Fox News Has Muzzled Talker Tucker Carlson, as Seen in His Hysterical Post-Termination Video

Posted by Mark NC on April 27, 2023 at 12:35 pm. 4 Comments :

Now that Tucker Carlson has been banished from his Fox News perch, the speculation has been gushing from all sides as to why it occurred and where he’s going next. Carlson himself remained silent for two days, presumably to compose some sort of face-saving statement from exile in the wake of his expulsion.

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The 48 hours of contemplation apparently had no beneficial effect on the message that Carlson finally delivered on Wednesday. He posted a video that didn’t answer any of the questions people might have had regarding his divorce from Fox News.

What Carlson felt compelled to convey to his mortified minions (video below) was that his absence from the television spotlight had afforded him some rare and profound insight that was invisible to him previously. He marveled that “One of the first things you realize when you step outside the noise for a few days is how many genuinely nice people there are in this country.” Those people must have avoided him when he was mouthing off maliciously on the air every night. But that wasn’t all…

“The other thing you notice when you take a little time off is how unbelievably stupid most of the debates you see on television are. They’re completely irrelevant. They mean nothing. In five years, we won’t remember that we had them. Trust me, as someone who has participated.”

You have to hand it to Carlson for admitting that the rancid discourse he engaged in for so many years was “unbelievably stupid.” In fact, it was so unbelievable that attorneys for Fox News defended him in a defamation lawsuit by successfully arguing that “no reasonable person” would take him seriously.

SEE THIS: HUH? Senior Fox News Misinformer, Tucker Carlson, Declares that ‘Misinformation Can Be True’

Carlson went on to complain that the topics discussed on programs like his were petty and disconnected to the issues that most people care about…

“At the same time – and this is the amazing thing – the undeniably big topics, the ones that will define our future, get no discussion at all. War, civil liberties, emerging science, demographic change, corporate power, natural resources. When was the last time you heard a legitimate debate about any of those issues? … Debates like that are not permitted in American media.”

Apparently Carlson only watched Fox News. Because discussions about war, civil liberties, science (i.e. climate change, reproductive health, gender identity, etc.), and corporate abuse of power, were regularly aired on other news channels. Meanwhile, Carlson was tackling such critical subjects as desexualized cartoon M&Ms, and testicle tanning, and the benefits of smoking tobacco.

SEE THIS: OH NO! Tucker Carlson is Turned Off By ‘Less Sexy,’ ‘Unappealing’ Cartoon M&Ms
AND THIS: Macho Poser Tucker Carlson’s Journey from ‘Dancing With the Stars’ to ‘The End of Men’
AND THIS: Tucker Carlson Boldly Defends Tobacco (and Cancer?) as the ‘Most American of All Pleasures’

And incredibly, Carlson still had more to whine about…

“The people in charge … have given up persuasion and they’re resorting to force. But it won’t work. When honest people say what is true, calmly and without embarrassment, they become powerful. At the same time, the liars who have been trying to silence them shrink, and they become weaker.”

This might be a backhanded slap at Fox News as the “people in charge” who are “resorting to force” by firing him. However, Carlson’s assertion that truthtellers will always prevail over liars is at least partially correct. He, as a proven, relentless liar, is now shrunken and weaker. So is the person he replaced, Bill O’Reilly. Likewise, Glenn Beck has receded to the fringes of his Internet video cave.

Carlson concludes his sappy soliloquy by asking “Where can you still find Americans saying true things?” He doesn’t bother to answer that question. What’s more, in the entire video he doesn’t mention Fox News, or being fired, or his next job. That’s pretty astonishing. But it isn’t by accident.

If big mouth Tucker were free to comment on any of those things, he surely would have. Therefore, it’s safe to assume that his termination from Fox included an agreement to keep his putrid yap shut. Fox likely conditioned his unpaid compensation on his refraining from attacking Fox, or seeking employment at any competitor. In other words, Carlson probably sold out his “principles” for hard cash. Which shouldn’t surprise anyone. He’s been doing that for years.

"The other thing you notice when you take a little time off is how unbelievably stupid most of the debates you see on television are," says the guy who whined on primetime about how the Green M&M was no longer sexy. https://t.co/iWtwdGruZp

— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) April 27, 2023

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Judge in Smartmatic Defamation Lawsuit Orders Fox News to Turn Over ‘Missing’ Documents

Posted by Mark NC on April 26, 2023 at 12:56 pm. 3 Comments :

One week ago Fox News settled a $1.6 billion dollar defamation lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems for 3/4 of a billion dollars. Fox News had falsely reported that Dominion’s voting machines were used in a conspiracy to flip votes from Donald Trump to Joe Biden.

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The settlement was the largest of its kind in history. It was a clear victory for Dominion, whose pre-trial discovery uncovered and made public unambiguous evidence of Fox News executives and hosts blatantly lying on the air, while acknowledging the truth – that there was no evidence of any election fraud – to one another in private, internal communications.

