Mike Royko called Rupert Murdoch The Alien. He landed on the Chicago Sun-Times like a bug-eyed monster from outer space and extruded poisonous slime. I was an eyewitness.
Under the leadership of publisher James Hoge, the paper had won six Pulitzers and should have won another one (for the ingenious idea of opening a bar named the Mirage and baiting it to attract the flies of Chicago corruption). Hoge had just overseen a redesign of the paper that made it then (and in my opinion still) the most elegant tabloid I had ever seen.
The Sun-Times was poised on the edge of something great. The Chicago Tribune remained tethered to its hidebound past. Morale was high.
After the closing of the Chicago Daily News in 1978, Royko, the greatest Chicago columnist, had taken up residence in a corner office of the Sun-Times where he wrote his superlative daily column and smoked all the Pall Malls he wanted to. This golden age lasted until 1983.The paper was owned by Marshall Field V and his brother Ted Field. Ted wanted to cash in. Marshall couldn't or didn't choose to buy him out. Murdoch was known to be a bidder. Royko was involved in negotiations with a group of local investors assembled by Jim Hoge to buy the paper. Marshall Field, who owned half the paper, said he was willing to sell to that group, but Murdoch offered $10 million more than Hoge could raise, and Marshall's brother, the movie producer Ted Field, insisted they take it.
This was a great blow to Mike. He went home and had a few drinks, and when the local TV stations brought their cameras into his den, he announced that a Murdoch paper was "not fit to wrap fish in."
The next afternoon I sat with him at Billy Goat's.
"I guess I resigned, huh?"
"Murdoch doesn't care what you say about him," I said.
"It's not what I said about him," Mike said. "It's that after describing a Murdoch paper that way, how can I work there?"
I continued to work at the Sun-Times, explaining: "It's not Murdoch's paper. It's my paper. He only bought it."
On the first day of Murdoch's ownership, he walked into the newsroom and we all gathered around and he recited the usual blather and rolled up his shirtsleeves and started to lay out a new front page. Well, he was a real newspaperman, give him that. He threw out every meticulous detail of the beautiful design, ordered up big, garish headlines, and gave big play to a story about a North Shore rabbi accused of holding a sex slave.
The story turned out to be fatally flawed, but so what? It sold papers. Well, actually, it didn't sell papers. There were hundreds of cancellations. Soon our precious page 3 was defaced by a daily Wingo girl, a pinup in a bikini promoting a cash giveaway. The Sun-Times, which had been placing above the Tribune in lists of the 10 best U.S. newspapers, never took that great step it was poised for.In the years to come, Murdoch brought in various editors, all of whom I liked, one from Australia, two from England. Slowly, piecemeal, they did what they could to restore the paper's lost respectability. They were all newspaperman and had in their blood a respect for the craft that Murdoch manifestly did not share.
But Murdoch was a gifted businessman, and he had larger designs. The Sun-Times owned a local TV station, WFLD/32. Murdoch began buying other TV stations, assembling what would become the Fox Network. When cross-ownership of TV and print in the same market was outlawed, he was forced to sell the newspaper. (The Tribune was allowed to keep WGN-TV and radio, and that's a long story.) As a parting gift, he bequeathed us a publisher who was forced to resign "after he lost an intense power struggle with the newspaper's chief financial officer," as the New York Times tactfully worded it in the days before David Carr.
It is therefore with a great deal of satisfaction that I observe the Alien's current troubles. This man has done more to harm journalism in America and Britain than any other person. I cannot speak for Australia. In the U.S., where his newspaper holdings are limited to the New York Post and the (actually good) Wall Street Journal, his damage has been done with Fox News, the first deliberately and unapologetically biased and partisan network in American history. You disagree? Be my guest.In the UK, it is now revealed, his managers and editors oversaw a culture of bribery and deception that was depraved even by the low standards of Brit tabloids. It appears even the Queen's cell phone was tapped, leading my friend Margo Howard to ask on Twitter, (1) Does the Queen actually use a cell phone? and (2) Would the hackers be guilty of treason?
You've read the news. I need not recount the details of the scandal. What we see now is the rare sight of all three major British parties, Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrats, marching together arm-in-arm, united in joyous agreement to bring the Dirty Digger low. His hopes of buying control of BSkyB, the British satellite network, appear doomed. His lieutenants face squirmy sessions before Parliamentary committees, and some of them may do prison time.
Murdoch himself, his son James, and his cherished News International CEO Rebekah Brooks, are all said to have no "personal knowledge" of the phone hacking. I think the term for this is plausible deniability. As David Carr, the most excellent media reporter for The New York Times, writes today of Brooks:I'd suggest it was inconceivable she did not know, given the number of hacking targets. What editor doesn't know where her stories come from, especially stories chock full of highly private, delicious conversations. Did Ms. Brooks think they were borne in through the window by magic fairies?
The News of the World staff reportedly greeted Ms. Brooks' statements in their newsroom with hoots and derision. One would expect no less. Britain now apparently faces a period without coverage of vicars with knickers before Murdoch launches the Sun on Sunday to cover the screws of the world.
Murdoch has been brought to bay by one great British newspaper, the Guardian. It devoted two years to the task. It did what frightened politicians and cowed opinion leaders dared not do -- it defied the power and the money of the Alien. Ironic, that Murdoch seems about to lose what would have been his crown jewel because he was never able to restrain the low tastes and trashy standards that wounded my newspaper in one of his drive-by shootings.
7/13/2011: In a great setback, Murdoch is forced to withdraw his bid fpr BSkyB.
I agree with you totally. Rupert Murdoch represents everything that is wrong with journalism and nothing that is right.
I'm very glad you suffered through that dark period and are still pumping out great articles like this today.
Is the Wall Street Journal not a newspaper?
Ebert: Yes, a pretty good one. Brain cloud.
It truly says something when, even in a business that's dying slowly and tragically, one particular paper's closing can be seen as a triumph and a victory.
I wonder, how did it all start? Was it a spontaneous idea that someone had to hack phones? It seems unlikely. More likely, a decaying of standards, a moral compromise here and there, until the frog was boiled and it seemed totally reasonable. There's going to be a book in this, written by an inside source or comprised of several sources' stories, telling how a newspaper could get so low.
Because of the subject, a "Citizen Kane" quote seems appropriate (and we'll get countless quotes, I'm sure): "If it was anybody else, I'd say what's going to happen to you would be a lesson to you. Only you're going to need more than one lesson. And you're going to get more than one lesson."
A wonderful piece Roger.
May I just add that he wields his power even more mercilessly down-under. He owns 70% of distributed media in this country. His papers are currently engaged in their usual role of attacking a government that is attempting to bring in a progressive piece of legislation to combat climate change. Murdoch does not like it when governments get out line, and start acting in the interest of their people.
The man is poison to democracy and I have enjoyed watching him squirm.
Fantastic stuff, Roger.
I imagine the advisors of the MA Journalism program I took last year in London (none of whom work for the tabloids) would have a field day with this. Too bad the program doesn't start up again until October.
Murdoch sold the Herald in 1994, so that he could purchase what would become the Fox affiliate in Boston. IIRC, he got a waiver from the FCC to allow him to purchase WNYW in New York and keep the New York Post, based on the argument that if he was forced to sell the paper, he would not be able to find a buyer, and the paper would die.
Ebert writes of Murdoch: "his newspaper holdings are limited to the New York Post and Boston Herald."
Are you not forgetting about the Wall Street Journal as well. That Murdoch should hold the reigns to a newspaper with pedigree akin to the New York Times is a disgrace.
Ebert: I think the Journal is pretty good.
Hi, Roger. I'm puzzled how you can show outrage at a private citizen spying on private conversations of people but have never seemed to show outrage at the last several years where the U.S. government is breaking all the laws and creating patriot acts to let the government spy on anyone they want at any time for any reason without a court order--even with a self-created order in the case of the FBI.
I'm puzzled why people are so outraged that a queen was snooped on, but so few people show outrage for the defenseless and helpless normal citizen.
you wrote: "In the U.S., where his newspaper holdings are limited to the New York Post and Boston Herald..."
Doesn't Murdoch own the Wall Street Journal, the largest paper in the US by circulation?
Ebert: Duh! What was I thinking?
Couldn't happen to a more deserving slime bucket than Murdoch. I love The Guardian more every year.
Dear Roger,
As someone who has been following with a passing interest the coverage of the hacking affair here in the UK, I'd like to thank you for addressing the broader issue of what Murdoch and his ilk have done to journalism (or, perhaps less naively, of the trends they have exacerbated).
Too often the British coverage has narrowed the story down to its most digestible components, devoid of context (as British coverage of most things is wont to do) and the narrative is thus teetering eerily close to one of a single tabloid losing its way, when even those without any insider knowledge of the media (like me, for example), can see that it is much bigger than that.
Fox News is only an Entertainment network, and not a "news" network and therefore has no bearing on journalism at all since they are no more in the same genre as News than The Cartoon Network or Nickolodeon. They found their audience, and know what their market wants --- what's the harm in feeding the fan base?
And also, what do you say to the legions of right wingers who claim that CNN and MSNBC are also "unapologetically biased and partisan." Because you gotta admit, a lot of their anchorpersons and hosts pretty much are.
"This man has done more to harm journalism in America and Britain than any other person. I cannot speak for Australia."
I can, Roger, and I can tell you that there is a depressing lack of quality newspapers in Australia, and News Limited owns three-quarters of this country's daily metropolitan newspapers. The newspaper landscape down here is dominated by right-wing broadsheets and scummy tabloid rags.
As Rupert Murdoch becomes grist for the 24-hour news cycle mill and he himself becomes a target for scrutiny, it will be very interesting to see the lengths he goes to to protect his provacy or the privacy of his business dealings.
If Murdoch is guilty of a crime, he should face his punishment for it.
But let's face facts, if he were of the Left, your tone would be quite different.
Enjoy the taste of Schadenfreude.
For years now I've felt Murdoch is the person most responsible not only for the decline in journalism today, but also for the intensely bitter partisanship and hard right lean that has taken place in the US.
Murdoch is easy to figure out if you understand that he is singularly driven towards amassing as much money and power as possible. If something will bring in viewers and readers he is for it, no matter what, no matter who it hurts, no matter the repercussions to society. The News of the World scandal is just the latest proof of this.
As far as politics go, if the left was the one more prone to a black and white world view and believing anything they are told so long as it agrees with their preconceived notions then Fox News would be a liberal network. Is he a conservative? Probably, but only because conservatives are extremely friendly towards those wanting massive amounts of money and power, not because of some right-wing world view.
As an Australian, I can say that Murdoch's political influences helped to shape the country as we know it today, stemming from his support of Gough Whitlam in the 70s, resulting in a higher standard of health care and educational resources, all, to an extent, gratis as provided by the government, as well as allowing for a massive boom in the import/export trade.
Having said that, he's a complete corporate tool and, regarding the integrity of journalism, the antichrist.
Great article Roger.
The WSJ is now a decent, but biased paper, where before it was the sole source of pure objective journalism. He ruined a great tradition.
You lost me when, after Gene Siskel's death, you destroyed your TV show by filling the other seat with a clown. You're a great movie critic -- but spare me your ethics crap.
Jerry Ryan @ "If Murdoch is guilty of a crime, he should face his punishment for it. But let's face facts, if he were of the Left, your tone would be quite different. Enjoy the taste of Schadenfreude."
"If" he's guilty of a crime?
I think what Roger celebrates here is not literally the prospective misery of another - but the idea of just desserts arriving and by way of karma. What goes around comes around and not a moment too soon, in Murdoch's case.
He's not the only person on the planet with faults and failings, but his most glaring one has been to encourage others to give into theirs, via lowering themselves to do it, and while receiving money for it in exchange.
He's the pimp of Schadenfreude.
And Roger? Rightly happy to see the blackguard getting called out.
Note: it's not like Roger heard the man's son had died, and decided to dance on his coffin.
The BBC's Yes Minister, of course, said it best about UK media:
The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country. The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country. The Times is read by people who actually do run the country. The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country. The Financial Times is read by people who own the country. The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country. The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is...And the Sun readers don't care who runs the country as long as she's got big breasts.
(Suffice to say that when the Beatles sang "She's the kind of a girl that makes the News of the World", they weren't talking about her being a mover and shaker in world politics.)
That's something to remember when we're talking about UK Rupert Murdoch vs. US Rupert Murdoch:
Over here, RM is Fox News, where not a single Daily Show goes by without Jon Stewart making Fox News's repeatedly toe-tripping attempt at anti-Obama "journalism" look like it was done by a fourth-grade class...Over there, the papers are just plain down the rabbit hole. Over here, we giggle and ignore him; over there, he's got them ALL.
