Crazy Like A Fox: Chapters 1 – 3

Chapter One: “Fox News Sunday”

To the best of my recollection, I have never watched an entire episode of “Fox News Sunday” until this afternoon. I have seen host Chris Wallace make appearances on other programs, but I’ve not caught his act as host (or, as some would prefer, moderator).

Before I review the show itself, allow me to vent about the lack of a news division on the Fox broadcast network. Biased coverage or not, if Fox is going to utilize the public airwaves, the public is owed a certain amount of beneficial (news) programing in return. “Fox News Sunday” easily fits alongside the broadcast networks’ Sunday chat shows and, if memory serves, some Fox affiliates air it on Sundays light on sports coverage. But relying on a cable channel for news and information is a corporate cheat. It is bottom barrel newsgathering, and it smacks of disrespect for the public and its airwaves.

Now, literally, onto the show. As with the late Tim Russert, Chris Wallace asks strong questions, but not a lot of follow up questions. If only there was an established show with a rotating roster of hosts, so the hosts could conduct hard hitting interviews that forced guests to break from their prepared soliloquies and speak from the head and the heart. As it stands, hosts of all stripes never want to risk offending big name guests out of fear they wouldn’t return at a later date. It is always the guest who should fear the reporter.

Wallace asked a generally fair amount of questions in a seemingly non-biased way, though he quickly rose to defend McCain’s point of view when he felt David Axelrod, Obama’s campaign strategist, had misrepresented it.

Karl Rove’s electoral map was referenced on several occasions throughout the show, but there was no explanation of how Rove had arrived at the math (he claims Obama presently has 260 votes shored up, McCain has 194, with 84 votes still in the air, and 270 needed to guarantee victory in November). MSNBC often cites the math conducted by the folks at FiveThirtyEight.com, but the website provides detailed explanation of how they reach their conclusions. Perhaps regular viewers know how Rove worked the math, but some explanation for first time watchers doesn’t seem out of line.

McCain’s strategist, Rick Davis, referred to himself in the third person. That bugs me. Wallace was mostly genial throughout the show, but he did get irritated at Davis, frustrated by the fact Palin hasn’t given any interviews since the announcement of her candidacy.

Wallace used the phrase “give some props.” Anyone my age or older trying to incorporate youthful slang is just sad. Then again, Brit Hume doesn’t think the public “gives a fig” whether Palin should answer questions from reporters. Who uses the phrase “gives a fig” anymore?

While on the subject of Mr. Hume, did he have a stroke, or has he always mumbled his words? I am not asking sarcastically. If he had a stroke, then my heart goes out to him as he works through the recovery process, but if he didn’t, he needs to get to elocution classes pronto. I sincerely had a hard time understanding a lot of what was coming out of his mouth.

Hume was a part of the pundit panel. As with the other Sunday shows, the panel didn’t feature a debate between learned colleagues. It was just another group of people trying to out talk each other. There wasn’t a lot of direct reaction to words uttered. Instead, it seemed as if the panelists were vying to shout their prepared ideas and “talking points” before anyone else could.

A technical matter: Audio and video playback were out of sync in B-Roll clips and bumpers in and out of commercial. There appeared to be a second or two delay between the words heard and mouths supposedly speaking them. Darned digital transfers.

Lastly, a comment about what appears to be Republican strategy that is the exact opposite of the Democratic strategy. The Republicans seem to make it very vocal that McCain is currently behind in the race. The Democrats tend to gloat about their high poll numbers. I’ve seen this in previous campaigns, and I have to say the Republicans have taken the more prudent approach, especially given the unique nature of this election. They want the conservative base to feel as if their vote is desperately needed. Meanwhile, liberals take an almost lax approach to voting, figuring the numbers are so in their favor that one more vote won’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

When it comes to polls and numbers in this campaign, I agree with a point made by Arsenio Hall on Tim Conway Jr.’s radio show. Hall stated that due to his minority status, when publicly questioned by a pollster, Americans will be more likely to endorse Obama than on election day itself, when they get to cast their votes in secret. Hall cited the same sorts of high poll numbers earned by LA mayor Bradley years ago, that failed to translate into the ballot booths. If Democrats want a victory, they will have to earn it. The Republicans are aware of this and actively seek the votes of every conservative in America.

What I saw on “Fox News Sunday” was a direct appeal by Republicans to get out and vote on election day (though those words were never used). They are, and I can’t believe I’m using this pun, utilizing a “fox” hole mentality. They want conservatives to feel embattled and needed, and I strongly believe this strategy could help them to keep the White House.

Chapter Two: “Geraldo At Large”

My first official job in the glamorous world of television production was in the summer of 1994. I had been hired as an intern for the West Coast bureau of CNBC. I had already learned engineering basics in college, but CNBC would not be a place for hands-on technical experience. My first week on the job, I pointed out to the office/studio engineer Pete that, according to the vectorscope and waveform monitors, one of the cameras was slightly out of phase. He quickly pulled me aside and told me that his job security lied in the fact he was the only person who knew how any of the sh*t worked, and that if I knew what was good for me, I’d shut the hell up and mind my own business. Eventually I learned he was teasing me, and that everybody at CNBC had a caustic sense of humor, but for the rest of my internship I limited myself mostly to random office tasks and away from the equipment.

My main job at CNBC was to “feed and water” the guests. The studio’s green room quadrupled as the makeup room, the office break room, and the boss’ office. CNBC West, as it was known, was carved out of a small section of the top floor of a two story building adjacent to NBC’s main studio facility. As guests arrived for various CNBC shows, I would meet them in the downstairs lobby, escort them up the stairs, offer them a beverage, and any leftover lunch remnants I could find in the refrigerator. Once the guests were fed and watered, they were on their own until someone who earned a paycheck chose to care about them. As the job’s nickname implied, the guests were akin to houseplants: though some were prettier than others, most were nuisance, and I felt my skills were underutilized.

