The White House War on Fox News continues unabated. If this report from the Chicago Tribune is correct, the White House is now threatening Democrat strategists to keep them from appearing on the network.  I find it hard to believe that this strategy will inure to the benefit of the White House.  The White House has already antagonized millions of independent Americans by insulting their character, think tea-baggers.

Now the White House continues its assault on one half of the cable news watching population, those that watch Fox News.

Fox News consistently has Democrat politicians and analysts on their network.  Without those appearances, conservative views will go unchallenged.

How can any of this be good for the White House?
FOX off-limits

At least one Democratic political strategist has gotten a blunt warning from the White House to never appear on Fox News Channel, an outlet that presidential aides have depicted as not so much a news-gathering operation as a political opponent bent on damaging the Obama administration.

Political consultants are a staple of cable television talk shows, analyzing current events based on their own experiences working on campaigns or in government.

One Democratic strategist said that shortly after an appearance on Fox he got a phone call from a White House official telling him not to be a guest on the show again. The call had an intimidating tone, he said.

The message was, “We better not see you on again,” said the strategist, who spoke on condition of anonymity so as not to run afoul of the White House. An implicit suggestion, he said, was that “clients might stop using you if you continue.”

In urging Democratic consultants to spurn Fox, White House officials might be trying to isolate the network and make it appear more partisan.

A boycott by Democratic strategists could also help drive the White House narrative that Fox is a fundamentally different creature than the other TV news networks. For their part, White House officials appear on Fox News — but sporadically and with “eyes wide open,” as one aide put it.

David Plouffe, the president’s campaign manager and author of a new campaign book, The Audacity to Win, was scheduled to appear on Fox’s On the Record with Greta Van Susteren last night as he promotes his book. His appearance, pre-empted by the breaking news of the shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, has been rescheduled for Monday.

White House Communications Director Anita Dunn said Thursday night that she had checked with colleagues who “deal with TV issues” and they had not told people to avoid Fox. On the contrary, they had urged people to appear on the network, Dunn wrote in an email.

But Patrick Caddell, a Fox News contributor and a former pollster for Democratic President Jimmy Carter, said he has spoken to Democratic consultants who have been told by the White House to avoid appearances on Fox. He declined to give their names.

Caddell said he had not gotten that message himself from the White House. “They know better than to tell me anything like that,” he said.

Caddell added: “I have heard that they’ve done that to others in not too subtle ways. I find it appalling. When the White House gets in the business of suppressing dissent and comment, particularly from its own party, it hurts itself.”

The White House has taken an aggressive stance toward Fox. When President Obama appeared on five separate talk shows one Sunday in September, he avoided Fox.

“It would be foolish for us to just treat it like it’s CNN, ABC, NBC and CBS,” said a White House aide. “That doesn’t make any sense. That would be like saying we’re going to do [interviews] with the news magazines and we’re going to do Time, Newsweek and the [conservative] National Review.”

The aide spoke on condition of anonymity to talk more openly about the White House’s thinking.

Last month, Dunn told CNN that Fox was, in effect, an “arm” of the Republican Party. Dunn said in an appearance on the rival cable network: “Let’s not pretend they’re a news network the way CNN is.”

As the dustup played out, Fox’s senior vice president of news, Michael Clemente, countered: “Surprisingly, the White House continues to declare war on a news organization instead of focusing on the critical issues that Americans are concerned about like jobs, health care and two wars. ”

Fox’s commentators have been sharply critical of the Obama administration. After the president won the Nobel Peace Prize, Sean Hannity, who has a prime-time show on Fox, said he got the award for “trashing America.”

The two sides seemed interested in easing tensions. On Oct. 28, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs met privately with Clemente.

But White House aides haven’t changed their underlying view of Fox.

Fox’s audience is by far the largest of the cable networks, with an average of more than 2.1 million viewers in prime-time this year. CNN is second with 932,000 prime-time viewers.

