Adding further evidence to the charge that he is anti-American, Senator Obama held a meeting with Fox News executives in an effort to blackmail a network into silencing commentators such as Sean Hannity. Apparently Osama Obama was miffed that not every media outlet was inthe tank for him and claimed he wanted nothing to do with executive Roger Ailes because the network was too down right mean.

Fortunatel, Fox News executives told Obama that the network would not go in the tank for him like CNN and MSNBC. Those networks are the American equivalents of the state run news agencies that pump out Castro's propoganda.

Silencing dissent. That is what the Obama campaign is all about. They wanted to offer a little more access for a little more favorable treatment. This is underhanded and disgusting and if you had any doubts Obama wasn't born here, isn't from here or isn't of here,all you have to do is look at his blatant disregard for the first amendment when it comes to his press critics.

Here's Cohen's Dreck about Hillary's speech last night

DENVER – His former rival moving for his nomination by acclimation as her friends and supporters chanted her name, Barack Obama became the Democrats’ official nominee this evening, with nary a suggestion of disunity in the house.

The traditional roll call of states proceeded, with each in its turn announcing the votes of its delegates, with California and then Illinois – Obama’s home state – passing. Then, as it got to New Mexico, with Obama well ahead of Hillary Clinton in the call, that state passed to Illinois, which then passed to New York.

Clinton – New York’s junior senator – was led into the hall, and, smiling, she called for Obama – who she fought a sometimes bitter primary battle against – to be nominated for the presidency by acclimation.

“Let’s declare together in once voiced, right here, right now, that Barack Obama is our candidate and he will be our president,” she said, as applause boomed through the Pepsi Center.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi – overseeing the proceedings – asked for yeas and nays. The former thundered through the hall, and, knowing something about calling voice votes, Pelosi seemed to gloss quickly past any scattering nay votes which may have resonated in the venue.

It didn’t matter. Obama was going to be the nominee, having secured it by beating Clinton during the primary season and winning the support of superdelegates to the convention even though it was she who was once considered the overwhelming front runner in the race for the Democratic nod to the White House.

No New York hoity-toity euphemism for the hoi polloi from that Southern Rebel.

* 2:20 p.m. ET

King Ailes' F&FW court: Queen Alisyn, Princess Dave, and Jester Clayton

This week, Human Events, which has been "leading the conservative revolution since 1944", is celebrating the 20th-anniversary of Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh, of course, is the right-wing radio monologuer who has "remade American politics", according to Karl Rove, or is a "big fat liar" as Al Franken has called him, in homage to the man's own distinctively rebarbative style. A distinctively American phenomenon, his partisan rants would lose any British station broadcasting him its license.

Original DVD cover.

"I'm not making this up," is Limbaugh's catchphrase. But, in fact, he often does just that. Rory O'Connor's book Shock Jocks: Hate Speech and Talk Radio, details the right-wing talkshow universe and makes the point that it was not just Limbaugh's native charm that got him launched on the airwaves. Rather, the concentration of media ownership, under a complaisant FCC, paved his way, along with the inspired political entrepreneurship of Fox CEO Roger Ailes, who offered the show free to local stations.

...snip...

Limbaugh's audience is so overwhelmed that they suffer from amnesia on the same scale as his megalomania. As he now boosts John McCain against Barack Obama, who remembers his comment that "all the candidates on our side, for various reasons, are uninspiring, or worse"? Who remembers the campaigner for drug-takers to go "down the river", as the same pill-popping poly-prescriptive panjandrum who copped a plea deal for going into treatment? Then, maybe he thought that OxyContin, like nicotine, was non- addictive, just as, in fact, he thinks carbon monoxide is non-toxic.

...snip...

For the Limbaughs of this world, gays, blacks, liberals, feminazis, Clintons, Obamas and all the rest of his Grand Guignol dramatis personae are unpatriotic, not real citizens, maybe not even human. They deserve neither rights nor respect. This is Bush's Radio G'tmo. It epitomises the ethos of the age.

