Murdoch gets his lackey. How long before the WSJ takes on the USA Today look and feel? If News Corp wasn't being given a free hand to take over to much of the media it wouldn't be such an issue. I never liked the WSJ before so on its own, it's all the same. The problem is the continuing path to consolidation in the media not to mention business in general. It's good for a few but really bad both for freedom of the press, democracy and business.
Just seems awfully suspicious that a day after I read a big story about how Murdoch is all upset at NBC because Keith Olbermann is mean to O'Reilly, and the story details how Murdoch told NBC he was going to have the NY Post attack NBC if they weren't nicer, suddenly the White House is attacking NBC, and buried at the very bottom of the story we find out that the White House is upset at - who? Why Keith Olbermann!
Gillespie also used the letter to complain about other aspects of NBC News coverage and to lodge a complaint about "blatant partisan talk show hosts like Christopher Matthews and Keith Olbermann at MSNBC," both of whom have come under attack from Republicans.
It's good to be Rupert and have such a patsy in the White House.
PS Note to Washington Post: People didn't ASSUME that Bush's Hitler remarks were about Obama, as you claim in the story. The White House told people it was about Obama. But mentioning that fact would kill the appearance of impartiality that you like to give by never reporting the actual facts, and only reporting the spin.
Oh I am shocked. 1000000% shocked and then some. Just ask an Aussie about how great the media is now that he owns almost all of it down there. Lots of open exchanges of ideas on both sides...the right and the far right. For all of the theater that the Bancroft family delivered before selling they now look either like frauds of just plain stupid. Either works fine.
Four months after buying the Wall Street Journal, Rupert Murdoch has been accused by a special independent committee of breaking "the letter and the spirit" of an agreement to protect editorial integrity.
A five-strong committee established as a condition of the Bancroft family's $5bn (£2.5bn) sale of the paper's Dow Jones parent company to Murdoch has complained that it was kept in the dark over the resignation of the Journal's top editor.
Committee members say they were not told until after the event about the controversial resignation last week of the managing editor, Marcus Brauchli, which has prompted fevered rumours of a rift over the direction of the paper.
Last month, AMERICAblog exposed yet another act of hypocrisy from Bill O'Reilly. We also showed he's a wimp who is afraid of his own boss:
Earlier this year, arm chair terrorism fighter Bill O'Reilly blasted the chair of General Electric for doing business with terrorist countries like Iran. Bill was in rare form when he took on this issue. But, Bill needs to have on another guest and blast him for cavorting with Iranians and Syrians, possibly even aiding in the recruitment of terrorists and certainly facilitating the spewing of hatred against Israel.
That guest would be Rupert Murdoch, the head of FOX News.
Murdoch owns FOX, for whom O'Reilly works. Murdoch also owns MySpace.com. Therein lies the problem. An astute observer pointed us to some of the users of Mr. Murdoch's site. There are numerous users of MySpace.com in states that sponsor terrorism, like Iran, Syria and Sudan. That alone should warrant intervention from O'Reilly using his own standards for doing business with terrorist nations. But, that's not the biggest problem. It's the Web sites honoring terrorist organizations that give us pause. There is the self-described "Offical Hezbollah MySpace" page.
That post includes links to several of the other terror sites hosted by Murdoch's company. You'd think that would set off Bill O'Reilly. You'd be wrong. Last night, O'Reilly again went after companies doing business with Iran. Again, he failed to mention Murdoch. This is a link to the video, which includes the following exchange:
Millions of Americans hold GE stock in good faith, but this is a bad company. Doing business with people killing American soldiers and Marines is simply unacceptable, and paying a guy $20 million to run a company into the ground is simply breathtaking.
There are more than a few villain CEOs in this country, but Jeffrey Immelt could well be the worst. And that's the memo.
Now, General Electric isn't the only concern doing business with Iran. The government of Switzerland and the French company Total, the oil company, are among other big offenders.
Actually, Bill, Rupert Murdoch is another big offender. Really big offender. Big tough Bill O'Reilly doesn't dare to go after Murdoch.
Earlier this year, arm chair terrorism fighter Bill O'Reilly blasted the chair of General Electric for doing business with terrorist countries like Iran. Bill was in rare form when he took on this issue. But, Bill needs to have on another guest and blast him for cavorting with Iranians and Syrians, possibly even aiding in the recruitment of terrorists and certainly facilitating the spewing of hatred against Israel.
That guest would be Rupert Murdoch, the head of FOX News.
