There has been much observation of – and some conservative chagrin about – the Leftward drift of the Fox News Channel (FNC).
‘Fox News Is Moving Left’: Opinions About the Media Inside Trump’s Green Bay Rally Are Breathtaking
Rush Limbaugh Bemoans ‘Never Trumpers Now All Over Fox News’
Admittedly, more than a little of the chagrin has come from me. And the Never Donald Trumper-ism has sometimes scaled the heights of Mount Ridiculousness. I mean, come on….
‘Whoa, Whoa, Whoa’: Neil Cavuto Slammed After He Cuts Off Kayleigh McEnany Presser
Fox News Allows Debate Cheater Donna Brazile to Tell RNC Chair: ‘Ronna, Go to Hell’
Fox News Stars Question Fox News’ Early Arizona Call for Biden
FNCs 2020 presidential election Arizona call was WAY premature. But that headline proves my ultimate point:
“Fox News Stars Question Fox News….”
My ultimate point is: FNC is still doing what we want it to do.
There are FNC stars upset by FNCs error – and they are willing and free to say so on FNCs airwaves. Can you imagine anyone on CNN or MSNBC criticizing CNN or MSNBC?
And lest we forget – FNC is still doing what it was founded to do. Have an ongoing, rolling, actual debate.
Yes, the likes of debate cheat Brazile and Juan Williams are why God invented the Mute button. (And I will never understand the Cheater Brazile hire.)
But they are not a reason to hit the Change Channel button. A debate – requires participants from both sides.
A debate – is what the one-sided Leftist claptrap factories that make up Big Media now never deliver. The likes of CNN and MSNBC haven’t had a conservative on their tiny airwaves in many, many years.
And really, how many Leftists don’t inherently annoy the daylight out of us?
Meanwhile, FNCs opinion hosts and their shows are still right up our alley.
Tucker Carlson is the King of News.
Tucker Carlson Has Highest-Rated Program in Cable News History
Tucker is King – for doing precisely what we want FNC hosts to do. Deliver Trumpian populist conservatism night in and night out.
Sean Hannity is the exact same guy he was as a founding FNC host in 1996. And has been as pro-Trump as anyone not actually related to the guy.
Laura Ingraham is a consistent conservative – and has almost always been another pro-Trump voice.
No one is going to always agree with you – except you. And even your support of you is perpetually in doubt.
But FNC is still mostly where we want them to be. Maybe a little less so than before. But still pretty darn close.
And let us not forget the human nature factor. Memory always accentuates the positive – and diminishes the negative.
When FNC first hit the air, its bipartisan presentation was a revolutionary way to do news. We were stunned – and thrilled.
The late Charles Krauthammer, a longtime Fox News Contributor, wrote about this searing novelty a little more than a decade after its debut.
“Fox has done a great service to the American polity – single-handedly breaking up the intellectual and ideological monopoly that for decades exerted hegemony (to use a favorite lefty cliché) over the broadcast media.
“I said some years ago that the genius of Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes was to have discovered a niche market in American broadcasting — half the American people.
“The reason Fox News has thrived and grown is because it offers a vibrant and honest alternative to those who could not abide yet another day of the news delivered to them beneath layer after layer of often undisguised liberalism.”
When something that novel and positive is delivered to a half-the-population that had been starved for it so many decades – their senses are overwhelmed with the goodness.
But us humans being humans, over time we get used to something we consistently get. We, frankly, get spoiled. We take for granted what we once considered a tremendous gift.
Or, to paraphrase the meaning of the Doobie Brothers album title:
What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits
Yes, some things have changed at FNC since 1996. But even some of that is movement to the Right.
To wit: Today’s solo Hannity for years shared his show with the late Leftist Alan Colmes. Now Hannity’s all Right – all the time.
Oh: And we conservatives have very, VERY few allies here on Planet Earth.
We the Reasonable Are Outnumbered – and Massively Outgunned
So we shouldn’t go actively looking to shoot horses for stubbing toes.
We’ll close this thought exercise with a quote from the late conservative Ronald Reagan:
“The person who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and an ally – not a 20 percent traitor.”
The Fox News Channel remains an ally – well on the positive side of the Reagan ledger.
This first appeared in Red State.