Twenty years of Rush Limbaugh radio? Eight years consecutive of Bush and Cheney? Surely it's time for parole?

Chimpy, Poppy, and Jebby called the show to congratulate Limpy. Here are some snippets of what Chimpy and Limpy had to say:

THE PRESIDENT: President George W. Bush calling to congratulate you on 20 years of important and excellent broadcasting.

...snip...

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I'm just calling along with President 41 and the former governor of Florida. We're fixing to have lunch here, and I said, "Listen, we ought to call our pal and let him know that we care" for you. So this is as much as anything, a nice verbal letter to a guy we really care for.

...snip...

RUSH: They were waving at me trying to tell me you were on the line, and I didn't know what was going on. So you succeeded here in the surprise. How are you doing, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: I am great. We're doing very good, thank you very much, sir. Concerned about our economy, obviously, but know we need to be drilling for some oil and gas in order to take the pressure off the gas prices -- and I'm pleased with the progress in Iraq.

RUSH: Have you heard what Senator Obama wants to do? He wants another stimulus check of a thousand dollars to every American paid for by the oil companies.

THE PRESIDENT: Yeah. Well, what we ought to be doing is encouraging oil companies to find oil, and that's the best way to take the pressure off the gasoline prices. We're on a very strong push to get the Congress to allow for there to be offshore drilling, and most Americans understand now that an increase in oil, particularly here in America, will help take pressure off of price. And I tell people I'd rather, you know, be buying American oil instead of sending our money overseas.

RUSH: You know, Mr. President, it's amazing. In 2004 during your campaign, Senator Kerry was constantly criticizing you for not "jawboning" with the Saudis enough to bring the price of oil down. Now, four years later, they're doing everything they can to keep the price from coming down. They apparently want it to remain high.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, they may want to, but the American people want to see some relief. It would be like a massive tax cut when the gasoline prices decline. So we're in times of economic uncertainty and the more money people have in their pockets the quicker we'll be able to recover, in my judgment. You asked how I'm doing. My spirits are high; I'm going to finish strong. I love my family and I'm spending two days here with mother and dad before I head overseas.

Then it was Poppy's turn:

BUSH 41: Do you see our man Ailes at all?

RUSH: Oh, yeah. I saw Roger at Tony Snow's funeral.

BUSH 41: Oh, did you?

RUSH: And a couple of times earlier this summer.

BUSH 41: Are we on the radio, are we?

RUSH: (laughing)

BUSH 41: I didn't know that. I'll clean up my act here. I'm glad they told me.

RUSH: Yeah, we're on the radio.

Dark Genius: The Influential Career of Legendary Political Operative and Fox News Founder Roger Ailes is available at Amazon for $16.47. To Order click here
Amazon Product Pages contain a lot of other details on this product as Customer Reviews, Sales Ranking, Special Offers, Alternate products that customers are going for and much more.Want to read these details? click here

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Other Products of Interest

• You Are the Message
• The Place to Be: Washington, CBS, and the Glory Days of Television News
• Mudslingers: The Twenty-Five Dirtiest Political Campaigns of All Time
• Rupert Murdoch's China Adventures: How the Worlds Most Powerful Media Mogul Lost a Fortune and Found a Wife
• No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner

You can turn on the FOX Network at any hour during the day and assuredly you'll find them yapping about terrorist plotting to disrupt hootin' nannies all across fly over America.  After the commercial break, you'll get a heavy dose of child predators and how there is one around every corner.  With little to segue or space to take a breath, they'll bring on some guy who swears that gays will being suing your church for the right to walk down those most hallowed of aisles.  Fear, fear and oh look just a little more fear. 

You'd think that FOX might change their motto from "We report, you decide" to something like "We'll scare you, you freak out!"  FEAR is the hallmark of the Murdoch/Ailes operation and now they've decided "what the Hell, let's trademark it!"

Yep, FOX News submitted a trademark application for FACT VS FEAR supposedly for an ongoing news segment.  Somehow on the FOX Network when it's a competition of FACT versus FEAR, fear seems to win every time.

