Bill O’Reilly

Rupert Murdoch Won’t Apologize For Racism

Posted by on February 24, 2009 at 12:46 pm. 1 Comments :

The overtly racist cartoon published last week in the New York Post stands as evidence of the intractable racism that still infects the right-wing media.

Today, Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of the Post as well as its parent News Corp, issued what he regards as an apology:

“Last week, we made a mistake. We ran a cartoon that offended many people. Today I want to personally apologize to any reader who felt offended, and even insulted.”

“Over the past couple of days, I have spoken to a number of people and I now better understand the hurt this cartoon has caused. At the same time, I have had conversations with Post editors about the situation and I can assure you – without a doubt – that the only intent of that cartoon was to mock a badly written piece of legislation. It was not meant to be racist, but unfortunately, it was interpreted by many as such.”

So Murdoch spoke to a number of people and now he understands the hurt that was caused. But he still is only apologizing to those who “felt offended” – as if they were responsible for the pain. What’s more, he characterizing those who were hurt as simpletons who misinterpreted the intent of the cartoon.

What Murdoch does not do is apologize for racism. His new found understanding doesn’t include a grasp of the hatred that is embodied in the insults and violence expressed in the Post’s cartoon. He doesn’t comprehend that his so-called apology has little meaning when it exists in a vacuum unsupported by his actions. After all, he has done and said nothing about his editor’s defense of the cartoon. Col Allan, in his response to the controversy, complained that…

“…there are some in the media and in public life who have had differences with The Post in the past — and they see the incident as an opportunity for payback. To them, no apology is due […and that the cartoon…] is a clear parody of a current news event.”

Apparently it was not so clear as Mr. Allan thinks. If Murdoch has to emerge from his lair a full week after publication, what is clear is that there has been public repulsion to the cartoon that is not going away quickly enough for the media mogul. But he probably won’t have to worry about business at the Post (Well, not more than usual since it has lost millions annually for over a decade). His readers have risen to the occasion to support the cartoon and its message. The vast majority of the comments attached to the online apology either defend the cartoon or berate Murdoch for apologizing. And amidst this rush to embrace hate are comments like this one:

New York Post Cartoon Comment

That comment is representative of many of the comments posted on the paper’s web site. Who will apologize for that?

Murdoch’s bully boy, Bill O’Reilly, has repeatedly hammered web sites like Daily Kos and the Huffington Post for what he says is hate speech. He attributes every comment on those sites to the name at the top of the page. In reality it is just an open forum where people speak for themselves. More often than not, objectionable content is quickly smacked down by other commenters. But in O’Reilly’s mind it is still the site’s responsibility. So I wonder if he will show some consistency and condemn the New York Post for comments like the one above. Especially since it is not an aberration, but the consensus.

Actually, I don’t wonder at all. In fact I wouldn’t be too surprised if Osinko turned out to be O’Reilly himself. After all, it was O’Reilly who ventured into Harlem and…

“…couldn’t get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia’s restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it’s run by blacks, primarily black patronship […] There wasn’t one person in Sylvia’s who was screaming, “M-Fer, I want more iced tea.'”

Osinko – O’Reilly / O’Reilly – Osinko — Hmmm…..

New York Post Cartoon

Racist New York Post Continues A Murdoch Theme

Posted by on February 18, 2009 at 12:30 pm. 3 Comments :

In today’s New York Post, and on their website, is a cartoon that shows two cops shooting an ape and saying “They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill.” I’m not going to help the Post out by linking to it. You can find it on your own if you’re interested. But here’s my response:

New York Post Parody

I suppose there will be apologists for the Post who will deny the obvious racist intent, but it’s hard to find another interpretation when the Stimulus Bill is so closely associated with President Obama and the cartoon depicts the author as a dead ape. In the best light, it is still an overtly hostile response to the serious issues facing our nation.

It is not however the first time a Rupert Murdoch property “joked” about assassinating Obama. Last year Fox News contributor Liz Trotta said:

“…and now we have what some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Osama …uh… Obama … well, both if we could.”

Very funny, huh? And then there was the time Bill O’Reilly declared that he didn’t want to “lynch” Michelle Obama. That was considerate of him.

Bill O'Reilly's Lynching Party

This recurring theme of racism and violence directed at the President and his family is just more proof that News Corp is not a legitimate news enterprise and should not be taken seriously or supported by consumers.

Bill O’Reilly Can’t Get No Respect

Posted by on February 17, 2009 at 12:43 pm. 2 Comments :

In a segment preposterously misnamed “Reality Check,” Bill O’Reilly has once again tread on territory that only highlights his hypocrisy and dishonesty.

