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Fox News Declares itself the Voice of Opposition to Obama
During an interview with NPR today the senior vice president for programming at Fox News, Bill Shine called his network the voice of opposition to the Obama administration. So much for the fair and balanced slogan, but at least FNC is now being honest about its intentions.
Shine said, “There were a couple of people who basically wrote about our demise come last November [and] December and were, I guess, rooting for us to go away. With this particular group of people in power right now, and the honeymoon they’ve had from other members of the media, does it make it a little bit easier for us to be the voice of opposition on some issues?” NPR’s David Folkenflik points out that FNC’s ratings are up since the election of Obama. In terms of ratings, Fox is way ahead of CNN and MSNBC.
A Pew Research survey done last year found that MSNBC and CNN split the Democratic viewership. Fifty one percent of CNN’s viewers are Democrats, and 45% of MSNBC viewers are Democrats. Only 18% of viewers on each of these two networks are Republicans.
However, Fox News has strong base of Republican viewers, as 39% are Republicans, but they also draw 33% of Democrats. It is not surprising that FNC’s ratings are increasing as the GOP is shrinking. Fox is the conservative news network. For battered and bruised Republicans, Fox News is comfort food for the ideological soul.
What Fox is doing here is mirroring the shift in the Republican Party. The GOP is moving more to the right, and FNC sees ratings in appealing to disgruntled Republicans who hate Obama. The angrier FNC gets with Obama, the happier their base viewership will be with the network. Bill Shine’s statement today was no surprise, as everyone already knew that Fox News is the mouthpiece for the GOP, just as MSNBC has become for the Democrats.
As a business strategy, declaring themselves the voice of opposition to Obama is smart. If anything it will push their ratings even higher among Republicans. At least maybe FNC will stop pretending that are an objective network. The whole notion that they are fair and balanced is an insult to anyone with more than 3 functioning brain cells. One of the interesting side effects of the Obama election might be a more unified nation that is more partisan in their cable news viewing habits.
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6 Responses to Fox News Declares itself the Voice of Opposition to Obama
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Sandanista1969
Apr. 8th, 2009 at 7:05 pm
Fox News never came off as conservative… That opinion says more than any comment I could make
Anonymous
Jul. 27th, 2009 at 3:18 pm
I am a 58 yr. old female who has voted democrat in every election since the first election I was able to vote in. (This past election was the very first one I voted Republican.) I really could give a flying fig which news station leans to the left or the right, etc. The only thing that is important to me is how truthfully the news is reported….Just give me the facts and don’t sugar coat it.
So, kudos to Fox…….keep up the good work!
Anonymous
Aug. 18th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
Perhaps by the “voice of the opposition” they meant the media outlet that checks the power of an enormously popular new administration, rather than the sycophantic and supine alternatives which offer no critique or skepticism of it? Fox News is by no means liberal, but it’s conservatism is right-of-center, not extreme. It is only by contrast to the other left-leaning outlets that it appears to be so far to the right. This is evidenced by the mixed politics of its viewership mentioned in this article, and the comparative homogeneity of audiences for CNN, MSNBC, et al. Whether you agree or disagree with the dominant editorial voice of Fox News, you should be glad that someone is asking questions of the new president.
Anonymous
Aug. 25th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
i have already moved my prescriptions from cvs to another pharmacey, i also started shopping at whole foods lol
keep posting the boycott company names please
i personally dont have a problem not buying from companies afraid of a little free speach, suck it up yall, its what makes america great. at least i didnt just finally love this contry like some spouses have, pathetic.