Where the monster was born

[Luddly Neddite]

Roger Ailes' Secret Nixon-Era Blueprint for Fox News

Republican media strategist Roger Ailes launched Fox News Channel in 1996, ostensibly as a "fair and balanced" counterpoint to what he regarded as the liberal establishment media. But according to a remarkable document buried deep within the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, the intellectual forerunner for Fox News was a nakedly partisan 1970 plot by Ailes and other Nixon aides to circumvent the "prejudices of network news" and deliver "pro-administration" stories to heartland television viewers.

The memo—called, simply enough, "A Plan For Putting the GOP on TV News"— is included in a 318-page cache of documents detailing Ailes' work for both the Nixon and George H.W. Bush administrations that we obtained from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Through his firms REA Productions and Ailes Communications, Inc., Ailes served as paid consultant to both presidents in the 1970s and 1990s, offering detailed and shrewd advice ranging from what ties to wear to how to keep the pressure up on Saddam Hussein in the run-up to the first Gulf War.

If it had been only the birth of a giant partisan rag - fox - it would not have meant much. But, that was only the beginning. The problem was that it became a huge juggernaut that resulted in the death of our news media.

 

[daveman]

Oh, no! It's simply AWFUL that the left no longer has a stranglehold on what the public is allowed to see!

It's not FAAAAAAAAAIR!!!

 

[whitehall]

Oh God, did the liberals finally find out the secret? Fox is a Nixon plot.

 

[daveman]

Oh God, did the liberals finally find out the secret? Fox is a Nixon plot.

On the ball, ain't they?

 

[Pogo]

That's a fine article. And judging by the posts thus far I may be the only one besides the OP who actually read it...

>> >> When Barack Obama announced early in his administration that he would conduct a live nationwide address to high school and students, Fox News hyperventilated and described it as an attempt to "indoctrinate children to support him politically." When Richard Nixon decided to address high school and college students in 1970, as this memo to Haldeman from deputy assistant to the president Dwight L. Chapin makes clear (read it here), Roger Ailes produced the event:

Roger Ailes is developing a plan which he is going to phone in to me tomorrow morning.... Ailes likes the idea of having the president originate live from one of the schools and then shift to the other schools to answer questions. <<

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -​

{Ailes to Sununu, 1990} "I have had at least half a dozen calls very recently from the press trying to lead me into discussions like, 'fiddling while Rome burns,' 'golfing while Americans are being taken hostage,' etc. The only reason this is of concern to me is that I notice the networks beginning to show more and more footage of the president in the golf cart. It is very clear that they have a point of view which does not represent a fair picture of how the president is handling the crisis... It is my judgment that the American people simply don't believe this about George Bush, and therefore there will not be a major repercussion. On the other hand, I know first hand what a megatonnage dose of media hammering the same message can do.... Do a little more fishing and less golfing."

{end memo, back to article}

Ailes, of course, knows from using golf to paint a president as remote and out of touch. Here are some recent Fox News headlines: "Obama Finds Time for NCAA Bracket, Golf Amid Global Turmoil," "Obama Chooses Golf Over Funeral," and "Barack Obama Plays Golf More Times than George W. Bush." <<

>> All in all, the documents show Ailes to be an engaged, brilliant, and often catty adviser with an obsessive, almost evangelical focus on the power of television to manipulate people for political purposes. It's almost as though, frustrated by the failure of candidates and presidents to hew closely enough to his political instructions, Ailes founded a network to demonstrate their practical application&#8212; see, this is how you use golf to undermine a president. <<

One is reminded of the lemmings in close proximity obediently parroting the Ailes lines all over this board on this very topic...

>> And the whole project began&#8212;on the taxpayer's dime&#8212;in the White House under the direction of a Watergate felon. One can only imagine how Fox News would report a similar scheme hatched in the Obama White House. <<

​

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Roger Ailes' Secret Nixon-Era Blueprint for Fox News

Republican media strategist Roger Ailes launched Fox News Channel in 1996, ostensibly as a "fair and balanced" counterpoint to what he regarded as the liberal establishment media. But according to a remarkable document buried deep within the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, the intellectual forerunner for Fox News was a nakedly partisan 1970 plot by Ailes and other Nixon aides to circumvent the "prejudices of network news" and deliver "pro-administration" stories to heartland television viewers.

