“In the documents, Shah emerges less as Trump’s man-on-the-inside at Fox than as a bridge between the then-president’s world and the network, and a reliable translator of Trump’s base for Fox’s management.“
This is blatant censorship and control of the largest MSM empire by the government. And it ended in violence.
I would say “wake up, smell the coffee”, but that ship has sailed…and sunk. IMO
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
But, but, but Hunter Biden’s laptop!
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For those who care about our country:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/04/us-extremism-portland-george-floyd-protests-january-6/673088/
Antifa was not blameless but neither the whole story nor the most important one. The history of anarchy and political violence in just the early 20th century was pretty astounding. How it relates to today is disconcerting.
Long, very detailed, but worth a read by anyone concerned about the direction of America, left or right.
Which is, of course, most of America.
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Paywalled for me.
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I was trying find a “gifted”. No luck yet.
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RE: “This is blatant censorship and control of the largest MSM empire by the government. And it ended in violence.”
Is this a joke? Is this an attempt to use sarcasm to make a point? If so, what is the point?
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Funny isn’t it?
Simply put, the Trump White House had a direct, strong influence on what MSM, FOX, aired. Threats of losing audience and the blessings of the president directed news and opinion. And this was not just evidenced by the recent Dominion suit. It was the business as usual.
We are not talking press releases or even coffee with officials and media reporters, the norm. Or even recommendations as asserted about the FBI and Twitter.
Illegal? Probably not. But exposing the relationship for what it was might be much more effective since those decisions were all about the bottom line as “guaranteed” by hand in glove cooperation to affect news. Not by ideology, but by keeping the MAGA movement fired up for the president and consequently audience for MSM FOX.
So there we are.
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RE: “Simply put, the Trump White House had a direct, strong influence on what MSM, FOX, aired.”
Is that a fact?
It may be concerning when government employees go to work in private industry, but there is little evidence of impropriety in this case. Quite the opposite.
We have a problematic “censorship-industrial complex” in our country and Fox News operates within it. So does every other outlet.
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But, but, but, Hunter.
Nonsensical to follow from the right wing mini-me mob .
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Wow, you Democrats are in a panic because there is one news outlet you don’t control. I guess you miss the old days when the other side could be silenced entirely.
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“Wow . . . ”
I see no signs of panic except maybe in your pretending that Trump has not been caught having done things that you accuse Biden of doing but with actual direct evidence.
The Left does not actually control any news outlets, but it is true that some news outlets eschew the spreading of “alternative facts.” Maybe that is who you are referring to?
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RE: “Wow, you Democrats are in a panic because there is one news outlet you don’t control.”
You gotta wonder how it is that liberals can see the problem, but only at Fox News.
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Well, CNN fired their problem. Faux News gave their problems raises.
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So what?
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Hypocrite, much?
CNN had a problem with Chris Cuomo advising his brother on his scandals. Faux News talking heads have been given carte Blanche to tell the viewers what they want to hear and not the truth.
If you do not see the issue, then I can’t help you.
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Not just one. But the biggest and vastly most influential among 1/2 the nation. Add in talk radio and broadcast type media is pretty much right wing 24/7 for a huge plurality of America.
That used to be a bragging point and now maybe not so much now.
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Ever wonder why every day more people abandon the MSM and trust FOX?
You can only gaslight people so long.
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Sure. And ever wonder why FOX panicked about losing audience if they DID NOT gaslight.
And they are still roiling. “Tucker tapes” was a pathetic example of that after revelations that they laughed at Trump’s minders and loony “theories, but no evidence” as put by Giuliani.
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RE: “You can only gaslight people so long.”
People gaslight themselves, too. That’s certainly part of the problem.
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“You can only gaslight people so long.”
Gaslight? You mean spreading “alternative facts?” Have you missed the bombshell revelations coming out of the Dominion defamation suit? If you did let me help. Testimony and documents reveal that the management and hosts of Fox News knowingly mislead their viewers. All the time. You do not get more gaslighty than that.
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RE: “Testimony and documents reveal that the management and hosts of Fox News knowingly mislead their viewers.”
No, they don’t. At worst, the testimony and documents reveal that Fox News published claims made by public figures.
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Uh, no. Rehashing the same claims, over and over, whether during an interview or with references to one, knowing they were lies, is misleading to a great degree.
The executives knew this, yet were more worried about losing audience. Emails, texts, by the thousands showed this clearly.
What is even more egregious, IMO, is that Baritromo was with the news side as the desk for FOX Business pushed the same false narrative on her show.
In addition, the reporter who said there was no evidence of fraud was threatened with firing. Or was fired, I can’t recall.
