Cody Willard Leaves FoxBusiness, They Block Farewell Blog Post. Gerri Willis Steps In To Dumb Things Down.
This post is a few days late because I don’t watch FoxBusiness, but Cody Willard who co-anchored their recently cancelled market wrap show Happy Hour has left the network. In what many would call true-to-Fox form, they blocked Willard’s farewell blog post even though he called his experience with Fox a “dream job.” Click link to see for yourself, I discovered same when clicking on HuffPo’s link, where some of his final blog comments were excerpted.
Happy Hour was a market wrap and current affairs show hosted in a bar. Despite this poorly conceived concept and even setting aside Willard’s excitable tendencies, he brought more credibility than most other FoxBusiness anchors in the network’s short history—mainly because of his independent thought. His show has been replaced by The Willis Report, hosted by former CNN financial editor Gerri Willis. Despite a media resume some might find impressive, this is a major dumbing down as evidenced in this Daily Show clip of Willis during the heat of the financial crisis. During the interview, Jon Stewart asked her to comment on a few financial media clips, and she demonstrated her outright ignorance about market basics. Good move Fox, no surprises I suppose.
As for Willard, I wish him the best. Like him or hate him, he’s a true entrepreneur, and that’s respectable. I’d just ask him to remember my previous case for keeping his hair short, so as to avoid having the UPS guy ‘Lady Wig’ look.