IT WOULDN'T MATTER IF BLOOMBERG BOUGHT FOX NEWS

Over the weekend, The Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin listed several ways Mike Bloomberg can spend his money that would be more useful to society than a futile presidential run. At the top of Rubin's list was this:

First, buy Fox News. I’m entirely serious. It is a journalistic toxic-waste dump that has misinformed millions of Americans, damaged our civic culture, spread xenophobia and insulated an unfit president from scrutiny. Certainly there is some price the Murdochs would accept for the Fox News empire. (They’ve already sold the entertainment portion of the company). Imagine a smart, fact-based cable TV news giant that adhered to journalistic standards and featured (and separated) smart conservative commentary, clearly labeled as opinion. It could spend the first six months simply running stories to correct past errors and bogus conspiracy theories. Getting more Americans back to looking at the same set of facts might be the best contribution Bloomberg could possibly make to American democracy.

Others are having similar thoughts:

Seriously, that would be the greatest thing that he could do for the country. https://t.co/rfePFF9Eha

— George Conway (@gtconway3d) November 8, 2019

It's a nice fantasy. But would a country without Fox News be a country without Fox-style news?

Please note that this is already happening:

In the midst of closing a merger between CBS and Viacom, Shari Redstone is quietly exploring a plan to launch a conservative TV outlet meant to square off with the Fox News Channel, sources tell The Hollywood Reporter....

Redstone has approached current and former Fox News personalities about such a plan, sources say, and she has spoken with former NBC News host Megyn Kelly.

... a Redstone spokesperson confirms that she quietly visited President Donald Trump in the White House recently.... Redstone plays her personal politics close to the vest but shortly after Trump’s election she told THR, "He's always been very good to me and a tremendous supporter of me personally."

Imagine if the available talent pool wasn't just Kelly (and Bill O'Reilly) but all of Fox's current and former opinion-show hosts. It's hard to believe someone with deep pockets wouldn't build a Fox 2.0 out of that. No one's tried to pump big money into the Fox wannabes -- One America News Network, Newsmax TV -- and Sinclair hasn't taken Fox on directly. But that would change fast if Fox suddenly weren't there.

A few years ago, I might have said that the Rupert Murdoch/Roger Ailes formula can't be duplicated -- Ailes, in particular, had an evil genius for putting what he wanted to see on the screen. But Ailes has been gone for years, as have several of his stars (O'Reilly, Kelly, Glenn Beck), and Fox just keeps going, with new management and new demagogues to replace the old ones. It's a formula now, one that can be easily reproduced. It would be.