The memo—called, simply enough, "A Plan For Putting the GOP on TV News"— is included in a 318-page cache of documents detailing Ailes' work for both the Nixon and George H.W. Bush administrations that we obtained from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Through his firms REA Productions and Ailes Communications, Inc., Ailes served as paid consultant to both presidents in the 1970s and 1990s, offering detailed and shrewd advice ranging from what ties to wear to how to keep the pressure up on Saddam Hussein in the run-up to the first Gulf War.

If it had been only the birth of a giant partisan rag - fox - it would not have meant much. But, that was only the beginning. The problem was that it became a huge juggernaut that resulted in the death of our news media.

Another wackadoodle conspiracy theory, when am I going to learn?

Thanks for the laugh though.

 

[Pogo]

Roger Ailes' Secret Nixon-Era Blueprint for Fox News

Republican media strategist Roger Ailes launched Fox News Channel in 1996, ostensibly as a "fair and balanced" counterpoint to what he regarded as the liberal establishment media. But according to a remarkable document buried deep within the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, the intellectual forerunner for Fox News was a nakedly partisan 1970 plot by Ailes and other Nixon aides to circumvent the "prejudices of network news" and deliver "pro-administration" stories to heartland television viewers.

The memo&#8212;called, simply enough, "A Plan For Putting the GOP on TV News"&#8212; is included in a 318-page cache of documents detailing Ailes' work for both the Nixon and George H.W. Bush administrations that we obtained from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Through his firms REA Productions and Ailes Communications, Inc., Ailes served as paid consultant to both presidents in the 1970s and 1990s, offering detailed and shrewd advice ranging from what ties to wear to how to keep the pressure up on Saddam Hussein in the run-up to the first Gulf War.

If it had been only the birth of a giant partisan rag - fox - it would not have meant much. But, that was only the beginning. The problem was that it became a huge juggernaut that resulted in the death of our news media.

Another wackadoodle conspiracy theory, when am I going to learn?

Thanks for the laugh though.

Even you didn't read the article. I'm surprised. Perhaps I shouldn't be.

Had you read it you'd know it's not "theory" -- it's documentation from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Three hundred and eighteen pages plus internal memos. Even the OP you quoted gives that away.

Summa you clowns are in such a hurry to genuflect to your puppetmaster that you forget to notice he's naked.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

That's a fine article. And judging by the posts thus far I may be the only one besides the OP who actually read it...

It is an article from Gawker. That is almost as bad as reading one of the free bloggers on PuffHo and declaring that they have found the answers to the immigration problem.

>> >> When Barack Obama announced early in his administration that he would conduct a live nationwide address to high school and students, Fox News hyperventilated and described it as an attempt to "indoctrinate children to support him politically." When Richard Nixon decided to address high school and college students in 1970, as this memo to Haldeman from deputy assistant to the president Dwight L. Chapin makes clear (read it here), Roger Ailes produced the event:

Roger Ailes is developing a plan which he is going to phone in to me tomorrow morning.... Ailes likes the idea of having the president originate live from one of the schools and then shift to the other schools to answer questions. <<

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -​

{Ailes to Sununu, 1990} "I have had at least half a dozen calls very recently from the press trying to lead me into discussions like, 'fiddling while Rome burns,' 'golfing while Americans are being taken hostage,' etc. The only reason this is of concern to me is that I notice the networks beginning to show more and more footage of the president in the golf cart. It is very clear that they have a point of view which does not represent a fair picture of how the president is handling the crisis... It is my judgment that the American people simply don't believe this about George Bush, and therefore there will not be a major repercussion. On the other hand, I know first hand what a megatonnage dose of media hammering the same message can do.... Do a little more fishing and less golfing."