If you can’t see the problem, the court will help you in April when the Dominion trial starts.
The precedent was Sullivan v. NYT in 1964 and it set the standard for media liability.
From SCOTUS:
The constitutional guarantees require, we think, a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with “actual malice” – that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.
— Sullivan, 376 U.S. at 279–80
Notice both knowledge of false or reckless disregard that it was. FOX knew that the multiple broadcasts of voter fraud accusations on FOX Business or the opinions (30 times just for the guests on air, plus affirmation when they were not) were false, yet continued to drive the narrative.
They knew it was false, but worried about “respecting” the audience.
Note that this case is not about damage to public officials, but a private company. The First Amendment protections are not as strong, so the case is actually worse for FOX.
Personally, that shows no respect for the audience. In fact, it shows, to me and most folks I’m sure, that FOX did not respect their viewers enough to tell them the truth.
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RE: “If you can’t see the problem, the court will help you in April when the Dominion trial starts.”
The problem I see is partisans trying to make more of this story than it merits. My main concern is that a judgement against Fox will be misinterpreted as somehow justifying the abuse of 1st Amendment freedoms.
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Did you see the SCOTUS ruling I posted?
There are very carefully defined limits, and a high to jump, but it is not unlimited. The point of knowingly spreading lies by media drops the protection. And FOX Business news as well as the evening talk show stars knew, yet continued to smear Dominion and Smartmatic night after night. No challenges, no corrections not even questioning for details.
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RE: “FOX knew that the multiple broadcasts of voter fraud accusations on FOX Business or the opinions (30 times just for the guests on air, plus affirmation when they were not) were false, yet continued to drive the narrative.”
I don’t believe that. In fact, it can’t be true because so far there is no evidence the accusations were false.
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“I don’t believe that.”
Of course you don’t. The truth is unpalatable to you.
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“In fact, it can’t be true because so far there is no evidence the accusations were false.”
Oh, I think you will find that Fox News will steer clear of trying to prove they were spreading the truth about Dominion stealing the election. The first criteria of defamation has been met – the statements in question were false.
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After almost three years of hearing Trump’s lawyer-cronies telling us they have evidence, yet the NEVER produce it. For the public or the courts. You say it can’t be true.
So based on that, you STILL believe the accusations to be true.
Proof is in the pudding. The issue is there is no pudding. Or milk, sugar corn starch or an other ingredients used to make pudding.
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RE: “Did you see the SCOTUS ruling I posted?”
Yes. I think it is a mistake to assume intention without evidence.
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No evidence? A few thousand emails stressing profit over truth from Murdoch on down to the hired help on FOX are a good start.
If you can’t read the SCOTUS about reckless disregard for the truth while FOX knew the truth, then I can’t help that for sure.
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“Yes. I think it is a mistake to assume intention without evidence.”
There does not need to be proof of intention to harm to be defamation.
There are four elements of defamation . . .
1) a false statement purporting to be fact;
2) publication or communication of that statement to a third person;
3) fault amounting to at least negligence; and
4) damages, or some harm caused to the reputation of the person or entity who is the subject of the statement.
The only thing at issue in the case will be number 3. And the Sullivan standard is . . . Malice OR Was it published “with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.”
Fox is going to pay. Bigly. IMHO.
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RE: “while FOX knew the truth, then I can’t help that for sure.”
You could help me and yourself if you could show that Fox knew the truth. I think you are misreading profit motive as malice.
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“. . . justifying the abuse of 1st Amendment freedoms.”
Defamation is the abuse of 1st Amendment freedoms not the holding defamers to account.
You worried about “partisan?” What is more “partisan” than a supposed news organization knowingly telling lies over and over again to support a politician whom you know is telling a Big Lie?
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RE: “What is more “partisan” than a supposed news organization knowingly telling lies over and over again to support a politician whom you know is telling a Big Lie?”
Spoken like a true Witch Hunter. You, too, need to show that Fox knowingly told lies. You can start by quoting the words Fox used.
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“Spoken like a true Witch Hunter.”
The hunting is almost too easy these days.
It is very clear from what we know so far from the Dominion depositions that the management and hosts at Fox were well aware that Dominion did not steal the election with or without the aid of the ghost of Hugo Chavez.
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“I think you are misreading profit motive as malice.”
“Malice” is not a necessary condition for defamation. I think it unlikely that Fox bore any particular malice towards Dominion. Why would they? I think in their zeal to carry water for their political boss – Trump – they were reckless in their disregard for the truth. And now they are going to pay. Bigly.
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How is it that you can say MSM and NOT include Fox News in that category? They have by far the biggest numbers news watchers.
