It's a familiar argument: politicians don't win by going after the media. You know the old saw (I am really showing my age here), "don't pick fights with people who buy their ink by the barrel."
One who makes that point with his usual incisiveness is Jeff Bercovici, who first came to prominence writing for the sadly defunct Conde Nast Portfolio, and who is now writing for an AOL publication, Daily Finance. As Jeff explains:
But just because you're right doesn't mean you're well-advised to go around saying so. Obama, who lectured Ailes in person at a secret meeting last summer, may think he can browbeat Fox into being nicer to him. He can't. Fox made its bones on the notion that it, alone among TV networks, is not part of the Liberal Media Conspiracy. For Obama to single out Fox for censure only confirms that impression. Not to mention that Obama's complaining about Fox's darts while gratefully basking in MSNBC's equal-but-opposite tilt sounds suspiciously like whining. (David Zurawik called Obama's diss of Fox News "a childish, silly bit of gamemanship by a president.")
Above all, it's futile. For whatever reason, Fox's ratings have climbed in recent months as the network's stridency towards him has escalated. As long as that trend keeps up, no amount of finger-wagging from the Oval Office is going to make a difference.
OK, smart commentary, as one always expects from Jeff. But what's really interesting is that the lefties at the Huffington Post seem to agree with Jeff's assessment. They linked to his story, under an approving headline--see screen grab above.
Be careful, Mr. President. When even your loyalists in the media are telling you are making a mistake, you probably are.
And in the meantime, Roger Ailes & Co. are obviously laughing all the way to the Nielsen Bank.