It's really not a bad strategy when you think about.  People want to entertained when watching TV.  AD folks will tell you that "sex" sells.  Sex doesn't do so bad at the movies either.  Likewise, scaring folks works as entertainment too.  What sequel are we at on the Halloween Movies now?

To entertain, you've either got to Scare, Humor, Titillate or Shock.  An easy way to remember it is with the acronym SHITS.  If you can simultaneously do all four, you'd be giving people the SHITS. 

With the likes of Hannity & Colmes, the morose Brit Hume, that Oompah Loompah Shepard Smith and Bill O the Clown, it is no wonder that the FOX News Netwwork gives me the SHITS.

So far they have not submitted a trademark application for "TERRORIST FIST JAB" but I'm sure it's in the works!

Josh Marshall gets it right, via Roger Ailes The Good.

Adding that being on vacation this week I have noted a discernible shift towards courting the LIV's from the McCain campaign. I suppose they had no choice, but how proud they must be.

Spicy Aly will have her castrato choir in tune and singing her song in no time. She doesn't need to tame the boys, Clayton Morris and Dave Briggs, but merely to continue to tutor them. She'll be no Ainsley! It's Aly's world and Clayton and Dave are just privileged to live in it.

As I wrote in an earlier article entitled "Y Ali Can't Save F&F Weekend," I do fear that the weekday Fox & Friends will falter without Aly. Try as she must, Gretchen just doesn't have it. She's a Miss America in a Miss USA universe. She's like a liberated June Cleaver that praises the concept of women's suffrage but doesn't quite appreciate her new empowerment. The center seat needs a gorgeous gal who can and will set Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade straight without hesitation at a moment's notice.

Roger, thanks for getting back with the program.

http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/fnc/changes_at_fox_friends_89182.asp
http://jakeho.wordpress.com/2008/05/09/y-ali-cant-save-ff-weekend/

Is FNC pulling another fast one on its loyal fans? When it canned the comely Kiran Chetry and later the trio of Page Hopkins, Kelly Wright, and Greg Kelly, it breathed nary a word to its Fox & Friends viewers. If F&FF is indeed being replaced by F&F, then what becomes of Alisyn Camerota? Will she return from vacation as a mere newsreader on F&F? Or will she be exiled with Page Hopkins to FNC's Siberia?

If Aly goes on permanent holiday from Fox & Friends, then I very well may join her. FNC cannot continue to treat its viewers with little to no regard without consequences. Roger Ailes, you called in to F&FW Saturday: hopefully, you'll get back with the program in general. It needs your attention desparately.

Links:

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=772056
http://homepage.mac.com/mkoldys/blog/jdp.html

"Laura and I are deeply saddened by the death of our dear friend Tony Snow," President Bush said in a written statement. "The Snow family has lost a beloved husband and father. And America has lost a devoted public servant and a man of character."

Snow joined FOX in 1996 as the original anchor of "FOX News Sunday" and hosted "Weekend Live" and a radio program, "The Tony Snow Show," before departing in 2006.

"It's a tremendous loss for us who knew him, but it's also a loss for the country," Roger Ailes, chairman of FOX News, said Saturday morning about Snow, calling him a "renaissance man."

He leaves behind his wife and 3 children.

read more | digg story

President George W. Bush also weighed in. Fox News' Washington bureau correspondent Julie Kirtz read his eulogizing statement which said, "Laura and I are deeply saddened by the death of our dear friend, Tony Snow. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife Jill and their children....The Snow family has lost a beloved husband and father and America has lost a devoted public servant and a man of character....All of us here at the White House will miss Tony as well as the millions of Americans he inspired with his brave struggle against cancer. One of the things that sustained Tony Snow was his faith and Laura and I join people across our country praying that this good man has now found comfort in the arms of his Creator."

