White House At War With "Fox" News

It seems that the White House is at war with Fox News. Presumably this is not one of the wars which President Obama inherited from the Bush Administration, but one which it started all on its own. It has even blogged about it.

Is this really a good idea for the Administration? Does the U.S. President really need a new Nixonesque "enemies" list?

I do not think so. First, according to a February 2009 story about the ratings, Fox News' fan base is huge. Fox News Channel "has been the top rated cable news network for 86 consecutive months. It averaged 2.8 million viewers." CNN was 15th and MSNBC was 23rd. This domination continued and even grew according to the May survey. Glenn Beck was up 130% compared to the same period last year. O'Reilly marked "its 102nd consecutive month as the top-rated cable news program". MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow went down.

Assuming that Fox News' popularity is based on the fact that the millions who tune in agree with most of what is said there, what is the White House's thinking on this? What is the President's message, for example, in deciding not to appear on Fox News to explain Health Care reform? Is it "let's just write these millions of folks right off and be done with trying to win them over"? Is that the game plan? "Let's go to war with Fox and its legions of followers" - is that it?

Second, doesn't targeting Fox in blogs and White House commentary not in fact help elevate its importance and increase viewership? It seems to me that the strategy of ignoring Fox and its commentators would do more to marginalize them, then making them enemy "numero uno". I assume that Beck, O'Reilly, Hannity and co. love the White House attention. It must demonstrate to them at least that their criticisms are beginning to have an impact and the White House knows it.

For the record, I rarely watch Fox News, MSNBC, or CNN. I do not even have cable access to Fox, but I am of course aware of the shows since I have been in places where it is available. If I want a balanced debate I watch PBS or if I really want to know what's important to me, I watch the Business News Network (joke). I read blogs, opinions and stories from a wide spectrum of views. So I am not defending Fox here. I am just suggesting that it is probably a bad idea for the White House to engage in its war with it.