Fox News is already suffering the consequences of their dishonesty. The network had already fired hosts Lou Dobbs and Dan Bongino due to the Dominion fallout. And there are likely more pink slips to be distributed in the coming weeks and months as Fox tries to slow-roll their efforts to punish scapegoats for the offenses that were part and parcel of Fox’s editorial depravity. But none will be more painful for Fox than their announcement that Tucker Carlson was terminated, and that last Friday was his last show.

SEE THIS: A Post-Mortem on Tucker Carlson Following His Unusually Abrupt Departure From Fox News

However, if Fox News thought that these concessions would put an end to their legal troubles, they were sorely mistaken. On the heels of the settled Dominion case, Fox will now have to confront essentially the same allegations of defamation from another voting technology company, Smartmatic.

Fox News had aired numerous false reports that Smartmatic was founded in Venezuela to steal elections for Hugo Chavez. They further lied that Smartmatic’s software flipped votes from Trump to Biden and that it transmitted ballots to foreign countries where they would be counted by operatives beholden to Biden and Democrats. It’s that sort of crackpot conspiracy theorizing that this case a slam dunk for Smartmatic. And there is already news on that front that is going to ruin Fox’s day…

“Fox News has agreed to give voting technology company Smartmatic additional documents about Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch and other senior corporate executives. Smartmatic is suing the right-wing network for $2.7 billion over its airing of 2020 election lies.

“The agreement was announced Wednesday at a court hearing in Manhattan. New York Supreme Court Judge David Cohen scheduled the hearing after Smartmatic raised concerns about whether Fox was complying with its pretrial obligations to turn over relevant evidence.”

Smartmatic lawyers told the judge that they “noticed obvious gaps” among the records that Fox News had already provided during the discovery process. They had good reason to suspect that Fox was being less than honest with their required document production. Fox did the same thing in the Dominion case, for which they were reprimanded by that judge in blunt terms…

“The judge presiding over [the Dominion] defamation case against Fox News admonished its attorneys Wednesday for potentially withholding evidence and said he is inclined to order an independent review by a special master that could lead to sanctions.” […]

“The judge expressed anger and frustration during a pretrial hearing after learning that Fox only recently turned over recordings of Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo [and] had withheld critical information about the role company founder Rupert Murdoch, who is chairman of Fox Corp., played at Fox News. […] Fox also did not reveal the recordings made by [Abby Grossberg] a former producer for Bartiromo.”

It’s clear that Fox News cannot be trusted to follow the law and meet their obligations required by it. Smartmatic will need to continue being vigilant and hold Fox accountable when they attempt to deceive the court. As will other plaintiffs who are lining up to sue Fox, including Abby Grossberg, the former Fox News producer for Tucker Carlson and Maria Bartiromo who claims that she was coerced to falsify testimony in the Dominion case; and Fox Corp shareholders, who are exploring legal options to hold Fox News directors and executives accountable for losses due to their malfeasance.

At this point, the only people who trust Fox are their glassy-eyed viewers, who believe everything they see on the network, even after learning that they’ve been lied to. Although even some of them are losing faith now that Fox has fired their white nationalist prophet, Tucker Carlson.

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Trump Announces that He’s Afraid to Debate Republicans for the 2024 Presidential Nomination

Posted by Mark NC on April 25, 2023 at 1:04 pm. 3 Comments :

It is still nearly a year before any of the primaries for the 2024 Republican nomination for president. But that hasn’t stopped Donald Trump from engaging in the sort of dirty campaign tactics that have been the hallmarks of his political life. Trump has a “burn all bridges” approach to electoral politics, and he has started his rhetorical bombardment unusually early.

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The principle recipient of Trump’s wrath has been Ron DeSantis. The Florida governor is currently the only credible opponent in the GOP field, and even in his case, the term “credible” is generous. Trump has been lashing out at DeSantis with criticisms of his failed stewardship of Florida (which is hard to argue with). He accuses DeSantis of seeking to cut Social Security and Medicare, mismanaging the COVID-19 pandemic, and has even implied that he is a gay pedophile. Meanwhile, Trump has welcomed all other GOP candidates into the race with open arms. There’s a reason for that…

SEE THIS: GOP Presidential Poll Reveals Why Ron DeSantis is the Only 2024 Opponent that Trump is Attacking

With the election cycle beginning to heat up, Trump is now displaying signs of his pitiful cowardice. He posted a hysterical comment on his floundering Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, threatening to refrain from participating in any Republican candidate debates scheduled by the Republican National Committee. Trump raged that…

“I see that everybody is talking about the Republican Debates, but nobody got my approval, or the approval of the Trump Campaign, before announcing them. When you’re leading by seemingly insurmountable numbers, and you have hostile Networks with angry, TRUMP & MAGA hating anchors asking the ‘questions,’ why subject yourself to being libeled and abused? Also, the Second Debate is being held at the Reagan Library, the Chairman of which is, amazingly, Fred Ryan, Publisher of The Washington Post. NO!”