For months O’Reilly has berated General Electric and its CEO, Jeffrey Immelt, for the poor performance of the stock. O’Reilly, with an undisguised disgust, asserts that Immelt is a “despicable human being” who should not be running any business due to his incompetence. But O’Reilly conveniently neglects to mention that News Corp, the parent of his employer, Fox News, has performed even worse in the stock market, presumably placing Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes lower on the scale of competence than Immelt. We already know they are more despicable.

Yesterday, O’Reilly attacked GE and Immelt again, citing a Barron’s article with the results of their survey of the 100 Most Respected Companies in the World. The article noted that GE had slipped from its top 10 position in each of the last four years (#1 in 2005), to #43 this year. O’Reilly summarizes saying…

“In short, Barron’s is saying Immelt is a disaster. But the fact that man has remained in his position for eight years says our financial system is rigged and Americans should be very wary about buying stocks in this environment.”

Actually, Barron’s isn’t saying anything. It is a survey of the opinions of money managers, most of whom have been severely burned by the recent market collapse. Even so, if Immelt is a disaster for placing his company at #43 out of 100 companies worldwide (not bad, really), what does that make Murdoch and Ailes for not making the list at all? It certainly makes O’Reilly a propagator of misinformation for failing to tell the whole story.

Perhaps worse than O’Reilly’s faulty reporting is his admonition that Americans “be very wary about buying stocks.” Not that that isn’t always safe advice, but O’Reilly is associating it with what he calls a “rigged” system. He is using fear to dissuade the folks from investing in an already troubled market. The problem here is not whether his financial analysis is sound, it is his hypocrisy. He often assails others for bad-mouthing America, which he asserts will do harm to the nation. But he doesn’t have any problem with his own rhetorical assault, which if heeded, could worsen or prolong our current economic crisis.

Why does Bill O’Reilly hate America? Maybe because most of the country has no respect for him whatsoever.

Update: Immelt has declined to take bonuses for 2008 due to the performance of the company. I wonder if Murdoch or Ailes will do the same.

Glenn Beck And The Jeffrey Immelt Hysteria

Posted by on February 7, 2009 at 1:25 am. 8 Comments :

This morning Barack Obama introduced the members of a newly formed Economic Recovery Advisory Board (ERAB). It is a fairly diverse group ideologically, and most people will have both praise and criticism for the Board’s makeup. One of the members, however, has already set off a nerve in what passes for Glenn Beck’s brain.

Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO of General Electric, is a long-time target of Bill O’Reilly’s wrath. O’Reilly has called him a “despicable human being” and has threatened to “get” him. Now that Beck has joined O’Reilly at Fox News, he is standing in line to get in some lumps of his own.

On his program today, Beck started out ranting that the Obama administration has merged with GE, simply because Immelt is a member of the ERAB. He is not even the chair of the Board (that would be Paul Volcker) which has 15 other members. And the Board is only an advisory group, so they have no policy making responsibility. Nevertheless, this is a merger that spells doom for America because Immelt is just such an evil individual in the demented mind of Beck.

Then, like O’Reilly, Beck demonstrates his brazen dishonesty by railing about how Immelt is a failure as the head of GE. Beck’s proof is that GE’s stock has declined precipitously in the past year (what stock hasn’t?). What Beck does not say, though he surely must know, is that Beck’s employer, News Corp, has fallen an almost identical 65% in the past year. So if Immelt is incompetent, then so is Rupert Murdoch.

Now, here is where Beck’s hysteria goes into overdrive. His in-studio guest was Thomas Borelli, a professional mercenary in the hire of rightist corporate pillagers. He is a principle of the Free Enterprise Action Fund – an investment vehicle described on its web site as…

“….a shareholder activist mutual fund (Ticker: FEAOX) that seeks long-term capital appreciation while aggressively challenging CEOs who use shareholder assets to advance the liberal political agenda which threatens long-term shareholder value, the free enterprise system and individual liberty.”

The acknowledged mission of this phony fund is to harass executives at shareholder meetings. The vast majority of the press releases on their web site are missives directed at companies that dare to oppose global warming. Borelli’s partner is Steven Milloy, a climate change denier and a Fox News contributor whose beat is Junk Science. The two of them used to work for Phillip Morris where they fabricated propaganda that dismissed the health hazards of smoking. Now they co-manage this socially irresponsible (and fiscally failing) mutual fund, one of whose top holdings is GE.

