# It was Fox wot lost it **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [November 9, 2012, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469 "2012-11-09T12:16:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/1 "2012-11-09T12:16:40Z")
After losing the popular vote in 4 0f the 5 Presidential elections since Fox started, can we not now say that FN - by its agenda and presentation - contributes to the unelectability (sic) of the GOP; that FN has materially contributed to the generational decline of the Republican Party? It radicalizes Republican-minded old white guys but it scares the middle, right? ---
**Author:** ![Jman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jman/32/4416_2.png) [@Jman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jman)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/2 "2012-11-09T12:24:01Z")
You know, you may have a point. Honestly, before Fox News started really bringing the crazies of the Republican party and making them ‘mainstream’, the country was far less divided, and there weren’t as many nutjobs…but we’ve become so split, and a lot of is because people are latching on to this, either for or against. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/3 "2012-11-09T12:37:42Z")
FOX News only started airing a few weeks before the '96 election, and was only available in a couple million homes. Kinda crazy to claim they had any influence on Clinton’s re-election, nevermind that they were responsible for it. ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/4 "2012-11-09T12:39:04Z")
So make it 3 out of 4. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/5 "2012-11-09T12:43:19Z")
God wot. We need a channel that doesn’t practice affirmative action. Perhaps The Blaze? ---
**Author:** ![Uncle\_Jocko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uncle_jocko/32/2932_2.png) [@Uncle\_Jocko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncle_Jocko)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/6 "2012-11-09T12:47:29Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > FOX News only started airing a few weeks before the '96 election, and was only available in a couple million homes. Kinda crazy to claim they had any influence on Clinton’s re-election, nevermind that they were responsible for it. Well, it’s not Fox, but Rush Limbaugh rose to prominence very rapidly around late 1990-early 1991 (I recall folks talking eagerly about him at my workplace, which I left in April of '91). And at that time, he was almost rabidly anti-Bush I (because he wasn’t conservative enough). So if you roll Rush together with Fox in the whole rightwing/conservative/frenzied anti-liberal media blowtorch, you could make them 1 for 6 as far as getting a majority popular vote for the Republican. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/7 "2012-11-09T13:57:19Z")
You’re only looking at presidential elections. I believe that (going back to 1998), the Republican party has either gained or maintained control of at least one chamber of Congress in 6 of 8 elections. One of those (2010) was, I would say, an overwhelming result of Fox News. ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/8 "2012-11-09T14:19:07Z")
But isn’t that a by-product of losing the main event; part of the check ann balances of the democratic system of Gov… ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2012, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-was-fox-wot-lost-it/640469/9 "2012-11-09T15:49:32Z")
I just ran across this CBS article and have been looking for a thread to post it in. This one’s as good as any. Apparently the Romney campaign [was relying on Fox for their news](http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57547239/adviser-romney-shellshocked-by-loss/). During the election itself, definitely, but from the sound of it during the campaign as well: > [@](#): > > Mitt Romney’s campaign got its first hint something was wrong on the afternoon of Election Day, when state campaign workers on the ground began reporting huge turnout in areas favorable to President Obama: northeastern Ohio, northern Virginia, central Florida and Miami-Dade. > […] > They just couldn’t believe they had been so wrong. And maybe they weren’t: There was Karl Rove on Fox saying Ohio wasn’t settled, so campaign aides decided to wait. > […] > They thought intensity and enthusiasm were on their side this time - poll after poll showed Republicans were more motivated to vote than Democrats - and that would translate into votes for Romney. > > As a result, they believed the public/media polls were skewed - they thought those polls oversampled Democrats and didn’t reflect Republican enthusiasm. They based their own internal polls on turnout levels more favorable to Romney. That was a grave miscalculation, as they would see on election night. They listened to Fox, they accepted the bullshit skew theories, and they believed their own hype. I think it’s crystal clear that the constant right wing propaganda machine is really starting to backfire on them.