DAILY NEWS: The local sports mogul and longtime backer of conservative causes says he’s a major investor in a new cable TV network that may have an even more difficult task than bringing hockey’s crown back to Philly, and that is toppling the right-wing ratings champ, the Fox News Channel. The Snider-funded RightNetwork – with a looser approach to conservative topics, including a comedy show and a jocular front man in sitcom star Kelsey Grammer – is 
hoping to come to your cable box as early as this summer. Snider – whose investment in RightNetwork is personal and not linked to his role as chairman of Comcast-Spectacor, which already owns the locally popular Comcast Sportsnet on cable as well as the Flyers, 76ers and the Wachovia Center – was not available for an interview. But he had earlier posted a statement about RightNetwork. “We’re creating a welcome place for millions and millions of Americans who’ve been looking for an entertainment network and media channel that reflects their point of view,” Snider said. “RightNetwork will be the perfect platform to entertain, inform and connect with the American majority about what’s right in the world.” MORE
PREVIOUSLY: Spectacor Sports Baron Ed Snider Is Funding The Movement To Save The War
PREVIOUSLY: Not many Philadelphians even know about Ed Snider’s politics, because most of the time we didn’t have to. But he’s quite far to the political right, a devoted acolyte of the late conservative icon Ayn Rand, funding an institute based on her principles and giving speeches about her. (A Philadelphia Magazine profile of Snider said he won’t read anything in the Inquirer except 
for the sports sections because the paper’s too liberal for him.) Fair enough, but in the last two years Snider has veered off. Even though his beloved Rand did not believe in pre-emptive war, Snider is now a major financial support of continuing our very wrongheaded pre-emptive war in Iraq and sending new storm clouds over its neighbor, Iran. According to numerous news accounts, Snider is a leading donor to the group Freedom’s Watch, which is spending millions (here’s the repulsive part I mentioned up top) promoting its lethal policies in the Middle East and right-wing candidates like Sarah Palin and John McCain who support that agenda. MORE