Advertising Age (subscription) takes us behind the scenes during a FOX News presentation to potential advertisers, where the atmosphere is as full of hype as its programming.

Fox and the rest of the cable and broadcast networks are getting ready to sell their advertising space for the new TV season, which traditionally begins in the fall.

The presentation bashes the competition in pursuit of non-news budgets, “A&E, they’ve gone from high brow to unibrow,” jokes Kevin Brown, Fox’s vice president for East Coast sales. “CNN used to be known as the ‘crisis news network.’ We’ve broken that deadlock.” He continues to detail ratings highs on non-political stories such as the Scott Peterson verdict and the Asian tsunami, but adds that the death of Pope John Paul II was an exception.

“And why not the pope story?” Keeshan asks.

“It’s not a fast-moving story,” responds Rittenberg.

No, it fairly crawled, like my skin does when I think of FOX News and all those affluent households with it blaring away in the background.

On one slide, titled “Who’s Hot/Who’s Not for Upscale Delivery,” Fox News claims to be up 85% in households (adults ages 25 to 54) with income of more than $100,000 during prime time. According to the slide, CNN was up 32%, while ESPN and Comedy Central were down 5%, and Discovery and TLC were down 10% and 43%, respectively.

…Some PHD executives are reluctant to accept some of the arguments made, particularly since figures are from the fourth quarter 2004, which included the presidential election, a particularly good time for the channel…

Rittenberg disputes spinning the numbers. “We’re fortunate that most of the information shows us in a good light. No one’s saying our numbers suck,” he says, adding that first quarter 2005 also compares favorably with first quarter 2004.

Maybe your numbers don’t suck FOX, but your so-called news really blows.