So call me suspicious when Charles Foster Murdoch gives up on Day One: Over here, when a CEO or senator gets caught on something nice and piranha-tasty like, say, crotch photos on Facebook, they play the "penitent martyr" violins for at least a week, a month average. Rupert throwing up his hands and saying "It's a fair cop" either means he's got something up his sleeve (like folding the paper and bringing it back out again three months later under a new name), or he thinks he can afford it, he's throwing his obsolete paper-press liabilities to the wolves, and focusing on tomorrow's WSJ headline.
But that doesn't mean it won't be fun watching the UK press chip away at him for a juicy bonfire of the vanities, like he'd trained them to do. :)
Excellent recounting of the events at the Sun-Times. I miss Royko's columns, back in the day.
I do disagree on Fox News being the first partisan news network. I would argue for CBS, under Murrow and Cronkite. Biased left. Fox News is just more open about a bias.
MSNBC beat Fox News on the air, per Wikipedia. Both launched in 1996, with MSNBC first in July and FNS coming later in October. MSNBC is arguably more "progressive" (Lean Forward!) than FNS is conservative.
Murdoch may own Fox News, but it is all Roger Ailes imprint. Ailes created a great network to provide balance to all of the rest of the media - which is left biased all day every day. Kudos to Ailes.
If Team Murdoch misbehaved with their tabloids in the UK, the get what they get. So be it. It's not the biggest scandal on my radar screen. We have bigger ones here that I'm watching, like Project Gunrunner.
The Australian Neanderthal
Studs Terkel was having a conversation with Harry Weisler in 2003. The topic was his art, the events of the day, and truth. The irrepressible one has wonderfully strayed. Returning to the subject at hand, Stud says:
"Once the people get the facts - it's getting the facts. And remember our media - this is funny - our media is called 'liberal media,' which is an obscene joke of course.
'Our media!' Is not the most powerful mogul the Australian Neanderthal, Rupert Murdoch? So this is the most astonishing thing. It's almost as if W. C. Fields wrote the scenario - as we have it today. Of course the humor, it's almost outrageous in the humor."
YouTube>"Conversations with History: Studs Terkel"
I work for a media empire that sounds a little similar in its acquisitions: QMI, owned by Pierre Karl Peladeau -- the Toronto Sun is one of the leading newspapers in the chain. Oddly enough, your Page 3 Girl reference already existed in the Toronto Sun before Peladeau acquired it, and he has since banished her from the prominent position. However, he has similar deigns in the news business, with his Sun News channel, which some have called Fox News North.
I can't say I agree with the political leanings of the news channel, or the paper as a whole; however, I can take some consolation from your story about Mike Royko. Thank you for sharing it. It's not my paper, but it is my job, and I shall continue to do the best I can.
Jerry,
Bad journalism is bad journalism. Murdoch's media tend to go for sensationalism and exploitation. I don't even believe he is that conservative, just a wealthy corporatist like most media owners. Ailes is the reason Fox is so unbalanced.
Randy,
Accepting that MSNBC today is as partisan as Fox (and I would dispute that MSNBC today presents stories in anywhere close as unbalanced a manner as Fox) the following statement is so misleading as to be incorrect:
"MSNBC beat Fox News on the air, per Wikipedia. Both launched in 1996, with MSNBC first in July and FNS coming later in October. MSNBC is arguably more "progressive" (Lean Forward!) than FNS is conservative."
Yes, MSNBC was on the air first, but it did not skew progressive until the success of Olbermann's show - well after Fox was on the air. Prior to that, it was trying to be like CNN.
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you weren't deliberately being misleading.
Rupert Murdoch brings to life the maniacal villains of the superhero comics.
Here's a bit of karma. Murdoch's wife Wendi wants to be a movie producer and her first film, "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan," is being released THIS week. She's not going to be all that available for publicity.
I hope that I would be right in assuming the term "Dirty Digger" is meant to refer to Murdoch as a digger of dirt and is not a reference to him being Australian. The term "digger" in Australia is a colloquial term used with reverence and affection for Australian soldiers. If the term here was used in reference to Murdoch's Australian background I trust Ebert did not intentionally insult Australians in general. Murdoch is not fit to lick an Australian soldier's boot!
Ebert: "The Dirty Digger" is a widely-used nickname for Murdoch. Google "Dirty Digger" and check out the top link.
Americans have the most curious notion of what constitutes the political "left." By the standards of Canada and Western Europe, there is no "left" in the mainstream American political spectrum. Example: the Conservative Party of Canada has done nothing to block same-sex marriages, abortions, or homosexuals in the military, nor will they, even though they have a majority government and could if they wanted to. They have taken no action to liberalize gun ownership nor will they, and they will take no substantial action against socialized medicine in this country. Left? Our right-wingers are far further to the left than the President that the Fox news types call a "socialist."
Yes, this started as an inquiry into phone-hacking of celebrities. Big deal, right? But, much more disturbingly, it has morphed into an inquiry into police corruption. Apparently, the police accepted bribes to provide information on citizens. Even the Queen’s public protection officers supposedly accepted bribes to tell details about her and her family. Then, when a public inquiry was urged, the police refused to take action saying there was nothing to investigate. And they kept refusing to act. One of their top men retired and went to work for News of the World. How does all this look? Their excuses for their refusal to investigate now include they were too busy, and they just messed it up. There is talk that they were actually afraid to investigate because the paper would publish sordid details of the private lives of the top brass. All the top politicos were also cozy with Murdoch. Well, now Parliament is in a mood and heads are set to roll in the sawdust. But, do you think this kind of thing only happened in the UK? That nothing like this happened in the US? Let’s wait and see. The story is only just starting.
The Wall Street Journal remains good, though its editorial page is sheer hackery. Of course, The Washington Post editorial page consists of torture defenders and disgraced Bush-era pols who should have been shamed into oblivion rather than given such a prime outlet for their voices.
The press really is the fourth pillar of democracy, and it remains sad to see it besmirched by Fox News, which could be laughed off did it not present a frightening kind of national propaganda outlet depending on which politicians are in charge. Hackery is dismissible, propaganda is frightening.
So the man who is a multibillionaire may have his intentions of expanding his empire further denied?
Surely that's bringing him too low. Roger, no man deserves such brutal a comeuppance.
I'm proud to be working down here at Knox College, the birthplace of the muckrakers; the Guardian's efforts to rake up Murdoch's muck puts them in good company. Veritas, as our simple motto proclaims.
On the comment 'first deliberately biased news network in American history', I have to disagree. Mostly because the idea that a news network should be unbiased and impartial is a fairly recent invention. The New York Times outright campaigned for Lincoln during the Civil War, for instance.
Which makes them a throwback, and a de-evolution, not a new thing.
I implore every American who is aware of this news story (as often international news stories get relegated) to spread the news as much as they can and try to enforce a thorough investigation into every Murdoch owned news outlet there is.
Already it's been allegated that it wasn't just the News of the World but also The Sun and The Times, a 'quality' paper rather than a tabloid, so who knows how far these dubious practices, not just of hacking but of political and social intimidation, extend.
"I wonder, how did it all start? Was it a spontaneous idea that someone had to hack phones? It seems unlikely. More likely, a decaying of standards, a moral compromise here and there, until the frog was boiled and it seemed totally reasonable. There's going to be a book in this, written by an inside source or comprised of several sources' stories, telling how a newspaper could get so low."
I think it was a desire for power and influence. What power they had wasn't enough. They had to be on top of everyone and have everyone's number, so to speak.
The more I hear about this story the more it comes out like a mafia investigation, like the Senate hearings in Godfather Part II. Only with the key difference that Al Pacino and Robert Duvall are likable.
It's nice to see that Roger has some objectivity here, having personally worked with the man, and isn't just another clueless observer braying at this week's devil a la the "Two Minutes Hate" in a certain well-known Orwell novel.
I personally don't know that much about Murdoch specifically, but I know his type. The soulless lover of money, has plenty but wants more and quality of product made to get it be damned. Free to have his minions invade the privacy of others to feed the ever more sickly and sickening "celeb hungry" masses who pick and claw at all the lame pieces of gossip they can get in lieu of finding useful things to do with their own lives.
I find it amusing that the type who would so easily destroy privacy for others are the ones that guard their own with extreme jealousy. This proves to me that they KNOW how it feels to be violated and have intimate details of their lives in the open for the world to see, they KNOW how unpleasant it all is, but they simply do not care.
This isn't the felling of a titan as some seem to believe, a mere stumbling, and overall I find the smug, self-satisfied attitude of the media (especially new media) particularly objectionable, as if simply having journalistic credentials or a Twitter account means you've contributed to the "fight".
Of course I'm pleased to see a pinch of justice served to a clearly immoral individual such as Rupert, but the gloating everyone seems to be partaking in is tedious and feeds into exactly the sickening "celeb fever" I was referring to. Gloat and render the whole thing moot if you want, but it cheapens us all and furthers the theory that humanity is basically scummy, a notion I don't like but seems increasingly true.
Even-handed articles like Roger's are the best way to chronicle such an event, and I wish more writers (not just those who are also journalists) would do something similar, or better still save their two cents for a more deserving subject while everyone else grinds the issue to death.
I have no problem with any of the Murdoch tactics.
I also have no problem with Fox News--who, by the way, returns from every commercial break with fire, flood, disaster footage of some kind. We used to call that news. Now we're too sophisticated for that. We just seem to watch it, according to the ratings.
I also have no problem with the Murdoch staffers going to jail.
This is the way things work. News is a messy business best carried out by sketchy blue-collar workers with few ethics and a love of writing. If we wanted it otherwise, NPR would be #1 in the ratings all across the country.
So let's fry these bastards from the News. And I want pictures.
Conrad Black once had a journalistic vision as well. Arrogance and greed are quick userpers of journalistic morals (or any morality, for that matter).
When one considers that George Bush Jr. was elected in no small part through the influence of FOX news (remember election night when it looked fairly certain Gore was the winner--then the tide started turning when FOX began its own push in the other direction?), and one then takes into account the wars, economic devastation, and anti-environmental measures that occurred as a result of that presidency, I'd venture to say that history could well look back on Murdoch as one of the most destructive figures--both directly and indirectly--to have stepped onto the global stage over the last half-century. And he cannot step off of it fast enough for my tastes.
wonderful article, kudos. Is it no longer illegal to own all the radio stations, newspapers, and television stations that you want, anywhere you want?
Roger, I look forward to the day that you dare write a piece which attempts to demonstrate how Fox News is so biased and on your black list, while other networks (MSNBC, CNN, etc.) are perfectly acceptable to the standard viewer. You have yet to demonstrate why Fox receives your venom, yet the others go unscathed. Perhaps because you agree with them (for example: Keith, and Chris Matthews), thus their safety from your attacks?
Here is the topic for your essay: How does Fox News show bias and "mere entertainment" that the other networks do not?
If they don't eventually indict Rebekah Brooks, this whole inquiry is a scam.
And you were only calling the WSJ "actually good."
Not The New York Post--right?
The NY Post is the National Enquirer with local news and sports.
Love your post Roger. I just watched The Network (1976) last night and this fits right in. Seems the strategy Murdoch has always employed is nothing new. But it's very thought provoking that a movie satirizing these rating ploys (in print, digital, etc) are now widely accepted. Has this scandal finally revealed the crescendo of acceptance for shock jock "news?" I'm leaning towards no (I think people are to accustomed to the hype at this point and expect it) but maybe wider constituents will turn the channel (or page) when these ploys are used.
Graham:
In your reply to Randy you take unfair advantage by citing those examples. After all, Canada is civilized.
Yesterday I put in a post at the Hugh Grant sidebar, which apparently didn't get through.
It was a kinda windy anecdote about when I first read about News of the World ... in the pages of a 1946 Agatha Christie whodunit, The Hollow.
The story concerned an upper-crust British family which had seen more than its share of scandal. Whenever anyone mentioned News of the World, it was a warning to be careful, lest the latest family mishap become public knowledge.
I was in high school (mid-60s) when I read The Hollow, and I didn't know that NotW was a real newspaper; I thought Mrs, Christie had created a stereotypical Fleet Street tabloid to represent them all (and perhaps to get back at them for their handling of the breakup of her first marriage).
The point being, of course, that News of the World's reputation was set long before Rupert Murdoch came along.
