Mainstreaming Teh Crazy: Fox Debuts Streamlined, Prototype Beck Replacement Show

Imagine “Glenn Beck” with real advertisers, minus the prop humor, stage tears, ecstatic religious trances and bipolar ambushes of Tea Party candidates and contract FoxNews co-freaks who fail Beck’s Princess-and-the-Pea purity test.

That seems to be the formula behind Fox Business News’ “Freedom Watch” package, which premiered over the weekend, with the largely anodyne Judge Napolitano pitching softballs to nutballs and nodding sagely at the resultant bursts of mostly-rehearsed wingnut static.

The NYT frames “Freedom Watch” as part of News Corps’ evolving outreach to the Libertarian viewing audience—which explains the presence of Ron Paul, if scant else about a show that wedged “Social Conservatives” Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann—as well as Tea Party idol Jim DeMint—into the same slot. Rand Paul, who has already been denounced by the Kentucky Libertarian Party, also appeared…as did PA Governor Ed Rendell, in a supporting role as Villain-of-the-Week.

Granted, this was just the first foray; but, so far, NewsCorps’ definition of “Libertarian” programming looks a lot like “All of the Crazy, with None of the Beck.” Except, of course, for the fact that the second installment of Judge Napolitano’s show will feature an appearance by Special Guest Glenn Beck.

So maybe the appropriate tag would be “All the Crazy, All the Time.” But tell me again where Libertarians fit into this picture, and why this show is airing on a “business” channel.

Posted by StrangeAppar8us on 06/14/10 at 09:10 PM • Permalink

Categories: Politics • Nutters • Teabaggery • Our Stupid Media •

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I’m just really confused here. If you have all of the usual suspects plus Ron Paul, does that make this a “Libertarian” show? Is John Stossel not pulling in the numbers? Is Judge Napolitano the Episcopal Church of Crazy to Beck’s Vatican of Nuttiness? Or is this all part of Rupert Murdoch’s master plan to drive Brit Hume insane?

Comment by StrangeAppar8us on 06/14/10 at 09:30 PM

Its Tea Party Porn…At least now I know what Rick Barber and his hallucinations were watching during the constitutional bukkake…

Comment by mr.gimmeabreak on 06/14/10 at 09:35 PM

Doesn’t Ed Rendell have something better to do than pop up on every cable “news” channel? Isn’t a governor or something?

Comment by Elisabeth on 06/14/10 at 09:56 PM

First, this a really good post. I haven’t watched anything on Fox for a while. The last time I did it was Sean Hannity. I don’t remember the exact name of the show, but it was something like “Adventures in Fallacious Rhetoric.” At least, that’s how I remember it.

My point is that Sean Hannity is erudite when you pit him against the brain-dead pummeling of Paultard, Sr. and Her Ladyship of Wolfkill.

Just today I was thinking of the closing chapters of my favorite work outside of the voyeurweb: Plato’s Republic. Plato/Socrates warns us that the danger of a democracy is that it can devolve into mob rule. When you couple that warning with the carnal instincts of a Rupert Murdoch, then the pairing of Palin and Paul seems inevitable.

Comment by AltHippo on 06/14/10 at 11:41 PM

Anyone else find this banner provocative?

SOCIAL CONSERVATIVES AND LIBERTARIANS ARISE

Is it a call to arms or a call to get up and dance?
If social conservatives and Libertarians get married, what will the children be like?

Comment by Glix on 06/15/10 at 10:45 AM

Emotionally stunted, convinced of their own superiority thanks to mumsy and dada, and depending on some kind of nepotistic scheme in order to actually make a living. You know, just like their parents.