First of all, “everybody” is certainly not talking about Republican debates. Hardly anyone has mentioned them at all. But more importantly, where does Trump get the idea that his “approval” is required to hold such debates. He can decline to show up if he’s too chicken to face his opponents. But he doesn’t get to decide whether there will be any debates, or to dictate the terms.

For the record, the only network that has been identified as a host for any GOP debate is Fox News. Apparently Trump believes that Fox is a “hostile network” that is filled with “angry, TRUMP & MAGA hating anchors.” That’s some nuclear-grade delusion right there. If he’s afraid that he will be “libeled and abused” by Fox News’ questions, what network could he possibly accept as a debate host? Perhaps Russia’s RT news channel?

Trump is also maligning the patron saint of the GOP, Ronald Reagan, whose presidential library has been selected as a debate site. Trump’s problem with that is that library’s board is chaired by Washington Post publisher, Fred Ryan. Trump doesn’t mention that both Rupert Murdoch and his son, Lachlan, are also board members, along with an array of hard right business and political figures. He also doesn’t explain how the physical location would influence the content of the debate.

It is notable that the RNC has already demanded that Republicans refuse to participate in any of the debates sponsored by the bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD). This was done on Trump’s behalf to keep him from having to answer questions more difficult than “Were you the greatest president ever”?

Some Republicans might complain of hypocrisy considering that the Democratic National Committee recently said that they don’t expect to be holding debates for the Democratic nomination. However, these are two entirely different circumstances. The RNC is expected to have many viable candidates vying for their nomination, including governors and senators. However, the DNC presently has no other serious contenders. New age oracle Marianne Williamson and Steve Bannon’s stalking horse Robert F. Kennedy Jr. certainly don’t qualify. What’s more, it was a decision made by the DNC, not President Biden. If the DNC decides to hold debates, Biden will surely be there.

What we are witnessing is just another example of Trump’s pettiness, self-importance, and abject fear. He’s looking for excuses to evade any confrontations with smarter Republicans on a national stage that he doesn’t control. Should he follow through on his threat, the RNC should hold the debates without him. Which would actually improve their usefulness.

For his part, Trump can stage another cult rally where he rambles on interminably about the same crapola he’s been whining about for the past two years (mostly election fraud and his rapidly accumulating collection of indictments). It won’t get any media coverage other than on Newsmax and OAN. And it certainly won’t expand his support beyond his base of glassy-eyed yokels who are already indoctrinated into his cult. All of which should make for a profoundly comical season of GOP politics.

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A Post-Mortem on Tucker Carlson Following His Unusually Abrupt Departure From Fox News

Posted by Mark NC on April 24, 2023 at 9:36 am. 5 Comments :

The recent settlement of the defamation lawsuit against Fox News by Dominion Voting systems may have had its second casualty. Last week Fox News and weekend blowhard Dan Bongino parted ways. This week it’s Tucker Carlson.

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According to Fox News PR, “FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor. Mr. Carlson’s last program was Friday April 21st.”

It is exceptionally rare for a network to “agree to part ways” so abruptly. They didn’t even give Carlson an opportunity to announce his departure and say farewell to his fans. His fans, of course, will be furious and take out their outrage on Fox.

Carlson has taken out his outrage on Fox himself in the past. He once described the network as “a mean, sick group of people.” So naturally, he would fit right in. Perhaps he feels the same way now that he’s been unceremoniously terminated. In the meantime, Let’s review some of the recent reasons that might have led to the surprising departure of Fox’s top rated host.

Private internal communications made public by Dominion revealed that Carlson “hates Trump passionately” and regards him as a “destroyer” and “a demonic force” What’s more, in those communications Carlson badmouthed his now former employer saying that…

“We’re threading a needle that has to be thread because of the dumb f**ks at Fox News on Election Day. We can’t make people think we’ve turned against Trump. Yet also call out the bullshit. You and I see through it. But we have to reassure some in the audience.”

SEE THIS: In Dominion v Fox News, Network Cries ‘We Can’t Make People Think We’ve Turned Against Trump’

Furthermore, while Carlson’s program had lost every major advertiser due to his repulsive ravings that no business wanted to be associated with, he also went after his (and Fox’s) biggest remaining advertiser at the time, Mike Lindell, the MyPillow guy…

“[Mike] Lindell seems to really have gone off the deep end. He is definitely crazy… I agree there’s concern about Lindell being a conspiracy theorist now. But he has bailed us out loads of times when no one else would.” […]

“We can concentrate on cancel culture rather than his wild claims… If no one is buying him, he loses money to be able to advertise with us. And then we lose our biggest advertiser.”

SEE THIS: Fox News Caught Coddling Conspiracy Crackpots for Fear of Losing Audience and Advertisers – Again!

However, there’s more grotesquery from Carlson that could have contributed to his well-warranted and long overdue downfall. Such as…

Actually, the examples above would probably have endeared Carlson to Fox News and their viewers. So the most plausible explanation for his getting canned remains his betrayal of Trump and Fox in the emails and texts that Dominion uncovered.

