I belong to a private political page on Facebook that consists mostly of liberals, and one of them asked for our opinions of the 3 cable political channels: MSNBC, CNN and FoxNews, and this was my reply:

We watch Morning Joe every morning and usually enjoy it, until recently when they became obsessed with ebola and ISIS/L coverage, but thankfully they're off them now. The rest of their lineup is pretty dreary and repetitive. The panel shows with Chris Hayes and Steve Kornacki are pretty unwatchable - clearly designed by and for MENSA-types, god bless em, but which clearly excludes me. FauxNews is more cartoonish in its presentation, laughable if you don't take it too seriously, which sadly, millions of people do, but for all their warts, they are the only network that understands how to entertain viewers, from their lighting, to their sets, to the appearance of their talent.

The sexy (?) blondes, the morning camera pointing at the same level and directly in front of the woman's short miniskirt in hopes she'll uncross them for a milli-second (cheap thrills being better than none at all), the uber-bright lights, the glossy/shiny lipstick, the clean lines of the sets. I think it's all more of a key to their success than their (lack of) content. MSNBC can't duplicate it now, but if they had pioneered all that, and Fox had MSNBC's "look" I honestly believe the ratings would be much closer in comparison.

But all that said, what is most important is that Fox gives its viewers the same thing that Rush figured out years ago. People want easy, simplistic answers. Black and white stuff. There's disease in Africa, keep them all there and don't let em in here. Next Issue! (with apologies to James McLaughlin...and Phil Hartmann.

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