Today F&F's A-Team did not step in as it had when Pope Benedict XVI visited the U.S. and when NBC's Meet the Press legend Tim Russert died. However, F&F's B-Team stepped up to the plate today: Ainsley Earhardt, Dave Briggs, and Clayton Morris acquitted themselves well and maintained a sober and respectful atmosphere. Even tragedy-averse Courtney Friel seemed subdued and did her best to dignify Tony's death.

F&FW, a job well done: Tony deserved it.

• McCain tries to reinvent himself as a deficit hawk. Deficit hawks find his plan unconvincing. Money quote from NY Times article:Robert Bixby, the president of the Concord Coalition, which advocates balanced budgets, questioned how his proposals could lead to balanced budgets.“It’s feasible to balance the budget by 2013, but very unlikely under the policies Senator McCain has proposed,” he said in an e-mail. “The spending cuts are far to vague too be counted on for significant savings and, even if they were more specific, I can’t see how they would come close to offsetting the level of tax cuts he recommends. Looking at this set of proposals it doesn’t seem that McCain fits neatly into either the deficit hawk or supply side camp.”
• Senator Jim Webb takes himself out of the Veepstakes. Not that he was necessarily in the running anyway...
• Obama tells Navy Times that because he hasn't served, he needs to earn trust of men and women in uniform.
• Rigidly Ideological Obama Supports Controversial Supreme Court Habeas Corpus Decision. Court favors restoring habeas corpus for Guantanamo Bay detainees 5-4. McCain and GOP criticize decision as one of the worst Supreme Court decisions ever. Obama supports it, clearly reflecting his reflexively doctrinaire liberalism. Oh wait, this is last month's narrative! This month we're supposed to be talking about how Obama is opportunistically tacking towards the center. Sorry, I got my talking points mixed up. We now return to our regularly scheduled cable news chatter...

• Team Obama confirms Obama will accept nomination at Denver's football stadium, Invesco Field (which has over 76,000 seats and room for 1,000s more on the field). Obama will give acceptance speech on 40th anniversary of MLK's historic "I have a dream" speech. McCain camp says it's not intimidated - McCain will give his acceptance speech in front of a green screen. Here's a sample:

• Bill Kristol uses his Op-Ed column to get his friend Mike Murphy hired to run the McCain campaign. Murphy is famous for his mantra that McCain's handlers must "let McCain be McCain." He put it more starkly over the weekend: "The depressingly self-absorbed McCain campaign machine needs to get out of the way." This should be fun. If they don't hire Murphy, they're unlikely to seize on a campaign theme that gets traction. If they do hire Murphy, they'll be a dysfunctional rift inside the campaign between the Rove-trained boys and girls and Murphy. It'll make the back-stabbing Hillary campaign look like the Osmond family by comparison.
• Bob Novak still has a purpose, which is to share decent gossip on what's going on inside the GOP from time to time (his rants against Democrats are rarely based on fact). Today he reveals a growing rift between rank and file House Republicans and the House GOP leadership. He suggests that after this election, the House GOP leadership will walk the plank.
• Right wing goes after Obama on abortion, using image of a black Uncle Sam in its campaign
• Inside the Belly of the Beast. At apparent risk to his career, a reporter divulges how FOX News plays vicious hardball behind the scenes to protect itself from criticism.
• The GOP wonders why it has difficulty expanding its base beyond fat Southern white guys over 50? Exhibit A is the Republicans effusive praise for the deceased right wing bigot, Jesse Helms, captured here.
• NY Times revisits Obama's years in Chicago's South Side when he worked for several churches as a community organizer. The reporter meets with several of the people Obama wrote about in his first book, Dreams from my Father.
• WaPo: Conservatives ready for battle against an expected McCain campaign effort to re-write the GOP platform at the Republican National Convention. In the 100-page document, all but 9 pages mention George W. Bush. The platform document will need to be completely rewritten to remove the taint of the Bush presidency. Conservatives in the party are ready to prevent that from happening.
• McCain's grand new economic plan his aides have been pumping for days turns out to be a yawner. Claims he will use savings from wind-down of Iraq and Afghanistan to reduce deficit and balance budget by end of first term. Money quote from Politico story: "McCain advisers admit that the document is a repackaging of previous policies, without dramatic new initiatives. Some Democratic officials had thought McCain might try to make a splash by proposing a bold middle-class tax cut."
• Bloomberg.com: Romney is a logical choice as McCain's Veep, but he carries a lot of baggage. First, McCain hated his guts during the primary, and there may be lingering bad blood. Second, Romney may hurt McCain with evangelicals, and his record at Bain Consulting, in which he implemented broad layoffs, might hurt in a down economy. His flip-flopping on red meat social issues won't help either.
• NY Times profiles Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook who left the company to join the Obama campaign. He created mybarackobama.com, which has nearly 1M users and has helped drive the organizing and interaction of supporters in innovative ways.
• Walter Shapiro/Salon profiles Kathleen Sebelius as a possible strong Veep for Obama. She may not carry her state of Kansas, but she has been highly effective in working across the aisle in a very red state, while remaining firmly pro-choice and pro-environment.
• Andrew Sullivan's London Times column: How Obama has shrewdly eliminated any reason to vote for McCain.

