What’s stopping you now, Rupert?

Mar 4th, 2023 | By
Category: Notes and Comment Blog

Andrew Sullivan on Murdoch and Fox:

The great and obvious flaw in the political right’s legitimate criticism of mainstream media bias is that the most dishonest, cynical, postmodern, post-truth, “everything-is-power” media enterprise is Fox News. 

You only have to watch it for a few minutes to immediately grasp this, which is why most visitors from other democratic countries are shocked that it exists at all, when they see it.

Same.

But it’s rare to get real, actionable, behind-the-scenes proof of the deception, and thanks to the Dominion lawsuit, we have it. It will be important to watch the trial, of course, and see how Fox tries to counter the specific claims. But it seems indisputable to me that many Fox journalists absolutely knew they were peddling lies without any foundation, from top to bottom, and broadcast them anyway for the sole purpose of ratings and money. 

Well, look at it this way – doing things for the sole purpose of money is a form of politics, and doing things for other purposes, like getting the truth out there, is also a form of politics, so it all evens out.

It’s a pretty simple and old-as-time story of corruption. After their own election analysts called Arizona for Biden, the brass immediately understood that if they remained true to even the most cursory journalistic standards, their ratings and revenue would take a huge hit.

So they lied and lied and lied, knowing they were doing it.

And the topic they were lying about was not some minor culture-war controversy, or some genuinely vexing congeries of electoral glitches that could be aired out. It was the core foundation of democracy itself — the basic public legitimacy of our elections, the charge that the fraud was “massive” and comprehensive and that democracy was over. Rupert Murdoch decided to throw the full weight of his media empire to give this lie oxygen — and thereby helped foment an armed insurrection against the peaceful transfer of power. 

And the continuing belief of around half the population that Murdoch’s lies are truth.

Then the continuing bullshit: “I would have liked us to be stronger in denouncing [the election lie] in hindsight,” he says at one point. Well, what’s stopping you now, Rupert? Cat still got your tongue? Can’t get booked on your own network to say this? The rank pusillanimity and shamelessness of it all.

…

What was Murdoch’s motive in all this? Money. That’s it. Money. Murdoch’s value above all values. A man with something like $8 billion to his name in his nineties still needs more. Always more. He needs it so much he prioritized it over the most rudimentary requirements of ethical journalism and, yes, democratic citizenship. He fomented an attack on the very base of our system of government because he still believes he is not rich enough. And he is utterly candid about this. Asked why Fox continued to feature loony Mike Lindell on the air, “Murdoch testified that Lindell ‘pays us a lot of money’ in advertising. And when asked why Fox continues to give a platform to Lindell, Murdoch agreed that ‘it is not red or blue, it is green.’” 

Money money money, it’s a rich man’s world.

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