Day: 3/5/2021

Fox News CEO Murdoch Admits that the Network Opposes Biden – For Ratings

Posted by on March 5, 2021 at 1:39 pm. 18 Comments :

When Fox News launched twenty-six years ago, its mission was to advance the interests of conservatives and Republicans, and to serve as a partisan counterweight to credible news enterprises and honest journalists. While that was no secret, it’s founders – right-wing newspaper magnate Rupert Murdoch and GOP media consultant Roger Ailes – pretended to be “fair and balanced,” a slogan that falsely implied that other news operations were not (and which Fox ditched four years ago).

Fox News, Joe Biden

This week Rupert’s son, Lachlan Murdoch, who is now the network’s CEO, spoke at a Morgan Stanley investor conference where he said the quiet parts out loud. Apparently, in the Era of Trump and QAnon, it is no longer necessary to veil their biases in cheesy slogans. Murdoch said that…

“‘The main beneficiary of the Trump administration from a ratings point of view was MSNBC … and that’s because they were the loyal opposition,’ Murdoch said of the rival cable network. ‘That’s what our job is now with the Biden administration, and you’ll see our ratings really improve from here.'” […]

“‘Seventy-five million people voted for a Republican president, sometimes in spite of his personality at times,’ Murdoch said. ‘That’s what we represent. We’re going to stick to the center-right. That’s where our audience is.'”

Murdoch was obviously making excuses for the fact that, since the election last November, Fox News has slipped to third place in the cable news wars, behind MSNBC and CNN. Rachel Maddow is now the number one program in all of cable, not just cable news:

However, Murdoch’s explanation is peculiar in that he is also admitting that Fox News is “the loyal opposition” to the the administration of President Joe Biden. That’s wholly inappropriate from a journalistic ethics standpoint. Plus, it implies that they were affirmatively supporting Donald Trump for the past four years. Of course, anyone with a functioning cerebrum knew this, but it was rarely stated explicitly in public by Fox News executives.

What’s more, Murdoch is also saying that the reasons for his network’s blatant bias is for ratings. That’s also improper in the news business, where truth is the standard to which honest journalists aspire. Truth, of course, was the first casualty of Fox’s mangling of the reporter’s craft.

And as if that weren’t bad enough, Murdoch went on to concede the repugnant nature of Trump’s personality, or lack thereof. Yet he is still supporting him because of the voters he hopes to keep as viewers. Murdoch outright slams Trump’s noxious demeanor and, in the same sentence, declares that that’s what Fox News represents, and will continue doing so.

The position that Murdoch is taking is not acceptable for any enterprise that purports to be in the news business. And while he seemingly spoke for MSNBC, NBC didn’t appreciate that presumptuousness:

“A spokesperson for NBCUniversal News Group, which includes NBC News and MSNBC, said in response that ‘our role, and the role of any legitimate news organization — whether it includes an ‘opinion section’ or not — is to hold power to account, regardless of party.'”

And therein lies the difference between Fox News and its competitors. While other news networks may have opinions, they are based on facts and applied uniformly. At Fox News their overt negativity is always aimed the Democrats and the liberals whom they regard as enemies (as conveniently illustrated by Tucker Carlson) this week. Fox’s extreme political prejudice has even irritated other members of the Murdoch family. Lachlan’s big brother James complained about the “toxic” politics practiced by Fox News:

“Those outlets that propagate lies to their audience have unleashed insidious and uncontrollable forces that will be with us for years. […] Spreading disinformation – whether about the election, public health or climate change – has real world consequences.”

That pretty much says it all. And it comes from a source that is embedded well inside the Fox bubble. Unfortunately, James has nothing to do with the network any more, other than being a shareholder. But when Daddy Murdoch is “off the air” that may change. And then, so may Fox.

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Also, Be sure to visit and follow News Corpse on Instagram. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fox News Projection: Tucker Carlson Rants Incoherently About ‘Fearful’ Liberals

Posted by on March 5, 2021 at 11:06 am. 5 Comments :

Concluding a week wherein Fox News was obsessively consumed with their contrived “cancel culture” outrages over Mr. Potato Head and Dr. Seuss, their star primetime bloviator, Tucker Carlson, unleashed a sweaty assault on the liberals he despises. Unsurprisingly, it revealed more about himself than his targets.

Fox News, Tucker Carlson

The theme of Carlson’s psycho-sermon (video below) was that “Modern liberalism is not a coherent worldview […] It’s a deeply unhappy, high-strung personality type.” Anyone who has watched more than a few minutes of Carlson’s program recognizes that this is pure projection. It is also an accurate description of modern rightists as represented by Donald Trump, the Republican Party, and most of the talent(less) on Fox News. Carlson led off his rant by inventing a reality wherein…

“Liberals are a fearful group. The list of things American liberals are afraid of can fill an entire shelf of volumes. It would make an amusing reference set: The Encyclopedia of Liberal Neuroses Unabridged. Absolutely everything upsets liberals, agitates them, and inflames their allergies. Nature itself is a terrifying experience for liberals because they can’t control it.”

Really? If fear and anger are what’s triggering Carlson, he’s missing the real world by a light year or two. It isn’t liberals who have been whining about toys and children’s books for a solid week. It isn’t liberals who censured their own party members for thinking independently. It isn’t liberals who attended CPAC (the Conservative Political Action Cult), and cheered a hysterically angry and frightened Trump harangue. It’s obviously Carlson and his confederates who are upset, agitated, and inflamed, by anything and everything that even mildly criticizes their precious wingnut dogma. But Carlson really skidded off the tracks when he declared that…

“A lot of liberals were certain that March 4, was the day the right-wing revolution would finally begin. March 4, they believed, with something called ‘QAnon Inauguration Day.’ What is QAnon Inauguration Day? We have no idea, and we don’t know anyone who does.”

To be clear, Carlson is admitting that he’s an ignorant dickwad who has no comprehension of current events. That’s a distinct liability for someone on what purports to be a “news” network. He then goes on to describe how the crackpot QAnon conspiracy theory that he never heard of was actually very well known and even warned about by Republicans in Congress. Yet somehow, Carlson – and everyone he knows – never heard of it.

Carlson also belittles the efforts of law enforcement and the National Guard, who prevented additional violence by the StormTrumpers in the days following the January 6th Trump Insurrection. He likens the National Guard to martinets of third-world tyrannical regimes. Is that his way of thanking them for their service?

Carlson suggests that providing security in the face of credible threats, validated by the FBI and Capitol Police, means that the concept of ruling by the consent of the governed is obsolete and anti-democratic. He believes that members of Congress should remain vulnerable to attacks by radical white nationalists or they aren’t really representing their constituents.

That’s really the bottom line for Carlson. He’s fearful and angry that he won’t be able to use force and threats to advance his racist ideology. And somehow Fox News continues to allow him to air this crap.

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Also, Be sure to visit and follow News Corpse on Instagram. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.