Beck and Borelli blathered on about the bankruptcy of Obama’s budget stimulus plan, and Immelt’s suspicious participation, as if either of these economic prodigies had anything useful to add. For the most part, this was an outstanding demonstration of how Fox News casts its programming with ringers who have no real expertise in the issues, but are adept at the art of disinformation. The most interesting part of the discussion was simply the fact that Beck found someone as ignorant and intellectually corrupt as himself to play with.

Update, 7/31/2010: The Free Enterprise Action Fund appears to have been transformed into the Congressional Effect Fund (CEFFX). The mission of this fund may be even nuttier than it’s predecessor:

The fund’s principal investment strategy is designed to invest in the S&P 500 on days when Congress is out of session (not meeting) and to invest in interest-bearing domestic securities or to otherwise be out of the stock market when Congress is in session (meeting). The Advisor believes that the investment methodology minimizes investment exposure and risk when Congress is in session, while fully investing in the S&P 500 when Congress is out of session.

What monumental ignoramus would invest in this? Other than a Glenn Beck viewer who is tired of being scammed by gold dealers, that is.

The New Face Of The Republican Party

Posted by on February 4, 2009 at 2:03 pm. 1 Comments :

It is now all of two weeks into the administration of Barack Obama, and already the media is heralding the end of the honeymoon. Considering that on the day of the inauguration, Chris Wallace of Fox News suggested that Obama wasn’t actually president at all because of the mis-articulation of Chief Justice Roberts during the oath, I’m not certain that the honeymoon didn’t end before it ever began.

The failure of the Obama presidency should be welcome news to some of his critics. Rush Limbaugh confessed to hoping for such an outcome. That admission created something of a stir, but the result seems to be that Limbaugh has emerged as the new leader of the Republican Party. He has taken his place at the top of the Party’s hierarchy and even allows members of Congress an audience wherein they can profess their allegiance and kiss his ass ring.

Obama recently told a gathering of Congress critters that “You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done.” Obama was criticized by some Democrats because these remarks just serve to elevate Limbaugh by taking him on. I agree with that analysis, but not that it deserves criticism. It can only help Democrats to elevate Limbaugh and make him the logo of the Republican brand.

The rest of the field isn’t much better than Limbaugh. Sarah Palin still pokes her perky head up every few days to keep her name in the news. And Joe the Plumber … er … journalist … er … political strategist just seems to keep finding new ways to embarrass himself and the Party he has come to represent.

GOP alums aren’t helping either. George Bush has moved into Dick Cheney’s secret, undisclosed location and has not been seen or heard since just after Obama’s inauguration (on second thought, maybe that’s how he’s helping). Cheney, on the other hand, has emerged from his lair wearing a sandwich board that says “REPENT! The end is NEAR!”

And, as always, Fox News remains the Public Relations arm of the Republican Party. Glenn Beck has arrived and is settling in comfortably with daily derision directed at Obama and his still forming team. Bill O’Reilly has declared war on the New York Times, presumably because he can’t keep waging his war on Christmas in February – and he must have a war raging at all times. And Chris Wallace, given a brief ten minutes with the President, uses part of it to ask if he is too thin-skinned because he told a joke about Fox News. Obama responded by stating the obvious:

“I think it’s fair to say that I don’t always get my most favorable coverage on Fox, but that’s part of how a democracy is supposed to work. We’re not all supposed to be in lock step here.”

The rightist echo chamber has already seized on these remarks asserting that Obama has insinuated that all of the media, other than Fox News, are in lock-step with the White House. Of course that is not what he said at all, and just watching the various news networks would reveal how shallow that analysis is. What is inescapable is the fact that Fox alone has a lock-step ideology. Despite false claims of liberal bias, other networks have much more diverse programming and personalities. CNN has Lou Dobbs, MSNBC has Joe Scarborough.

Only Fox has a 100% ideologically pure schedule. And it is Fox that is home to the Limbaughs, Palins, Wurzlebachers, Becks, Hannitys, O’Reillys, etc., who, due to the absence of real political leadership, are the new faces of the Republican Party.

The Fox News Conservative Book Promotion Channel

Posted by on February 3, 2009 at 2:42 am. 3 Comments :

Anyone who watches Fox News with any frequency is painfully aware that it is little more than a marketplace for rightist propaganda and rancor. But lately, I noticed another kind of hucksterism that is rampant on the network. Several of their regular anchors and contributors are identified as authors in the graphics at the bottom of the screen. This happens often enough that I began to wonder just how widespread this practice of co-promotion of TV and publishing was. As it turns out, it is pretty damn widespread. If you were to populate your library with books by Fox News personalities, you would have to purchase all of these – to start:

