But we can, at least correct some facts. In his column, Krugman cites a recent Politico piece, and writes, "every major contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination who isn’t currently holding office and isn’t named Mitt Romney is now a paid contributor to Fox News." Politico cited four national-level Republicans currently working as Fox employees or contributors: Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, and Rick Santorum. So is that the Republican field, as Krugman says--those four, plus Romney? If so, perhaps Krugman would have a point when he asserts that Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes are trying to unduly influence the GOP.
But those aforementioned names are not in the least tiny bit the entire list of presidential hopefuls. For example, there's Mitch Daniels, the governor of Indiana, Tim Pawlenty, the governor of Minnesota, Haley Barbour, the governor of Mississippi, Jon Thune, the Senator from South Dakota, and Mike Pence, the Congressman from Indiana. And let's not forget Rick Perry, the Governor of Texas, and Ron Paul, the Congressman from Texas. That's seven real presidential possibilities right there, none of whom are connected to Fox, beyond appearing on air every once and a while; and there are many s more possible names, courtesy of CBS News. And there could yet be others, coming out of nowhere in the wake of, say, a 2010 victory--yes, that means you, Carl Paladino of New York, or John Kasich of Ohio, or Mark Kirk of Illinois, or Meg Whitman of California.
Most of those names, one might add, are bigger names than Santorum, who was defeated for re-election in his home state of Pennsylvania by the biggest landslide in Keystone State history. And Huckabee, of course, seems well ensconced at Fox--not at all clear he's even intereested in running for office; he's obviously having fun on his TV show.
So when we analyze it, we see that Fox really has two possible--repeat, possible--presidential contenders, Palin and Gingrich. That's two out of a field of 15 or 20. Big deal.
Thus we are left to wonder: If Krugman gets wrong basic counting such as this, why should we trust him as an economist or anything else?
