Fox News chief returns to Warren
By LARRY RINGLER Tribune ChronicleArticle Photos
WARREN - The downtown Warren that Roger Ailes remembers from age 8 had Fred Astaire dancing his way across the silver screen at Robins Theatre.
Shoppers bustled from stores and restaurants, while he and his grandmother fed pigeons at the fountain in Courthouse Square.
His father worked for Packard Electric, drawing his paycheck from one of the nation's mightiest manufacturers, General Motors Corp., and enjoying shrimp cocktail at the Saratoga Restaurant.
The Warren that the Fox News chairman and chief executive officer returned to Monday at age 68 made him ''a little sad,'' he said, with empty storefronts and weakened manufacturing base.
''You can tell this is a town that needs jobs and optimism,'' said Ailes, a 1958 Warren G. Harding graduate who will serve as the guest speaker today when the Trumbull County Veterans Memorial is dedicated near Courthouse Square. ''You worry about towns like this.''
But Ailes said residents already are showing signs of working together to improve their lives, noting the efforts put forth to build the veterans memorial.
''I don't think I've ever seen a community pull together better than Warren, Ohio,'' he said.
Ailes urged residents to follow his father's advice: ''If you want a helping hand, look at the end of your arm.''
Ailes said he took that advice, putting in sewer pipes and guardrails for the county and state highway departments at age 16 and 17. That experience gave him strength, he said, as he pursued a career as a television producer, then a media consultant for presidents Nixon, Reagan and others, and finally launching highly successful cable television networks such as CNBC and Fox News.
''I always knew that if all else failed, I could go back and put those guardrails in,'' he said.
Ailes acknowledged people sometimes need a helping hand because everyone doesn't get the same breaks. But he added, ''The government shouldn't replace your own hands.''
One of the strengths Ailes said he sees in today's youth is they often volunteer more than his generation did.
''What you have is a whole group of fine, young people willing to do things, but you have to have direction, leadership, opportunity," he added. ''It's tricky business.''
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teddyrodo
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11-11-08 10:22 PM
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See Above comment Ted Rodosovich WGH 1960
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teddyrodo
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11-11-08 10:20 PM
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Hey Rog, howse 'bout getting the Repubs to get their noses out of folk's personal lives. Get back to the philosophies that lifted my Dad - Warren's Sup't of Sanitation under (starting with Mayor Bill Burbank) - from the steel mills as a Dem turned Repub? Get the GOP outa the bedrooms (Gay marriage) and schools (really stoopid*****like Creationism, Intelligent Design) and back to fiscal responsibility, strong but efficient defense, ... and a "check" on some of the more whacky/extreme ideas that come from BOTH the Republicans AND the Democrats. And, for toppers, howse 'bout relinquishing the two party monopoly on the CPD (Commission on the Presidential Debates) that you horseheads scammed on us in 1988 or 1989. The League of Women Voters did a bang up job with the debates for decades until you media moguls/monopolists elbowed in. The League allowed Democracy to function by allowing 3rd party candidates have their chance to present their arguments. WOT SAY, Roggie? Ted Rodo- s
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