As far as gaslighting the people goes, FAUX has it down to a science. But the curtain has been pulled back on it. The problem is the Faux News audience doesn’t care they have been lied to repeatedly, called stupid by the hosts that pander to them, and continue to watch because they hear what they want. BUBBLE.
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How do you know what the Fox audience thinks?
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One way is to read the comments from the rightwing faction on this forum. The denials of being Faux News watchers notwithstanding, the tropes, words and phrases used by yourself, Don, and Mr. Smith come right out of Faux’s bs.
Another is to hear how producers at the network felt about their viewers.
“Pfeiffer, who has since left the network, responded by trashing Fox viewers.
“Like negotiating with terrorists,” Pfeiffer wrote. “But especially dumb ones. Cousin f—– types not saudi royalty.” ”
So which cousin is being f—ed?
And if the audience cared about being blatantly lied to every night, they would have left in droves. They WANT those lies. It makes them feel superior and smart. IMO, they are PT Barnum’s favorite people.
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“They have by far the biggest numbers news watchers.”
Ever wonder why that is? Why is a cable channel displacing the century old networks?
I knew 50 years ago that Walter Cronkite was lying to me, and omitting important news. but I had no alternative but NBC and ABC, who were telling the same lies and ignoring the same news.
FOX broke tha cabal.
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Yet you continually say they are not part of the MSM. That makes zero sense to anyone with a 6th grade reading comprehension.
But then again there was this insightful comment about Faux News viewers by one of Carlson’s former producers.
“Pfeiffer, who has since left the network, responded by trashing Fox viewers.
“Like negotiating with terrorists,” Pfeiffer wrote. “But especially dumb ones. Cousin f—– types not saudi royalty.” ”
Funny how you believe Cronkite was lying to you, but you deny that Faux News is CURRENLTY lying to the country and admitted to it in their own words. Not taken out of context, but released as part of discovery in an attempt to save their collective backsides.
The cabal may have been broken. But the cabal breaker is in toruble.
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And yet the legacy MSM can’t collectively draw FOX’s audience, so how is FOX in trouble.
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They were afraid of losing to Newsmax and OANN, small, but eager to gain audience. They were more than willing to continue the Big Lie for audience and, of course, money. In fact there was a dip for FOX.
I don’t know if they gained back or not. I am sure Carlson begged for the tapes so he could patch things up with MAGA and Trump. Sure enough, Trump did tweet niceties about Tucker after showing the 4 minutes of escorting the “Viking” out of 56 minutes of him breaching and yelling with the mob.
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“And yet the legacy MSM can’t collectively draw FOX’s audience, so how is FOX in trouble.”
Fox News has the largest individual audience share ON CABLE but it does not outdo all the legacy mainstream media combined. Not even close. Another one of your handy made up facts.
Here is the viewership for the top four MSM news prime time news broadcasts . . .
ABC : 8.3 million
NBC : 7.2 million
CBS : 5.2 million
PBS : 2.7 million
Fox News : 2.3 million (prime time viewers)
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Don’t the evening opinion shows show a huge surge for FOX, however? Compared, of course, to MSNBC, CNN, etc.
Baritromo was successful and respected in the business reporting field , but tried to feather her nest a bit, $5million a year was not enough, by hosting Powell and friends. That was the news side which did have some credibility.
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“Don’t the evening opinion shows show a huge surge for FOX, however? Compared, of course, to MSNBC, CNN, etc.”
Sure, Fox generally equals or beats MSNBC and CNN combined ON CABLE. ABC, NBC, PBS and CBS are not in that constant talking head market. Total audience for the three networks is south of 3 million.
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Thanks.
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I wii say that media is not always perfect or unbiased. Come to think of it, neither is just about anyone or company in any field.
With that in mind, there are so many more venues, left and right, that are easy to compare and contrast with a few mouse clicks. Unfortunately some Americans like to be spoon fed what confirms their own biases. Liberals are not immune.
To, the problem is that Republicans overwhelmingly (60% or more) got all their news and information from FOX and affiliates. Like putting all your eggs in one basket. If the eggs gathered were rotted, well, so it goes. No fresh eggs, no omelet.
FOX may have been a nice contrast back with Hannity and Colmes, but when Colmes left, it was a slow, steady descent from fair and balanced.
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“Ever wonder why that is? . . .”
Fox News has not displaced anyone. They have cornered the brain dead end of the news market with their WWE style of grievance bullshit. ABC, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, NPR are very much alive.
So, Walter Cronkite lied to you. And Abraham Lincoln was a failure and a war monger. Anything else we should know?
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