Bloomberg’s Jonathan Salant
broke
the news that a Fox News parent company had donated $1 million to the Republican Governors’ Association. The explanation was slightly lacking: News Corp “opposes proposed federal rule changes that would weaken the position of its Fox network in negotiations with cable companies,” and that’s something some governors will deal with, but why not hand the bag of money to federal candidates? Anyway, it was enough to kick off attacks from the Democratic Governors’ Association, which has spent a year being compared unfavorably to the RGA (in fundraising terms), and the DNC. Nathan Daschle’s statement on behalf on the DGA went like this:
Time and time again, Fox News has defended itself against accusationsthat it is nothing more than a tool of the Republican Party. We know now that thereality is so much worse: they’re bankrolling the GOP. FOX’s newsdivision is ignoring the fact that its own parent company made a direct andunprecedented partisan contribution to defeat Democrats. This is hypocrisy atits worst, and is a sad day for all of us who believe that an independent andimpartial media is vital to our democracy.
And so on. I see an attempt – it’ll probably succeed, given Fox News’ propensity to respond to this stuff – to start a debate over something that confirms what liberals think is happening. A lot of the Democrats’ attempts to gin up their tired base involve informing them of the money flowing in to the GOP while they’re not looking.
