Happiness Is: Fox Off The Air

by Dick Mac

In my home I use the station-blocking feature of Cablevision for very few channels. First one blocked was Fox News; because, no child should ever stumble on that horror. How do you explain to a 6-year-old that her friends who are gay are hated by most of the country? How do you explain to her that most Americans think stupidity is better, and intelligence is unpatriotic? These are conversations I just don't want to have until she's a little older. I don't want her to get the idea that being a teabagger is acceptable. So, we don't talk about those things at all, yet.

News Corp., the company that owns Fox News and a string of other Fox stations, pulled some of their programming off of Cablevision because of a dispute over fees. Fox wants $150,000,000 from Cablevision, who paid $70,000,000 last year. There is nothing on television worth double the price. Cablevision wanted to keep negotiating, but News Corp., pulled a half-dozen of their stations. Sadly, they did not pull Fox News. Perhaps that's covered under a different license.

I am happy that Cablevision has stood-up to News Corp., and I don't miss Fox one bit.

Sure, it's sad that 3.5 million people will miss the World Series, but so what? It's only baseball, and it's all available on the internet anyhow. It's too bad that 3.5 million people are frustrated about missing insipid series like "Glee" and "House," but that is what Fox has decided. And we can watch the episodes online.

Personally, I'm thrilled, and I am hoping that Fox stays off the air permanently.

Can you imagine what's going to happen to their advertising prices if 3.5 million New York households no longer receive their signal? They might lose money, and that's good news. You see, Fox News does not turn a profit, it is financed by the profits from the Fox television network. So, if the main network starts losing money, perhaps Fox News will be hit with budget cuts.

I hope Cablevision stands its ground, and my suggestion is: Offer Fox $25,000,000 for their crappy stations and cut everyone's cable bill by a buck or two.

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