Bill O’Reilly
A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity
Culture Warrior
The O’Reilly Factor
Kids Are Americans Too
The O’Reilly Factor for Kids
Who’s Looking Out for You?
The No Spin Zone

Dick Morris
Fleeced
Outrage
Rewriting History
Power Plays: Win or Lose
Because He Could
Off with Their Heads
Condi vs. Hillary: The Next Great Presidential Race

Michele Malkin
Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild
In Defense of Internment
Invasion

Mike Straka
Grrr! Celebrities Are Ruining Our Country

Sean Hannity
Deliver Us from Evil
Let Freedom Ring

Glenn Beck
The Christmas Sweater
An Inconvenient Book
The Real America

John Gibson
The War on Christmas
Hating America
In Defense of Religion

Laura Ingraham
Power to the People
Shut Up and Sing
The Hillary Trap

Major Garrett
The Enduring Revolution: The Inside Story of the Republican Ascendancy and Why It Will Continue
The 15 Biggest Lies in Politics

Ann Coulter
Guilty
Slander
Godless
Treason
If Democrats Had Any Brains, They’d Be Republicans
How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must)
High Crimes and Misdemeanors

Bernie Goldberg
A Slobbering Love Affair
Crazies to the Left of Me, Wimps to the Right
110 People Who Are Screwing Up America
Bias
Arrogance

James Rosen
The Strong Man

Greta Van Susteren
My Turn at the Bully Pulpit

Updated to add:
Fox News Washington, D.C., deputy managing editor, Bill Sammon
At Any Cost: How Al Gore Tried to Steal the Election
Fighting Back: The War on Terrorism from Inside the White House
Misunderestimated: The President Battles Terrorism, Media Bias and the Bush Haters
Strategery: How George W. Bush Is Defeating Terrorists, Outwitting Democrats, and Confounding the Mainstream Media.
The Evangelical President: George Bush’s Struggle to Spread a Moral Democracy Throughout the World

This a wholly unprecedented marketing partnership between a so-called news organization and a right-wing political crusade. The books being plugged by the Fox spokesmodels are hardcore partisan tracts that all reflect the same regressive ideology. They have implemented a campaign that blankets their airwaves with pitches for published opinion pieces that are mostly dishonest, manipulative, and overtly hostile.

So where is the other side in this debate? Of course there are no anchors or hosts that lean even modestly left on the “fair and balanced” network. But even amongst their pseudo-liberal commentators like Kirsten Powers, Bob Beckel, or the recently departed Alan Colmes, you would be hard pressed to turn up a handful of literary works. Even so, I have never seen any of their limited line advertised on the air. Conversely, grousers like O’Reilly hawk their books on every broadcast. And you’ll find that appearances from the Coulters and Goldbergs increase coincident with the release of each new product. As for the other networks, there are a few authors scattered about, like Lou Dobbs, but the shelf space they would consume would be a mere fraction of the Fox Book Club.

The truly astonishing thing about all of this is that anyone would want to read (or watch) any of these pathetic characters to begin with. They represent a collection of the world’s most ill informed, logic deprived, truth averse losers in modern media. Bernie Goldberg, the fired CBS alum, is an unrepentant propagandist who writes books about media bias. Well, I guess he should know. Major Garrett, Fox’s White House correspondent, presciently penned a tome with the subtitle of “The Inside Story of the Republican Ascendancy and Why It Will Continue.” That was published just prior to the Democratic takeover of Congress in 2006, followed up in 2008 with additional congressional gains and an historic White House victory. Good call, Major

But my favorite is the Clown Prince of Fox, Dick Morris. His 2006 book, “Condi vs. Hillary,” predicts the prospects for the commencing presidential election. Here is a sample of his astute analysis from the introduction to the book:

[T]here is no doubt that Hillary Clinton is on a virtually uncontested trajectory to win the Democratic nomination and, very likely, the 2008 presidential election. She has no serious opposition in her party […]

The stakes are high. In 2008, no ordinary white male Republican candidate will do. Forget Bill Frist, George Allen, and George Pataki. Hillary would easily beat any of them. Rudy Giuliani and John McCain? Either of them could probably win, but neither will ever be nominated by the Republican Party.

So Morris got the Democratic nominee wrong. He got the Republican nominee wrong. And the Republican who Morris said could win if he were nominated actually lost. It is on the strength of this sort of analysis that Morris gets asked back to provide additional insights.

The truth is, it doesn’t matter on Fox (or almost any of the TV news nets) if you’re wrong. The only thing that matters is that you faithfully regurgitate the conservative dogma and talking points. If you do, then you will have a job for life, and your books, web sites, and other media spew will become part of the marketing machine that props up conservatism. It’s an elegantly parasitic relationship. TV exposure begets propaganda which begets book deals which begets TV exposure which begets propaganda, ad infinitum.