On the July 2 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends, co-hosts Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade labeled New York Times reporter Jacques Steinberg and editor Steven Reddicliffe "attack dogs," claiming that Steinberg's June 28 article on the "ominous trend" in Fox News' ratings was a "hit piece." During the segment, however, Fox News featured photos of Steinberg and Reddicliffe that appeared to have been digitally altered -- the journalists' teeth had been yellowed, their facial features exaggerated, and portions of Reddicliffe's hair moved further back on his head. Fox News gave no indication that the photos had been altered.

Now, I for one don't believe a word of it! Doesn't Media Matters know that Fox News is fair and balanced? It must be true; I heard it on the news.....on Fox! They would never do something so sophomoric as altering pictures! Anyway, you can read the hit piece over at Media Matters if you want. I am not going to copy any more of that nonsense over here. Instead, I thought I would post pictures of the journalists whose integrity Media Matters is impugning, as well as some of the rest of the gang at Fox News. First is one of the morning hosts of Fox and Friends, Steve Doocy.

Next is Steve's co-host, Brian Kilmeade, the other stellar journalist maligned by Media Matters.

Who could believe the home of a serious journalist like Bill O'Reilly could ever do anything so childish?

Fox News is not a silly children's channel that plays silly games. If it were, would it attract newmen with the gravitas and unwavering truthfulness of Brit Hume and pundits with the unbiased wisdom of Karl Rove?

Even if you think there is the slightest chance that any of these dedicated giants of journalism would ever stoop to something as mean and nasty as altering the photographs of perceived enemies, they would never be allowed to under the watchful eye of the president of Fox News Channel, Roger Ailes!

I hope that Media Matters apologizes quickly and genuinely!

Geraldo Rivera. That greasy information pimp. He literally exploits the bad happenings of good people and transforms their mistakes, errors, or even deaths into an all out Journalistic Inquiry. His reports on minorities always take the tone of support through illogical conclusion. His bias being that he may or may not be part South American part Ivy League goofball lends me the satisfaction of knowing I am partially right when I point out Objective Journalism versus (albeit) honest and truthfilled journalism. His journalistic processes are so venomously objective to his own beliefs and viewpoints, which could actually equate with that of some mustachioed chimpanzee with eye brackets peeling his lids open and flashing screens instilling images and java pictures of beatings, rapes, murders, suicides, ballet, croquet, the Arquettes, indoctrinations, episcopalians, and probably old Tom and Jerry catoons. Let's move on, shall we...