Carlson was also a devoted supporter of some of the world’s most heinous dictators, especially Vladimir Putin. For instance…

This may still be just the beginning of the lawsuit fallout from Domain, as well as Smartmatic and others to come. The jobs of Maria Bartiromo, and Jeanine Pirro, and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott, are likely in jeopardy. Time will tell.

One thing for certain though, is that Fox News isn’t going to change their ultra-rightist editorial bias. And the replacements for Carlson and others may actually be worse. Remember that Carlson was the replacement for the despicable Bill O’Reilly when he was axed for sexual misconduct. So there’s is no reason to give Fox any credit for throwing their biggest legal liabilities overboard.

Where Carlson goes next is also an open question. He would surely fit in well at a Russian propaganda network like RT or Sputnik. Newsmax and OAN would be foolish to hire him while they are defending themselves against defamation lawsuits prompted by Carlson’s commentaries, but that doesn’t mean they won’t try. Maybe he could work for Trump’s Media and Technology Group (TMTG) – the parent company of Truth Social – that is currently failing pitifully and being investigated for criminal malfeasance.

UPDATE: Fox News Has Muzzled Talker Tucker Carlson, as Seen in His Hysterical Post-Termination Video

In the coming days and weeks there is going to be much speculation about Carlson’s future, and the details his dishonorable discharge. Although the Daily Show might have figured out what’s really going on…

This must be why Tucker got fired.pic.twitter.com/EKwtWVRwVr

— Jo (@JoJoFromJerz) April 24, 2023

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Fox News Senior Racist, Tucker Carlson, is Terrified that Black Voters Will ‘Flood the Suburbs’

Posted by Mark NC on April 23, 2023 at 1:09 pm. 4 Comments :

For several years now, Tucker Carlson has used his Fox News platform to propagate the blatantly racist theory of “white replacement.” The gist of the argument is that Democrats, liberals, and others committed to equality, are plotting to dilute the votes of white bigots by importing people of color into communities currently dominated by Republicans and right-wingers who seek to suppress the votes of non-white citizens.

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[BREAKING: Tucker Carlson is now a former Fox News host]

Carlson’s efforts on behalf of this theory have earned him the admiration of America’s most prominent and virulent racial hate groups. Decent people would be severely disturbed if they learned that the KKK or neo-Nazis were supporting them. But it doesn’t seem to bother Carlson. In fact, it likely inspires him. So he persists in promoting the white replacement theory at every opportunity.

Most of the time Carlson’s discourse on the subject asserts that Democrats are encouraging immigrants to come to America illegally as a means to electorally outnumber the “native” white folks. Never mind that those immigrants can’t vote, and even if there were some amnesty program, it would still take years before they would have citizenship and voting rights.

However, in his latest harangue, Carlson is accusing Black Americans of being part of the great replacement. He unleashed a rancid monologue that was not only insulting, it made no logical sense…

Black Americans are the only racial group in this country with average credit scores of under 680. Now, why is that? We don’t know. […] If you wanted to change that you would encourage people to have good spending habits and pay back their debt. But they don’t care about that – making people happier and getting them out of debt. No. they want to change the suburbs, make them denser, so there will be more reliably Democratic voting. That’s the bottom line.

Tucker is taking a break from freaking out about Trans people to freak out about Black people moving to the suburbs. pic.twitter.com/yoCwjxgfYQ

— nikki mccann ramírez (@NikkiMcR) April 22, 2023

So Carlson claims not to know why a perennially discriminated group might have lower credit scores than the majority population. That’s not because he’s ill-informed. It’s because he’s deliberately lying in order to advance his asinine narrative. In Carlson’s warped mind, he asserts that it’s a plot by Democrats to “change the suburbs.” And his reference to making them “denser” is a just his dog-whistle alternative for “blacker.”

But Carlson was far from finished. As reported by Media Matters, he went to declare that…

“The defining strategic insight of the modern Democratic Party is that you don’t really need to convince anyone of anything. What matters is demographics. You need to import enough people from elsewhere.”

Ironically, it’s Carlson who is injecting demographics into this discussion. He’s asserting that people of particular races, or age groups, or income, are going to vote a particular way. And they must not be permitted to move into neighborhoods where people that look and think like Carlson live. He went on to say that…

“…the plan is to flood the suburbs with voters they believe will support the Democratic Party.”

Carlson’s choice of the word “flood” was a purposeful allusion to Blacks moving to suburbs as a natural disaster. Because to Carlson, that’s precisely what he believes it would be. But he doesn’t bother to explain how any of this makes sense. After all, if Blacks who are financially able to migrate to the suburbs did so, wouldn’t that leave the districts they moved out of with fewer supposedly Democratic voters? And contrary to Carlson’s rant, couldn’t those new residents be convinced by Republicans to vote differently?

No. Republicans – as Carlson said of Democrats – “don’t care about that.” They only care about keeping their neighborhoods segregated and clinging to political power. And Carlson isn’t afraid to make these grotesquely racist remarks out loud on his national television program. He knows that it’s certain to get him more appreciation from the bigots who currently comprise the bulk of his audience, and that of Fox News.

