Just like his Washington Post colleague Chris Cillizza, media blogger Erik Wemple just can’t stand the notion that someone would assert the press favors Hillary Clinton for president. We noted the other day that Fox News boss Roger Ailes said the press will vote for Hillary no matter what she does. Wemple claimed that “makes no sense” and blustered about how tough the media’s acting.
Fox News chief Roger Ailes is a quote factory, a golden interviewee for any media journalist. “I don’t give a rat’s a[–] what the world thinks,” he said in an early April interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
This cavalier attitude enables Ailes, one of TV’s inestimable talents, to say stuff that makes no sense. Like this: “[I]t looks like Hillary is going to do whatever she wants and the press is going to vote for her.”
Problem No. 1: Ailes, as head of cable TV’s dominant news channel, can’t refer to “the press” as some kind of Otherworld. Fox News is the press, too. As the Hollywood Reporter piece notes, Fox News will generate $2.18 billion in revenues this year. That kind of money can fund all kinds of journalism on Hillary Clinton, and surely it will.
Problem No. 2: Has Ailes been following the news? Did he miss the March 2 New York Times story on Clinton’s use of a private e-mail account during her tenure as secretary of state? And the utter and overwhelming media pile-on that followed?
"Utter and overwhelming pile-on" from the e-mail scandal? It looks like he hasn't looked at our new study on how the networks have gone missing in action on the e-mail server-shredding.
Wemple also cited the new Peter Schweizer book Clinton Cash on the Clinton Foundation's habits and how the Post and The New York Times agreed to review it for articles.
But Ailes didn't say "the press will never write a tough article." He said no matter what Hillary does, "the press is going to vote for her." Surveys from 1992 and before showed 90 percent of the press voted for Democrats. Now they fail to participate in public surveys. Does that mean they won't all vote for Hillary? Does Wemple think half f his Post colleagues will vote for the Republican nominee? Insert snicker here.