And at the center of it all is Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., a vertically integrated media empire that channels disinformation throughout it’s layers of television, radio, newspapers, magazine and book publishers, and the Internet. This complex web of entanglements insures multimedia distribution of the right wing’s political philosophy. Each props up the other to produce an architecture of lies in support of their lust for power and their Utopian dream for social Darwinism. Goebbels would have been proud.

Bill O’Reilly Fears Machines Destroying Our Children

Posted by on January 31, 2009 at 2:19 pm. 4 Comments :

A few days ago I wrote an article revealing that Bill O’Reilly Is Scared Out Of His Mind. Well, he is still trembling with fright, this time over the rampaging demons that have possessed our computers and the Internet – and are coming after our kids. In his latest column he warns that…

“…the lives of younger Americans are changing drastically because of machines.”

Oh no! It’s the revenge of the machines. According to O’Reilly, kids don’t play sports anymore. There is no more softball or soccer or tennis. Just the dreaded machines from which they can experience “the thrill of victory without getting sweaty or bloody.” What’s the world coming to when we can’t see our children bleed?

O’Reilly contrasts this to his formative years when he grew up in a neighborhood that consisted of jocks and hoods. That sounds like a pretty stupid neighborhood. Apparently there were no scholars or artists like there were in my neighborhood. We also had jocks and hoods, but nobody cool wanted anything to do with them. O’Reilly goes on to describe how he hung out with the jocks, most of whom became prosperous adults, while the dope smoking hoods “bottomed out” or died. He must have forgotten about the “the former hippies running the crazy left media,” about whom he complained so bitterly just a few days ago. I presume that running the media is a fairly prosperous enterprise (just ask O’Reilly’s boss, Rupert Murdoch).

Fast forward to the present and you’ll catch O’Reilly comparing computer use to narcotics, and assigning all manner of contemporary ills to the scourge of electronica:

“I believe the long-term ramifications of cyberspace are enormous for the USA and for the world. You can see it in the current recession. Many folks are stunned when they lose their jobs. They simply don’t know what to do. A few days ago, a fired worker in Los Angeles murdered his wife and five kids before killing himself. Instead of starting over, the guy flipped out.”

That’s right – the recession and mass murder are somehow the fault of cyberspace. As proof that this is a problem unique to this modern age, O’Reilly compares it to the Great Depression when, in O’Reilly’s mind, there were no murders or other social maladies. One wonders how that economic collapse occurred at all, 75 years before there even was an Internet to bring down society. In the old days people loved poverty and behaved themselves. They were just a bunch of happy poor folks who played touch football in their former farmlands. Maybe that’s what they meant by the Dust Bowl. It’s only now that, as O’Reilly says:

“…kids and many adults are becoming hypnotized by a technological world that requires little accountability and massive escape possibilities.”

It’s funny that he doesn’t include television in that cabal of hypnotic evil. No one was ever bewitched by the Siren’s call of the cathode ray tube, were they? TV was never accused of sedating the population and promoting a trance-like ignorance, was it? It’s even funnier that he goes on to complain that people today are overly concerned with “individual pursuits” and have forsaken “civic responsibility.”

Wait a minute. Did I hear that right? Bill O’Reilly is preaching that we should be less concerned about the individual and more involved with the welfare of our neighbors. Or put another way, he’s advocating socialism and community organizing, just like the rest of the radical leftist loons who control the media. Who’da thought?

Bill O’Reilly Is Scared Out Of His Mind

Posted by on January 23, 2009 at 2:15 pm. 2 Comments :

All the symptoms are present. The shameless self-glorification. The lashing out at perceived enemies. The mangling of reality. The desperate grasping for affirmation. Bill O’Reilly is scared out of his mind. To be a little more accurate, I should break that sentence apart: Bill O’Reilly is scared – and – Bill O’Reilly is out of his mind.

His latest journey into bombast is titled, “The Collapse of the Left-Wing Press.” In it he makes claims that illustrate the severity of his tunnel-blindness. As evidence of this imagined collapse, O’Reilly cites the financial misfortunes of newspapers like the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Never mind the fact that the entire newspaper business has been hit by a perfect storm of a declining economy, an anemic advertising environment, and competition from the Internet, O’Reilly also ignores the troubles of conservative publications like the bankrupt Tribune Company. And he predictably attacks NBC/GE. They are a favorite target of his due to Keith Olbermann, who has challenged the Factor on the air and in the ratings. O’Reilly’s dementia produced this babble:

“General Electric, which owns NBC, has taken a sharp turn to the left in its corporate philosophy, while at the same time it watched its stock price decline from about 50 dollars a share to around $13. The fact that CEO Jeffrey Immelt still has his job ranks up there with the miracle of the US Airways water landing.”

