How Fox News Is (Still) Hurting the Republicans

[Herrick]

This article has a link to an 18-page study about Fox News' detrimental affect on the GOP written by Bruce Bartlett. Sounds like it could be interesting. Unfortunately, I'm having problems viewing it at work.

 

[ideologyhunter]

I read a précis of the article. Among his points are the fact that Fox News fans are objectively less well informed than those who watch a mix of news sources (or avoid Fox altogether.) He also says that Fox radicalizes its fans, setting up a perpetual outrage that the party pols then have to replicate -- leading to a loony bin party (no surprise there.) It also leads to viewers who don't realize that their viewpoint has gotten so skewed that it doesn't resonate with the national majority (Fox fans have to wonder how Obama got elected twice.) If this is happening to the G.O.P., I am delighted.

 

[SimpleDon]

I read the article. It concludes with the not too surprising conclusion that Fox News does finally more harm than good for the Republican party itself, not just with conservative voters. He concludes with,

Former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum perhaps put the complicated, double-edged relationship between Fox and the GOP best when he said, “Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and now we're discovering we work for Fox. And this balance here has been completely reversed. The thing that sustains a strong Fox network is the thing that undermines a strong Republican party.”

The article includes this gem from Newt Gingrich,

“One of the real changes that comes when you start running for President – as opposed to being an analyst on Fox – is I have to actually know what I'm talking about,” he said. “It's a severe limitation,” Gingrich added.39

 

[SimpleDon]

Bruce Bartlett has pretty impressive movement conservative credentials. He was an aide to Ron Paul, Jack Kemp, Ronald Reagan and a Treasury official in the administration of H. W. Bush.

While his degrees are in diplomatic history he is considered to be an expert in supply side economics, that is, Reaganomics, neoliberal economics. (A cynic would say that lack of knowledge about economics is a requirement for being an expert in supply side economics, not a hinderance.)

This probably explains why he has such a difficult time understanding why this has happened. Why Fox News has in a relatively short time gone from being a conservative biased news network to the sole source of the conservative positions that all conservatives have to parrot or pay the price of being thrown out of the club.

It is because of the nature of conservatism itself. Traditional news sources don't have a liberal bias because they are located in the major cities or because the people who report the news are the products of liberal arts studies in college. The traditional, not Fox News, sources have a liberal bias because the news is largely about reporting the problems in our society, in pointing out where society as is not working well.

Conservatives use to complained that the news wasn't reporting the things that were good about America, the overwhelming majority of things that Americans get right in our country. And they were correct, but not because the news was bent on running down the country but because increasingly the news collectively decided that their job was to report the problems in society so that those problems could be fixed.

This is counter to the most basic tenets of conservatism, that the status quo and the traditions of society must be maintained. That if we go back to ignoring the problems that maybe they wouldn't go away but society will be better off because there will be much less conflict and everyone will be happier. That change involves the risk of making the problems worse and not better, especially for most people. That making things better for some can only happen by making things worse for others and that those others largely are conservatives, who needless to say were the ones who benefit from and therefore are the happiest with the status quo.

To blunt this ever increasing amount of reality in their lives conservatives rely on memes that tell them what seems to be obvious and real isn't actually real and obvious. Conspiracy theories are an example of this. Elaborate stories, alternate truths, lies and more lies. All explaining why change is not needed, that problems aren't really problems, that everything is okay.

This is where Fox News comes in. Their job is to provide the alternate truths that conservatives need. It is an easy job, it doesn't require that any consistency be maintained, only that today's alternate truth explain to a uncritical audience why today's reality isn't real. There is no retrospection, no one on Fox News will dwell on yesterday's explanation to see if it was true, they know that it wasn't. The memes that don't strike a chord can be quickly abandoned. Other news sources questioning the alternate truths just prove to the believers that they are right in believing that the mainstream news is hostile to conservatives and that alone is even more reason to trust only Fox News.

This gives Fox News tremendous power, they are the keepers of the lies that direct an army. And they can direct that army anywhere that Fox News wants them to go. They are making this stuff up more or less out of the ether.

Fox News can and they do push their viewers further to the right and they can convert moderates into conservatives in the same way, through the application of the most basic of human emotions, fear. Those people are coming for you, coming for your children, coming for your religion, coming for your wealth, your income and your well being. And the government is going to help those people take all of it away from you.

