Ex-CNNer Bill Hemmer On What's Different At Fox: "We're A Business. Viewers Count"

New York Observer:

"He's an Ohio guy," said Bill Hemmer. "And I'm an Ohio guy. We Buckeyes stick together."

It was a recent Wednesday morning, and Mr. Hemmer, a native of Cincinnati, was sitting across from NYTV at a restaurant in the Muse Hotel on West 46th Street, talking about his boss Roger Ailes, the president of the Fox News Channel and scion of Warren, Ohio.

Until a few years ago, Mr. Hemmer and Mr. Ailes played on opposite sides of the ball. Mr. Hemmer, 43, made his name at CNN, where he rose quickly through the ranks over the course of a decade, reporting from the likes of Kosovo and Afghanistan and hosting a series of morning news shows.

Read the whole story: New York Observer

Comments

[TakeBackAmerica]

Another sell-out queer. Pathetic.

[Danny]

I will say, though, that "news as a commodity" is a novel twist. That explains the "manufactured news" phenomenon. We are a very sick "democracy", and showing a very bad example to the rest of the world.

[Danny]

So where do we comment on the far more serious issue of FCC consolidation and "cooked statistics" and cable companies whining?

[wndrwrthg]

Hemmer, fox is a joke and viewers can't count above ten (unless they remove their shoes).

[ProfessorDuh]

To think I used to like you, Hemmer. You're Fox droppings now.

[cmk1967]

No Bill, Fox is a propaganda machine masked as a news service.

[freespeach]

CNN is a shit sandwich for the middle classes.
Shit, bread and Dijon mustard.

Fox is a shit sandwich for the uneducated elderly and the trailer park crowd.
Shit bread and ketchup.

Both treasonous networks helped sell the Iraq invasion with lies.
Both have continued to enable and support the criminal Bush administration.
Both are guilty of trying to help the case for war with Iran.

They are both scum.

[Steamboater]

Hemmer was always white bread and mayonnaiase and his reporting always came through as so--bland and not very exciting. He belongs at Fox where it's a business and not necessarily news and where you can hardly describe Fox as having any real journalsts. It's show biz and bull from Bill O'Reilly and Hannity. Hemmer had a cnahce to be a real contender at CNN but blew it when the white bread and mayo cmae out of the closet. No fire in that belly at all.

[rcampbell]

In the article, Hemmer states: "We’re a business. Viewers count. Ratings count. The store has got to stay open. We need customers.­”

That's a pretty string admission of their non-news bias and infomercial orientation. He didn't say the truth was the network's product nor the public's need (right?) to know the facts to make informed decisions nor even the news is their top priority. Their mission is to pander to a specific audience to promote their own interests. That's why they're Faux Noise--biased, predictable and ultimately irrelevant

[MajorKong]

"A liberal journalist is a journalist first and a liberal second. A conservative journalist is a conservative first and a journalist second, if at all." - Conservative Activist Grover Norquist

[deedrdo]

maybe the CNN crew were just, you know, eating. why spin it into a 'pizza party during a disaster'? oh yeah, it's faux.

first anderson cooper and now bill hummer. it must be a fashionable trend to have closeted gay anchormen.

[Dantana]

Yeah, Fox is not really a news channel. The morning "Friends" is more like a convervative The View, with Steve Dufus (what a boob!).

Fair and balanced? If they really were, they would have to adopt it as their slogan.

Hemmer is a total sellout, a closet case busking for all the bigoted Christianites.

[bibimimi]

Blackwater---"It's a business. Bodies count."

[revko]

Most prostitutes feel that way

[neoconscums]

Yes you are a business, Bill - THE ZOO BUSINESS. My apologies to all the ANIMALS in the zoo!