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Fox News, please define "highly rated." Or, would Chris Wallace like some cheese with that whine?

September 19, 2009 6:36 pm ET by Eric Boehlert

Honestly, is there anything in more annoying than a millionaire, celebrity journalist like Chris Wallace wallowing in self-pity?

By now, everyone knows that on Sunday, Obama will make the rounds on the morning news shows but that Fox News Sunday, hosted by Wallace, will be left out. The insult is obvious and poor Chris Wallace is not handling it well. He's alternating between feeling sorry himself and taking every opportunity to lash out wildly at the administration. (Gee, think the WH hit a nerve w/ its Wallace snub?)

Here's the funny part, though. During one pity party session, a Fox News host claimed Obama was skipping out on "the highly-rated Fox News Sunday."

Here we go with more alternate universe stuff from the GOP Noise Machine. Because if by "highly rated" Fox meant dead last, than yeah, it's an accurate description. The facts: Wallace hosts, and has hosted for years, the perennial Sunday morning news show loser. Fox News Sunday pretty much gets lapped by the rest of network field. It's not even close. And since Wallace became host during Bush's first term, the ratings haven't really budged an inch. The show's in dead last, where it has remained pretty much since its inception.

So instead of feeling sorry for himself this weekend, we'll offer up this novel advice to Wallace: Get more viewers! Maybe if your show wasn't a ratings doormat (like, for a decade running), Obama would make time for you. But why should the White House make an effort to include Fox when Wallace's show at times barely draws one million viewers?

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    • Author by ReasonAndResolve (September 19, 2009 7:40 pm ET)
      15  
      Not to mention the fact that President is unlikely to gain any supporters of Health Care Reform on a cable network that has consistently mis-informed its viewership and pretty much spends all of its time attacking the current administration.

      President Obama would be wasting his time and only setting himself up for a host of questions about irrelevant topics.

      Fox is irrelevant.
      Report Abuse
      • Author by DellDolly (September 19, 2009 7:43 pm ET)
        10  
        This is exactly what I said yesterday - that Obama is trying to sway people who can be swayed. He's not going to find that audience on FoxNews Sunday.
        Report Abuse
        • Author by Bad News (September 20, 2009 9:56 am ET)
            1
          Chris Wallace thinks he's Oliver Twist, "May I Have More Please"
          Mr. Wallace is so Pitiful he Actually tried to make his Sunday show a Tease.
          Chris, Will you ever let go of your Father's CoatTail?
          I imagine your Father sees you as a "Bad Seed" you know that Son that constantly needs to be Bailed out of Jail.

          Speak truth to power.


          Mr. News
          Report Abuse
      • Author by MiddleLeft (September 19, 2009 8:20 pm ET)
        11  
        President Obama would be wasting his time and only setting himself up for a host of questions about irrelevant topics.

        And his statements would be clipped and spliced for use in later "reports".
        Report Abuse
      • Author by lvdino (September 21, 2009 10:01 am ET)
           
        So it's about politics not policy. People who don't agree with the President are not worth his time and effort. Those American don't need to understand the President's point of view, so why waste his time on a network likely to challenge him. How courageous!
        Report Abuse
    • Author by paul8616 (September 19, 2009 8:25 pm ET)
      7  
      I think the 'highly-rated' brag is sort of like those late-night snake oil infomercials that look an awful lot like Larry King's set. Fake news masquerading as real news, using the visual imagery of established sources. Or, to put a finer point on it: Chris sure looks like his dad, doesn't he?

      And plus it keeps another anti-Obama narrative alive. The one where Fox is the only source for The Truth(tm), and Obama fears The Truth(tm), so therefore Obama avoids Wallace.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by New Frontier (September 19, 2009 8:36 pm ET)
      5  
      Chris? Quit Fox. Go work for a real news organization. Make amends. Repent. Salvage your reputation. Make your dad proud.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by toombsie (September 19, 2009 8:38 pm ET)
      2  
      Wallace, though bad enough, hasn't figured out the recipe for high ratings on fox news. What you have to do is say the most outrageous, racist statements you can think of and then the audience naturally follows. I'm not complementing him, but really he doesn't have enough conspiracy theories, he doesn't call Obama racist enough, he doesn't talk about Obama as a Nazi as much as he should if he really wants a highly rated "Fox News" program. That is what his audience desires, and he just doesn't deliver the goods.
      Report Abuse
      • Author by princeofwheels (September 19, 2009 8:57 pm ET)
        3  
        Maybe deep in the dark recesses of his soul there is a little light of journalism still flickering.