Bill O'Reilly. He is self-proclaimed. In what? Ho.. Well, how about everything? Leaving out Ideology for the traditional viewpoints of "most American citizens" he emphasizes fundamental principles and argues with other half wit, all knowing types all in the attempt of rousing contempt for their opposing beliefs. Sure, it makes for good talk-radio and television but his outspoken and usually over the top remarks make him a squandered cause. Oh, oh, oh... Ms. Andrea Mackris. Well.. Hehe, we already know how you lost your virginity, but do tell us all again.. Mmm nothing like good old lubricated summer sausage. You fiendish hot-aired balloon! From the O'Reilly Report to the now O'Reilly Factor he may be the most on the center personality on the network... Wow. Shame. Goodbye sixty million dollars! The phone sex must have been well worth it.. Didn't he ever interwiew any of those deviant Senators? Mr. Idaho Spud, Larry Craig, are you in the audience tonight? No. Must be using the restroom.. Ouch.

Grete Van Susteren. For the record, this hose hound barking day and night about news matters. She really got my goat about the Aruba situation. Well, I would think that if slanderous statements against a(n) institution, client, or even a tourism affiliation within the country has hard enough fellings about her inane allegations then why shouldn't they have the right to have their point heard? The suing party was not responsible for the crime that Van Susternen was supposed to be commenting and therefore her remarks are uncalled for and very blatantly rude. Poorly aimed assaults of the verbal degree are nothing new with her, but you would think that after a law suit or two she would just stick with the facts... Ma'am.

These are but a few of Fox New's oblivious anchors, and I'm certainly not condemning them for good - once in awhile they make a valid point, except for Geraldo who is always wrong and a ferocious little ferret boy.. Next Injustice For All segment will be pointed at Nancy Grace and her obssesion with a cold Tall Boy.. Snap.

Just keep your eyes open. Don't let the media validate your opinions or beliefs or lifestyles or anything. Be smart and try thinking for yourself. Resist the moriae of these political junkies and understand it's their job to scrounge for dirt. What would Erasmus say if he were living in this time? Would he have dropped Chrisianity and the church and become a social and political caricature for the Fox News Corporation or would he be in the same rocking boat as me, blogging for a cause...

Floyd Brown, the man behind such slander as the infamous Willy Horton ads is back and as immoral as ever. This time he's turning his attacks, on Barack Obama. The race-baiter extraordinaire drew upon racism in this ad just as he did in the Willy Horton ads in the 1980s. The ad repeats the false claim that Barack Obama was a Muslim as a child(which he wasn't.) It then says that it doesn't matter if he was a Muslim then(which again he wasn't) what matters is if he is one now(which he's not.)

Every Republican should denounce this racist and xenophobic ad for the trash that it is. However, the majority won't. A few with a conscience may, but most won't. Most will simply say that this is politics as usual and say that the use of racism, xenophobia, and slander in a political campaign is perfectly acceptable. It has been but that doesn't mean it should be. We're Americans, we should be better than this. We should run campaigns where all involved take the high road and deal solely in the facts rather than make up lies which they can use to scare the ignorant. He and every involved on this ad or the Willy Horton ad(including Roger Ailes) should be ashamed of themselves.

Anyone who had morals or a conscience would be outraged, but clearly Brown doesn't have that burden. McCain also apparently doesn't as he has resigned himself to silence on the misconduct of his party and its attack dogs.

It's why I call them, "Media Man." Beware The Man.

Thanks to Roger Ailes, the good one.

Links: http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/fnc/fox_news_hot_for_henderson_84628.asp

http://jakeho.wordpress.com/2008/05/13/a-megan/morning/

The immediate takeaway is that O’Reilly and Ailes are thin-skinned; they can dish it out but they can’t take it. And so they will go to absurd lengths to shut up their critics. I have a hard time believing that pique is the primary motivation, though.

Here’s one theory: What’s going on is an attempted precision strike to take out Keith Olbermann’s unique space in the universe of cable yakkers.

Though he might balk at the term, Olbermann is a Fox-style liberal. There’s no one else on TV who fits that description. Most of the “liberals” on TV news fall into the crypto-liberal category, like Dan Rather. Even George Stephanopoulos would call himself a newsman first. That’s advantage Fox, which can tag them with the “liberal” label and force them to deny it. (Which they sometimes can’t – double advantage. Or which they respond to by taking their cues from Fox – triple advantage.)