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Fox News Cancels Their Senior Trump-Fluffing Rage-Aholic, Dan Bongino

Posted by Mark NC on April 20, 2023 at 12:32 pm. 4 Comments :

Times are changing fast at Fox News now that a court has affirmed that they are staffed by shameless liars. On Tuesday the right-wing propaganda network agreed to settle a defamation lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems for a whopping 3/4 of a billion dollars. And on Thursday they fired their ultra-bombastic, Trump-fluffing, weekend ranter, Dan Bongino.

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According to Bongino, his termination by Fox News had nothing to do with the defamation lawsuit settlement. He says that it was merely an inability for the two sides to come to an agreement on his contract renewal. However, given his past performance, and the damage done to Fox’s already reprehensible reputation, it’s difficult to completely separate the two events.

Bongino has been a staunch defender of Trump throughout the former reality TV game show host’s occupation of the White House and beyond. Trump could do no wrong in Bongino’s eyes, whether it was his two impeachments, his sexual harassment, his deadly COVID mismanagement, his disastrous economic policies, or his theft and hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. Bongino stayed by Trump’s side. So now it is, in Bongino’s words, “a sad day,” as he reveals that last week’s program was his final one for Fox News. Forbes Reports that…

“Fox News has ended its relationship with Dan Bongino […] Bongino said on his podcast Thursday…’It’s tough. It’s tough to say that. You know, I’ve been there doing hits and working there for ten years…so the show ending was tough. And I want you to know it’s not some big conspiracy. I promise you. There’s no acrimony. This wasn’t some WWE brawl that happened. We just couldn’t come to terms on an extension.”

The timing, however, is curious. While Bongino wasn’t among the named defendants in the lawsuits against Fox News (such as Lou Dobbs and Maria Bartiromo), he was a frequent source of flagrantly false commentaries, including several asserting that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged and stolen” from Trump.

In one case he hosted an interview of Trump wherein Trump delivered his tedious complaints about election fraud. Subsequently, the clip that Fox later posted online had cut out those remarks. When told about the editing, Bongino was outraged and pledged to get to the bottom of it. He never did.

SEE THIS: SCAREDY FOX: Why Did Fox News Censor Trump’s ‘Big Lie’ Rant? Pending Lawsuits?

Being canceled by Fox News was surely “tough” for Bongino, Especially since his other pursuits are also collapsing. He was a principle owner of the conservative, crackpots-only Twitter clone, Parler. But just last week It’s new owner announced that they are shutting it down. Variety reports that…

“Parler, the self-described “uncancelable free-speech social platform” that catered to right-wing users — which was nearly acquired by Kanye West last year — has been shut down by its new owner.

“’No reasonable person believes that a Twitter clone just for conservatives is a viable business any more,’ Arlington, Va.-based digital media company Starboard said in announcing Friday that it had acquired Parler.”

Bongino will likely find a new home on some other wingnut media outlet. Perhaps Newsmax or One American News (OAN). In the meantime he still has his podcast, and a considerable flock of sheeple following him online.

As for Fox News, they will probably fill his timeslot with an even more radically right-wing shouter. The real question is: Who will be shoved out the door next? Maria Bartiromo’s future is likely hanging by a thread. And Fox president, Suzanne Scott, could not be sleeping well in the wake of the Dominion settlement.

Whatever changes Fox makes will probably be stretched out over time so as to make them appear to be unrelated to the Dominion matter. But it is typical of Rupert Murdoch to make others pay for his failures. So expect more contract “disputes” to be announced in the coming weeks and months.

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The Fox News 3/4 Billion Dollar Dominion Defamation Settlement is Also a Judgment Against Trump

Posted by Mark NC on April 19, 2023 at 11:15 am. 2 Comments :

On Tuesday Fox News agreed to a settlement with Dominion Voting Systems over allegations that Fox defamed the company. The settlement represented a clear victory for Dominion, whose pre-trial discovery uncovered unambiguous evidence of Fox News executives and hosts blatantly lying.

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Dominion got Fox News to agree to pay 3/4 of a billion dollars (787.5 million) in restitution for the network’s flagrant and deliberate dishonesty. While some people are disappointed that Fox wasn’t required to make public, on-air retractions and/or apologies, the unprecedented amount of the settlement is a pretty strong statement all by itself. Fox’s concession to shell out this much money is a de facto confession of guilt. And Dominion’s focus was properly on compensation for damages caused by Fox’s malicious lies. Now they will get paid immediately, rather than after multiple years of appeals. As Dominion’s lawyer said: “Lies have consequences.”

However, it’s also necessary to point out that this settlement is an indictment of Donald Trump. The lies that Fox News disseminated had a single purpose. And that was to prop up the “Big Lie” propagated by Trump that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged and stollen” (sic) from him. Consequently, when Fox agreed to this massive payoff, they were simultaneously conceding that Trump’s election fraud allegations were completely false.

