As some popular talking heads at Fox exit, we should also not be surprised to see Chris Wallace negotiate a buyout at CNN and return to Fox. Or a return of Megyn Kelly, just for example.
Murdoch and sons have options and can create a new and rigorous brand that serves the center-right, with considerable appeal to independents and the center-left as well. They will take a huge immediate hit but use 2024 as a window to establish themselves and re-build their viewership.
Sorry, I can’t stop ruminating. Let’s imagine that Murdoch and sons want to push out a lot of the current lineup and make the place over into a WSJ-like news organization. The path is not hard to imagine:
* upgrade 5-7 faces from the WSJ (e.g., Kimberly Strassel, Gerard Baker, Karl Rove) and the National Review (Andrew McCarthy)
* Bring back Chris Wallace, Megyn Kelly and perhaps one other former Fox “star”
* Seriously upgrade Maria Bartiromo who is by far the classiest and best of the remaining talking heads
* Give more air time to Britt Hume, Juan Williams and a few others already on staff
* Bring in 2-3 folks like the Hoover Institute’s Peter Robinson for weekly shows (he does Uncommon Wisdom, which is G-R-E-A-T)
* Recruit away 1-2 other RINO news personalities from other networks
I think they can push out the current Fox lineup almost entirely, fix these replacements and voila, a new brand going into the fall of 2023.
Megyn Kelly won’t be coming back. She said, “life is better after FOX”.