White House attacking Fox News Makes No Sense

Like almost all political pundits (liberal and conservative), I just didn't get the strategy behind the White House going after Fox News. If it was to isolate them, or make people think twice about watching it, it has failed miserably:

Nielsen: Fox News ratings up almost 10% since WH declared war

It’s a nine-percent bump in the two weeks since Anita Dunn’s whine heard ’round the world — in terms of overall audience. Among the coveted 25-54 demographic? A 14-percent bump.
............

Red Eye,” at 3 a.m., is beating Campbell Brown at 8 p.m. on CNN in the demo. (Worse, perhaps: Anderson Cooper is getting beat by … re-runs of Nancy Grace.)

I heard someone on TV with this theory. They think the White House did this to distract the news organizations from other issues that the White House is losing on right now. Health care, the war, and the economy. It could be, but bringing more Americans in as viewers of Fox News, that will report the stories on the White House, seems rather stupid to me. As wrong as this White House is on the issues, I never thought they were stupid.

Maybe I was wrong there.


This is not related (except for maybe the stupid part), but it is necessary to point out. Remember when White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel went on a Sunday talk show and said that Obama is having such a hard time with Afghanistan because they had to start from scratch? And then Cheney said in a speech that they were indeed briefed and handed over all the findings of the Bush administration. Cheney says that their strategy in January was remarkably similar to the one the Bush administration left to them.

Well, Gibbs avoided the question the first time around, but this time he was forced to answer:

In the press gaggle aboard Air Force One this afternoon, White House Press Secretary Gibbs admitted the Obama administration received and was briefed on the Bush team's review of Afghanistan.

Gibbs bobs and weaves, but it's clear that Cheney was telling the truth. I just find it astonishing that Rahm thought he could get away with it.