First, its not surprising. Anyone with honesty intentions could tell the Republicans were going to be the big winners in this election cycle which would spur more conservative individuals to watch the results than liberals.
Second, Fox really did an excellent job. Their anchors were not talking heads but more of the typical journalist. They both did a good job of asking legitimate questions to the more partisan guests they had on, such as pressing Huckabee and Palin on where they think common ground can be found. They did have special segments with their typical talking heads but they were relatively short and outside of O'Riely going after the one guy in Florida they weren't THAT slanted or obviously bashing of segments.
Third, the setup was very aesthically pleasing. Normally I find myself spending more time on CNN than Fox on election night as I enjoyed their program and look, but this year the more they push all these new gadgets and shiny bells and whistles the more obnoxious it is to watch and I found myself watching fox's simple but efficient layout more often.
Fourth, MSNBC was a joke and it was obvious they would be as soon as they announced their talking heads as being the anchors. Can you imagine the outcry if Fox had Hannity, O'Reily, Beck, and Coulter being their election night hosts? They were rude, condenscending, and blatantly biased the entire time. It was really, really striking looking at some of the things going on over there and comparing it ot the other two. Especially Fox when its so often getting tons more flack for this kind of thing than MSNBC gets.