Of course, the court had already made that determination in rulings to pre-trial motions. That, however, didn’t stop Fox from issuing a bizarre statement following the announcement of the settlement. The network said that…

“We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false. This settlement reflects FOX’s continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards. We are hopeful that our decision to resolve this dispute with Dominion amicably, instead of the acrimony of a divisive trial, allows the country to move forward from these issues.”

There’s a surprising quantity of bullpucky in that brief paragraph. First of all, the judge’s ruling that Fox is now acknowledging actually stated that “the evidence developed in this civil proceeding demonstrates that is CRYSTAL clear that none of the Statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true.” That’s a far cry from “certain claims” about Dominion being false. The court explicitly said that “none of the Statements” were true.

The judge further ruled that Fox News couldn’t pretend that they were merely reporting newsworthy comments by others when, in fact, they were making the false assertions themselves. So it’s preposterous that Fox now says that they have a “commitment to the highest journalistic standards.” They would have a hard time arguing that they have any ethical standards at all. Fox was proven to be more concerned about losing viewers and revenue, than they were about truthful reporting.

As for Fox News not being required to make on-air retractions or apologies, the record is now clear that Fox News deliberately lied to their viewers. Their own internal communications showed them expressing opinions that were wholly contradictory to what they said on the air. And agreeing to pay 3/4 of a billion dollars to Dominion affirms their knowledge that they were purposefully dishonest.

What’s more, the terms of these sort of settlements are generally confidential. The fact that the terms in this case were immediately made public is not an accident. It was likely a demand by Dominion that Fox was forced to accept during settlement negotiations. Rest assured that Fox would have preferred that the amount of their financial punishment were never disclosed.

Donald Trump also would have preferred that the terms of the settlement were confidential. Perhaps that’s why, 24 hours later, he has not said a single word about his Ministry of Propaganda being slapped with a huge penalty for lying on his behalf. He knows this is as much a condemnation of his own dishonesty as it is of Fox’s. However, after he’s had time to come up with some feeble excuse that puts all of the blame on Fox, he will post it on his floundering Twitter ripoff, Truth Social.

Finally, this isn’t over by a long shot. There are still pending lawsuits against Fox News and their personnel. They include…

Dominion: There are still has pending lawsuits against individuals who frequently lied about Dominion on Fox News, including Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Mike Lindell.
Smartmatic: Another voting technology company still has a $2.7 billion lawsuit pending against Fox News, Maria Bartiromo, Lou Dobbs and Rudy Giuliani. The defendants falsely accused Smartmatic, a Florida company, of being founded in Venezuela, and conspiring to switch votes from Trump to Biden.
Abby Grossberg: The former Fox News producer for Tucker Carlson and Maria Bartiromo, claims that she was coerced to falsify testimony in the Dominion case.
Fox Corp Shareholders: Investors are exploring legal options to hold Fox News directors and executives accountable for losses due to their malfeasance.

It remains to be seen if Fox News will take punitive actions for the costly malfeasance of their employees. Everyone from their president, Suzanne Scott, to hosts such as Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson, are at risk for some sort of discipline, up to and including termination. And while no one expects them to stop lying, the network will have to be far more careful about the lies they tell in the future.

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LOL: Trump Tells Fox News to Defend Itself in a Lawsuit Accusing Them of Lying to Lie Even More

Posted by Mark NC on April 17, 2023 at 12:15 pm. 3 Comments :

This week the billion dollar defamation lawsuit against Fox News by Dominion Voting Systems is schedule to begin. It was delayed for one day with rumors that Fox was pleading to settle, which, at this point, appears unlikely.

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Hopefully Dominion will stand firm to make sure that Fox News, its executives and hosts are held accountable for the harm they’ve done to the nation. Most legal analysts agree that Dominion’s case is strong, and there have already been significant pretrial rulings in Dominion’s favor.

In the meantime, Fox News is also getting some legal advice from the primary source of all their legal problems, Donald Trump. In a late-night frenzy, Trump posted a comment to his floundering Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, offering what he thinks would be the best course for Fox News to take in their defense. His 2:39am comment raged that…

“IF FOX WOULD FINALLY ADMIT THAT THERE WAS LARGE SCALE CHEATING & IRREGULARITIES IN THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, WHICH WOULD BE A GOOD THING FOR THEM, & FOR AMERICA, THE CASE AGAINST THEM, WHICH SHOULD NOT HAVE EXISTED AT ALL, WOULD BE GREATLY WEAKENED. BACK UP THOSE PATRIOTS AT FOX INSTEAD OF THROWING THEM UNDER THE BUS – & THEY ARE RIGHT! THERE IS SOOO MUCH PROOF, LIKE MASS BALLOT STUFFING CAUGHT ON GOVERNMENT CAMERAS, FBI COLLUDING WITH TWITTER & FACEBOOK, STATE LEGISLATURES NOT USED, etc.”