First of all, GE is the largest defense contractor in the world. The notion that its corporate philosophy has turned sharply left is simply delusional. It is the sort of multinational conglomerate that benefits most from rightist politics and policies. What’s more, it’s the sort of patriotic institution that O’Reilly would ordinarily praise for supplying our soldiers with arms and equipment. All it takes for O’Reilly to turn on them is a cable network pundit mockingly calling him the “Worst Person in the World.”

Now, let’s take a look at the stock performance of News Corp, the parent of O’Reilly’s employer, Fox News. It has suffered an almost identical percentage decline from about $25 dollars a share to around $7. By O’Reilly’s own standard it is a miracle that Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes still have their jobs.

Next O’Reilly seeks to explain why America voted for Barack Obama and Democrats in congress. Essentially he boils it down to the economy, but hastens to add that the country is actually more conservative, the election results notwithstanding:

“Despite the power shift in Washington, America remains a traditional country that largely rejects big government and radical social change. The former hippies running the crazy left media will never get that.”

So the people didn’t really vote for change. It was just some sort of mass hysteria brought on by the reefer madness emanating from “Abbie Hoffman wannabes” in the press. O’Reilly’s Talking Points Memo last night went even further, asserting that the far-left media advocates a socialist economy and is filled with hate:

“And the hate the far-left media traffics in has alienated many folks. I mean, the disrespect shown to President Bush is disgraceful, and most decent people know it.”

Apparently O’Reilly doesn’t read Foxnews.com – or News Corpse. Yesterday I documented some repulsive comments on the Fox web site that called Obama the anti-Christ and wished for his family to be burned alive. O’Reilly doesn’t seem to care about that disgraceful show of disrespect. And he has no claim to decency when he himself has said that law-abiding citizens exercising their First Amendment rights are worse than Nazis and the KKK.

All of this suggests that O’Reilly is desperately afraid. Why else would he feel the need to repeatedly fluff himself and his ratings? Why else would he need to maliciously attack the lurking enemies he imagines around every corner? Why would he find it necessary to construct false and misleading arguments against those shadows that torment him? It is fear that has consumed him and is now his most profound motivation. It’s a fear that has clouded a mind that wasn’t all that sharp to begin with. And now that mind is MIA.

The truly sad epilogue to this story is that he is not alone. It seems that the entirety of the Republican establishment media has decided on a strategy of shock and awe aimed at the new administration. There has been a concerted and coordinated effort launched before the echos of the inauguration speech have faded from the Capitol Mall. It’s purpose is to discredit and diminish Obama and his team prior to their having even done anything. As usual, Jon Stewart of the Daily Show has encapsulated this development perfectly.

Fox News: Want Terrorists In Your Back Yard?

Posted by on January 22, 2009 at 4:14 pm. NO Comments :

President Barack Obama signed an Executive Order today aimed at restoring the rule of law, as well as our nation’s commitment to human rights. He reiterates the message in his inaugural speech that we are not bound by “a false choice between our safety and our ideals.” The order provides for the…

“…closure of the Guantanamo detention center no later than one year from the date of the Order. Closure of the facility is the ultimate goal but not the first step. The Order establishes a review process with the goal of disposing of the detainees before closing the facility.”

Despite specifications that the Order be implemented in a manner that regards the welfare of the American people as the highest priority, Fox News via their Fox Forum has a posting that asks, “Would You Want Terrorists In Your Back Yard?” The blatant unfairness and imbalance of that question is typical of Fox News. Obviously, no one is proposing that the detainees be released into anyone’s petunia gardens. The Order requires a thorough review to determine how best to proceed toward a goal of bringing terrorists to justice and disposing of others appropriately.

It should be remembered that the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay have not been convicted of, or even charged with, any misdeeds. For justice to prevail, those who may be guilty must be arraigned and prosecuted so that they can be punished. The rest should have their cases reviewed to determine if they represent a threat, and then dealt with accordingly. Even POWs are eventually repatriated. The problem with this war is that the enemy is an amorphous cloud of evildoers that cannot be certifiably defeated. There will be no ceremony on the deck of a battleship where the enemy leader surrenders his sword. How long, then, should the U.S. incarcerate alleged combatants without even permitting them a defense? Obama’s EO puts an end to this quandary.

