Are We Having Fun Yet?

CHIEF EXECUTIVE—The day the Fox Business Channel debuted, the normally abrasive talk show host Bill O’Reilly advised anchors Neil Cavuto and Alexis Smith to “have fun with it.” Since then, the news team has taken the advice in the spirit it was offered, serving up a frothy mix of happy-face banter and chummy interviews. This reflects Fox’s strategy to make its coverage more upbeat than the style of reporting found on rival network CNBC. Since CNBC has never been thought of as especially antibusiness, this double- whammy of institutionalized chirpiness could be bad news for short sellers every where.

Maybe they should start their own network where the anchors frown and grimace all day. It would surely find a home on PBS.Buried inside O’Reilly’s seemingly lighthearted, throwaway counsel is a revolutionary idea. Is there any good reason that business coverage can’t be chipper and festive even when things go a bit sour? Why does business news have to be so ominous and negative? Why does everyone in the press corps always have to be the Grinch? Read article.