That’s great advice. Fox News should take Trump up on it. After all, what better defense could they have for deliberate and defamatory lying than to lie even harder? Maybe Trump would like to offer to testify on Fox’s behalf and bring along some of that “proof” that he says there is so much of, but which he has failed to produce in more than two and half years.

After getting a couple of hours of nervous sleep, Trump elaborated on his comments the next morning, saying that…

“FOX NEWS IS IN BIG TROUBLE IF THEY DO NOT EXPOSE THE TRUTH ON CHEATING IN THE 2020 ELECTION. THEY SHOULD DO WHAT’S RIGHT FOR AMERICA. WHEN RUPERT MURDOCH SAYS THAT THERE WAS NO CHEATING IN LIGHT OF THE MASSIVE PROOF THAT WAS THERE, IT IS RIDICULOUS AND VERY HARMFUL TO THE FOX CASE. PERHAPS HE SHOULD SAY THAT ‘HE JUST DIDN’T KNOW,’ BUT THAT IS HARD TO BELIEVE. RUPERT, JUST TELL THE TRUTH AND GOOD THINGS WILL HAPPEN. THE ELECTION OF 2020 WAS RIGGED AND STOLLEN…YOU KNOW IT, & SO DOES EVERYONE ELSE!”

Trump is absolutely right in saying that “FOX NEWS IS IN BIG TROUBLE IF THEY DO NOT EXPOSE THE TRUTH.” The problem is that Trump is still peddling the “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was “RIGGED AND STOLLEN” (sic). He doesn’t reveal what “good things will happen” if Murdoch were to dive deeper into Trump’s dishonesty. But this isn’t the first time that he has prevailed on Murdoch to further spread his election fraud lies.

What’s more, Trump’s assertion that everyone knows that the election was “stollen” is in stark contrast to every poll on the subject. A recent poll shows that “nearly two-thirds of Americans (65 percent) think Fox News should be held accountable after … spread[ing] false information about the 2020 presidential election.” And the only people who still buy Fox’s lies are those who are already fully indoctrinated Fox and Trump cult disciples.

SEE THIS: IT’S A CULT: Most Fox News Viewers Are Still Loyal After Dominion Lawsuit Discloses Their Lies

To make matters worse for Fox, they just bought a full page ad in the New York Times (Really? The NYT?) claiming that Fox is the “most trusted” news network. That’s rich coming so soon after the Dominion lawsuit revealed them to have been outright lying to their viewers.

However, the ad itself is a lie. It is reporting a YouGov “Profiles” poll, which is not a public opinion survey. It’s a marketing service that caters to businesses seeking information about their own customer base. Note that in an actual, unbiased YouGov survey Fox News came in second to last in trust. Just above Breitbart News. And that tells us all we need to know.

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Saturday Night Live Tears Up Trump’s Ludicrous Lie that Everyone He Meets is Crying

Posted by Mark NC on April 16, 2023 at 11:23 am. 2 Comments :

The single most reliable characteristic of Donald Trump is that whenever he speaks is almost certainly lying. His lies generally involve insults aimed at his foes, distortions of his political “accomplishments,” examples of his blithering ignorance, and always hysterically exaggerated exaltations of himself.

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Last week Trump visited Fox News for a tongue-bathing session with Tucker Carlson. This was Carlson’s penance for expressing his true feelings about Trump in internal communications acquired by Dominion Voting Systems in their billion dollar defamation lawsuit against Fox News. In those private discussions Carlson told his Fox confederates that Trump is a “demonic Force” who he “hates passionately.”

SEE THIS: In Dominion v Fox News, Network Cries ‘We Can’t Make People Think We’ve Turned Against Trump’

In lieu of digging up his rosary and reciting a thousand “Hail Trump’s,” Carlson pitched him a few soft (and well-tanned) balls and gazed adoringly while Trump rambled incoherently for an hour.

The entire interview was a rehashing of every bit of nonsense Trump has been disgorging for months and years. And it included one of his favorite venerations of himself: The fatuous fantasy that his cult disciples are frequently reduced to tears whenever they are in his putrid presence. Describing the scene when he appeared in a New York courtroom to be arraigned on 34 felony counts of fraud, Trump said that…

“When I went to the courthouse, which is also a prison in a sense, they signed me in and I’ll tell you, people were crying. People that work there, professionally work there. They have no problems putting in murderers, and they see everybody, it’s a tough, tough place. And they were crying. They were actually crying. They said, ‘I’m sorry.'”

'They Were Actually Crying': Trump Tells Tucker Carlson Employees at the NY Courthouse Told Him 'I'm Sorry' https://t.co/P1qSAM0As5 pic.twitter.com/GD4xM7gL2u

— Mediaite (@Mediaite) April 11, 2023

First of all, a courtroom is not in any sense a prison. Although it isn’t surprising that Trump would feel trapped there. But more to the point, Trump’s wild assertion that court staffers were crying and apologizing – which was refuted by witnesses – is just plain preposterous. And among those who recognized that fact were the folks at Saturday Night Live. SNL’s “Weekend Update” segment featured “anchor” Colin Jost running a compilation of Trump’s prior claims that he makes people sob, and asking “Why is everyone in Trump’s stories always crying?” Jost followed that up by pointing out that…

“You’re bragging that when people see you they just burst into tears? Because it never sounds like excited crying like when teenagers see BTS. It sounds more like scared crying like when hostages see Jigsaw.”

