Bret Baier Profile…

The New York Times’ Jeremy W. Peters profiles FNC’s Bret Baier…

Indeed, Mr. Baier has experience in directly affecting the trajectory of the campaign. An interview Mr. Baier conducted with a rattled and irritable Mr. Romney in November on his show “Special Report With Bret Baier” turned out to be a defining moment in the campaign, leading to a wholesale change in the candidate’s media strategy. Mr. Romney took offense to Mr. Baier’s line of questioning about his reversal on certain social issues — questions that had become routine on the campaign trail — and scolded Mr. Baier, saying, “This is an unusual interview.”

Mr. Romney’s response was so widely ridiculed by critics who complained that he had become accustomed to only doing softball interviews that the former governor started making himself widely available to the press.

The moment underscored Fox News’s unique role in the political process. Viewed by its loyal audience — the largest in cable news by far — as a conservative alternative to media that skews left, it has to walk a careful line. It does not want to appear as needlessly rough on Republicans and alienate those viewers. But the journalists there, who resent the network’s reputation as a mouthpiece of the political right, also do not want to leave any doubt that they are being tough.

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