{end memo, back to article}

Ailes, of course, knows from using golf to paint a president as remote and out of touch. Here are some recent Fox News headlines: "Obama Finds Time for NCAA Bracket, Golf Amid Global Turmoil," "Obama Chooses Golf Over Funeral," and "Barack Obama Plays Golf More Times than George W. Bush." <<

>> All in all, the documents show Ailes to be an engaged, brilliant, and often catty adviser with an obsessive, almost evangelical focus on the power of television to manipulate people for political purposes. It's almost as though, frustrated by the failure of candidates and presidents to hew closely enough to his political instructions, Ailes founded a network to demonstrate their practical application— see, this is how you use golf to undermine a president. <<

One is reminded of the lemmings in close proximity obediently parroting the Ailes lines all over this board on this very topic...

>> And the whole project began—on the taxpayer's dime—in the White House under the direction of a Watergate felon. One can only imagine how Fox News would report a similar scheme hatched in the Obama White House. <<

​

Tell me something, why aren't you worried about the various times progressive news has gone off the deep end and made up things about Republicans? IS it because you are a partisan hack?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Roger Ailes' Secret Nixon-Era Blueprint for Fox News

If it had been only the birth of a giant partisan rag - fox - it would not have meant much. But, that was only the beginning. The problem was that it became a huge juggernaut that resulted in the death of our news media.

Another wackadoodle conspiracy theory, when am I going to learn?

Thanks for the laugh though.

Even you didn't read the article. I'm surprised. Perhaps I shouldn't be.

Had you read it you'd know it's not "theory" -- it's documentation from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Three hundred and eighteen pages plus internal memos. Even the OP you quoted gives that away.

Summa you clowns are in such a hurry to genuflect to your puppetmaster that you forget to notice he's naked.

What makes you think I didn't read the article? I almost stopped when they claimed that no one had ever seen this document before, even though the Nixon library has been open for years. but I wanted to see if they would blame global warming and Benghazi on Nixon.

 

[Pogo]

Another wackadoodle conspiracy theory, when am I going to learn?

Thanks for the laugh though.

Even you didn't read the article. I'm surprised. Perhaps I shouldn't be.

Had you read it you'd know it's not "theory" -- it's documentation from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Three hundred and eighteen pages plus internal memos. Even the OP you quoted gives that away.

Summa you clowns are in such a hurry to genuflect to your puppetmaster that you forget to notice he's naked.

What makes you think I didn't read the article? I almost stopped when they claimed that no one had ever seen this document before, even though the Nixon library has been open for years. but I wanted to see if they would blame global warming and Benghazi on Nixon.

The word "theory". Documents aren't theories. They are, however, linked. Profusely.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Even you didn't read the article. I'm surprised. Perhaps I shouldn't be.

Had you read it you'd know it's not "theory" -- it's documentation from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Three hundred and eighteen pages plus internal memos. Even the OP you quoted gives that away.

Summa you clowns are in such a hurry to genuflect to your puppetmaster that you forget to notice he's naked.

What makes you think I didn't read the article? I almost stopped when they claimed that no one had ever seen this document before, even though the Nixon library has been open for years. but I wanted to see if they would blame global warming and Benghazi on Nixon.

The word "theory". Documents aren't theories. They are, however, linked. Profusely.

Glenn Beck is famous for linking things up the same way, isn't he?

 

[Pogo]

What makes you think I didn't read the article? I almost stopped when they claimed that no one had ever seen this document before, even though the Nixon library has been open for years. but I wanted to see if they would blame global warming and Benghazi on Nixon.

The word "theory". Documents aren't theories. They are, however, linked. Profusely.

Glenn Beck is famous for linking things up the same way, isn't he?

No. I doubt The Glenn Beck has links between his own synapses. But this isn't about him anyway.

By "link", I mean literally. Links via URL to the documents that paint the history. You can't document a diary of the roots of a project like Fox News, complete with 318-page plan and memoranda, and then call it a "theory".

The shooter on the grassy knoll is a "theory"; the bullet in Kennedy's head is a "fact". What we have here is more at the latter.

 

[Pogo]

That's a fine article. And judging by the posts thus far I may be the only one besides the OP who actually read it...

