Why do Republicans meet in private with Roger Ailes?

I recall reading an article about Obama having private meetings with MSNBC journalists (one in particular with Maddow and Olbermann comes to mind). Bush used to do the same thing with Fox News reporters....

Dont get me wrong, I despise the fact that our political establishment is buddy-buddy with journalists and media outlets, but I dont think there's anything especially unique about Romney doing what other democratic and republican politicians have been doing (and continue to do).....

 

The President having a private (or even off-the-record) interview with a journalist whose very job it is to seek out such meetings , and the aspirational president paying his respects in private to Il Don Gordo of the FNC gangsters isn't really even in the same ballpark.

The question in the original post remains - can you point to a similar incident, let's say, Obama having undisclosed meetings with the publisher of Slate? (there really isn't a good left-wing analogue to the type of thing that FNC does for hte right....msnbc is not really a valid answer, insofar as nobody actually watches it, and those that do aren't really the same as Fox's Sexy-genarian army of sheep in terms of willingness to truly believe)

I doubt you can.

Anyway, to answer the original question, as if it's an actual question, the reason for the meeting is to ensure the blessing of the communications wing of the republican party. This is not even remotely debatable.

 

Only thing I can find on that is Obama participating in an off-the-record briefing with a group of reporters that included Maddow and KO.

 

Besides, Ailes is not a reporter. I guess the best though still flawed analogy would be Obama traveling to visit with George Soros, but there really is no Dem equivalent to Ailes.

 

Yep, Ailes is out for scalps.

 

If your criticism is partisan, then you are bound to aggrandize minor discrepancies to demonstrate moral superiority.

But if the criticism is principled, then let's apply it across the board. Obama does have private meetings with journalists. Him and other politicians routinely grant private meetings to large donors (and lobbyists, special interest groups, etc.). These things happen, whether officially or unofficially, and its far easier to feign outrage at the 'other side' than take ones own side to task. And it would be wrong to limit this criticism to just them two, given how rampant the 'private meeting' culture has become....

 

A "private meeting' with a journalist is called an "interview". You're correct in pointing out that interviews are routinely granted.

What's more interesting than anything mentioned in this thread is why you feel the need to draw a false equivalency between that and various Republicans paying homage to their in-house Ministry of Truth. Basically the last time this happened was probably the Hearst-Pulitzer prewar era.

Again, not even a debatable point, and one for which you're unable to come up with an analogue.

What's in it for you?

 

Obama meets with those folks because their money and/or support can make life easier. Romney goes to Ailes because he has to go to Ailes.

 

Either you're being deliberately duplicitous or are incredibly naive about politics and the way it works. These private meetings are rarely interviews as much as they are assurances that said journalists will toe the company line when it comes to covering the administration (even if its not explicitly framed as such).

Let me try reframing this argument to add clarity:

There is a protocol that exists within political discourse that permits (and often encourages) certain forms of capitulation. Obama and his predecessors standing in front of interest groups, vying for their support, in the most deferential, servile manner is considered necessary for any president.

Obama has been effective in doing so, and has established close relationships with many journalists and media outlets, which makes it highly unlikely that he'll be criticized in any meaningful way.

Romney going to Ailes is exactly what it seems, and I'm not defending it or trying to paint a rosey picture of what he's doing. But given how definitively the cards have been stacked against him, combined with how regularly politicians find themselves in similar positions, it only makes sense that he'd try to strategize a counter narrative using Fox News as an instrument for doing so. And if Obama were in his shoes, I have no doubt that he'd be willing to succumb to such strategies as well....

 

Don't waste your time vaids_13. He's just trolling you because it's the only thing he has going on in his life.

 

link?

What information are using to come to the conclusion that private meetings are about the President making sure reporters will toe the line?

 

LMFAO - so you're saying Obama regularly has secret off-the-record meetings with journalists in order to ensure messaging compliance from his minions who are all in the bag?

Evidence? No? Didn't think so....

 

really guys?

From the linked to politico piece:

Romney and Obama and anyone dependent upon public opinion would be fools not to try to influence coverage with the press. What makes you say these meetings were secret?? Can't leave all the spin to the bloggers and tv ads, you know.

 

I like it when random enemies from D&D wars past raise their periscope, after virtual decades, in BBS time, of nursing their wounds and mourning their besmirched honor due to some long forgotten slight, much like Edmund Dantes in the Chateau d'If - brooding, scheming, plotting, then make their TRIUMPHANT RETURN to proclaim that RANDOM STRANGER ON INTERNET WHO MADE ME LOOK SILLY A FEW YEARS AGO must HAVE NO LIFE.

I have a life, friend, but it is not based on revisiting the wounds and misfortunes of the past, as the Count himself discovered after exacting his long-desired revenge on de Villefort, Danglars and Mondego; there is no future in it.

THere's a difference in kind here considering the role of Ailes & Fox and its relationship with the Republican party - supplicants petitioning Fox News in 2012 isn't remotely like Teddy Kennedy having a scotch with Ben Bradlee back in the day, I don't think that needs to be explained.

There's an underlying false equivalency here - Fox News and Ailes are different from the Washington Post (which, btw, is a ****ty newspaper), for reasons that have been documented too many times to even get into.

 

please explain.

Are you suggesting they shouldn't meet with the head of the number one rated cable news network. A network that's friendly to their point of view? They'd be fools not to. I can understand not wanting to *watch* fox news, but if you're a politician trying to influence the public message (and they all are), meeting with them is exactly what you do. It's exactly what they ALL do. Or try to. You don't snub the network because it has a wider reach and more influence then some random newspaper. I don't think that needs to be explained.

Or do these meetings have to be in public?