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Despite describing himself as a liberal who tamped down his political views to work at Fox, Muto had kind words for conservative icon O’Reilly, calling him a “self-made man” and “master of the medium,” even while describing his distaste in participating in an ambush interview of Rosie O’Donnell for the show.
He also revealed that the highly profitable network had a rickety system of getting videotapes on the air during most of his tenure, which often left junior staffers with lots of power over what images aired with stories.
According to Muto, many of his colleagues at Fox didn’t believe the channel’s public posture that Fox News is “fair and balanced” while countering the liberal bias of mainstream media. “Everyone knew that our job was to sort of stir up viewers and make them angry and, you know, get them to watch more,” he said. “Because angry people keep media on for longer, basically.”
By the book’s end, Muto writes he would most like to see Fox News Channel “drop the veil” and present its pro-conservative partisanship openly. “I’d want [founder and president] Roger Ailes to come out and say it’s harmful to the discourse and harmful to our viewers when we pretend we’re the fair ones and everybody else is biased.”
So why don’t they do that?
“I think the network still craves legitimacy,” Muto said. “Everyone knew we’re the partisan network. But they want plausible deniability. [They] worry if they went over all the way, then people would just be able to write them off as the crazy, right-wing network.”
Eric Deggans is for the Tampa Bay Times’ television critic.
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