It is an article from Gawker. That is almost as bad as reading one of the free bloggers on PuffHo and declaring that they have found the answers to the immigration problem.

>> >> When Barack Obama announced early in his administration that he would conduct a live nationwide address to high school and students, Fox News hyperventilated and described it as an attempt to "indoctrinate children to support him politically." When Richard Nixon decided to address high school and college students in 1970, as this memo to Haldeman from deputy assistant to the president Dwight L. Chapin makes clear (read it here), Roger Ailes produced the event:

Roger Ailes is developing a plan which he is going to phone in to me tomorrow morning.... Ailes likes the idea of having the president originate live from one of the schools and then shift to the other schools to answer questions. <<

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -​

{Ailes to Sununu, 1990} "I have had at least half a dozen calls very recently from the press trying to lead me into discussions like, 'fiddling while Rome burns,' 'golfing while Americans are being taken hostage,' etc. The only reason this is of concern to me is that I notice the networks beginning to show more and more footage of the president in the golf cart. It is very clear that they have a point of view which does not represent a fair picture of how the president is handling the crisis... It is my judgment that the American people simply don't believe this about George Bush, and therefore there will not be a major repercussion. On the other hand, I know first hand what a megatonnage dose of media hammering the same message can do.... Do a little more fishing and less golfing."

{end memo, back to article}

Ailes, of course, knows from using golf to paint a president as remote and out of touch. Here are some recent Fox News headlines: "Obama Finds Time for NCAA Bracket, Golf Amid Global Turmoil," "Obama Chooses Golf Over Funeral," and "Barack Obama Plays Golf More Times than George W. Bush." <<

>> All in all, the documents show Ailes to be an engaged, brilliant, and often catty adviser with an obsessive, almost evangelical focus on the power of television to manipulate people for political purposes. It's almost as though, frustrated by the failure of candidates and presidents to hew closely enough to his political instructions, Ailes founded a network to demonstrate their practical application— see, this is how you use golf to undermine a president. <<

One is reminded of the lemmings in close proximity obediently parroting the Ailes lines all over this board on this very topic...

>> And the whole project began—on the taxpayer's dime—in the White House under the direction of a Watergate felon. One can only imagine how Fox News would report a similar scheme hatched in the Obama White House. <<

​

Tell me something, why aren't you worried about the various times progressive news has gone off the deep end and made up things about Republicans? IS it because you are a partisan hack?

Your desperation to get the spotlight off Fox News is noted but I'm afraid dubbing your respondent a "partisan hack" even before he's had a chance to read the question, let alone answer -- makes you a partisan hack. Not to mention presuming to have climbed inside my head to declare what I'm worried or not worried about.

I'm not even going to dignify this turd of a post. Pull your head out of your ass and try again. If you can figure out how.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

The word "theory". Documents aren't theories. They are, however, linked. Profusely.

Glenn Beck is famous for linking things up the same way, isn't he?

No. I doubt The Glenn Beck has links between his own synapses. But this isn't about him anyway.

By "link", I mean literally. Links via URL to the documents that paint the history. You can't document a diary of the roots of a project like Fox News, complete with 318-page plan and memoranda, and then call it a "theory".

The shooter on the grassy knoll is a "theory"; the bullet in Kennedy's head is a "fact". What we have here is more at the latter.

Never watched his shows, did you? He actually draws lines between historical events on whiteboards in order to support his meandering views of history.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

That's a fine article. And judging by the posts thus far I may be the only one besides the OP who actually read it...

It is an article from Gawker. That is almost as bad as reading one of the free bloggers on PuffHo and declaring that they have found the answers to the immigration problem.

