News and views from the award-winning author of the novels The Skinny Years, America Libre, House Divided and Pancho Land

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

The new MundoFox: "El dinero habla"


While many in the FOX News nation clamor for an "English-Only" United States, Rupert Murdoch has launched MundoFox, a new Spanish-language TV network. The reason behind this apparent betrayal of far-right principles is simply this: El dinero habla. [Money talks].

Expected to begin operation in the fall, MundoFox will go head-to-head with NBC's Univision and Telemundo for a Spanish-language TV market with a $3.6 billion yearly ad spend. The MundoFox programming is expected to follow the same formula as its current rivals: telenovelas, telenovelas and more telenovelas. "We think there's opportunity for growth. We're going to capture a big part of that growth," said Hernan Lopez, president of Fox International Channels in a Billboard interview.

In a similar vein of hypocrisy, Republican candidates Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, who also support the US-English movement, launched a blitz of Spanish-language campaign ads during the Florida primaries.

As I noted in a previous post, it seems money and votes can make multiculturalists out of even the most ardent hardliners.

Raul Ramos y Sanchez