SNL gloriously mocks Trump for continually saying (lying) that people cry in his presence. pic.twitter.com/7uilgZxJlr

— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) April 16, 2023

It’s remarkable that Trump can say these things with a straight face, confidant that anyone would believe him. But it’s even more remarkable that there are people who actually do believe him. That’s the power, harm, and danger of cults. And clearly Carlson has joined the Trump Cult as he made no effort to ascertain the validity of Trump’s boasting. In fact, he is so thoroughly indoctrinated that he has even advocated a violent response to Trump’s having been indicted.

SEE THIS: Tucker Carlson Warns that Trump’s Indictment Makes This ‘Not the Best Time to Give Up Your AR-15’

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Fox Nation vs. Reality:
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Putin Puppet Tucker Carlson Spews Russian Propaganda in Defense of the Intelligence Leaker

Posted by Mark NC on April 14, 2023 at 12:02 pm. 7 Comments :

This week it was discovered that highly sensitive, classified, United States military documents had been illegally published online. Within a few days the “leaker” was identified as Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.

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Some of the documents contained information related to the Russian war against Ukraine and could harm the war efforts against the Russian aggressors. So naturally, Fox News and the pro-Putin wing of the Republican Party were all in favor of the intelligence hack and immediately set out to defend the traitor who leaked the documents. Even Donald Trump weighed in with his inane theory that President Biden was the leaker…

SEE THIS: Trump Floats the Stupidest Lie About Biden and Intel Documents: ‘Maybe He Was the Leaker’

Leading the parade of anti-Americans cheering on the illegal breach of national security, was Fox News Senior Putin Propagandist, Tucker Carlson. On his Thursday night episode, Carlson – who has explicitly declared that he’s rooting for Russia in its criminal war against Ukraine – embarked on a wholly fictitious account of what was in the leaked documents. And, of course, his fabricated version made the U.S. out to be the villains…

“Briefing slides had begun to show up, among other places, on Twitter. And the slides show that this is not Ukraine’s war. It’s our war. The United States is a direct combatant in a war against Russia. As we speak, American soldiers are fighting Russian soldiers. So this is not a regional conflict in Eastern Europe. […]

“The second thing we learned from these slides is that despite direct U.S. involvement, Ukraine is, in fact, losing the war. Seven Ukrainians are being killed for every Russian. Ukrainian air defenses have been utterly degraded. Ukraine is losing. The Biden administration is perfectly aware of this. They’re panicked about it. But they have lied about this fact to the public.”

Fox's own correspondent reported that the US Special Forces stationed in Ukraine are part of an embassy attache, not combat troops. But Tucker Carlson is on air claiming their presence is an act of war. https://t.co/TNzJSDxNgV pic.twitter.com/OZtJDDr14m

— nikki mccann ramírez (@NikkiMcR) April 14, 2023

First of all, There are exactly zero American soldiers fighting in Ukraine. Carlson is likely cooking up this lie from reports that there are some military personnel stationed at the U.S. embassy, a customary assignment for all foreign ministries. They are not combatants. But Carlson’s lie could give Putin an excuse to target Americans and American assets in Ukraine and around the world. And notice that his own colleague, Fox News White House correspondent, Jacqui Heinrich, debunked him, reporting that “there is a small military presence at the Embassy.”

Secondly, Carlson’s assertion that Ukraine is losing the war is completely made up. His numbers were pulled straight out of his asinine prejudices against Ukraine and America. Every military analyst – with the exception of those beholden to Putin – agree that Russia has been getting beaten by almost every measure. The only thing that Russia has succeeded in is slaughtering civilians and committing war crimes.

Carlson went on to call for the arrest of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who he baselessly accused of lying to the Senate. He also introduced his own conspiracy theory that the Washington Post and the New York Times colluded with the Biden administration, using “illegal surveillance techniques to identify” the leaker. Actually, it was “billing records of an Internet social media platform and interviews with another user” that helped the FBI identify the suspect.

Interestingly, at his arraignment Teixeira was charged with “unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents.” Which is essentially the same crime that Trump committed when he stole documents from the White House and hoarded them at Mar-a-Lago.

All of Carlson’s raving in this extended and tedious harangue was in defense of Russia and the suspect now in custody who stole classified information and published it online. But worse, it is pure unadulterated propaganda on behalf of Carlson’s masters in the Kremlin. It is emblematic of the anti-American stance taken by Carlson, Fox News, and the GOP. It is aiding and abetting America’s enemies. And it borders on treason.

Be sure to visit and follow News Corpse
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And check out my books on Amazon:

Fox Nation vs. Reality:
The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.

Thanks so much for your support.

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