Now the two are joining forces.

   The duo announced that Fox News Radio would become Clear Channel’s primary national news service for more than 100 of its news and talk stations in a five-year deal that starts in 2005.

   Fox’s service will deliver what it calls general-interest news, including five-minute top-of-the-hour updates, and will of course feature the organization’s top TV talent.

  Under the deal, Fox News Radio will also have access to news produced by Clear Channel News Network, which features more than 500 local news reporters.

  The new deal immediately elevates Fox News Radio as a major player, competing directly with Viacom’s CBS Radio and Disney’s ABC Radio, which will probably end up being dropped by the Clear Channel stations that now carry it.

  ABC Radio still remains dominant, and will even after the deal is in place, with more than 2,500 stations still carrying it, even if its dropped by all the Clear Channel stations.

    Clear Channel Radio and Fox News Radio hope to have more than 500 Fox News Radio affiliates by mid-2005. Right at the deal’s outset, Fox News Radio will have 37 Clear Channel stations in the country’s top-40 markets, in additional to several hundred more in mid-size and smaller markets.

   The Wall Street Journal reports ABC Radio’s Paul Harvey and Sean Hannity talk shows, which air on Clear Channel stations, will not be affected by this new deal.

   The alliance between Fox and Clear Channel will most certainly incite the worries of liberals, who see both as bastions of right-wing political beliefs. But whether the alliance floods the radio airwaves with yet more conservative viewpoints won't become apparent for some time. 
   Both Fox and Clear Channel deny any political agenda in the alliance, citing rather the opportunity to provide listeners with more choices in their news. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.