The question posed on the Fox Forum has inspired over 2,300 responses at the time of this writing. Some of them illustrate the sick and twisted pathology of Foxism. Bill O’Reilly has repeatedly condemned web sites like Daily Kos and the Huffington Post because he found a few repugnant remarks by anonymous commenters. He is apparently too stupid to understand that open forums sometimes result in expressions of free speech that are indefensible. So he blames the site and attributes the sentiments to its operators. This has led to his over-the-top assertions that Arianna Huffington and Markos Moulitsas are worse than the Nazis and the KKK.

Well now it’s time for O’Reilly to demonstrate his fairness and consistency. Comments on the Fox blog refer to Obama as a terrorist; as the anti-Christ; they wish for his family to be burned alive; they threaten assassination by invoking Lincoln’s fate at the Ford Theater. Does O’Reilly attribute those sentiments to Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch? Will he condemn Fox News for hosting these comments:

Tom BB: America’s enemies rejoice now around the world and in the US. Obama the terrorist is in charge.

Steven: Hell No! Obama is of the devil!

drwoo: MAY OBAMA’S WIFE AND KIDS BE THE FIRST TO BE BLOWN UP, BURNED ALIVE OR HAVE TO JUMP OUT OF A WINDOW ON THE 88TH FLOOR (SPLAT). MAY OBAMA REAP WHAT HE HAS SOWN> AMEN!!!

Jim: The Antichrist has arrived and is doing well in the White House. Say goodbye to what we all know as a free and God loving America.

Jim P: WHEN THE BOYS FROM GITMO GET HERE OBAMA WILL GIVE THEM WELFARE,SECTION 8 HOUSING AND EVERYTHING ELSE THE STUPID ASS PEOPLE WHO PUT HIM IN OFFICE GET. LET THEM LIVE IN DC. THEY WILL BLEND IN WITH THE REST OF THE DC RESIDENTS! HOPE ALL THE LOW LIFE AND WELFARE PEOPLE WHO VOTED FOR OBAMA ARE HAPPY. BY THE WAY, WHEN WILL THE TICKETS TO THE FORD THEATER GO ON SALE?

Don Brown: Obama needs to be checked to see if he has a 666 somewhere on his body.

To be clear, these examples are the bottom of the Fox barrel. But the vast majority of comments on the Fox Forum were in opposition to the closing of Guantanamo. What surprises me about that is the fierce lack of confidence that these people have in American ideals and law. Why don’t they believe that justice, if allowed to work, would not prevail? Why don’t they believe that American values would produce a just result? Why are they so dismissive of the Constitution and its capacity to bring about the right ends? It seems to me that they are decidedly skeptical as to the merits of our nation’s founding principles. Isn’t that, by definition, unpatriotic?

Personally, I don’t attribute the remarks of anonymous commenters to the whole of Fox News. The anchors and correspondents do just fine themselves incriminating the network with their prejudices and disinformation. The Fox blogging community simply reflects that bias. And O’Reilly is the leader of the pack. That’s why I don’t expect him to have the integrity to be consistent. He will neither repudiate these remarks, nor criticize Fox News for promoting them. And he won’t retract his condemnations of others whom he disparaged for doing the very same thing. That’s just the way he is. He’s a sanctimonious, hypocritical, demagogue, who is fixated on disseminating his agenda of lies. His audience has found him, and he has found his home in the arms of Rupert Murdoch. I’m sure they are all very happy together.

Changing Channels: Fox News In the Age Of Obama

Posted by on January 20, 2009 at 4:24 pm. 3 Comments :

In 1996 Rupert Murdoch hired Roger Ailes, a Republican media consultant, to build a new 24 hour cable news network. Fox News immediately went to work to disparage Democrats and liberals. They spent their early years mired in debt, losing $80-90 million annually. It was only Murdoch’s deep pockets that kept them out of bankruptcy. Still, they had some strategic success as they badgered Bill Clinton with Whitewater and Lewinsky, and they corralled Republican and evangelical voters so that George Bush and Karl Rove could reach them more easily.

However, it was during the Bush years that Fox News began to outperform the cable competition. CNN, HLN, and the launch of MSNBC diluted the non-rightist audience giving Fox a plurality of viewers and bragging rights for ratings victories. Fox enjoyed first shots at interviews and scoops from the administration and Congressional Republicans. That brought them greater influence and gratitude from the halls of power. In addition, the White House kept its TVs tuned to Fox, as well as those at Camp David, the Crawford ranch, and even on Air Force One. Vice-President Dick Cheney even had a travel directive that required that “all televisions [be] tuned to Fox News.” Woe to those staffers who failed in that duty.

