With all the recent speculation about whether or not Joe Biden will run for president, I ran across this headline quote from my friend, the late Roger Ailes.
I met Roger almost 10 years ago through my work on a political campaign in Putnam County, NY. My candidate was in a nasty race and our campaign was placing many ads in the Putnam County Courier; a publication run by Roger’s wife, Beth. From time to time, I wrote some editorials that Beth was kind enough to publish. One Friday afternoon I, along with another campaign volunteer, Vinny, a retired NYPD officer, were at the paper talking to the editor. Vinny was trying to make a point that the opposition candidate was doing things that he felt the paper should be calling him out on. The conversation, at times, became heated and then the front door opened. ‘I saw the lights on and was wondering what was going on’, Roger said as he walked in. ‘What’s up?” he asked, walking into the office with his one security escort. Vinny, unbelievably, not knowing who Roger was, proceeded to grab Roger by the arm and promptly told him what he felt the paper should be doing. My eyes became wide when I saw Roger’s security escort begin to approach Vinny. Roger waived him off and proceeded for the next 40 minutes to engage Vinny in a conversation about our candidate’s campaign. He was animated, knowledgeable, funny, irreverent and completely down to earth. While Roger was completely engaged in this conversation, I grabbed the latest edition of the paper that had one of my editorials and I sheepishly asked Roger if he would be kind enough to autograph it for me. He did. I still have it. Vinny ended the conversation by saying something that I will always remember, ‘Roger, he said, ‘you just don’t F*^#Kin’ get it’…….Roger let out a howl of laughter and we left. A couple of weeks later I was called by the paper’s editor and told Roger wanted to meet me. I went back to the papers’ office and a friendship began. Over the next several years, Roger had me over for dinner, coffee in his office in NY and it was not unusual to get a phone call from him at my office which always had my co-workers in amazement when they would ask who was calling for me and he’d say, ‘It’s Roger Ailes’. He wanted to talk about local politics. Sometimes, it was just to extend an invitation for dinner. For a guy on the national stage, he took the time to know, and understand, the local issues. He loved Garrison. He loved taking his son, Zach, to local nurseries for plants and flowers. At the risk of embarrassing Zach, I once saw Roger give Zach a kiss goodnight and heard him say, “I love you, Peanut”. He knew that I had a friend who lost a son in the 9/11 attacks and once, when this friend was invited to the White House during the beginning days of the Obama administration, Roger wanted to know what went on. He wanted the story. ‘What did Obama say…what did Holder say?’ I think he got a kick at still being able to deliver a news story like the best of those correspondents that worked for him. The one time I asked him for anything was when my daughter, in her 3rd year of college, needed an internship. Roger came through and Jenny began at Fox News. Jen still tells the story of being completely overwhelmed one day and running into Roger in the elevator. Stammering to introduce herself, Roger just looked at her as said. ‘I know who are you are. Keep up the good work’ as he got off the elevator. Later that summer, Roger got a kick out of my daughter making friends with the Fox News cafeteria folks who always, after swearing her to secrecy, would give her the same meals that Rupport Murdoch had them prepare for him. Buffalo Chicken Wings were his favorite. There’s so much that has been said and will be said about Roger Ailes. Once, I asked him why he continued to work so hard after having done it all. He looked at me and said the he wanted to show all Americans, simply, what their responsibility is to be Americans. We could all use Roger’s clarity these days. I miss my friend.
The Valley Viewpoint 