Fox’s viewership is not what worries the White House, though. More troubling to White House aides is that other news organizations may uncritically follow stories that Fox has showcased.

The White House aide said: “Where some of the falsehoods become dangerous is when the rest of the media accepts them as fact and reports on them, either out of a desire to tap into Fox’s news audience – which you can understand, given where circulation and viewership rates are – or as some sort of knee-jerk fear of being considered liberally biased, which is what conservatives have been saying of the mainstream media for years.”

The White House’s pugnacious approach to the network leaves some Democrats troubled.

Don Fowler, a former Democratic National Committee chairman, said in an interview: “This approach is out of sync with my conception of what the Obama administration stands for and what they’re trying to do. I think they’ll think better of it and this will be a passing phase.”

American Thinker: Talkers fill GOP leadership vacuum

The Old Media are in a breathless tizzy over Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and other conservative talk show hosts. These high-profile voices of the Right speak to ever-larger audiences. They provide a logical and devastating criticism of the leftist agenda of the Obama Administration on a daily basis. So, Old Media asks: Are these conservative talkers the new leaders of the Republican Party?

The answer is yes, by default.

The Republican Party has a defined structure of local, state and national leaders. As a precinct committeeman and local party chairman, I am part of this structure. Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele is working diligently to communicate the conservative message. However, Steele is hampered by a media reluctant to shine their light on an African-American conservative success story. More importantly, Steele is constrained by a party apparatus dominated by non-conservatives.

Limbaugh et al suffer no such constraints. They are free to broadcast conservative principles in their own unfiltered style. The desire of liberal lawmakers to restrict their access to the public airwaves is proof of their influence and importance to the conservative cause. The talkers are not a danger to America — they are a threat to the liberal media and political monopoly.

A common refrain from the base is: Why aren’t Republicans doing anything to stop the Democrats? Of course, most are voting against liberal proposals such as higher taxes, higher spending and bigger government. The problem is that Republicans are the minority party in a representative democracy.

Between elections, the only way to stop the majority party is to threaten their majority status. This is achieved by generating ample issue-oriented public outcry that worries the most vulnerable of the majority party legislators. However, you can’t beat something with nothing. So, you have to channel that public outcry into action.

This is where the Republican Party is failing. They are not connecting with the town hall dissenters and Tea Party protestors. Some Republican elected officials even act embarrassed by these citizens turned activists. The liberal media immediately highlights these embarrassed Republicans to marginalize the protestors. Rather than pushing them away, the Republican Party should be recruiting these folks. These citizen-activists need a channel for their energy and passion and their natural home is the Republican Party. Protests are for publicity, elections determine government policy.

So, where does the ignored and derided would-be citizen-activist turn? Logically, to those they hear every day confirming the correctness of their beliefs – Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and the thousands of other conservative talk show hosts trumpeting their cause. Many a host is asked: What can I do? Sadly, the answer is never to contact your local Republican Party.

The Republican Party ignores this ample public outcry at its peril. However, more than political irrelevance and election defeat is at stake. America will pay the much higher price.

Yesterday, we wrote a post entitled, “Van Jones Will Be Forced to Resign: It is Just A Matter of Time” outlining the damage Van Jones is doing to the Obama Administration. Americans are losing trust in Obama. President Bush’s credibility was destroyed by the Democrats effective attempt to paint Bush as a liar. Obama is suffering the same fate, but at his own hand.

I have put together a series of clips of talk radio hosts and their guests making just such an argument. You will hear from special guests including Carl Rove and Charles Krauthammer.

Krauthammer: Van Jones being a 9-11 Truther is Devastating.

Ingraham Debates Van Jones Controversy On “Factor”

Karl Rove Calls Van Jones A “Foul Mouthed Lunatic”

I have often made the point that many of the appointees within the White House are being placed there to avoid Congressional consent and oversight. This and more, from Sean Hannity, including his statement, “He is Bill Ayers”.