"The Man Who Owns The News" Is Scared Of His Own Shadow.

Michael Wolff is the author of The Man Who Owns the News, a biography of  News Corporation czar Rupert Murdoch.  Jason Linkins highlights Wolff's weekend conversation with Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz this morning on HuffPo, and it appears that Murdoch thinks FOX News is shit, too.

According to Wolff, a meeting in September to discuss FOX's treatment of Barack Obama between Murdoch, FOX News honcho Roger Ailes, and Obama was a "set-up" by Murdoch. While it "eased tensions" and led to Obama's appearance on The O'Reilly Factor, it was really a ploy by Murdoch to get Obama to level charges at Ailes that Murdoch himself was too timid to mention: 

KURTZ: Well, you say that Murdoch has kind of a crush on Roger Ailes, but you also depict him as being sort of slightly embarrassed by FOX News. Evidence?

WOLFF: Well, sitting with him -- and he -- actually, "embarrassment" is exactly the word. He turns away from it. He sort of says -- he says, "Well, we're going to talk about that."

When he arranged for the summit between Murdoch and Obama, the first time that they met, he brought in -- he brought Ailes to this exactly so that he could let Obama take on Ailes. Murdoch himself didn't want to say, you know, change your coverage, you're unfair here. He specifically brought Ailes into the room so that Obama could say, what are you doing?

KURTZ: Wait. You're saying that not only did Rupert Murdoch obviously want to meet Barack Obama himself because he looked like he was going to be the next president of the United States, but he wanted Barack Obama to complain about the coverage of his own Fox News?

WOLFF: Absolutely. This was a whole setup so that Obama could say to Ailes, what are you doing here? And Obama did. They sat knee to knee, and Obama said, I don't have any time for you. Why should I sit here and do this? You treat me like a terrorist. What's going on here?

So why is Rupert such a wimp when it comes to his faux news channel?

WOLFF: Rupert Murdoch is shy, fundamentally a man that is conflict-averse. That's number one. Number two, Roger Ailes -- remember, Murdoch is a newspaper guy. He's not a television news guy. Roger Ailes runs this place. Actually, Roger Ailes told me -- and there's some dispute; the Murdoch people said that's not exactly true -- but he told me that in his contract it says that Murdoch cannot interfere, that he has final say. He can be fired ultimately, but, otherwise, he has final say and that Murdoch can't talk to his people.