Your recounting of the amazing adventures of Murdoch at the Sun-Times prompts a few sideline observations from me:
- I seem to recall reading somewhere that one of the sticking points of the sale was the Field Press Syndicate, which the Hoge group either didn't want or wanted to break up. Murdoch was willing to take it on as is, and supposedly that closed the deal (please correct if I've got that wrong).
There weren't that many assets in the FPS. One was a twice-weekly TV column by Gary Deeb, which Field syndicated to other papers even after Deeb had lost his spot at the Sun-Times.
At this point, Deeb was doing a daily "media commentary" segment on Ch7's late-afternoon newscast. It was Gary's usual mix of fawning over friends and ad hominem attacks on his enemies (and Deeb had a list that rivaled Nixon's).
It fell to Deeb to report the story of the sale of the Sun-Times to Murdoch, and so he did - in a manner that was, for him, surprisingly muted.
When the segment ended, Joel Daly asked Deeb if he would consider working for Murdoch.
Deeb gave a very bland, almost noncommittal answer - "I'd really have to think about it", something like that - and roll commercial.
But here's the thing -
-once the sale went through, Deeb was already working for Murdoch.
The copyright notice had read Field Press Syndicate.
Now it read News, Inc. (or whatever Murdoch's company was calling itself).
What that means is this: If Deeb really didn't know that Murdoch's company was now syndicating his column, that made him an incompetent reporter.
And if he did know -
- then he lied to Joel Daly (and everyone else who was watching Eyewitness News that night).
That was Gary 'Uriah' Deeb as we remember him : "Quoth the Craven Evermore!"
- I thought I had a few more things, but I seem to have run dry at the moment. This thread looks to have some longevity in it, so I might be back.
"'Til Then ..."
Roger,
Your attack on Murdoch appears itself to be poor journalism. You tell some interesting stories, but if your major aim is to say something negative about the man then you have failed. You're simply preaching to the choir and assuming an audience who either knows a great deal of information beforehand or automatically assumed him a bad man. What are the reasons that Murdoch is such a bad person. Now I have no intention of defending someone who I know very little about, but you did give me one fact, "In the years to come, Murdoch brought in various editors, all of whom I liked, one from Australia, two from England." There's one fairly verifiable piece of information that only says good things. Otherwise, there is some vague information about a few meetings with staff and some smut advertisement. So FoxNews is the first biased network? So what? If anything I fault them for not being upfront on it, yet at the same time the myth of neutrality is a bit of a naivete. It may be the first network with such a record, merely because that whole concept of 24 news cycle television is fairly new itself. It would happen. The New York Times and The Guardian are certainly biased. Sure, Fox News may have pioneered the concept of biased journalism in the Network News stations, but it's gone on in different formats for a while. Plus, Hollywood has been biased in a liberal direction for quite some time. This is a very powerful medium.
Yet, good gracious, i'm not trying to defend someone I know little about. I haven't really followed it too closely (despite the Guardian's best efforts, as this is set as my home page, mostly for the England love you know, it's got an attractive layout), but the response is nothing short of gloating. The Guardian is really a bit obsessed at this point. You know, get a life. You can't deny this has a lot to do with attempting to malign Murdoch because of a conservative influence. There's no reason for this story to be as obsessed over as it has other than some glass clinking in the background from a liberal bias.
One of the toughest sales for me over the past few years has been the concept of a "liberal elite". It seems mostly like an easy, hard to actually confirm/deny go to excuse for a criticism. Yet, I have noticed many times New York times editorials and their articles that mindlessly attack conservative ideas, such as a concern over national debt, with arguments that boil down to "conservatives are naive". Simply put, Arguments that reek of pseudo-intellectual... nonsense. Planned Parenthood, idiot conservatives don't know their facts when saying public money goes to abortions when going to Planned Parenthood.Really?!! So if public money covers Planned Parenthood overhead it's not going to free up funds for other goals?
Or perhaps, although we're being a bit unrelated/related here, I just pulled up the daily show website to watch, because I do actually enjoy it, well you know, this is relevant because of the recent Stewart/Fox debates, which I have enjoyed actually, but what is a line under one of the videos for the recent debates. "The Republicans insistence on making the debt ceiling their give as opposed to increased tax revenues is like a doctor who believes strictly in magic consulting with a patient." How condescending. So someone like myself who does follow that same logic, realizing that simple math shows that less money in the hands of the wealthy does create less of an ability for those wealthy to hire others with their surplus income. Sure I buy that and at the same time think there are already enough taxes and they just need to flippin' use what they've got, I believe that and pretty strongly. So I'm like some guy who only consults with magic to solve problems? How condescending. I wonder what that would make someone who believes just about everything that a Jonathan Edwards, one of the earliest Presidents of Princeton University and who ""is widely acknowledged to be America's most important and original philosophical theologian," and one of America's greatest intellectuals." If you take these brand of views as your starting point and then decide where the publishing brands and networks of the world are you'll find yourself considered an intellectual dinosaur.
I agree, bad journalism is bad journalism.
But wasn't it NBC that famously and effectively planted a bomb on a truck to make a story bigger than it was?
Dan Rather and CBS who ran with a story about President Bush that was invented, and even after admitting they falsified evidence, claimed "I still believe the story is true."
Salon's Jonathan Broder was fired for plagiarism from the Chicago Tribune.
CNN had to settle a case with Richard Jewell.
So who represents the shining example of good journalsim?
As I said, enjoy the Schadenfreude but don't pretend that you'd feel differently if it were someone from the Left.
The Wall Street Journal has been getting less serious in its editorial pages, but I can't tell if that's Murdoch, or the fact that what passes for conservatism is less serious than when I subscribed to the WSJ in college. What is the point of publishing anything by Karl Rove or most Republican congressmen, when their words are only intended to advance a strategy of Republican permanent majority, without any real ideology? Bring back Mark Helprin and other writers (I'm blanking on names, sorry!) like the ones I read in the early 1990s. I disagreed with them usually, but I didn't question their veracity or integrity.
When the WSJ online switched from mediated comments to letting the trolls run amuck, that had to be Murdoch. I used to get excited when my comment was selected for publication there, because it meant I had made my point with sufficient clarity and style, for a forum I respected. Now it means nothing.
"If" he's guilty of a crime?
Yes, my statment was if he's guilty of a crime he should be punished for it. How do you disagree? That I haven't convicted the Rupert Murdoch? He knows less of what's going on at the company than almost anyone. . . as Mr. Ebert said, he doesn't run the paper, he simply owns it.
Of course Roger is celebrating the prospective misery of another. . . as you yourself have written "just desserts... by way of karma." Who doesn't celebrate dessert?
And at no time did I ever imply that Roger Ebert would dance on the coffin of Rupert Murdoch's son, and I take offense that you had to clarify that.
My statement was simple, and I believe, accurate.
For those who aren't aware, schadenfreude is a loanword from the German language, meaning pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others.
As i said, enjoy the schadenfreude.
Stephen Colbert coined what I think is a pretty apt term for Murdoch and his circle at the top the other day in reference to the leadership in Pakistan, "incompetlicit." Either Ms Brooks and Murdoch are complicit in these scandals, incompetent as leaders or both. The video also sums up our situation in Pakistan/Afghanistan quite well...
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/391148/june-30-2011/colbert-report--formidable-opponent---pakistan
BREAKING NEWS
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Penis Defense League
Rupert Murdoch brings to life the maniacal villains of the superhero comics.
It's arguable he was the satirical inspiration for Jonathan Pryce's maniacal media baron in the James Bond 007 "Tomorrow Never Dies", but theories also point to Ted Turner showing off his ownership of the 007 broadcast reruns. ;)
(And they slipped in a Bill Gates joke too, but that was just gratuitous.)
Roger,
I beg to differ with you, but Fox News is not the first deliberately and unapologetically biased and partisan network in American history. It is the second. CBS is the first.
The Guardian did great things on this story, but please also to credit the two MPs, Tom Watson and Chris Bryant, who kept on at this story despite meeting considerable resistance.
wg
What can be said of Fox News that hasn't already been said and disagreed with and argued about 100 times before? I'm not even going to try.
I'll just say that I've always liked Brit Hume - at ABC and Fox News, and both organizations have been worse off for his absence.
Also, I agree with you, Roger. The Journal is a fine paper.
Roger Ebert Quote: "It appears even the Queen's cell phone was tapped, leading my friend Margo Howard to ask on Twitter, (1) Does the Queen actually use a cell phone? and (2) Would the hackers be guilty of treason?"
Another follow up question - Is treason against the crown still punishable by being publicly hanged, drawn and quartered or would the sentence in this case be simply commuted to beheading?
I love it when aliens get a taste of their own probe!
Same should have happened to William Randolph Hearst for trying to ruin Orson Welles' career.
There's never been a man more deserving his ugly face. Let's hope Murdoch doesn't escape indictment.
"7/13/2001: In a great setback, Murdoch is forced to withdraw his bid fpr BSkyB."
7/13/2011 is more like it :)
Ebert: Stupid typo.
I got to the part where you said, "You disagree? Be my guest." Why didn't you put this in the politics section, where I could ignore it?
Ebert: I did. But it didn't work.
I do find one thing curious in all this.
Had this happened in the United States, had a newspaper illegally hacked the phone records of a Congressman, or a Senator, or even the President, we'd be hearing about freedom of the press, and the people's right to know.
Remember all the times the NYTimes published military secrets over and over. . .
Freedom of the press is something Europe simply does not have.
I maintain as I did from the start, if a crime was committed, he should be punished.
"Yes, my statment was if he's guilty of a crime he should be punished for it. How do you disagree? That I haven't convicted the Rupert Murdoch? He knows less of what's going on at the company than almost anyone. . . as Mr. Ebert said, he doesn't run the paper, he simply owns it."
Murdoch's choices and decisions have long since established both his character and approach to doing business. 1. Appeal to the lowest of the low, 2. encourage them to sink further still, 3. make money off them in the process - 4. and use it to consolidate a position of increasing power. The sort of power able to intimate heads of State. And so as to control that which might seek to impede you, and your greed.
And based on that, decades of business dealings, he's morally guilty of consistently undermining what's in the best interests of the public and for caring little for anyone save himself.
A pimp may not know all the details, but he's still the one in charge. And if you work for him, you're expected to bring back money not excuses. SELL NEWSPAPERS. And why the people who oversee the day-to-day running of this or that, and on his behalf, simply following orders to get results.
"Of course Roger is celebrating the prospective misery of another. . . as you yourself have written "just desserts... by way of karma." Who doesn't celebrate dessert?"
It's never wrong or unjust to embrace the hopeful defeat of all there is to rightly abhor and hold in contempt. Murdock is not "just another businessman" and like so many countless others. It what he's done, what he stands for, what he enables, how and why - it's the thought of seeing THAT defeated, and at long last, which Roger is embracing. Or so it strikes me.
"And at no time did I ever imply that Roger Ebert would dance on the coffin of Rupert Murdoch's son, and I take offense that you had to clarify that."
You're taking issue with an offense never given, as I never inferred the above while reading your post. I simply qualified my own understanding of schadenfreude.
"malicious joy in the misfortunes of others," 1922, from Ger., lit. "damage-joy," from schaden "damage, harm, injury" (see scathe) + freude , from O.H.G. frewida "joy," from fro "happy," lit. "hopping for joy," from P.Gmc. *frawa- (see frolic)." - http://dictionary.reference.com
And there's nothing malicious at work in Roger's entry. He doesn't hate Murdoch personally - he hates what Murdock has done and continues to. For what's contained within the entry if not a recounting of past examples of it?
Whereas "schadenfreude" - at least for me - has always carried an uglier connotation and owing to its origins.
Dancing on someone's grave, a figurative example of it etc.
Now, Randy.... Comparing FOX news with CBS (under Cronkite and Murrow) is fairly ludicrous. For a network to have one partisan commentator on the air at any one time is one thing (Morrow and Cronkite were not key figures at CBS at the same time); but to have every commentator--not to mention many of the news stories--on one's network reflecting the same partisan viewpoint is quite another.
And describing the media in general as left-leaning is--well, I suppose some still buy that curve ball. Let's leave aside the matter of all the times the mainstream media has--when push came to shove--supported Right-Wing agendas (can you say "Iraq war"?), and look instead at one almost comically dramatic example of media imbalance from the Bush II administration: it turned out that a "reporter" in the White House press pool, who lobbed conspicuously softball questions at the President, was not only a right-wing "plant" but a known gay prostitute. Nothing against gay prostitutes, mind you--hey, to each his own--but can you imagine the scandal that would have ignited had that occurred under a democratic president? Yet the story died a quiet death, in the hands of the so-called liberal media.
