Edwards: The Murdoch-Slayer
by Josh Gerstein
Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 11:38 PM
updated Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 11:38 PM
Score one for John Edwards as Nevada Democrats bail out on the August debate the state party planned under the auspices of Fox News. Party officials are citing a lame joke that Fox News president Roger Ailes made this week, alluding to the similarity between the names of Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden.
However, the fact is that the debate was already in trouble, and that trouble started with Mr. Edwards saying he would not attend. His absence wouldn't have doomed the event, but, in addition to the usual "scheduling conflict," he cited the role of Fox. The network is detested by liberal bloggers, who soon won a pledge from New Mexico's Governor Richardson to skip the event. Fox News officials also fueled the flames by engaging publicly with those trying to undercut the network's debate.
Mr. Edwards has won huge brownie points now with left-wing bloggers, who will view him as the dragonslayer who trounced the Murdoch machine. The episode also hurts Senator Clinton with Democratic activists by highlighting her recent coziness with Murdoch. Mr. Obama already has some cred with the Fox haters, after he reportedly gave the network the cold shoulder for repeating an erroneous report about him attending a madrassa.
(The Nevada Democrats who arranged the debate may have been right about the party needing to reach new audiences, i.e. Fox viewers, but that's a highbrow general-election concern that doesn't count for much in the primary contest.)
Mr. Edwards could take this gambit too far. Will he reject Fox interviews? Refuse their questions at press conferences? Kick them off his plane? All in all, though, Mr. Edwards's footwork here was quite nimble. If the conference-call-heavy Clinton camp and the still-getting-its-sea-legs Obama camp can't maneuver or at least match on stuff like this, they may be in for more trouble than they've anticipated from Mr. Edwards and some of the second-tier candidates.
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