An Atheist in the FOXhole: A Liberal’s Eight-Year Odyssey Inside the Heart of the Right-Wing Media by Joe Muto
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Pretty disappointing. Two stars because I’m rounding up, but I can’t call it one star since I didn’t hate it. But there’s nothing revelatory in this so-called tell-all. Should we be surprised that the people who work for and run Fox News know they’re not Fair and Balanced? This is something we figured out, accepted, and got over years ago.
And to be clear, this book isn’t really about Fox News, very much. Mostly it’s about ‘The O’Reilly Factor.’ And mostly, its apologetic, even praising Bill O’Reilly more often than not. I’m not saying the book should have been a hateful screed eviscerating the guy, but when Muto writes “The mere existence of this book… is going to make this next line surprising… I actually like Bill O’Reilly,” my reaction was a loud “No, really?” dripping with sarcasm.
I suppose it’s my own fault, judging a book by its cover. The cover if this one has, in caricature, pictures of O’Reilly, Palin, Coulter, Susteren, Beck, Rove and Hannity. Palin gets a few paragraphs, including Muto’s saying that she’s a very attractive woman, that the cameras don’t do her justice. Coulter is a very nice person off air. Beck is a loony, and everyone at Fox knew it. Rove is a smart guy. Hannity pulls in ratings less than O’Reilly’s, and Susteren is in third. Wow. That’s a real foxhole you got there, Joe.
The book is subtitled “A Liberals’ Eight-Year Odyssey Inside the Heart of the Right-Wing Media.” I’m afraid this is a seriously slanted description. A self-confessed ne’er-do-well tosses his liberal sensibilities aside to get a job, and moves up the ranks a bit before getting bored and chucking career away on a whim. Hardly an odyssey. And “the Heart of the Right-Wing Media”? Maybe, but drinks in a bar with production assistants, trying to figure out where to live in Brooklyn, breaking up with girlfriends… that’s now what I’d call the heart of anything.
Cutesy asides, footnotes, moments of self-deprecation related ad nauseum, and the meager recounting of that laughably inconsequential and utterly pointless three days as Gawker’s ‘Fox Mole’… all of it detracted from what meager bits might have made this an interesting “insider’s” view. But only might have. The best thing I can say about this book is that if you want to know what it’s like to be a TV news producer, there’s a few details here for you. Mostly it sounds dull.