“No contemporary figure has done more to shape the intersection of American media and politics than Ailes, who, until Thursday, had been the Fox News chief since its very first day on the air in 1996.” NPR on Roger Ailes’ unparalleled impact on the public sphere.

+ James Poniewozik in the NYT: “American democracy is meant to be king-proof. Presidents win two terms, maximum. Supreme Court justices are one voice among nine (or, currently, eight), senators one in a hundred. To amass the kind of long-term power that allows you to shape politics and culture geologically, like a river carving out a canyon, you have to go elsewhere. Roger Ailes found that place.”