Fortunately for me a double-homicide in Brentwood took place. Suddenly, CNBC became a hotbed of activity, and it was at this point when I met one of the Geraldo Riveras. At the time, there were two Geraldos. One of them existed on daytime television, where he roamed an audience filled studio asking inane questions, only pausing occasionally to get his nose broken by skinheads. The other Geraldo sat behind a desk, wore glasses, and hated O.J. Simpson. I met the be-spectacled Geraldo, as well as Johnnie Cochran, Marcia Clark, and several other key players in the O.J. Simpson trial. Most of the time, Geraldo operated out of CNBC’s primary facility in Ft. Lee, NJ, using the CNBC West studio for remote interviews with various “legal analysts.” But there were a few instances when Geraldo felt compelled to witness the circus firsthand, only CNBC was too cheap to send his production team with him. In those instances, I was given a job, and it was one I was doing anyway, so it wasn’t like it was any extra effort. I would watch and record the pre-trial proceedings, taking careful note of anything interesting, which Geraldo could then mention during his show.

Now on Fox News, Geraldo wears glasses, and I don’t think anyone has thrown a chair at his face in years. Geraldo still speaks with a freakish iambic cadence, and he still dry reads the words on his teleprompter as though he has never seen them before. The top story during “Geraldo At Large” was the approach of Hurricane Ike to Florida and Cuba.

Domenica Davis, a Fox News weather bunny that physically rivals the beauty of LA’s Maria Cuban tried to explain the progress of the storm to Geraldo (and his viewers). I kept waiting for a conservative bias.

Geraldo reported McCain ahead of Obama in a recent poll by 3% (ignoring the math which states all polls have an error margin of + or – 3%). The graphic under most of the round table discussion about Sarah Palin: “Is the media biased against Governor Sarah Palin?” Geraldo’s answer was not “no.”

I didn’t know Susan Estrich was still alive. Watching her on Geraldo’s show tonight, I am still not sure.

Geraldo made a bizarre correlation between himself and Gov. Palin, stating they both had five children, but because nobody criticized him for heading off to places like Iraq and Afghanistan, clearly when people criticize Palin they are being sexist. I don’t know if this means Geraldo can’t distinguish being a TV personality from the Vice-President of the United States, or if he’s just whistling Dixie.

Mike Huckabee believes the majority of attacks against Gov. Palin stem from “left wing bloggers still living in their mother’s basement.” I guess he is implying the mainstream media doesn’t have the guts to openly criticize McCain’s choice for VP. I can’t argue that (though, for the record, I live in my own apartment, and my mother has never owned a house with a basement).

Geraldo finally appears “at large,” sans glasses, on the water near Plum Island, but only for a few seconds. Then he was back in the studio. Apparently the Island of Dr. Moraeu is considered a terrorist target, but since Geraldo is not wearing glasses, I do not know if I can take him seriously.

Apparently, Fox News has a remote facility in Irvine, CA. I won’t go into all the reasons why I believe Irvine is indicative of everything that is wrong with suburban life, but the city that gave us Jon Lovitz is at the heart of conservative Orange County, CA, and a 90 minute drive from the city of Los Angeles.

“Geraldo At Large” is the Fox News the other news outlets routinely criticize: Heavily biased, fronted by personalities instead of journalists, and offering little in the way of hard news. Most of the hour was spent discussing how other people covered events in the news, as opposed to covering the news itself.

Chapter Three: “Fox & Friends”

I am not a morning person. There are those who love waking up to a beautiful sunrise. Not me. There are those who are wide awake as soon as their feet hit the floor. Not me. There are those who enjoy happy talk, inane banter, and an almost total lack of information. Not me.

I can’t hold Fox News liable for their horrific morning show “Fox & Friends,” because all morning shows are garbage. Just once, I’d like to watch a morning news program and not feel as though my brain had suffered a total cascade failure.

Frankly, I couldn’t even be troubled to learn the names of the three hosts/anchors. I think “the skirt,” as Robert Culp might call her, was a substitute, but it doesn’t really matter.

A few items that disqualify a show as a news program:

- A coffee table
- Men not wearing ties
- Anchors talking over each other
- A story about a physics student who raps
- A story about animals in zoos

As annoyed as I sometimes get at the lack of substance in evening newscasts, they are still head and shoulders above morning news programs. I am sure they have done studies that reveal “morning people” aren’t really all that interested in what is happening in the world. Let me assure you, if you are the sort of person who desires idle background noise to get you through the morning, tune into “Fox & Friends.”

On this morning’s “Fox & Friends,” the happy hosts gloated about the removal of Keith and Chris from MSNBC’s election coverage, then lamanted over David Gregory as their replacement. They complained Gregory was “too liberal.” Personally, I don’t know if Gregory has a personality, let alone a political bias.

Then came their question of the day for viewers: “O says no: Is she afraid she would help Palin?”

Let me be perfectly clear: I couldn’t care less about who Oprah has on her show. The happy hosts of “Fox & Friends” believe Oprah is subject to the equal time rules governing journalists. They claim the decision not to book Palin on Oprah’s show is unfair. My question: has anyone even checked to see if Palin wants to appear on Oprah’s show? Oh, right, that would involve a reporter getting close enough to Palin to ask her a question.

Does Fox News use a non-traditional spelling for the world’s number one terrorist, or was “Usama Bin Laden” a type-o when it crawled across the screen during the show?

The program ran two hours, but I confess I only watched an hour of it. When I am in the mood for mindless TV, I’ll watch “Chuck” or even reruns of “The Monkees.” At least those shows don’t pretend to be more than they are.