To paraphrase Stephen Colbert: for some, reality itself is left-leaning. I trust you would agree with him, Randy.
Totally off subject, but I love how you said "Brain Cloud". My favorite movie malady of all time. I'm one of a small minority who claim Joe Vs the Volcano among my favorites. John Patrick Shanley creates a beautiful surreal world that captured the degradation of what we call living these days and offers the possibility of fresh air "away from the things of man". I think I'll watch it again tonight.
Roger, I also am greatly enjoying watching Murdoch's public scolding. Since Fox News opened with their claim of being "fair and balanced," American politics have grown dysfunctionally partisan. Murdoch isn't the only reason for this, but I think he's a big one. I don't have any problem at all with a network that is, as you put it, unapologetically partisan. I have a problem with that network calling itself fair and balanced so that its viewers can consider themselves to be well informed on all facets of the issues, when nothing could be further from the truth. I love when public figures such as yourself call a spade a spade. Thanks for speaking the truth.
Jerry,
"Dan Rather and CBS who ran with a story about President Bush that was invented, and even after admitting they falsified evidence, claimed "I still believe the story is true.""
I do not believe they admitted to falsifying evidence, just what they presented was not verifiable. It appeared they were set up by a conservative group. Yes, the information supported Rather's opinion, and he was so eager to get it on the air, he and/or his producers failed to vet the information properly, but no one at CBS made it up. And the fact is it's indisputable that Bush's father bought Jr out of the draft. The question was did Bush even complete the basic requirements of his cushy detail?
"So who represents the shining example of good journalism?"
To that, I can say there is very little good journalism nowadays. However, Murdoch specifically targets the lowest common denominator.
I love reading your commentary, and as usual, you're spot on.
Ryan wrote: "remember election night when it looked fairly certain Gore was the winner--then the tide started turning when FOX began its own push in the other direction?"
FOX was the very first network to call the election for Al Gore. Let that sink in. The very first. How does that fit into their supposed bias for Bush on this matter?
Let me guess. You didn't watch FOX at all that night, did you? You got your news from DailyKos or DU I would guess. You probably think Sarah Palin said she could see Russia from her house.
Makes you think, Robert Maxwell should have won years ago, eh?
Loved the journal entry, Roger, but I have to say that Murdoch's greatest crime in taking over the Sun-Times was that it likely inspired a major subplot in Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.
Give Murdoch enough time and The Wall Street Journal will become the print version of FOX News.
England's Financial Times seems to give the most impartial view of American business these days.
When Murdoch took over the Boston Herald he made it into a poor-man's version of The New York Post and gave us Wingo! on page 3 as well.
I rotate between Fox and MSNBC. While they both have strong viewpoints (biases), I find that MSNBC is much more partisan in its news coverage.
Devil's Advocate time: I am far from being a member of Rupert Murdoch's fan club. I don't support his newspapers, cable networks or their tactics (as an entertainment entity, I will give you that Fox Network U.S. has brought us some groundbreaking shows, esp. in the 1990s.)
But as for the journalism tactics: If the same techniques were used to investigate Halliburton, Enron or "Dr." Bachman's therapy in Minnesota, would we be even having this conversation? No, I am sure the newspaper in question would be polishing its Pulitzers even as we await Roger's next blog post.
Roger -- HUGE fan for the last 30 years. That's what matters most here ... but when it comes to politics, you are so off the rails, sir; it does try one's credulity.
Your little exercise, IMHO, in cathartic schadenfreude is beneath you, Roger. I can listen, read, and just absorb by osmosis your talent for days on end, but when it comes to your worldview on politics ... it's like nails on a blackboard, my (politically) whacked-out, liberal friend. But, i will say this for you, kind, sir. If there were anyone on the left I would listen to, it would be you, Roger, because of the relational capital you have acquired (one-sided thought it must be) over the years of my reading and sitting at the feet of erudition earns you that right, viz., to have me chew on this piece, paragraph after graph, and swallow this pabulum like the one you birthed supra.
Just a quick reminder: Rupert Murdoch is NOT Conrad Black, Roger. If you would adjudge your political friends on the left in the same manner you condemn those on the right (in that smarmy way you do), then perhaps I'd allow a bit more latitude in your leftist soapbox. As it is, nails, Roger, nails on the blackboard when it comes to listening to your take on politics.
'I'm puzzled why people are so outraged that a queen was snooped on, but so few people show outrage for the defenseless and helpless normal citizen.'
You couldn't be more wrong, when celebrities phones were hacked it was an amusing sideshow. They've got broad shoulders, it's the price you pay for fame and celbrity some argue.
When it was discovered that the phone of Milly Dowler a 13 year old girl had been hacked when she was missing, with her messages listened to and deleted, giving false hope to her parents and the police investigating her disappearance then people became outraged. The revelation that other 'normal citizens', such as relatives of the 7/7 bombings and families of deceased servicemen had their phones hacked made the NotW and News International's postition untenable.
CTRL+F "Randy Masters" is always good for a laugh.
“his newspaper holdings are limited to the (actually good) Wall Street Journal and New York Post”
For the sake of clarity, that should read, “his newspaper holdings are limited to the New York Post and the (actually good) Wall Street Journal.” Just in case anyone is not familiar with both papers, the Wall Street Journal is one of America’s most respected newspapers, while the New York Post is the New York Post. In the annals of journalism they will forever be best remembered for the classic headline of April 15, 1983 (when they were the only newspaper on the stands in New York, having been the first to settle a strike): Headless Body in Topless Bar. However, my favorite Post moment was in late 1999, when they held a readers’ poll to select the worst person of the millennium, and Bill Clinton came in second, only eight votes shy of tying with winner Adolf Hitler, and easily besting the distant third place finisher, Joseph Stalin. Mrs. Clinton came in sixth, behind Pol Pot and Josef Mengele, but ahead of such lightweights as Charles Manson, Genghis Khan and Benito Mussolini.
I didn't know Murdoch once had his grubby mitts on the Sun-Times. Thanks be to Allah (or the Flying Spaghetti Monster or whoever) that he soon let you guys go.
I wonder - if there were no Fox News, would millions of Americans still believe that President Obama is a Kenya-born Muslim socialist? (And before I am deluged with angry denunciations, let me hasten to add that many of my best friends are Kenya-born Muslim socialists!)
Ebert: Google "Dirty Digger" and check out the top link.
Unfortunately, Google personalizes searches now, so this sort of instruction no longer works!
@ Mike S. "I rotate between Fox and MSNBC. While they both have strong viewpoints (biases), I find that MSNBC is much more partisan in its news coverage."
How funny, I do exactly the same thing! I agree that both are biased and MSNBC seems more unabashedly so.
I know that in theory, I should be supporting something closer to straight journalism, but by the time I get around to watching the news on TV, I already know all the stories in detail from Internet news sources. Watching straight news just feels redundant when what I'm really looking for is news analysis. The punditry on both Fox and MSNBC often falls short of this, but it comes closer than watching someone read headlines.
"Rupert Murdoch" has always struck me as a perfect name for the villain in a Victorian melodrama. The man himself seems to agree and has accordingly spent his life living up (or down) to the name.
I notice that some people on this thread are still enamored of the old 'liberal media' canard and are using it to defend Fox News and its ideological brethren. It's probably not worth my time to point out to these commenters that the 'liberal media' charge has been repeatedly and definitively debunked (most rigorously, from a leftist standpoint, by Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman in Manufacturing Consent; most entertainingly, from a liberal standpoint, by Joe Conason in Big Lies; I await an honest conservative debunking of this petrified piece of right-wing dogma).
All the noise about liberal bias only serves to conceal the actual, unspoken (maybe even unthought) pro-corporate bias of ALL media corporations, from Fox to MSNBC. All talk of bias in media should begin there. That would be a genuinely productive and truly radical discussion. (Which means it will probably never happen.)
They never admitted to falsifying evidence? It ended Rather's career. . .
I mean, good Lord, they used Microsoft Word default Time New Roman font and default size to mimic a supposed 1970's era typewritten government document.
And you guys think Murdoch is corrupt?
MSNBC at least has Morning Joe.
7/13/2011: In a great setback, Murdoch is forced to withdraw his bid fpr BSkyB.
Which was largely the reason he gave in so quickly on the NotW, so that it wouldn't cause a taint on the Sky negotiations.
Um...didn't work, did it? :)
YouTube: A Bit of Fry & Laurie
(sigh...Remember when Hugh Laurie was still funny, was deadpan expert at playing the slightly Thick, and wasn't playing abrasive jerks with implausible American accents?) :(
Murdock's gnarled visage reminds me of the photo of the Shar Pei that appeared in the "This is a dog" blog.
Nothing bad can be said about one of yours, because they're saints.
It can only ever show bias - never truth.
You're a fool with blinders on.
In the U.S., where his newspaper holdings are limited to the New York Post and the (actually good) Wall Street Journal, his damage has been done with Fox News, the first deliberately and unapologetically biased and partisan network in American history. You disagree? Be my guest.
There is no unbiased news source. As a previous poster pointed out, until the start of the 20th century, any town big enough to support one paper would almost always have at least 2, the Democratic one and the Republican one. Hearst regularly bragged about making the news, and probably caused the Spanish American war.
The concept of an "independent" media was really an invention of the post-WW2 media, which was rather biased against the anti-FDR Democrats and Republicans. As others have mentioned, CBS and Cronkite definitely intended to oppose the government on Vietnam. (As citizens, they probably should have, and were right to do so. You just can't choose a position AND claim not to be biased.)
The viewers have biases too. We associate people who agree with us as "fair and balanced" (to steal a term), and those who disagree as biased, extreme, or "just plain wrong". Having people in the media say "You shouldn't watch Fox News, it's too biased/stupid/wrong; watch CNN/MSNBC/etc." just reinforces the besiegement mentality that Fox News both feeds upon and relieves.
I find myself stuck in the middle with all this. I am a centrist libertarian, so Fox News's big-government conservatives (and blonds with legs) annoy me. OTOH, CNN's announcers can barely read the teleprompter (see Wolf Blitzer's trip to Jeopardy), and the MSNBC crew would have Mr. Obama's love children in a heartbeat (Chris Matthews especially is so in lust it's disgusting).
I got so fed up that we turned cable completely off. I read the blogs online (100% bias, 0% pretending otherwise) and read Yahoo News for the headlines. If I can catch the national news, it's Scott Pelley on CBS if I'm home on time, and the BBC on PBS if I catch the 10PM local news. I expect to have to do all of my bias filtering myself, but at least I don't feel like taking a shotgun to the new flat screen.
Thanks for changing the Murdoch pic. And it gave aliens a bad name. Also, it reminded me of this Simpsons clip of Mr. Burns trying to smile (click on my name).
@Jerry Ryan, and the Right Ilk who will chirp,
"But let's face facts, if he were of the Left, your tone would be quite different."
You think you have enlightened us with an unassailable insight of irrefutable logic. But, your statement is dumb. Stupid. Unsound.
I don't blame you. You've been watching and reading so much Murdochian reverso-speak for so long, it's understandable.
Yet, consider this a lesson in language and its proper use: One cannot qualify "facts" with unmeasurable "ifs," anymore than one can argue with absolute certainty the merely imagined.
In other words, one cannot face facts with one's head up one's other end.
Checked the Worldometer. Earth just cleared 500,000 clicks in this year's trip through space. Sadly, we ain't getting anywhere, just going in circles.
Fox News is propaganda and the claim of bias (which is just fairly recently, claiming everything is just an "opinion"/"editorial" show) is just more propaganda.
And MSNBC gave us Michael Savage, Anne Coulter (as bad as it gets in the mainstream) etc. and they have a 3 hour morning show every weekday that is "biased."
But aside from that, it seems that MSNBC "bias", seems really as just kind of a counter to Fox (not a very good strategy), as if they are trying to debate the propaganda...which isn't about debating.
It's like they are trying to talk to Hitler and say "you know, I think Jews are pretty nice and I have the friends to prove it. Coming up next, a Jew that isn't crazy: nor does he want to eat your children's blood. Coming up next...we'll see how mr. mustache likes that one."
Addendum to last comment
Make that 500,000,000 clicks. I'm bad on numbers.
Hi Joe.
I guess it's a difference in perception. MSNBC has seemed skewed left to me as long as it's been MSNBC.
