Note the placement of the Dennis Hastert story, which I've highlighted.
The Hastert story is on the front page of Fox Nation, but in eleventh place, below the following more prominent headlines:
GOP Calls On AG Lynch To Prosecute Lois Lerner In IRS ScandalThere are those who argue that Fox News isn't a propaganda tool of the GOP -- it's strictly a profit-maximizing infotainment enterprise. (See, e.g., Politico's Jack Shafer a few days ago.) But if all Fox wants to do is make money, why would it shy away from the most riveting, lurid, shocking story in the current news?
Don't Miss The Premiere Of 'The Greg Gutfeld Show' This Sunday On Fox News At 10 PM ET
Are You a #ProudAmerican? Here's How to Share Your Pride!
Pelosi: Clintons Will Have To Answer For Foundation
Who Voted To Bring 33 Million Immigrants North?
Five Scandals For Hillary Clinton And Bernie Sanders That Would Sink Any Republican
Watters' World: Unemployed Edition
Baltimore Police Union Head: Mosby Political From Start
Chris Kyle's Widow: 'I Proudly Stand With,' Endorse Rick Perry
Todd Starnes: Feds Want You to Eat Healthier S’Mores
Fox is shying away because the story is an embarrassment to Republicans, and because the very act of shying away is perceived by the Fox audience as an act of tribal solidarity, a bird-flip to the "liberal media," which is devoting lots of resources to the Hastert story. (Go here for a whiny complaint about all that media attention to Hastert, from National Review's Ian Tuttle.) Fox, speaking for the right-wing tribe, insists that Lois Lerner is a much more important story right now than Hastert! Bill Clinton's ties to FIFA are much more newsworthy, says Tuttle!
So a big part of profit-seeking is rallying the Republican tribe by ignoring what normal people regard as news, and insisting that the right's obsessions and hobbyhorses are the real news. There's no point, on the right, where promoting the ideology ends and profit-seeking begins. They're one and the same.