Fox News exists to lie to conservatives. They aren't trying to convince the rest of the spectrum with their lies, beyond the fear based conversions. But they do have an impact on the other news organizations. Simple monetary competitive pressure to try to try to duplicate Fox News' commercial success catering to conservatives has pushed other news outlets to the right. The now widespread example of "reporting the controversy," that allows the other outlets to repeat Fox News’ bullsh*t without having to mention that it is bullsh*t.

Yes, this is harsh. But conservatives accept whatever ground that you are willing to give up that would be required to be less harsh and take it as sign that they are right. Without giving up any ground of their own.

So no Mr. Bartlett, the mainstream media didn't become more liberal, they got better at their jobs, uncovering, exposing the problems in our society, not papering over them. Conservatives have Fox News and Fox News has a lot of paper. But finally it is going to hurt conservatives and their Republican party in the end. I have to believe that.

 

[untermensche]

One thing that hurts the Republican Party is the "Whiteness" of FOX.

It is mostly white people talking to white people about things that interest some white people.

The nation is becoming more diverse, and if the Republicans are unable to attract more than white voters they will become a permanent minority party.

 

[zorq]

I loved your post Don. Thank you.

 

[maxparrish]

Bruce Bartlett has pretty impressive movement conservative credentials. He was an aide to Ron Paul, Jack Kemp, Ronald Reagan and a Treasury official in the administration of H. W. Bush.

While his degrees are in diplomatic history he is considered to be an expert in supply side economics, that is, Reaganomics, neoliberal economics. (A cynic would say that lack of knowledge about economics is a requirement for being an expert in supply side economics, not a hinderance.)

This probably explains why he has such a difficult time understanding why this has happened. Why Fox News has in a relatively short time gone from being a conservative biased news network to the sole source of the conservative positions that all conservatives have to parrot or pay the price of being thrown out of the club.

After reading Bartlett's own prolonged lamentation of angry bitterness (link below), it is not so difficult to understand what actually happened. His complaint is one of many of his era - that Reagan was as good as it was going to get and 'the supply-side revolution' was over. Unable to face the new reality Bartlett turns on his own with often contradictory complaints, alienates his peers, and is "shocked" that Bush JR. was not "an ideological conservative", but merely someone conservative in temperament.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/revenge-of-the-reality-based-community/

The one over-riding message of his new understandings is that he is angry about his own treatment by peers and he conveys it in a series of nearly incoherent staccato blurbs of animus (e.g. he is still a supply sider...except he is on Krugman's side; he wanted lower taxes which, he insists, consistent with him now wanting much higher taxes, etc.). And, as he conveys in every other tweet EVERY Republican seeking the Presidency is "a wanker" (an obsessive-compulsive bit of numbing name-calling made dozens of times).

It is because of the nature of conservatism itself. Traditional news sources don't have a liberal bias because they are located in the major cities or because the people who report the news are the products of liberal arts studies in college... the news is largely about reporting the problems in our society, in pointing out where society as is not working well.

Conservatives use to complained that the news wasn't reporting the things that were good about America, ... they were correct, but not because the news was bent on running down the country but because increasingly the news collectively decided that their job was to report the problems in society so that those problems could be fixed.

Traditional news sources tended to liberal and report 'bad news about America" for one obvious reason: good news is no news. The press feeds off dissatisfaction, alarm, and hobegoblinization...which, of course, is also the whole point of American politics. It has nothing to do with the "news collectively decide(ing)" anything OTHER than to push a view of the prevailing intelligentsia (which has ALWAYs tended to be left of the American center).

This is counter to the most basic tenets of conservatism, that the status quo and the traditions of society must be maintained. ...making things better for some can only happen by making things worse for others and that those others largely are conservatives, who needless to say were the ones who benefit from and therefore are the happiest with the status quo.

To blunt this ever increasing amount of reality in their lives conservatives rely on memes that tell them what seems to be obvious and real isn't actually real and obvious....

This is where Fox News comes in. Their job is to provide the alternate truths that conservatives need. It is an easy job, it doesn't require that any consistency be maintained, only that today's alternate truth explain to a uncritical audience why today's reality isn't real. ...

This gives Fox News tremendous power, they are the keepers of the lies that direct an army.

Fox News can and they do push their viewers further to the right and they can convert moderates into conservatives in the same way, through the application of the most basic of human emotions, fear. ...

Yes, this is harsh. But conservatives accept whatever ground that you are willing to give up that would be required to be less harsh and take it as sign that they are right. Without giving up any ground of their own...