As a liberal on a traditional, non-ideological news network, Olbermann breaks this pattern. It actually is dangerous to Fox, whose raison d’etre is the notion that liberalism is secretly shading the competition’s news programming. If liberalism is out in the open, and liberals and non-ideological reporters can coexist on cable news, Fox’s project to obliterate those distinctions in people’s minds – everything on NBC is liberal bias, so go with conservative bias instead – falters.

There are a lot of reasons why Olbermann is the only outspoken liberal in a primo slot on cable news. Fox’s success is perhaps the biggest. And there just aren’t that many TV personalities, liberal or conservative, with the combination of ego, persistence and ratings to go up against O’Reilly toe-to-toe. Phil Donahue, let’s face it, was a bore. (And bear in mind: there’s not much point to mixing it up with O’Reilly & Co. to begin with. We don’t need even more exploding-heads stupidity on TV. I’m also leaving out Stewart and Colbert here, in a class by themselves.)

But Olbermann has also tapped into something. His outraged rants against the likes of O’Reilly and Fox, and against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney channel a kind of populist anger at Republicans that is surging as the Bush years wind down. And though Olbermann goes over the top at times, often his rants are right on. People should be outraged, for reasons too numerous to mention here. It’s a wonder ratings-starved cable networks don’t do more to harness this – there’s gold there.

Once, Fox thought it had the market cornered on over-the-top populist outrage. No more. Hence the logic to the idea that Olbermann-must-be-destroyed. If Ailes succeeds, the networks will think twice before trying to replicate the Olbermann formula.

Howard Kurtz writes an article this morning on the possibility that election stealer and Fox News executive Roger Ailes will "unleash" his "attack dog" Bill O'Reilly on NBC's parent company GE. O'Reilly has complained in the past that GE has helped "kill Americans in Iraq" because they do business with Iran. Then O'Reilly criticized most of the known world for buying Iranian oil, which helps the Iranians more than GE ranges and microwaves. No, no, that would have been logical.

GE is no good guy. Their policies have hurt the environment and at times even poisoned people by means of pollution. However, their attacks on conservative politics via Olbermann is a bit, well Vaderesque (the clip is stupid, but you get the point). One evil condemning another, and maybe it will have a happy ending?

The idea of "unleashing" O'Reilly is a bit ridiculous, especially in the week after this:

You'd think Ailes would be more careful about the words he chooses. To be fair, maybe Ailes is referring to the 2005 Jet Li movie Unleashed, in which Jet Li acts like some kind of autistic martial arts master that violently freaks out on people when his electronic behavioral collar is taken off. Before you go thinking I may be on to something, I remind you three important distinctions:

1) Jet Li is 5'6," over 40, and can dunk a basketball. O'Reilly is 6'4," over 40, and most certainly cannot dunk.

2) Despite his hugely successful career, Jet Li remains very humble and hardworking. O'Reilly is a pompous ass who just reads off Republican talking points.

3) Jet Li is not a falafel fucker.

So what then is the point of "unleashing" O'Reilly? Was he being held back before?

It's good for business. An honest look at the entire situation would show that Olbermann, who is very articulate and seems very bright, is not exactly a renowned journalist. Before 2002, just about the biggest story he covered was this:

Olbermann was seemingly brought in as a left wing foil for O'Reilly, and to try to steal some of the circus crowd away from the Factor. He has, and though his numbers are rising, he is still not near the Factor's ratings. O'Reilly sees this as the weakness of left wing ideology to captivate people--the reality is probably that the left wing is getting more of their news from the internet, and the right wing would rather sit back and hear it from a righteous white man who stands up for their values.

The result is a media marketing side show that ends up playing into electoral politics and decisions. To think someone could be casting their vote based on a marketing strategy by a network and not by an examination of policy is disheartening, but it is now a reality of American politics.

Bonus Jet Li ass kicking action from Unleashed: