Fox News is in court again -- well, still -- facing off against a voting-machine company. What, you thought it was over, and that they'd settled out of court for a staggering sum?
That was Dominion. This is Smartmatic, and it ain't over yet. Lawyers and PR flacks from both sides are talking tough and the shockingly cynical comments from Fox on-air talent and others that came out in the run-up to the Dominion settlement are getting another run-though.
Will Fox blink? Will Smartmatic prevail if the case goes to trial? I don't know. I do know it's all about eyeballs and the relentless pursuit of them -- and the ad dollars they bring -- by Fox News. If you were expecting any Edward R. Murrow-like pronouncements of journalistic ideals, or even partisan flag-waving like the newspaper magnates of old, forget it.
Update
11 months ago
3 comments:
Tangent: Being vaguely aware of Edward R. Murrow as some sort of legendary character, I read the speech. Wow. I'm embarrassed to say I had to exercise some underused brain cells to absorb it. We appear to desperately need folks like Murrow and Eisenhower.
Here's hoping Fox gets justice, whatever the form.
Murrow "...the American public is more reasonable, restrained and more mature than most of our industry's program planners believe". Probably true in Murrow's day; definitely not true today. In his day, publicizing nonsense required at least a modicum of infrastructure and investment-a small radio station, an independent newspaper...
Today, any idiot with a keyboard can spread their vile ignorance across the globe in seconds. Murrow was the product of a society-and its standards and values-which no longer exists.
Ken, you had better pray it still exists, or we're cooked. I think you can sell our people some pretty awful bullshit, especially with the right packaging, but a narrow majority of Americans still begin to recognize the smell and recoil from it, at least by the second box.
I'm literally counting on it, hanging on by sheer force of will instead of retiring. I don't speak Canadian well enough to pass for a native and I'm too old for such a big change -- but an irrevocably Trumpized U.S. is not a place I can safely retire in: I own too many books and way too many contrary opinions. The mid-terms will tell the tale and I have to manage until at least then. If I can.
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