There may never have been (and hopefully never again will be) such a close relationship between a news organization and a presidential administration. In the end, they were even trading places as if they were merely different departments of the same enterprise: When presidential advisor Karl Rove moved out of the White House to become a Fox News contributor, Fox anchor Tony Snow moved in to become Bush’s press secretary.

Going forward, Fox will find themselves on a new frontier. It is highly improbable that they will be the exclusive broadcaster in the White House of Barack Obama. Although, I certainly hope that the new administration will pay close attention to the spew emanating from Fox, I don’t expect them to be in cahoots. Murdoch and company are definitely going to lose some of their clout. There will be a new Chairman at the FCC, and a new position for a White House Technology advisor. These will be knowledgeable and independent people who will serve the public interest – for a change. Here is a sampling of the views of Fox News, and Big Media in general, from some senior members of the new administration:

President Obama: “In recent years, we have witnessed unprecedented consolidation in our traditional media outlets. Large mergers and corporate deals have reduced the number of voices and viewpoints in the media marketplace.”

Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State Designate: “There have been a lot of media consolidations in the last several years, and it is quite troubling. The fact is, most people still get their news from television, from radio, even from newspapers. If they’re all owned by a very small group of people – and particularly if they all have a very similar point of view – it really stifles free speech.”

Eric Holder, Attorney General Designate: “With the mainstream media somewhat cowered by conservative critics, and the conservative media disseminating the news in anything but a fair and balanced manner, and you know what I mean there, the means to reach the greatest number of people is not easily accessible.”

More President Obama: “I am convinced that if there were no Fox News, I might be two or three points higher in the polls. If I were watching Fox News, I wouldn’t vote for me, right? Because the way I’m portrayed 24/7 is as a freak! I am the latte-sipping, New York Times-reading, Volvo-driving, no-gun-owning, effete, politically correct, arrogant liberal. Who wants somebody like that?”

This can’t be good news for Fox News. But the network seems to be aware of the shifting landscape and has been preparing for battle. They signed new long-term contracts with Ailes, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity. They axed Hannity’s foil, Alan Colmes. They hired reinforcements like Mike Huckabee, Glenn Beck, and Judith Miller. Clearly they see trouble ahead and are responding by stocking their armory with ever more weapons of mass deception.

Unfortunately for Fox, forecasts are not rosy for the disinformation station. They are consistently the slowest growing cable news network, particularly in the all-important 25-54 demographic. They have the oldest skewing cable news audience. They are facing stiffer competition than ever, with the surging Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow’s record-breaking debut. The Fox News ratings crown was once unassailable. Today, while still maintaining their first place average, they often come in second and occasionally third. That was unthinkable two short years ago.

As for their future prospects, it is difficult to make a case for Fox to be optimistic. In addition to their recent ratings woes, they are entering a period wherein the American public may not appreciate a network that is hostile to a new president who is held in high regard. Obama is beginning his term with an 80% approval rating. Of course, that won’t last, and Fox will surely seek to shorten Obama’s honeymoon. But contrary to some media analysts who suggest that an adversarial relationship with Washington will benefit Fox, the truth is that Fox experienced its strongest growth amidst the friendliness of Bush years. This suggests that it is not simply drama and controversy that propelled Fox (although that is their preferred programming model), but that having powerful political allies helped them to succeed. When looked at objectively, that shouldn’t surprise anyone. When has having powerful political allies ever been a disadvantage?

Nevertheless, Fox is pursuing the path of most hostility, as evidenced by their new schedule. For further evidence note the response by Fox News commentators following Obama’s inaugural speech. Brit Hume’s first comments were to find passages that might please the right. Chris Wallace actually speculated that the flubbed oath of office (due to Chief Justice Roberts mangling the text) might mean that Obama isn’t really president (Let the conspiracy emails begin). Glenn Beck spent the whole hour of his second show on Fox heaping scorn on Obama. And while Rush Limbaugh isn’t technically on Fox, he is a charter member of the same ideological fraternity, and he has published a long dissertation on why he hopes Obama fails. These guys aren’t wasting any time.

This is just a preview of what we have to look forward to. The influence of Fox News is bound to decline. The Obama camp would be justified in giving Fox a cold shoulder. Fox deserves it for their brazen partisanship and for failing the test of responsible journalism. Other networks should now get some exclusives and scoops. And the more that this historic administration ignores Fox, the less relevant they will be.

We will now see Fox revert to the behavior of an injured wild beast that becomes even more ornery and more dangerous. We see it already. It’s important that we keep an eye on this threat, as it is not retreating to its lair. But it is retreating in the hearts and minds of the American people, and for that we should feel some sense of relief.