FNC isn’t just beating MSNBC and CNN, the channel is #3 in all of cable tv.

I think the reason is because FNC does not insult its audience.

It doesn’t suggest that they are racist extremists and link them to Tim McVeigh if they voice dissent at townhall meetings.

It doesn’t call them haters if they don’t support same sex marriage.

It doesn’t suggest that they are theocrats if they worry about the secularization of the public square.

According to a Pew Institute study, FNC has more Democrats in its audience, than MSNBC and CNN have Republicans in theirs.

Many FNC watchers voted for Pres. Obama and embraced “change”.

They watch FNC because though the channel may criticize politicians, it doesn’t condescend to the regular joes and jills sitting in front of their tv sets.

MSNBC’s David Shuster and CNN”s Rich Sanchez could both take a lesson from that.

I watch FNC because I like going to the circus. I like watching dancing clowns like Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. I don’t respect them or find them to be intellectually honest. I do find them highly entertaining in the same way I find a car chase entertaining. It is truly mindless entertainment.

CNN and MSNBC are similarly mindless but not quite as entertaining. FNC is just as insulting to my intelligence as they are.

They suggest that people are communists or socialists because they use public utilities like roads and post offices.

They give legitimacy to people who create such a disturbance at forums where people of both their views and opposing views cannot get a chance to be heard because they are dominating the conversation by acting like 4 year olds having temper tantrums.

They suggest same sex couples do not deserve the same rights as any other human being.

They suggest that church and state are not separate and that their personal religious views need to be institutionalized.

So yes, I am a FNC viewer, but not for quite the reasons you might think.

Fox News has since day one in 1996 established itself as a conservative news channel. It’s been courting and become the right-wing talk radio equivalent on television. Fox has a very loyal conservative audience. Fox New’s high totals are in unison with the common political factoid that older people are more conservative (which is why Fox News has a lot of hearing aid adverts).

CNN keeps trying to establish itself as independent/centrist, while MSNBC from jumping around for years recently established itself as a liberal alternative (hasn’t even been a year of it, even).

Phil Griffin should actually get a pay raise because he’s taking the network far beyond where they’ve ever been before – John Gibson’s made-up quote of him saying “going liberal was the right thing to do!” actually applies here. Going liberal *was* the right thing to do. No offense to Dan Abrams who got his show taken off the air in order to create a new show that would keep Keith’s audience. Using the same strategy Fox News did of constructing and building a loyal audience takes time. I remember reading DailyKos poll a couple of weeks back liberals are still quite split between CNN and MSNBC, so that leaves a lot of liberal viewers which MSNBC can snipe away in the future. There’s a lot of room for growth.

Actually, Antony Rosa, same sex couples do enjoy the same “inherent” rights under the Constitution as heterosexuals.

Marriage has never considered an “unalienable” right for ANYONE, in our country’s history.

You might not agree with this, but holding this centuries old sentiment hardly makes one a radical/extremist.

As to having one’s religious beliefs “institutionalized”, the Founders strove for a balance among the secular and the spiritual in that within the Constitution and the BIll of Rights are both the concepts of separation of church and state, AND that all our INHERENT rights are endowed by our Creator, not by men.

I strongly suspect that you don’t only view FNC as a network of clowns, but consider many of your fellow citizens as such.

If you guard your contacts and rigorously screen your friends, an individual may well manage to thrive (and profit) in such egocentric and esoteric circumstances.

A television network would do well not to follow such a path.

Celia,

The Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states that: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive ANY person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

We have seen women denied the right to vote, and minorities the right to be treated as equal citizens. Same sex couple, they too will see their day of justice, whether you like it or not. It doesn’t make you radical or extremist, it simply means you don’t understand the constitution and basic civil and human rights.

Your inherent rights endowed by YOUR Creator, are your own, and you may do what you wish with them, as long as they do not remove my rights.

I consider people clowns if they act as such, everyone is given the benefit of the doubt. There are true conservatives I respect, there are many Republicans I respect. The dancing clowns on Fox News are not worthy of anyone’s respect. They’ve been given the benefit of the doubt and have proven themselves to present no good solutions to real problems, and only create more divisiveness among easily influenced citizens. They’re not alone, however. CNN and MSNBC aren’t much better in that regard. Cable news of all political persuasions is pretty much a lot of ideological noise with little to offer in the way of real ‘news’

“We have seen women denied the right to vote, and minorities the right to be treated as equal citizens. Same sex couple, they too will see their day of justice, whether you like it or not. It doesn’t make you radical or extremist, it simply means you don’t understand the constitution and basic civil and human rights.”

I have no problem with same sex couples entering into civil partner contracts nor do I confuse a recitation of the Fourteen Amendment as anything but begging the original question.

The Constitution protects certain rights as “inalienable,” those include a right to liberty and to privacy, which the courts have said includes a person’s right to marry.