Murdoch owns FOX, for whom O'Reilly works. Murdoch also owns MySpace.com. Therein lies the problem. An astute observer pointed us to some of the users of Mr. Murdoch's site. There are numerous users of MySpace.com in states that sponsor terrorism, like Iran, Syria and Sudan. That alone should warrant intervention from O'Reilly using his own standards for doing business with terrorist nations. But, that's not the biggest problem. It's the Web sites honoring terrorist organizations that give us pause:
There are many other similar sites on MySpace, like this one that honors Ayatollah Khomeini and contains a number of other troubling-looking videos. Granted, there is no way for me to verify whether that site above is the official Hezbollah site on MySpace. But, given the grave nature of the threat, figuring that out seems like a perfect task for Bill O'Reilly and his crack team of terror fighters over at Fox News.
Also, don't forget, O'Reilly spent a lot of time attacking DailyKos and other blogs for content that he viewed as objectionable, even though it was written by kooky anonymous visitors to our sites (and even though O'Reilly's own kooky commenters made some rather troubling threats about Hillary). O'Reilly has a very strict standard for accountability from others, even when they're not really responsible for the hate that may appear on their Web sites. Let's see if Bill O'Reilly and FOX News hold Murdoch's MySpace to that same standard of accountability.
The Federal Communications Commission erased nearly all of a proposed $1.2 million indecency fine against a number of Fox television stations yesterday, saying the Rupert Murdoch-owned network should be fined for airing an offensive television show only in markets where viewers complained about it.
Instead of ordering all 169 stations that aired it to pay the larger fine, the FCC ordered 13 Fox-owned and -affiliated stations to pay a total of $91,000 in indecency fines for broadcasting an episode of the long-canceled reality show "Married by America" nearly five years ago.
In yesterday's order, the FCC turned down a Fox claim that said the April 7, 2003, show -- which featured digitally obscured nudity and whipped-cream-covered strippers -- was not indecent.
Opening up the cable TV industry was a great move, but media consolidation? Look at how well consolidation in the banking and telecom industry has worked. If you want to see how well media consolidation works, look at the path the US media is already on or check out Australia, where Rupert Murdoch dominates the media with very few exceptions. Is that what we want to see in the US? Wasn't the Cold War supposed to be about issues like this? Looks like the Soviet Union won.
What ever happened to the spirit of competition that used to be important in America?
What a novel idea that keeps popping up in Europe. The courts across Europe are promoting competition instead of consolidation. In this particular case, the Murdoch media empire had bought a significant minority position in a competing television broadcaster despite cries of outrage by competitors who believed this was unhealthy and uncompetitive. Not so surprisingly, this deal occurred during the Blair years, who remains cozy with Murdoch.
Ah yes, I can almost remember the days when competition existed in the US instead of the sorry system that currently exists. The two continents are moving in opposite directions at the moment with regards to business and that does not bode well for US business nor consumers in the long run. Is the US really served by just a handful of media outlets? Is it really in the best interest of American consumers to have a few telecom operators? Are bigger banks even interested in the average customer? When did competition in the US become such an outdated and old fashioned idea?
The WSJ is actually a good paper. Their editorial policy is wacked out to the right, but the news side has always been fairly independent. With Murdoch now buying the paper, you can kiss the news side of the WSJ goodbye. Just as Murdoch has done at FOX and elsewhere, the only news you'll get to see in the Journal is the news that fits Murdoch's own far-right warped view of the world. It's one thing for FOX to lie the American people into a war and to lie the American people into supporting a failed American president, but it will be quite another should FOX start packaging propaganda to American's business community under the guise of the Wall Street Journal's good name (and it will). That's not just bad for the country, it's bad for business.
This is why Bush's close friend John Howard needs to be sent packing. It should come as no surprise that Rupert Murdoch overwhelmingly dominates the Australian media when there are willing and able helpers like Howard to fuel the undemocratic, knuckle-dragging media. Much like Bush in the US, Howard is Murdoch media and Murdoch media is Howard. Xenophobia? Yes, a key plank for Howard. Bizarre racist attacks for political posturing? Of course. Strong support of Iraq despite evidence that it is a miserable failure? Naturally. The trend has not been overlooked by the Law Council of Australia. First on the Gitmo detainee, David Hicks:
Presenting a damning report on Hicks' trial, the council said the two cases defied legal norms.
"There's an 'Alice in Wonderland' quality to both these cases. First the sentence, then the verdict. Mr Hicks and Mr Haneef both know what that feels like," said council President Tim Bugg
And more recently on the detained Indian doctor in Australia, despite reports that his ties to the failed Scottish attacks are highly suspect.
Haneef, an Indian Muslim doctor, is technically on bail awaiting trial on a charge of providing "reckless" support to a terrorist organisation by giving a SIM card to members of a group linked to the British car bomb attacks.