You said it, exactly as I would have, were I so eloquent. Thanks, Betsy
The people who say Murdoch is only in it for the money are mistaken. His tabs always combine racism, xenophobia, emotionalism and anti-intellectualism with an admiration for blustering male authority figures like Giuliani and Steinbrenner. His objective is a society in which a bullying, selfish, self made billionaire is universally (or as near universally as makes no difference) admired as the summit of human existence.
Roger,
My memory may be incorrect but I remember Royko saying something like, "Murdoch makes newspapers that no self-respecting fish would be caught wrapped in." This was followed by the Sun-Times creating a mascot of "(some name) the Self-Respecting Fish." The mascot didn't last very long.
I also remember you saying something like If there really is a Headless Body in a Topless Bar you think it should be the headline in the newspaper - or words to that effect.
Fox News rocks! its actually entertaining unlike the other boring news channels, who cares if they bias or not as long as they bring in the funny. Certainly weird how they can look straight at the camera and honestly say they are fair and balanced, im not sure if theres a sane person who believes that. Aside from fake act they put up, they are good at keeping the government in check and giving republicans a voice. MSNBC is worse, we can agree, what a sorry excuse for a tv news network.
With regard to Rupert Murdoch's character, you might be interested in an anecdote from Bruce Guthrie, a former editor for News Limited,while attending a meeting of News editors in Colorado in 1968.
"In short order, Murdoch, who was hosting the session, turned red, then purple, as I repeatedly asked a senior executive from his London paper The Sun whether the publication had any ethical framework. It didn't, the paper's news editor finally admitted. In most media companies that admission might have earned the executive a rebuke. But instead, I copped it, with Murdoch later dismissing me as a ''Fairfax wanker''."
Fairfax is the competing (liberal) news network in Australia, where as others have pointed out News Limited has 68% of the newspaper market (Australian Press Council 2005). Fairfax has 21%.
Jerry,
No they did not. Rather certainly did not. He did not need to.
Where are you getting your information? Certainly Rather and CBS were guilty of bad journalism in that story and heads should have rolled, although Rather's record is still that of an exemplary newsman.
The source was bad and most likely from someone funded by Rove's people or the Koch brothers, etc.
Rupert Murdoch may be ruthless, cynical, grubby, whatever... but why he is getting this "Antichrist" treatment is beyond me.
NOBODY can single-handedly achieve social impact on such a scale. Murdoch has money, lots of it, but without reporters willing to work for him and - this especially - without massive audiences willing to buy his paltry "goods" he would be nowhere, he would be no-one.
Simplistic? Yes.
But then most truths about human collective life really are simple.
Often depressingly so.
Roger - excellent commentary on the current situation. I remember the debate in public media during May 2007 when the Wall Street journal was about to be acquired by News Corp. Will the Bancrofts succumb to the lure of lucre and sell their prestigious paper? They did just that after being offered a substantial amount along with a figleaf of a promise that there won't be even a hint of interference in the manner that the journal has functioned traditionally. Either by design or by chance, TCM showed a Bogart film noir called 'Deadline - USA' which was singularly apropos for those times. I wonder if you could suggest a movie that parodies or mimics what is going on now?
When I was ten, my family was in the papers from Ohio to England. I was proud of the witticism I'd made, which got quoted properly until it reached England. The quote was attributed to an older brother who said it to his father of the same name.
I told it to a reporter and my father wasn't there. I objected to this false reporting and got beat up for it, thanks to a larger older brother who wanted his share of fame and fortune, too.
I don't know what Rupert Murdoch was doing in those days, as he was never in the news. Prob'ly learning to lie, exaggerate, pander, cheat and steal in slicker fashion than any other newsmedia people lied, pandered, cheated and stole had done up to his time.
...while, of course, upholding the grand old tradition of honor, honesty, social conscience and filial perspicacity that newspapers have upheld with pride and determination since an hour after their new printers arrived from Gutenburg's shop.
Or not. Joseph Pulitzer, who indeed ought to have had the right to bestow another five prizes on the Sun-Times, found he could make a good deal more money not running honest news items about certain proprietors of certain svelte local businessmen than by informing the public of their few temporary flaws in character. which, in the long run, really wasn't that much of the public's business.
It is good that a few flaws in the character of Rupert Murdoch have been pointed out. We are certain he will bring them to the resolve which, clearly, they require.
Still, we have yet to consider the flaws in character of enormous unsung masses of people who wrap their lives around what is written in the papers or uttered electronically by the high-priced hairdo utterers. They swallow it, believe it, and suddenly know good from evil based on what they are told.
It's just my speculation, but I have a notion these faithful customers also have something to do with that ubiquitous sliding sound I keep hearing, as though a vast handbasket has been slipping its way down toward hell.
Ebert: I did. But it didn't work.
Okay. I'll keep ignoring it, and feel less annoyed while doing so. :)
Good post Roger. As someone who doesn't care in the least for politics, it was a good and informative read.
You know the newspapers really are going down, and its a shame that they are. I make sure to buy the Sun-Times once or twice a week, and have to say, it still has a ton of value. It's a real shame people don't read them any more and would rather get their news from elsewhere, since its another change in modern times. They say the natural successor will be news on the internet. Lets hope publishers can find a way to stay afloat online so there are still reputable sources of hard worked journalism around, and not just highly opinionated shouting to see who can get the most attention.
No, the three major U.S. networks in the late 60's/early 70's werent partisan or biased when they plastered body counts every week night on the news.
How about let's call a spade a spade? ALL the networks have an agenda.
> Fox News, the first deliberately and unapologetically biased and partisan network in American history. You disagree? Be my guest.
I remember the election days of 1996, when a poll among mainstream journalists was published, in which 85% identified themselves as Democrat, and 90% identified themselves as liberal. Would you assert that those media held firm with a balanced and unbiased line, that under those conditions such would even be possible? In the days before Fox became the juggernaut that it is today, it was pretty well-known that the mainstream media networks were heavily liberal-biased. Is Fox worse? Perhaps. Well, almost certainly. But to say that they are the first is unrealistic, if not disingenuous. Concrete example, the Clinton-Dole debate on TV. Clinton was photographed at a handsome angle, looking very presidential. Dole was shot at a bad angle with bad light. Was it an accident that he looked bad? And when Dole was speaking and *had the floor*, the camera would flash to Clinton *mouthing* a response. Deliberate foul I say.
Off-topic:
Saw your Twet about the soft open for The Undefeated in Orange County.
BIG MISTAKE.
First, what idiot decided on a midnight showing of a political infomercial at the same hour as the Harry Potter opening?
Palin's obvious target demo would be matinee goers on a weekend afternoon. Daytime showings should draw pretty well, especially if the right-wing sites make good on their ticket offers.
I do not doubt that The Undefeated will make 'beaucoup bux' as Palinites come out in force to support their Number One Gal - probably many times over. Palin's advantages over Ayn Rand are many - principally being that she's still alive.
So The Undefeated should make a whole lotta dough-re-mi at the B.O. Goody-goody for them.
... As long as they don't kid themselves that they'll be making any converts to the cause.
And you have a nice weekend too.
Much of the back story is at The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/phone-hacking
The full story drags on for years, with much of it hidden in plain sight. The Sydney Morning Herald provides a movie treatment synopsis:
http://www.smh.com.au/business/media-and-marketing/the-journalist-who-brought-down-a-newspaper-20110714-1hf5f.html
"It was not until last week, however, that the scandal exploded with Davis's revelation that the News of the World had hacked into the phone of a 13-year-old murder victim, Milly Dowler, and may have impeded a police investigation into her 2002 disappearance by deleting some messages.
Until then, the public believed the phone hacking scandal affected only celebrities, sports stars, politicians and the royal family - powerful people who needed no help in battling the British tabloids.
But the idea of reporters listening in to messages left for a murdered schoolgirl proved too much."
This is the corollary to Joseph Welch asking Joe McCarthy, "Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?"
Fade to black.
Noah Taylor plays a young Rupert Murdoch in an underrated and under-noticed Australian film "Black and white" and his (apparently true) campaign against the death penalty, motivated by the conviction and sentence of an Aboriginal man, Max Stuart, for murder.
"I'm Rupert Murdoch. I own the news."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_and_White_%282002_film%29
And Les Hinton and Rebekah Brooks have just resigned! I don't care how shrewd and ambitious they were, they didn't give a shit about news, only headlines and shock value. Lame, indecent, and pathetic. All they had going for them was cleverness, money, and Murdoch's idiotic and shameless sensibility behind them. Like hires like. Of course, now the question is, Will it get any better? Or, Who will they hire next? These people have, just like most power-privatizing-gluttons, destabilized the very core of journalism, of its quality, of its respectability and all for what? I doubt they can answer that question with anything but "I did it for money." And I'm sorry, that answer doesn't fly. These people need to be broken down in public, taken from their high haughty towers and brought low. Forget prison. They need a psychological destabilization that mirrors the collective bludgeoning we've been receiving from their sub-par charade of shit. Make 'em cry, make 'em realize their human folly and hubris and that their empires will fall by the wayside. Like Shelley wrote in Ozymandias,
"Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away"
I talked to a few folks this week as I traveled about the debt crisis. What did they think about it? How was it going to get solved?
It was petty much unanimous: "I don't care. I don't follow politics".
But, hey, as long as the media has a real scandal to cover, like Murdoch-Gate. Sure. Cover that.
Hi Vilvos,
Glad to provide a service. I live to entertain you.
Seriously though, have you watched our episodes of "Making Nice TV" yet. You might get a kick out of them.
Click on my name and try Episode 5 "on Patriotism". Enjoy!
Hi Ray,
No, I would not agree with that. This is a center-right country, as validated by the 2010 national election which gave the House to the GOP. But, it is a decidedly left media, with 90% or better of the national media voting Democrat (self-identified in studies).
The problem, of course, has always been with the supposedly-objective "anchors" who are in real life are classic partisan liberals, like Cronkite. Name me a conservative who was ever on CBS as an anchor or correspondent.
What's changed since then is the rise of a TV punditry. Many people apparently cannot separate hard news from punditry. Fox News has both. The pundits are predominantly conservative, although Geraldo and Juan Williams are there too. And I don't know what Greta is. The "news" people like Shep Smith are liberal. Nothing at all like that balance on MSNBC. Or CBS/ABC/NBC for that matter.
I know that the liberals that comment here don't get the liberal bias in the news. It's because it so closely fits your worldview that you don't see a bias. Trust me, it's there and it's blatant.
Hi Graham,
I get that Canadians and Europeans are puzzled by the descriptions of left and right in America. I've seen enough of these comments in on Roger's Journal in the last 3 years that I get that.
I would just say two things to you:
1. You don't live under the same Constitution and political system that we do, or have the same political evolution. America is a special case. Founded in liberty. We the people. A limited government by design, set up by the founders with bright shiny fences around the federal government to keep it from expanding.
2. You are understating the left in the USA, and it's socialist history. The socialist mentorship that Barack Obama was steeped in.
I know that it's not the radical revolutionary Marxism that you equate with leftist socialist politics. There was a history of that strain, including the SDS and the Weather Underground and such. They didn't win out in the socialist evolution in America. The pragmatic-socialist wing - represented by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) - did. The Saul Alinsky types, who advocated achieving socialist revolution through pragmatic electoral politics. The community organizer scheme, etc.
I would highly recommend that you read Dr. Kurtz's "Radical-in-Chief" for a detailed explanation of the socialist leftist evolution in America, and Barack Obama's journey through that socialist network. It's quite startling, and it is predictive of the bad policies he's pursuing in office. If you don't know about organizations like the Midwest Academy, then you don't know enough about Barack Obama. And most of you don't. That's just a fact.
Roger, why didn't you publish my comment? There was nothing offensive in it. (The one about still picking up the Sun-Times and how it is a real shame newspapers are dwindling in numbers).
I always thought you had an inflated ego, but you are wiser then most, so I kept reading. If its a personal thing you have against me for some reason, fine, but don't stifle my opinion. What I said was fair.
When I heard on the news that you had tweeted that inconsiderate comment about the Jackass cast member who had died, did you just feel so compelled to write something like that? Never mind how he died, his friends were in pain and mourning because they had a friend just die, regardless of the circumstances. Would you tell a woman whose husband died of heart disease to not have let him eat so unhealthy and to have gotten him in the gym?
I don't expect you to post this comment either, but luckily I have my own medium, thank you very much.
Maybe you are just becoming a cranky old man.
Ebert: I publish all comments, certainly including yours.