>> >> When Barack Obama announced early in his administration that he would conduct a live nationwide address to high school and students, Fox News hyperventilated and described it as an attempt to "indoctrinate children to support him politically." When Richard Nixon decided to address high school and college students in 1970, as this memo to Haldeman from deputy assistant to the president Dwight L. Chapin makes clear (read it here), Roger Ailes produced the event:

Roger Ailes is developing a plan which he is going to phone in to me tomorrow morning.... Ailes likes the idea of having the president originate live from one of the schools and then shift to the other schools to answer questions. <<

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -​

{Ailes to Sununu, 1990} "I have had at least half a dozen calls very recently from the press trying to lead me into discussions like, 'fiddling while Rome burns,' 'golfing while Americans are being taken hostage,' etc. The only reason this is of concern to me is that I notice the networks beginning to show more and more footage of the president in the golf cart. It is very clear that they have a point of view which does not represent a fair picture of how the president is handling the crisis... It is my judgment that the American people simply don't believe this about George Bush, and therefore there will not be a major repercussion. On the other hand, I know first hand what a megatonnage dose of media hammering the same message can do.... Do a little more fishing and less golfing."

{end memo, back to article}

Ailes, of course, knows from using golf to paint a president as remote and out of touch. Here are some recent Fox News headlines: "Obama Finds Time for NCAA Bracket, Golf Amid Global Turmoil," "Obama Chooses Golf Over Funeral," and "Barack Obama Plays Golf More Times than George W. Bush." <<

>> All in all, the documents show Ailes to be an engaged, brilliant, and often catty adviser with an obsessive, almost evangelical focus on the power of television to manipulate people for political purposes. It's almost as though, frustrated by the failure of candidates and presidents to hew closely enough to his political instructions, Ailes founded a network to demonstrate their practical application— see, this is how you use golf to undermine a president. <<

One is reminded of the lemmings in close proximity obediently parroting the Ailes lines all over this board on this very topic...

>> And the whole project began—on the taxpayer's dime—in the White House under the direction of a Watergate felon. One can only imagine how Fox News would report a similar scheme hatched in the Obama White House. <<

​

Tell me something, why aren't you worried about the various times progressive news has gone off the deep end and made up things about Republicans? IS it because you are a partisan hack?

Your desperation to get the spotlight off Fox News is noted but I'm afraid dubbing your respondent a "partisan hack" even before he's had a chance to read the question, let alone answer -- makes you a partisan hack. Not to mention presuming to have climbed inside my head to declare what I'm worried or not worried about.

I'm not even going to dignify this turd of a post. Pull your head out of your ass and try again. If you can figure out how.

I am not defending Fox News, feel free to shine the light on them all day long. What I am doing is mocking the idea that a pan developed by one president to get the word out, and used by every president since then, none better than Obama, is the reason Fox News now exists.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Roger Ailes' Secret Nixon-Era Blueprint for Fox News

Republican media strategist Roger Ailes launched Fox News Channel in 1996, ostensibly as a "fair and balanced" counterpoint to what he regarded as the liberal establishment media. But according to a remarkable document buried deep within the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, the intellectual forerunner for Fox News was a nakedly partisan 1970 plot by Ailes and other Nixon aides to circumvent the "prejudices of network news" and deliver "pro-administration" stories to heartland television viewers.

The memo—called, simply enough, "A Plan For Putting the GOP on TV News"— is included in a 318-page cache of documents detailing Ailes' work for both the Nixon and George H.W. Bush administrations that we obtained from the Nixon and Bush presidential libraries. Through his firms REA Productions and Ailes Communications, Inc., Ailes served as paid consultant to both presidents in the 1970s and 1990s, offering detailed and shrewd advice ranging from what ties to wear to how to keep the pressure up on Saddam Hussein in the run-up to the first Gulf War.

If it had been only the birth of a giant partisan rag - fox - it would not have meant much. But, that was only the beginning. The problem was that it became a huge juggernaut that resulted in the death of our news media.

Why cant everyone be part of Obama's State Run Media?

Why are "news" outlets even allowed to print stories without government clearance?

What kind of country is this that has differing opinions???????

 

[Pogo]

It is an article from Gawker. That is almost as bad as reading one of the free bloggers on PuffHo and declaring that they have found the answers to the immigration problem.



Tell me something, why aren't you worried about the various times progressive news has gone off the deep end and made up things about Republicans? IS it because you are a partisan hack?