A decision earlier this month by a Brisbane court to free him on bail was immediately followed by the cancellation of his visa by the government and he remains in custody.
Just think how exciting it will be as the Murdoch media empire in America trips over itself to prop up more politics like this. Fun days ahead...
With Blair now out of power and unable to obstruct access, the UK Government has finally released interesting information under the UK's Freedom of Information Act. Considering the timing of the phone calls between Rupert Murdoch and the hit pieces that followed it is no wonder Blair wanted to keep the details away from the media. More than ever it appears as though Blair worked hand in hand with Rupert Murdoch and his right wing media empire to smear dissenters such as Jacques Chirac and anyone else who opposed the war in Iraq.
In Alastair Campbell's diaries, published last week, the former spin doctor described a Downing Street dinner for Mr Murdoch and his sons, James and Lachlan, in 2002. "Murdoch pointed out that his were the only papers that gave us support when the going got tough. 'I've noticed,' said TB," Mr Campbell wrote. Lance Price, Mr Campbell's deputy, called Mr Murdoch "the 24th member of the [Blair] Cabinet". He added: "His presence was always felt. No big decision could ever be made inside No10 without taking account of the likely reaction of three men, Gordon Brown, John Prescott and Rupert Murdoch. On all the really big decisions, anybody else could safely be ignored."
A few choice examples of the Murdoch media follow up after those calls:
Phone call:11 March 2003
The Sun says: 12 March 2003
"Like a cheap tart who puts price before principle, money before honour, Jacques Chirac struts the streets of shame. The French President's vow to veto the second resolution [on Iraq] at the United Nations - whatever it says - puts him right in the gutter."
Phone call: 13 March 2003
The Sun says: 14 March 2003
"Charlatan Jacques Chirac is basking in cheap applause for his 'Save Saddam' campaign - but his treachery will cost his people dear. This grandstanding egomaniac has inflicted irreparable damage on some of the most important yet fragile structures of international order."
Phone call: 19 March 2003
The Sun says: 20 March 2003
"Time has run out for Saddam Hussein. His day of reckoning is at hand. The war on Iraq has begun... The courage and resilience of Tony Blair and George Bush will now be put to the ultimate test."
Rupert Murdoch is obviously a smart guy, having built a media empire around the world that is very profitable and continues to grow. Like him and his product or not, the man has been an enormous success. Although he surely has some core beliefs, he's also clever enough (or possibly cynical enough) to sniff out an opportunity and run with it. This is a man who despite the overwhelmingly conservative tone of his media empire, he has been a big supporter of Tony Blair and has been receptive to Hillary's campaign. Sure, neither is on the left side of the spectrum, but neither necessarily jumps out as what you would expect from Murdoch. Regardless of his intentions - cynical or real - this new development is very significant because this is the leader of the right wing media in the Anglo world, India, China and beyond.
Mr Murdoch has bought a Toyota-made Lexus GS450H "green" car, and other practical measures include solar-powered golf carts to carry people round the Fox film lot in Hollywood, building environmentally friendly studios, replacing company fleets with hybrids, using renewable energy, and offsetting remaining emissions by financing windpower in India.
The world's most prominent media tycoon is being hailed by environmentalists as the most important of a chain of high-profile new recruits to the battle to control climate change, including Sir Richard Branson and Sir Terry Leahy, chief executive of Tesco.
His planned campaign "to change the way the public thinks about these issues" could be particularly effective because of the strength of his operations in the United States, China and India, the three most critical countries for tackling global warming. Mr Murdoch told his employees: "We must first get out own house in order."
News Corporation has a carbon footprint of at 641,150 tons a year and will now aim to be carbon neutral by 2010. News International, which publishes his British newspapers, and the publishers HarperCollins will achieve this goal by the end of the year and all books published by the imprint Fourth Estate are to be printed on recycled paper from 1 July.
Wow, even FOX News hasn't tried this little trick. The conservative tabloid, New York Post, owned by Republican media magnate Rupert Murdoch, published a story today criticizing Democrats for giving a "death sentence" to millions of Iraqis. The only problem? The AP never wrote any such thing. You wouldn't really call this plagiarism - I'm not sure what you call it. Faking someone else's byline in order to print a story blasting a political enemy. Wow. TPM's Greg Sargent spoke with the AP reporter, David Espo, who the NY Post claims wrote the story. Espo says:
"I didn't write anything remotely like that. My name was on the story and I didn't write it anything like the way it was printed."
Publishing a fake AP story. I certainly hope the Associated Press is going to weigh in on this one.