Joseph Pulitzer, who indeed ought to have had the right to bestow another five prizes on the Sun-Times
Although, of course, it was the Pulitzer/Hearst battle that inspired one other new NYC paper to advertise itself as "All the news that's FIT to print." Wonder whatever happened to them.
(Or the Sun and World either, for that mater.)
In other late-breaking sinking-ship news, Murdoch's WSJ exec Les Hinton has recently left the paper, rather than be implicated in Rupert's latest folly.
This thing's had a busier exit door than a Newt Gingrich presidential campaign. ;)
(kind of talking About this comment)
See this is why I attack the mindset and not the person....
" I know that the liberals that comment here don't get the liberal bias in the news. It's because it so closely fits your worldview that you don't see a bias. Trust me, it's there and it's blatant."
Leaving aside all the other stuff I said :about how there's a "Hey, everyone else in the world, You, you're supposed to be my enemy (although I don't know that)" that characterizes this culture of abuse in politics, television etc.; a mechanism that only understands fighting (which you can see it seeking others out as such).
Oh, never mind, let 's just look at that quote above.
Doesn't that mindset of the quote above just tellingly gloss over of what should be the shocking realization of the brainwashing of hundreds of millions of people?
It just, without realization, said that hundreds of millions of people in America are being brainwashed.
And notice how there's a lack of concern for that fact as well.
I mean, a non-progandized mindset, it seems to me, would probably show some emotion for the fact that hundreds of millions of people in America are being brainwashed and concern and would feel a responsibility towards knowing itself so that it could prevent the distortion of the good.
It sounds to me, like brainwashing, when you one can just say that hundreds of millions of people are being brainwashed so expressionlessly and with absolutely no acknowledgement of that fact, like "Hey, a hundred million people are being brainwashed and there's mind-control, but the fact that that can be done and be done to hundreds of millions of people isn't what concerns me; just the fact that you're a dirty liberal"....it's got to be an insubtle form of authority with brainwashing; the dirty dirty has to be really dirty. That's how the brainwashing tries to tempt one...by trying to make one believe there's an easy answer out there. In this case it's like "Hey, you need an enemy...I got a dirty-as# liberal here...needs a good wash."
I see a mindset mesmerized with a susceptibility of worship for any form (not source) of sparkling insubtle authority, of its promise of easy answers.
You know what I mean? "Look how sparkling the dirt is on that liberal." Mezmerizing.
And if anyone thinks I'm growling at Fox News, or brainwashing in general, I'm just stating the truth. Understanding increases enjoyment. So, you can keep watching and listening to these things, but now you can know what they are too; in other words, knowing that they are trying to brainwash you will actually increase your enjoyment of watching it, although, part of the method of brainwashing is bombardment of noise, a feeling of "Ah! I can't think...shut up for a second television!" then you might want to change it
Is the WSJ "pretty good" now? Joe Nocera in the NYT disagrees with that in his piece called "The Journal Becomes Fox-ified" published today.
Also, is FOX "biased"? That shouldn't be an issue on its own. The issue is the non-stop lies - convincing millions of Americans that up is down.
I wonder if the title of your post is a play, somewhat, on the "Boogie Nights" character of Dirk Diggler?!
Just a thought.
If people wouldn't buy papers like The New York Post and watch FOX there wouldn't be a problem. One interesting thing, viewership at CNN spikes during a crisis and falls again during slow news times. Do people trust CNN for objectivity and want just the facts? Then they go back to everyday neurosis?
Hugh Grant said a wonderful thing, that what interests the public isn't always in the public's interest.
Hi Roger.
I loved the sit-down with you and Royko at the Billy Goat.
Did you ever know Roy Fisher?
That American journalists tend to skew more towards a political party that embraces facts, science, logic and reason should be of no surprise, the same way that religious zealots tend to skew more towards a party that embraces faith, prayer, superstition and religious doctrine.
The American Republican party is one step removed from actually advocating a theocracy. All they have to do is purge themselves of what they consider moderates.
...But, hey, as long as the media has a real scandal to cover, like Murdoch-Gate. Sure. Cover that.
This is no surprise, Randy stepping up to defend his Uncle Rupert. Authoritarians will always defend their grifters, no matter how greazy they are.
As for us non-authoritarians, we can easily follow the debt ceiling debate (read: Tea Party economic terrorism) AND relish the heat Uncle Rupert is taking.
I take umbrage at the person who called Rupert Murdoch a "slime bucket." Slime buckets serve a useful purpose.
It was (is?) illegal for companies owned by foreign nationals to own broadcast media in the United States. Rupert Murdoch was fast-tracked for U.S. citizenship so he could create the Fox Network.
It was illegal for a company to own a newspaper and broadcast media in the same market. Congress made an exception specifically so Murdoch could purchase the New York Post.
The fact that politicians are now expressing shock at Murdoch's tactics is both ludicrous and decades overdue.
The noble staff members who, in the words of Sergeant Shultz "knew nothing," aren't quitting out of moral outrage. Their personal wealth is directly tied to the value of News Corp/News International stock. They are trying to salvage it. And some, such as Les Hinton, would cheerfully eviscerate puppies on live TV if it would help Murdoch.
Finally, while you are quoting A Bit of Fry and Laurie on the subject of Murdoch, do not forget this vox pop:
Laurie: Rupert Murdoch would sell his own mother for fifty quid. Uh… I offered him forty but he said "No. Fifty, take it or leave it."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKjY2jXU25o
@Randy:
Regarding your comment:
"You don't live under the same Constitution and political system that we do"
Your knowledge of Canada is shockingly thin, particularly for someone who articulates their views with such confidence. THere is not a dime's worth of difference between the Canadian Charter of Rights and your bill of rights, with the possible exception of the vastly over-interpreted second amendment. WEre you somehow not aware of the existence of our Charter? IF you were, but still felt qualified to make the above comment, then you are foolish indeed. Regarding the political system, we Canadians operate under a democratic form of government, same as you. THe similarities are far greater than the differences. Both of our countries operate on multiple levels - federal, provincial/state and municipal, with established divisions of governing power.
You seem to be operating under the widespread delusion of US citizens that they are the only country that operates as a fullblown demoncracy. Canada has also done so, and has done so SINCE ITS INCEPTION. It has arguably done so in a much more ultimately successful manner than the supposed beacon of the free world. The United States is not unique - at least not for any positive reason. The only people that believe it is unique are those of limited exposure to the rest of the world and live within its borders, surprisingly enough.
The rest of your stale commentary on socialists, Barack Obama and Saul Alinsky are not worth responding to.
"How about let's call a spade a spade? ALL the networks have an agenda."
Yes. It's called "profit."
Hi Gerald,
Hey, man. Let's have a discussion instead of you just calling me wrong and foolish right of the bat.
There is not a dime's worth of difference between the Canadian Charter of Rights and your bill of rights...
Well, except that it is a come-lately charter ratified in 1982. The US Bill of Rights has been a part of our political DNA since 1791. That makes a big difference in how we view the main political question: the proper size and role of government.
You seem to be operating under the widespread delusion of US citizens that they are the only country that operates as a fullblown demoncracy.
Well, except that we don't have a "fullblown democracy". The US has a Constitutional Republic. Big difference. So, if you're going to start whacking me for not knowing about your government, know that about our government.
Our constitutions overall have differences. You have parliments and some vestiges of monarchy that we don't have. Etc.
Overall, I take your point. We have a lot in commong. Yes.
Having said that, Canadians don't get to have it both ways. As in, weighing in often here on Roger's Journal about how much saner your government is, and then railing on me for pointing out any difference.
And my points on socialism are dead on point. You have not done the research to refute it. Not wanting to talk about it is a convenient dodge.
Just finished reading some really good articles on Silvio Berlusconi who may just very well equal Murdoch in levels of corruption, greed, and illegality. Much like Australia, Italy, UK, and sadly the U.S., people just can not seem to understand the threat to all of society when one individual wields so much power. That Berlusconi is not living a life sentence in prison is a testament in my opinion how these Murdochs and fellow travelers are able to manipulate and corrupt our societies.
You would think at least in the U.S. we had learned our lesson with allowing one or two individuals to control and manipulate such as Hearst and Pulitzer were able to do (word Spanish and war come to mind). We say to ourselves incessantly that those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat. We say it, but we sure do not seem to understand it.
Without FOX cheerleeding the incompetence of the Bush administration, just think where we would be without the Iraq War, Afghanistan mission over, no Mediare part D, no unpaid for tax cuts. I can only think back to how so many FOX viewers so many years later still believed that WMDs were found in Iraq. Such a sad and depressing time we live in.
Hi Josh,
You'll have to quote me the line where I defended Murdoch. I did not.
The reporting on the debt crisis is lazy and biased. Left-biased. Obama biased.
For example, both sides have dug into to a non-negotiable position. GOP won't accept tax increases. Obama won't do a deal without tax increases. Yet, all of the MSM accounts accuse the GOP of "intransigence".
Here's an example: http://econ.st/m4sY6j
How is only one side showing intransigence? Obama says ""I don't see a path to a deal if they don't budge. Period," and he's not intransigent?
It's not the only example. The MSM keeps parroting Obama's description of a "balanced deal", without properly explaining it is the reality of tax increases now vs. the speculative promise of spending cuts 10 years from now. Some balanced deal. Yet, the MSM doesn't want to explain that.
Left-biased media. In full ambulance chasing mode on the Murdoch story and negligent on the debt crisis story. That's what I said.
Thank you for the extremely vivid and visceral trip down memory lane. I lived in Oak Park in eighties and commuted into the city via el. I was able to read both papers in their entirety during my commute. I remember this period well.
The newspapers were a big surprise when I moved to the area from downstate Illinois, having delivered all four as a paper boy. This was just after the Mirage series and its aftermath had settled down. I knew the American had folded and my favorite, the Daily News, was absorbed into the Sun Times. However, the fiercely Republican Tribune (arguably at the time it was worse than Fox now), had morphed into a world-quality paper with excellent reporting and commentary. The Sun Times, the fun read with the excellent columnists, became less and less fun to read as time went on. I looked to the Tribune for national news and the Sun Times for local news about the neighborhoods. Eventually, the Sun Times became the paper for sports and car ads. (Supposedly both were superlative and world class; I really didn't care for either.)
I deliberately bought the Sun Times for the columnists, but eventually they all went away except for you and Glenna Syse. Mike Royko moved to the Tribune immediately upon the Murdoch takeover. Your friend, Ms. Howard's mother, left for the Trib as soon as she was contractually able. Jory Graham (sadly and tragically) succumbed to the inevitable. Roger Simon drifted off to Baltimore. To retaliate, the Times in turn imported a minor gossip columnist from the Trib and turned her into a self-serving legend in her own mind (although I understand privately she was a rather nice person). She was their answer to Royko. Enough said. Briefly, there was a trio of women writers who traded off with fun observations of daily life (Judy Markey, Jorie Luloff and one other whose name escapes me now). The contest to find the replacement to Ms. Howard's mother was painful to watch and the results were even more painful to read.
I remember Wingo very well. Every celebrity who passed through the City was photographed similing and holding up a Wingo card. I wondered if they actually knew what they were holding. Otherwise your description of the bikini-clad Wingo Babe was spot on. About the second or third day of the contest, I calculated the odds of winning. It wasn't hard to do. I had better odds of dating every Wingo Babe for a year, including Ann Miller. (That particular work of cruelty is emblazoned on my memory.)
At the end of my tenure in Chicago, about 1989, the Tribune took one full el ride, the lunch hour, and the better part of the return trip to finish. I was able to skim through the Times in half an el ride: the comics and a couple of interesting pieces in the features. I even used the Trib's second section for news on the neighborhoods. As I understand it though, the car ads and the sports pages doubled since the beginning of the decade. My friends who were connoisseurs of such things said that they had doubled in quality at the same time.
Of course what goes around comes around. These days when I return I buy the Trib to stare aghast at how far the mighty can fall, and I buy the Times to get a good read of the news, commentary, and features.
Thank you for the memories. I love your columns. Keep up the good work.
Fox News is a conservative alternative to everyone else. Remember the 2008 presidential election? Rupert Murdoch, on the other hand, seems to be sheer businessman. He's giving people what they want. Many people on both political sides are Kool-Aid drinkers who turn on these opinion shows just to have their opinions validated. Most news media is a racket, though. They sell us sensational trash and then guilt-trip us into thinking we are better citizens for being "informed."
I am from Rupert Murdoch's home town of Adelaide, South Australia. The daily South Australian newspaper owned by Murdoch, is a disgrace to journalism.