Your desperation to get the spotlight off Fox News is noted but I'm afraid dubbing your respondent a "partisan hack" even before he's had a chance to read the question, let alone answer -- makes you a partisan hack. Not to mention presuming to have climbed inside my head to declare what I'm worried or not worried about.

I'm not even going to dignify this turd of a post. Pull your head out of your ass and try again. If you can figure out how.

I am not defending Fox News, feel free to shine the light on them all day long. What I am doing is mocking the idea that a pan developed by one president to get the word out, and used by every president since then, none better than Obama, is the reason Fox News now exists.

No, what you were doing was an ad hominem/strawman fallacy. And what you're doing now is a rhetorical handbrake turn as a means of escape.

Olé.

 

[PredFan]

Oh, no! It's simply AWFUL that the left no longer has a stranglehold on what the public is allowed to see!

It's not FAAAAAAAAAIR!!!

BAM! Nailed it!

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Your desperation to get the spotlight off Fox News is noted but I'm afraid dubbing your respondent a "partisan hack" even before he's had a chance to read the question, let alone answer -- makes you a partisan hack. Not to mention presuming to have climbed inside my head to declare what I'm worried or not worried about.

I'm not even going to dignify this turd of a post. Pull your head out of your ass and try again. If you can figure out how.

I am not defending Fox News, feel free to shine the light on them all day long. What I am doing is mocking the idea that a pan developed by one president to get the word out, and used by every president since then, none better than Obama, is the reason Fox News now exists.

No, what you were doing was an ad hominem/strawman fallacy. And what you're doing now is a rhetorical handbrake turn as a means of escape.

Olé.

I attacked you? Seriously?

 

[PredFan]

That's a fine article. And judging by the posts thus far I may be the only one besides the OP who actually read it...

It is an article from Gawker. That is almost as bad as reading one of the free bloggers on PuffHo and declaring that they have found the answers to the immigration problem.

>> >> When Barack Obama announced early in his administration that he would conduct a live nationwide address to high school and students, Fox News hyperventilated and described it as an attempt to "indoctrinate children to support him politically." When Richard Nixon decided to address high school and college students in 1970, as this memo to Haldeman from deputy assistant to the president Dwight L. Chapin makes clear (read it here), Roger Ailes produced the event:

Roger Ailes is developing a plan which he is going to phone in to me tomorrow morning.... Ailes likes the idea of having the president originate live from one of the schools and then shift to the other schools to answer questions. <<

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -​

{Ailes to Sununu, 1990} "I have had at least half a dozen calls very recently from the press trying to lead me into discussions like, 'fiddling while Rome burns,' 'golfing while Americans are being taken hostage,' etc. The only reason this is of concern to me is that I notice the networks beginning to show more and more footage of the president in the golf cart. It is very clear that they have a point of view which does not represent a fair picture of how the president is handling the crisis... It is my judgment that the American people simply don't believe this about George Bush, and therefore there will not be a major repercussion. On the other hand, I know first hand what a megatonnage dose of media hammering the same message can do.... Do a little more fishing and less golfing."

{end memo, back to article}

Ailes, of course, knows from using golf to paint a president as remote and out of touch. Here are some recent Fox News headlines: "Obama Finds Time for NCAA Bracket, Golf Amid Global Turmoil," "Obama Chooses Golf Over Funeral," and "Barack Obama Plays Golf More Times than George W. Bush." <<

>> All in all, the documents show Ailes to be an engaged, brilliant, and often catty adviser with an obsessive, almost evangelical focus on the power of television to manipulate people for political purposes. It's almost as though, frustrated by the failure of candidates and presidents to hew closely enough to his political instructions, Ailes founded a network to demonstrate their practical application— see, this is how you use golf to undermine a president. <<

One is reminded of the lemmings in close proximity obediently parroting the Ailes lines all over this board on this very topic...

>> And the whole project began—on the taxpayer's dime—in the White House under the direction of a Watergate felon. One can only imagine how Fox News would report a similar scheme hatched in the Obama White House. <<

​

Tell me something, why aren't you worried about the various times progressive news has gone off the deep end and made up things about Republicans? IS it because you are a partisan hack?

BAM! Nailed it again!