        Then again, maybe not.
        Report Abuse
    • Author by erworthing (September 20, 2009 1:27 am ET)
         
      Pointing out that the show is not, in fact, highly rated is fine. The implication that ratings imply quality is not. Why suggest that FOX is being skipped for poor ratings, and that if it did have more viewers then, OK, everything is a go? FOX is being skipped because it is FOX. FOX news is junk, and as for pettiness it can now compete with Eric Boehlert.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by JoshSN (September 20, 2009 7:26 am ET)
      1 4
      I would have rated this article higher if there had been some numbers to back up the ratings claims, or a link to a webpage showing the numbers.
      Report Abuse
      • Author by DellDolly (September 20, 2009 1:25 pm ET)
        2  
        Hey, if you don't know that network news has many more viewers than cable news, I feel sorry for you. I suspect that the author of this assumed that either the readers here would already know this because it's been discussed many times, or that they would believe that he wouldn't lie about an easily researched piece of data. It's similar to someone saying that Obama has great approval ratings when he first took office, and you demanding to see the actual surveys that documented that. It's assumed to be common knowledge.

        "Far more people watch the three network evening newscasts than prime time cable news shows— roughly ten times more." (2006)

        http://www.journalism.org/node/1363

        "By the most basic measure, ratings, network nightly news still dwarfs cable. In 2008, night in and night out, the 22.8 million viewers who on average watched the three nightly newscasts was nearly seven times larger than the combined audience of the three main cable news channels at any given moment in prime time (3.5 million viewers)"

        http://www.stateofthemedia.org/2009/narrative_networktv_audience.php?cat=2&media=6

        Report Abuse
    • Author by mobaidin (September 20, 2009 8:05 am ET)
      2  
      You know what the first question would be?
      Mr. President, arent' you overexposed?
      When he was quiet they complained. Now that he's actively promoting his policy he's overexposed.

      Report Abuse
    • Author by jflz201884 (September 20, 2009 1:07 pm ET)
      2  
      Like other Rupert Murdoch (News Corp.) outlets, Fox News tailors coverage to make Democratic presidents look bad. Accordingly, it cast Obama's Europe trip as "an apology tour," much as it did candidate Obama's campaign swing overseas last year. When the president criticized European leaders' decisions, Fox deleted the footage, concentrating on remarks alluding to U.S. mistakes. Hence, a seeming apology wholly in keeping with Fox's preferred narrative. That was the tactic on Fox news programs as well as its opinion shows.
      We can't look into anyone's head. But it's near certain that Fox's "Europe tour as apology" story really angered Obama. Any president would recoil at such editing. And, ratings aside, any president would be inclined to refuse an interview on a big but unrelated story a few months later.

      Jerry Elsea
      Report Abuse
    • Author by Ed Moffett (September 20, 2009 2:45 pm ET)
         
      Unfortunately, Fox News is correct here.

      For the 9/6 weekend, Fox News Sunday had 2.2M viewers of its rebroadcast IN ADDITION to the 1.2M viewers of its regular time slot.

      http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/sunday_shows/sunday_show_ratings_september_6_2009_130848.asp

      Report Abuse
    • Author by lvdino (September 21, 2009 9:02 am ET)
         
      Okay, so it's about politics not policy. The President of the United States only responds to those people who agree with him. How courageous!
      Report Abuse
    • Author by shaggles (September 21, 2009 1:51 pm ET)
         
      So they won't air his press conferences because 'the country doesn't need another health care speech' but they want him to come on Fox Sunday? That seems a little odd.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by MT (September 21, 2009 3:55 pm ET)
         
      If President Obama had stuck to the networks, your point would be well taken. Since Mr. Wallace has twice the viewership of CNN or Univision, which the President did appear on, he's got a legitimate gripe.

      Report Abuse

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