"Left-biased media. In full ambulance chasing mode on the Murdoch story and negligent on the debt crisis story. That's what I said."
Ambulances. Lights. Sounds pretty sparkling
**clears throat**referring to my past few comments talking about the mindset of this commenter **clears throat again**
Randy,
Uncle Rupert
No matter how subtle you think you were being, we get it. You’re annoyed that the only one in the world who gets it is you; everyone else is too wrapped up with Uncle Rupert to care about what’s “Really Important”. In your case: non-stop liberal bashing.
Debt Ceiling Negotiations
Sorry, Obama giving in 100% to GOP demands and getting 0% in return is not a negotiation, it is a hostage strategy. And only right-wing hacks consider the increase itself to be a concession.
In Tea Party alternate reality, Obama is the radical. In regular reality, the majority of Americans rightfully blame the reactionary House GOP. Look at the new polls, Americans aren’t as stupid as you would hope Randy. Just like Newt’s House in the ‘90’s, the majority of Americans know where to lay the blame. I know this is incompatible with Tea Party Alternate Reality, but there you are.
The cognitive dissonance you are experiencing must be unbearable.
Hi Roger:
Striped suits for the whole miserable gang. Yet, consier this irony: So many ink-stained wretches still admire Ben Hecht's dubious ethics of the Front Page era.
Does Murdoch remind anyone else of Gail Wynand?
Randy,
"I know that the liberals that comment here don't get the liberal bias in the news. It's because it so closely fits your worldview that you don't see a bias. Trust me, it's there and it's blatant."
MSM has a corporate bias. The idea that it's liberal is laughable.
The problem is Fox actually distorts the news and deliberately misinforms its viewership. What you perceive as a liberal bias is a the minimal reliance upon facts and reason in the MSM that Fox cannot even manage.
Roger, I have to disagree with you about the Wall Street Journal (now referred to in my precincts as the Wall Street Urinal).
I haven't read all the comments prior to mine, so I may be treading old ground here. But Murdoch's tenure at the Wall Street Journal marked a significant change from the Bancroft family's ownership (dysfunctional as it was).
The Journal's famed long-form coverage largely disappeared. Politics crept into editorial material, blatantly so in some cases. Bias was evident everywhere, in stark contrast to the Journal's previously pristine objectivity. Most of all, writing standards nosedived. Stellar writers departed in droves, leaving only hacks behind.
And -- case in point -- the current phone-hacking scandal in Britain wasn't just given short shrift in the Journal, it was given no shrift at all until just recently, when the scandal could no longer be ignored, whereupon it finally did receive short Journal shrift, just cursory coverage at best.
No -- what was once one of the great papers in the US (the ranks of which now pretty much include only the NYTimes and the Washington Post) is now little more than capitalistic dreck. Alas.
William Dods beat me to it. The case against the NOTW didn't break wide open until the revelation that their PI hacked into Milly Dowler's phone and worse still, deleted messages on it. That was their Rubicon. There may not be a lot of sympathy for people who live public lives -- celebtiries, politicians, even the royals -- but the attack on the Dowlers' privacy crossed a line that no decent person could accept.
Incidentally it's heartbreaking to read what the Dowler family suffered while their daughter was missing. Apart from the NOTW hacking which raised false hopes that their daughter was still alive, they were harassed by several mentally unbalanced people claiming to be Milly or to have knowledge of her whereabouts. At least these people had the excuse that they were deranged.
(Long-time lurker; first-time poster)
I was born and raised in London in the 1960s. My working-class parents always read The Daily Mirror, but The News of the World was absolutely forbidden in our house. It was years later that I learned why--TNOTW was often referred to as "The Whore's Gazette."
And THAT was long before Rupert Murdoch owned it. I can't say New Corp's ownership improved the tenor of the paper.
Digger is a term generally used for Aussies (I suspect it originates as a term for miners). Australia has--and has had--a lot of mines.
On a random note, why do you think DISGRACE was pretty much ignored by the public (and the Academy)? It is John Malkovich's best performance by far. And the film itself is excellent. I'm curious why the director received no attention or acclaim in the US. I assume, pessimistically, it's because the film is about race.
I just watched LIFE, ABOVE ALL. Attendance was sparse, although the film was excellent. But I doubt we will be seeing a supporting actress nomination for the brilliant Harriet Manamela as Mrs. Tafa? It seems to me that unless a movie dealing with race offers a dose of neatly packaged, feel-good, phony "uplift" (or just presents a Bahrani-esque poverty tour), then it just pretty much gets ignored. That sucks.
Once again for the benefit of Randy Masters:
When Barack Obama was elected President in 2008, with the Democratic party gaining greater control of both houses of Congress, this did not mean that the USA was a "center-left" country.
In 2010, when the Republican party gained control of one house of Congress, this did not mean that the USA had become "center-right".
The factor that determines the outcome of any election in this country is immediate past performance.
In other words, "What have you done for me lately?"
In recent years particularly, the prevailing characteristic of Americans is a heightened impatience. We want the problems solved right now - and if whoever we voted in last year doesn't do the job instantaneously, well, chuck 'em on out and run the new guys in (as if they'll pull off the miracle any better than the old guys did).
Obama is catching as much or more heat from his "base" on the Left as he ever has from the Right.
But the "bases", Left and Right, don't constitute the majority of voters. They never have, and they never will.
Most American voters are non-ideological. Over the years, they've voted for Democrats and Republicans, sometimes even in the same year. It all depends on how things are going at the time the election is held.
If things are going well, or look like they're getting better, the incumbents get to stay on.
If things are going badly, or look like they might get worse, the out party gets in.
This is the way it's been all throughout our history.
This is how it will be next year.
If the economy improves at all between now and next November, Barack Obama will be reelected. Most likely it'll be closer than 2008.
If the economy worsens, the Republican nominee will win - unless Obama and the Democrats take a page from Harry Truman in 1948 and run against the Republican Congress.
Either way, it'll be a lot closer than '08.
Voters don't give a rodent's rear end about ideology.
They care about results - and who's more likely to get them.
And that's why more and more voters are frustrated by the mounting intransigence on both sides.
Oh, Roger:
Websense is blocking the Foreword to your new book: "Social Networking".
And what the hell have you got against the Baker Street Irregulars, anyway?
I always liked reading The Guardian when I was in London for a semester abroad. :-) And I guess Rupert Murdoch proves that the most poisonous creatures in the world do indeed come from Australia.
Hi Roger,
Just a thought on your thought, from your article:
I continued to work at the Sun-Times, explaining: "It's not Murdoch's paper. It's my paper. He only bought it."
Do you suppose that Roger Ailes thinks the same thing about Fox News?
Fox TV network says Rupert Murdoch. I don't watch it much, and have to spend time keeping my kids off of it's programming.
Fox News says Roger Ailes. A respectable network. A world apart from Fox.
Consider that.
Ebert: I imagine he does think that. I believe he is more unprincipled than Murdoch.
Please take this article down before Murdoch sends more assassins! :( :( :(
slightly off topic here, but doesn't anyone think the reason for the decline of the new york times is it's ridiculous cost? I could buy a pack of smokes for the daily cost of the NYT. And a pack of smokes is much more enjoyable and probably better for you. Seriously, newspapers are dying, maybe the times should lower it's cost and at least try to stay alive?
Randy: Fox News says Roger Ailes. A respectable network.
Setting aside the obvious comedy of this statement, I see Randy is building a narrative here; something you'll probably see bubbling up from the Fox News crowd:
"Roger Ailes runs Fox News Cartoon Network, not Uncle Rupert! Nothing to see here, move along!"
This of course assumes that Roger Ailes is a less contemptible figure than Uncle Rupert. Again, authoritarians always protect their grifters, no matter how sleazy.
News flash Randy: The same sensationalist tactics at work on Fox are the same used at Fox News. You know, aim for the lowest common denominator and you'll never miss. And yes, I speak as an actual fan of several Fox shows.
History time, Randy:
It was Rupert Murdoch who hired Roger Ailes to organize and run Fox News, with the specific charge of providing a "conservative alternative" to the other broadcast and cable news outfits.
Before coming to Fox, Ailes had been at CNBC-MSNBC, where he was putting on all kinds of talkers, trying to get an audience, and generally not succeeding against the long-established CNN.
For a brief time, Ailes even put himself on-air as a host; if memory serves, he was certainly no worse than most.
Anyway, Ailes was answerable to the GE-RCA brass, headed by that notable Leftist Jack Welch (:-D), so Murdoch's offer came at exactly the right time (so to speak). With the free hand given him by Murdoch, Ailes made stars out of Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity, revived the Great Grandstander Geraldo Rivera, found 'liberals' like Alan Colmes, Ellis Henican, Susan Estrich, and the like who were willing to be lapdogs for the conservatives, and moved the news coverage into Aussie-style sensationalism, a nod to his patron.
And give credit where due - it worked.
All the other cabloid news outlets have been playing catch-up ever since.
*Small Sidelight:
Am I the only one who remembers when Ted Turner was considered the guy who was going to turn TV news to the far Right?
I think it was back in the '80s when CBS was in play, just after Bill Paley died. Turner put in a bid, and announced that he'd like to be Dan Rather's boss. A whole bunch of conservative Republican pols, led by Jesse Helms himself, announced their support of a Turner takeover of CBS.
At this point, CNN was still comparatively young, and the Right was still playing the victim against the major broadcast nets.
Anyway, Turner didn't get CBS, but not long after, a funny thing happened:
Turner addressed a broadcasters convention somewhere and announced that the experience of running CNN had "turned me into a kind of liberal - and it's a lot of fun!" (I believe this quote is accurate. And for the record, it predates by a number of years Turner's courtship of Jane Fonda.)
Turner's Republican supporters were dumbfounded, to say the least.
All of the above is, to the best of my recollection, the absolute truth (corrections welcomed).
And I gotta go get lunch.
I was thinking about your belief that Roger Ailes is “more unprincipled than Murdoch.” Ailes seems to believe in his conservative politics just as sincerely as Murdoch, and bad as it is Fox News is far from the ooziest carbuncle in the king’s crown. The one thing I can see on Murdoch’s side is that he used to own The Village Voice. He didn’t interfere with an editorial slant that was obviously diametrically opposed to his own, and he restored it to sufficient solvency that it continues to be published today. People still wonder why he did this. My theory is that he sees himself as some kind of corny movie hero who lets his enemy pick up his sword after he is disarmed through some random accident because he wants to show that he can beat him in a fair fight.
Filmgoers may recall John Landis's superlative horror movie, An American Werewolf in London. At one point in the film, the lead, restless, flips on the TV. The first thing he sees is an ad for The News of the World: "Read about her nude pictures ... Nina tells how she had fun and found trouble earning too much money, getting in too much mischief..." (Nina, in a sultry voice) "'In the end it nearly destroyed me!' ... Don't miss the naked truth about naughty Nina!" At the time, I thought it was one of Landis's many in-jokes, but apparently that was an actual News of the World TV spot that was broadcast at the time! The film was released in 1981... long after Murdoch bought the paper, but before it switched from a broadsheet to a tabloid.
Roger, Roger. Did Murdoch make Royko less of a columnist? Did he make you less than what you could have been? Did you quit taking your salary? What.
Ebert: And your point is...
Sony got hacked, Bank of America got hacked, so why shouldn't Rupert Murdoch's minions be allowed to hack too?
This is what the news division of Fox News told me!
The top five most venomous creatures to come out of Australia.
5. Red Back Spider (Latrodectus hasselti)
4. Funnel Web Spider (Atrax robustus)
3. Stone Fish (Synanceia verrucosa)
2. The Box Jellyfish (Chironex fleckeri)
1. Rupert Murdoch (Australiasis atra mors)
Did not Murdoch gain the ability to own ANY USA television stations as a result of Newt Gingrich's legislation to make him a citizen? Or did Newt's legislation allow foreigners to own US media?
In any event, perhaps both Rupert and Newt are getting their Karmic rewards.
hi roger - while I've long cherished both you and your writing (both of which I consider genuine treasures), I am also reminded of what first occurred to me amidst the recent flap following your "jackass" wisecrack:
arrogance and impulse can pose a dangerous combination.
I miss Royko's columns. Worth the price of the paper, every one. Kass - he's never done it for me. The best columnists left in Chicago are in the Sun-Times sports section - Morrissey and Telander.
Fox News overall is a much better source of the truth than the liberal rags you hold so dearly by.
It seems bias is a word you use rather liberally - anything that you disagree with.