Conservatives have Fox News and Fox News has a lot of paper. But finally it is going to hurt conservatives and their Republican party in the end. I have to believe that.

I don't know if the above is the actual "analysis" of Bartlett or of your own making, but either way it is lame. Whatever you think conservatives 'know' regarding government managed "happiness", conservatives have always expressed oppositional views to liberalism and its mouthpieces. There is nothing "new" about some unspecified "increasing reality", other than the fact that the reality is that the 3 network oligarchy has been shattered by cable TV, talk radio, and the rise of the Internet.

So clearly you are confusing "compulsion" with opportunity. The critical conservatives have always been present, but now that they have avenues to louder and broader voice - hence, their opposition is trying to convince them that it is in their best interests to shut up, roll over, and wag their tails (Foxnews is terrible, Limbaugh is dangerous, yada yada).

But I am sure they (you?) are only giving such well-meaning advice in their best interests, right?

 

[Starman]

One thing that hurts the Republican Party is the "Whiteness" of FOX.

It is mostly white people talking to white people about things that interest some white people.

The nation is becoming more diverse, and if the Republicans are unable to attract more than white voters they will become a permanent minority party.

Yes indeed, those wascawy Wepubwicans should imitate clever Democrats, and promise minorities increased welfare benefits, and keep them, in Hillary's words, "down on the plantation." Don't treat blacks as equals, but as victims of everything. LBJ promised to "have those ******* voting Democrat for the next 200 years. The tactic of patronization continues to work.

 

[untermensche]

One thing that hurts the Republican Party is the "Whiteness" of FOX.

It is mostly white people talking to white people about things that interest some white people.

The nation is becoming more diverse, and if the Republicans are unable to attract more than white voters they will become a permanent minority party.

Yes indeed, those wascawy Wepubwicans should imitate clever Democrats, and promise minorities increased welfare benefits, and keep them, in Hillary's words, "down on the plantation." Don't treat blacks as equals, but as victims of everything. LBJ promised to "have those ******* voting Democrat for the next 200 years. The tactic of patronization continues to work.

Oh yes, those stupid blacks, too dim to know it is really the Republicans that want to help them.

Despite the fact that the Republicans have only supported putting them in prison, for decades.

 

[Rhea]

Interesting thing about FOX (and their viewers) is how they think of themselves as NUMBER ONE NEWS! The reality is that they have the most cable news share... not the most viewers by any stretch. But all the people they are radicalizing keep hearing that it is the NUMBER ONE WATCHED cable NEWS SHOW!!! It's part of the radicalization process, to make them think their nutty opinions are mainstream somehow.

 

[funinspace]

Maybe Fox could help the Repugs find their missing millions of fundagelicals, then they could sweep the 2016 election…ROTFLMAO
http://www.usatoday.com/story/opini...lections-demographics-medved-column/26474707/

As they plot strategy and evaluate candidates for 2016, too many Republicans embrace the notion that the key to victory lies with hordes of disillusioned Christian evangelicals for whom today's GOP isn't nearly conservative enough. Long before Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, made this assumption the explicit basis for his campaign, this comforting idea percolated through talk radio and activist cadres, with frequent reference to the three million (or four million, or six million) "missing conservatives" who failed to show up to support Mitt Romney and thereby doomed his hapless, "mushy moderate" campaign.

The article then goes on into facts (yeah that funny stuff that teabaggers aren’t that into) that demolish yet another myth…

 

[ronburgundy]

One thing that hurts the Republican Party is the "Whiteness" of FOX.

It is mostly white people talking to white people about things that interest some white people.

The nation is becoming more diverse, and if the Republicans are unable to attract more than white voters they will become a permanent minority party.

Yes indeed, those wascawy Wepubwicans should imitate clever Democrats, and promise minorities increased welfare benefits, and keep them, in Hillary's words, "down on the plantation." Don't treat blacks as equals, but as victims of everything. LBJ promised to "have those ******* voting Democrat for the next 200 years. The tactic of patronization continues to work.

So in your mind the only two alternatives are to be identical to the Democrats on welfare or be as extremist, transparently racist, loony-bin irrational and anti-factual as Fox News on every issue. Well, you are clearly Fox's target demographic, but the party you root for is weaker due to trying to cater to such views that are just too loony and immoral for many otherwise fiscal conservatives and social moderates to get on board with.