When Clinton surrogate Ed Rendell went out of his way to praise Fox News's campaign coverage last month, it was possible to imagine it was just an off-message gaffe by a politician who has long proven himself prone to them.
But following longtime Clinton fundraiser Terry McAuliffe's comments in the wake of the Pennsylvania primary, it's abundantly clear that Fox News is just the latest beneficiary of the Clinton's campaign's ongoing outreach to the vast right-wing conspiracy (which, as Jason noted with regard to the North Carolina ads, goes both ways). For those who missed it, McAuliffe praised Fox so effusively--"Let me congratulate Fox because you were the first ones to call it for Hillary Clinton. Fair and balanced Fox. You beat them all"--that the network immediately built an entire station promo around his comments, pushing the idea that it has "no agenda":
This will, of course, be a prominent riposte to the inevitable (and no doubt accurate) charges of pro-GOP bias that Fox faces in the fall, regardless of who the Democratic nominee is. (It would, of course, be worse for Hillary in the unlikely event that she somehow snatched the nomination.) But that's a problem for another day and, in all likelihood, another candidate. The important thing now, of course, is to bring every possible weapon to bear--Richard Mellon Scaife, Rush Limbaugh, The Drudge Report, The American Spectator, Fox News--against the all-but-inevitable Democratic nominee. Keep fighting the good fight, guys.
Update: For some reason the YouTube of the Fox promo featuring McAuliffe doesn't seem to be showing up. (Our crack technical team is on it.) Those curious can find it here.
--Christopher Orr