I like how you chose such a flattering picture of Mr. Murdoch.
On the "FOX News bias" dead horse:
Here's FOX's announcement of (arguably) the most important news story in 40 years:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13qfS2NZ2xg
Notice the cut-away?
Contrast this with Cronkite's coverage of (definitely) the most important story in 41 years:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxA6sSTAaws&feature=related
Also, how come the FOX news bias always seems to be denied by those who identify themselves as right-wingers? I fully admit MSNBC is a biased "news" source, unreliable and skewed to the leftist demographic to which I belong.
Randy,
Do you feel that FOX the only reliable "news" source, meaning that EVERY OTHER news source is skewed left?
-Dave
SkloopB:
This is a joke, right?
The proper term is "Digro"
@Michael: Too often the British coverage has narrowed the story down to its most digestible components, devoid of context (as British coverage of most things is wont to do)
I don't know, Michael, I think you're being too hard, or too selective, on British journalism. Remember, it WAS The Guardian who broke this story, in the best traditions of journalism. And in my opinion, if you want to know what's going on on Planet Hollywood, tune into CNN or FOXNews... but if you want to know what's going on on Planet Earth, you want BBC World News. And I'm not even British; I'm Canadian.
A reminiscence by the current editor of the Christian Science Monitor, from his days at the first Murdoch acquisition in the US:
http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/editors-blog/2011/0719/When-a-US-newspaper-first-felt-the-Murdoch-touch
. . . One day, I phoned the rewrite desk with a small article about the city commissioning a study into whether suburban communities were paying their fair share of jointly used urban services. It was just a study (even I thought it was a little boring), but it was worth noting somewhere in the paper.
“Not so fast,” the city editor said. “I can make something of this.”
On the way home from work, I saw the final evening edition with my minor story screaming from pages on the street: “CITY DECLARES WAR.” . . .
Britain now apparently faces a period without coverage of vicars with knickers before Murdoch launches the Sun on Sunday to cover the screws of the world.
It's interesting you should say that, as News of the World was often referred to as "News of the Screws".
Doesn't Murdoch's Sun-Times buyout highlight the fundamental weakness of all private institutions? If the people at the top shepherd their charge carefully, they can build up superior, durable talent and trust throughout their institution. Yet a new owner or powerful executive with different ideals can destroy decades of effort in days.
The transformation doesn't have to be malicious or cynical. An outsider museum or college president might reorganize in order to revitalize, not realizing the changes are sacrificing irreplaceable knowledge and experience. An executive in a creative industry might simply feel the studio needs to satisfy different tastes. But the result is the same as if someone came in with the sole intention of sabotaging a hated rival or exploiting a market opportunity. The identity of any private institution, its culture, its social links within and without its walls, are as fragile as the whims of whoever sits at the helm. Major shifts at newspapers and other content producers are easier to recognize, since their public face and private identity are linked so tightly.
Public institutions have their own vulnerabilities, of course. Yet even there, the biggest upheavals tend to come when a single political entity has enough power to overrule the institution's professionals. Education systems, the EPA, even the National Archives can swing wildly as politicians trade control. All it takes is the right appointment at the top.
Most people below the leadership rung seem willing to suspend disbelief about their impact on their workplace. They know they're not calling all the shots or particularly indispensable. Yet they're still willing to commit themselves beyond the minimum requirements for the sake of an institution they believe in.
Is this an unavoidable result of our inability to read minds to detect other people's true intentions? So much communal effort and identity are thrown away when the wrong person steps in to run things.
Hi Mike,
I know that Murdoch hired Ailes. And he lets him run it. Which is why I said it has more of Ailes imprint than Murdoch's. If you want to see Murdoch's imprint, look at Fox TV network (not Fox News), which is a lowest common denominator sewer.
Also, what you described with the hiring of O'Reilly, Hannity, Henican, Rivera, Estrich, etc. is called "Fair and Balanced". No other news network has that strong of diversity of opinion. None.
Hi Dave,
Good talking with you on here again.
Randy, Do you feel that FOX the only reliable "news" source, meaning that EVERY OTHER news source is skewed left?
No one news source is the "only reliable" news source.
I find Fox News to be fair and balanced, per their slogan, with the widest diversity of opinion and trusted news sources on the air. Brett Baire does the best evening news show with "Special Report" on the air, for example. By the same token, they also air rabid-leftist Bob Beckel and conservative Sean Hannity. Diversity.
I wouldn't be very well rounded if I only watched Fox News, though.
I read and watch a ton of news throughout the week, each week.
On the conservative side:
- Townhall.com is a great site to read conservative op-eds and news. Probably my main source for opinion.
- I link to a lot of sites and op-eds through Drudge as an aggregator.
- Breitbart's "Big" sites are coming on strong. You really should read his book "Righteous Indignation".
- FreeRepublic.com is the de rigeur chat site. I've been a member for years.
Left-wise:
- Roger's Ebert's Journal, of course
- I read Huffington Post every day
- I have a subscription to the Economist. Gives me the European leftist perspective
- I watch CNN often. Definitely left-centered. I watched them last night after the two speeches and watched them put on left-winger after Obamabot after fake Republican (Gergen) etc.
- I read DemocraticUnderground.com (DU) often.
Plus, I read a ton of political books - on both sides.
What I find reliable is to watch/read the widest variety of sources I can and synthesize my own opinion from that.
There is an oft-repeated observation that goes like this:
Liberals can go through life without being exposed to conservative thought if they so choose because of the relentlessly liberal media environment that we have today. Conservatives, on the other hand, cannot help but be exposed to the relentless liberal onslaught in the media, in academia, in Hollywood. The result is that conservatives are more well-rounded.
Every liberal should be reading be reading Breitbart's book to understand the new media, Palin's books to understand the conservative right, and Rand Paul's book "The Tea Party Goes to Washington" to understand the rise of the Tea Party. Virtually none are. Why?
How many conservative sources do you regularly read or watch for balance?
Hi Josh,
And yes, I speak as an actual fan of several Fox shows.
Ah, that explains a lot.
Fox is Murdoch, and it's a sewer. I can't think of a single show that I watch on Fox.
Fox News is Ailes. It's quality, the quality shows, and it kicks it's competitors behind daily because of the quality.
I am glad to see that there will be changes after the phone hacking and such. What garbage! Hopefully some things will change! Abuse of power and I thought it was cool to be such a big player in the media, but what an abuse of money, power and media!
great point . It's interesting you should say that, as News of the World was often referred to as "News of the Screws".
Randy Masters (partying like it's 1984):
So Rupert Murdoch is now an 'unperson'.
Never mind that his whole background is in the news business (print, broadcast, and cable).
Never mind that all knowledgable sources are on record that Murdoch's involvement with the entertainment side of his corporation (TV and movies) is minimal, that they serve principally as a source of income for NewsCorp.
Well, there it is, the company's name: NewsCorp.
And Murdoch is the one who said "I own the news."
First in Australia, then in England, then in the USA.
News has always been his primary interest, and likely always will be
.It made him his fortune, it gave him his power, it might still get him a knighthood (just like his father before him).
But Randy wants to make him vanish from the news equation, because ... why?
Because he's become an embarrassment?
Fact is, Murdoch's no different now than when he turned Australia into a tabloid paradise.
Or when he made the already racy English tabs even more so.
(Old Benny Hill joke:
Schoolmaster: "What do we call the hottest part of the sun?"
Student: "Page three.")
Murdoch's first stop in American news was a paper in San Antonio, Texas, where he introduced Wingo.
When he transformed the New York Post, which had been the most liberal paper in town, into the shrieking blatt that it is today, no one who knew his history was surprised in the least.
But maybe that's part of what Randy calls Murdoch's "sewer", that it shouldn't be counted against FoxNews.
Except that all the copyright lines read NewsCorp.
And always will, unless Murdoch's successors break up the company holdings after he's gone. That could still be his own family.
Semi-Irrelevant Anecdote:
Fred Friendly, who ran CBS News for many years, once wrote of his only face-to-face meeting with James Aubrey (aka 'The Smiling Cobra'), who ran CBS's entertainment side.
I don't have the exact quote at hand so this is approximately what Aubrey said to Friendly:
In this system you and I are always going to be adversaries.
They say to you, "Take your lily-white hands, bring us prestige, win us awards."
They say to me, "Take your grubby little hands, make hit shows, make us loads of money."
What Friendly was telling about was the long-time battle between news and entertainment for the favor of CBS's founder-chairman William Paley.
Paley came into radio from the entertainment side, but he came to develop an appreciation for news as CBS esentially invented broadcast journalism.
The trouble came because Paley tried to divide his loyalty between the two camps; he saw no reason why they coudn't exist side-by-side.
But the two sides each felt that the other was being favored, leading to the hostility Aubrey was referring to.
Aubrey eventually left CBS, and Friendly stayed on for a while longer, but the "feud" continued. It still exists at the networks today, in somewhat reduced form.
What the above story has to do with Rupert Murdoch:
He understood the situation better than Fred Friendly did.
Murdoch saw that the money made by entertainment could be used to finance expansion of news - the two sides feeding each other. Add in sports as a kind of bridge, and you have the modern media empire model that is now commonplace.
The point to remember is that Murdoch came out of news - tabloid news to be sure, but news.
.
Relevant Anecdote:
Murdoch arrived at the press plant of a paper he'd just taken over and announced that they were switching from broadsheet to tabloid format.
The crew nervously informed him that they didn't know where the
paper guides were to convert the presses.
Murdoch said nothing, but continued to make a silent inspection of the plant. Then he found a tall ladder, leaned it against one of the presses, and climbed.
There, on top of the press, under a canvas covering, were the paper guides for that machine. Same thing for all the other presses.
News is Murdoch's first concern, even if it is the overheated Aussie brand.
And I daresay, Randy, if you were to tell him differently to his face, his response would be in the great Austarlian tradition:
POW! - right in the kisser.
Oh, and one other thing, Randy:
If the day ever comes that FoxNews gives a daily or nightly show to anyone who is as ferociously to the Left as Hannity is to the Right - then maybe I'll buy "Fair 'n' Balanced".
You know, the way MSNBC has Joe Scarborough on every morning, sometimes supported by Pat Buchanan.
The whole game of "Count The Talking Heads" is ridiculous anyway. It's the host that paces the show, and Fox's hosts are mainly on the starboard side.
MSNBC, CNN, Fox News and the rest are not so much news outlets as vehicles to sell ads. And let's stop the self-delusion. Fox News is a conservative propaganda outlet, having sponsored Tea Party rallies, providing Republican candidates with lucrative employment, and generally misleading its gullible viewers.
MSNBC is the reverse image of CNN, not Fox News. MSNBC has its liberal anchors (and has fired a few), but it also has Scarborough. CNN had Lou "Birther" Dobbs as an anchor for years. They tried the estimable Kathleen Parker with Eliot Spitzer, but now they have E. D. Hill, she of the Obama "terrorist fist jab," from Fox News. They hired Glenn Beck for the execrable HLN (as did Disney's ABC).
If you want to be informed, read a newspaper. Read the AP, McClatchy and, yes, the New York Times. Read Brooks and Krugman, Pitts and Parker, Will and Robinson. Above all, read and view the news from multiple sources critically.
And for more on the power of the news, rent/watch "Inventing L.A.: The Chandlers and Their Times," a fascinating story with a Chicago connection.
Did you know Murdoch, like Katie Holmes, is scared shitless of raccoons. Ailes, like Tom Cruise, is not. I think that explains everything.
Mr. Ebert, what are some some news sources that you respect?
Ebert: The Economist, the Guardian, the Independent, the NYTimes, the CSMonitor.
Cool. How about broadcast journalism sources? Also, what makes a news source good in your eyes?
Ebert: NPR, BBC and CNN.
There are no "news" sources anymore. News used to mean an unbiased report of factual occurrences- now all mainstream media is corrupt and manipulative. The American economy has been taken down by a marxist administration. Unemployment and poverty are the themes of the future. Individual rights have been trampled upon by a dictator who bypasses congress to implement his own agenda. Where is the outrage regarding "gunrunner"- silence from the media you mention. Where is the outrage that the massive banking fraud resulted in no criminal investigations- silence from the media you mention. Where is the outrage that the massive government debt has only resulted in a call to tax and spend more by the entrenched powers in Washington- silence from the media you mention. Sorry, I liked you as a film critic, but your venture into political commentary exposes your ignorance of economics, civics, and history. The blind and misplaced allegiance to the ideology of your hero and the propaganda media that supports him has turned a once thriving culture into an Obamanation.