Roger Ailes will be remembered as a lecherous, misogynistic and terrible boss — and that’s a good thing

Science and medicine will probably disagree with me, but I choose to believe that Roger Ailes died of a broken heart. Deprived of a steady stream of nubile employees to sexually exploit, the infamous Fox News CEO and progenitor of 21st-century-style authoritarian propaganda simply lost his will to live.

Ailes’s death was announced on Thursday, less than a year after his ouster from Fox News during a wave of accusations of sexual harassment from more than 20 women, thereby ensuring that Ailes will be remembered primarily as an alleged sexual predator. There are those who will no doubt worry that the legacy of his unrepentant lechery will crowd out other important aspects of his career, such as the way he replaced the goose-stepping severity of previous authoritarian propaganda with endless cheesecake and eye-bleedingly loud graphic design. But to my mind, there can be no better encapsulation of Ailes’s legacy than the struggle over the way he treated women.

Roger Ailes Was One of the Worst Americans Ever

On the Internet today you will find thousands, perhaps even millions, of people gloating about the death of elephantine Fox News founder Roger Ailes. The happy face emojis are getting a workout on Twitter, which is also bursting with biting one-liners.

Fox News Statement Taunting Trump Was ‘100 Percent’ Roger Ailes

As the war between Fox News and Donald Trump ratchets up, Roger Ailes is fighting off criticism from his senior executives over his handling of the crisis. According to one highly placed source, last night, Ailes sent out the now-famous statement mocking Trump as being scared to meet with the “Ayatollah” and “Putin” if he became president. “That was Roger 100 percent,” the source explained. “A lot of people on the second floor” — where top Fox executives work — “didn’t think it was a good idea.”

Roger Ailes: Soledad O'Brien Was 'Named After A Prison'

Roger Ailes made a jaw-dropping comment about CNN's Soledad O'Brien during a college lecture on Thursday night.

The Fox News chief was speaking to journalism students at the University of North Carolina. In the question-and-answer segment of the talk, he referred to O'Brien as "that girl that's named after a prison."

Ailes was referring to the Soledad Correctional Facility in Monterey County, California. CNN responded to the remark on Friday. An insider told The Huffington Post, "Roger is wrong. Soledad is named after the Virgin Mary, 'Maria de la Soledad.' It's a name her parents gave her in part because they met at Daily Mass."

Ailes made the comment while speaking about the latest developments at the network for a lecture at the university's journalism school. On Thursday, he also responded to Newt Gingrich's recent criticism of Fox News.

The GOP candidate had accused the network of favoring Romney, and said that CNN was "less biased." Ailes said that Gingrich was "trying to get a job at CNN because he knows he isn't going to get to come back to Fox News."

He condemned the Fox News mole, the former employee who was fired after writing anonymous posts about the network. “The mole shows a culture that believes in theft, a lack of loyalty, turning on his colleagues, lying to management, and there are some real, ethical, serious questions about it,” Ailes said.

He defended Fox News against criticism that the network's coverage is biased, as well. "What you're really telling me is that there's a little cable channel over here that's driving you nuts because it won't line up with your worldview," Ailes said. "If there's an alternative point of view, don’t wet your pants.”

Original Article
Source: Huff
Author: Katherine Fung