C’mon Fox, CNN: Admit your political leanings

WASHINGTON — You know what I wish? That good old unblushingly liberal Ted Turner were still in charge at CNN, and that he and Fox News’ flat-out conservative Roger Ailes would go at it head-to-head in all-news cable. Then Americans would have a chance to see how we like news European-style — with ideological biases clear and frankly acknowledged.

The Fox News Channel experience suggests we’d go for it. FNC’s departure from American-style allegiance to neutrality has carried it from nothing to No. 1 in cable news in five years. The thanks go to an assemblage of talent whose primary qualification is conservatism. As their internal joke has it, most have been "drinkin’ the Kool-Aid" — and the result is a feisty, lively mix.

Now CNN, its commitment to plain old news having paled before the Fox fireworks, is struggling to respond. As Ailes, Fox News chairman and CEO, says, CNN "had become a national and even worldwide brand of generic news. I think they have fulfilled their mission of making news the star, but sometimes news is boring."

CNN parent Turner Broadcasting System’s new chief executive, Jamie Kellner, seems to agree: The old "making news the star" idea is "a little old-fashioned, you know?" Kellner, having come up partly through Fox, having helped bring "The Simpsons" to the screen, seems to think entertainment is the cure: He hired an actress from NYPD Blue as a Headline News anchor.

But jazzing things up isn’t going to do it for CNN. Fox leapt to success by slipping the bonds of neutrality. Here’s a network that, as Bush’s tax-cut proposal is discussed, runs an underline saying "Cut ‘em already." Here’s a news anchor who ad-libs, "God bless that man," on Ronald Reagan’s 90th birthday. In other words, here is flat-out allegiance to a political philosophy. Fox’s bully (and often bullying) pulpit for conservatism gives it energy. There is relief, it seems, in lack of pretense.

Alas, that’s not the whole picture. FNC is clear in its ideological bias, but it hasn’t gotten to the part about frank acknowledgment. Its slogans pay homage to the old-fashioned neutrality concept of American journalism: "We report. You decide," they say. "Fair and balanced."

This feigning causes difficulties. For example, when Fox news anchor Tony Snow’s column appeared on a GOP Web site, Ailes made Snow’s syndicate promise not to provide the column to the site any longer.

This is odd. As the Web site’s founder put it, "Tony Snow is a conservative. All you have to do is read his work and know his background to know where he stands philosophically. So my question is this: Who did Fox think was going to run Tony Snow’s columns? A bunch of Libs???"

"Fair and balanced" has never been Fox owner Rupert Murdoch’s creed and never will be. But dropping the slogans’ cover would rob Fox of a big club. They must claim balance in order to charge others with lacking it. As Ailes likes to say: "If we look conservative, it’s because the other guys are so far to the left."

This is a powerful charge — like calling someone "racist" — and it works wonders. Thus the pitiful sight, recently, of the new CNN chief, Walter Isaacson, going to Capitol Hill to talk to conservatives. Trent Lott and J.C. Watts no doubt loved the supplication. But it’s unlikely they’re going to love CNN. Isaacson has also been courting Rush Limbaugh. If he could snag Limbaugh, perhaps he could "neutralize continuing allegations from conservatives that CNN leans left," as USA Today put it.

It’s not going to happen. Conservatives have grown phenomenally effective at charging others with leaning left, and they’re not going to quit over a little thing like that.

So I say, CNN should simply embrace the charge at last and run with it.

Oh, I like sober news. I’m the sort who goes to C-Span to watch a presidential debate just to avoid some blabbermouth telling me afterward who "won." But we’re not all purists. And there’s no perfect purity in the news, anyway, which means there is something to be said for out-and-out ideological allegiances.

In Paris, left-leaners can buy Le Monde, and right-leaners Le Figaro — or you can buy papers with views opposite your own. You decide. They report. Our cities don’t have enough newspapers for that. But we do have plenty of room on cable TV.

I can just picture it: CNN leaning left as full-throatedly as Fox does right, and both of them admitting it. Now that would make for some lively cable TV news.

Geneva Overholser can be reached at The Washington Post Writers Group, 1150 15th St. NW, Washington, DC 20071-9200 or overholserg@washpost.com.