on this is

I wonder if the reason we don't see more of that approach is network sensitivity to criticism over alleged bias/imbalance.

I doubt that very much, I think most of these sorts of decisions are all about ratings.

The PBS-style or old-network-news style of moderation and news analysis never brought in more eyeballs than a small portion of the public interested in that sort of thing. The conflict and drama of political adversaries brings in many more eyeballs.

"Crossfire!" as Bob Novak used to shout at the beginning of that pioneering show (pioneering of the profit model, I mean,) is assured to attract a lot more viewers. If you're an outfit running for profit, you've got to have some.

And it also helps a great deal to add some "characters" with "personality" that are good/evil or at least interesting in the viewers' eyes. Moderates are boring. Highly adversarial political debate way outdraws analysis as far as "must see" or "must participate." If a show is single-character based, like Limbaugh, Maddow, or Sharpton, it has to constantly return to the topic of "what the enemy is saying/doing" to keep the eyeballs.

I often see "holier than thou" comments in the blogosphere when this whole thing is brought up. I don't take them seriously at all. Many more people participate and are excited by politically adversarial points than by analysis or wonkery in the blogosphere, too. The more adversarial, the bigger the audience, and the more character driven, the bigger the audience, the more emotional, the bigger the audience.

Here's just a few examples that come quickly to mind: Look right now on Dagblog and see how Resistance's comments on guns increase hits and participation. Who would begrudge Richard Day's long constant jihad against conservative pundits and wingnuts who drive him mad? Look at how participation drops when there is no main boxing event like an election or a big emotional news event like the Newtown shooting. Everyone has an opinion in the latter case, and everyone is a mightly big market share. Back when TPMCafe got intentionally flooded by Obama fans by the management, and one could not talk about anything else but the primary fight because any attempt to scrolled away, I remember Andrew Golis being frustrated by the success of it, doing a post screaming "enough now, can somebody anybody post about something else besides Hillary Clinton?"

I don't think that this should necessarily be denigrated because I think many more people's brains work this way: they need adversarial debate to get their thought juices working. I am not one of those people, but I think I am in the minority. (Not to mention, in this country, we have a two-party, not a parliamentary system, but that's another whole ball of wax.) So running politics and news shows and blogs "for profit" as it were really is running them in a sort of "majority rules" way. I don't think we can ever go back to elites running news shows not-for-profit, elites deciding what you should think about "for your own good" like a class in school, where the result is: many people tuning out all together. I just wish I would see more of the promised "boutique" marketing for those of us who don't like what the majority likes and not end up pandering to hits.

P.S. The movie "Network" basically laid this all out long ago, always worth a re-watch. And Kucinich's job at Fox is to be an interesting "character." If he's just a dweeb like Colmes, it's a fail.

I doubt Kucinich will be the

Aaron Carine — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 19:00:26 +0000

In reply to One other thought on this is

I doubt Kucinich will be the new Colmes. The aggressive and unapologetic leftism he displayed as a Congressman makes me confident that he won't emulate The Great Wuss.

One other thought on this is

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 16:39:12 +0000

In reply to Saw that. My initial

One other thought on this is that I'd like to see a network try a very different approach for these panel discussions than the one I mentioned, which is to have panels that feature people with truly eclectic views that don't buttonhole into a neat right/left spectrum. There are people like that.

I wonder if the reason we don't see more of that approach is network sensitivity to criticism over alleged bias/imbalance. They may see the safer way for them to go as the more (almost totally, and usually deadly dull?) predictable and traditional one that basically all but "assigns" particular points of view for the designee to reflect in their remarks. But that is not the only way or necessarily the most interesting approach.

Saw that. My initial

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 16:28:53 +0000

In reply to Dennis Kucinich joins—Fox News?

Saw that. My initial reaction is that Ailes would love to try to make Kucinich the face of their opposition, given what appear to be fairly prevalent perceptions that he lacks gravitas and has been subjected to a fair amount of public ridicule and comments meant to diminish. He occupies the Alan Colmes seat.

I hope he makes them regret it by showing himself well able and willing to back up what he chooses to say. Ailes is right on this point: Kucinich does have an important perspective to offer, precisely because he is willing to say things many elected officials and commentators are not willing to say. There are many others at least as capable of holding their own who would begin that gig with greater stature. It should not only be Kucinich flying the left-of-center flag--there should be another less farther left individual than him IMO if the network that claims it seeks fairness and balance means to make good on that (same goes for other networks that use that kind of format). Truly balanced four-person panels should have comparably articulate, capable and respected hard right, moderate right, moderate left and hard left reps to reflect the spectrum of views well.

Money.

Orion — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 13:52:43 +0000

In reply to Dennis Kucinich joins—Fox News?

Money.