News Of The World

[Boz]

Anyone who can't go to the trouble of making a REAL cream pie -- and uses shaving cream instead -- does not deserve an ounce of attention and should be thrown into prison, if not Gitmo.

That's just plain lazy. And there is no excuse for lazy props, whether your intention is protest or comedy or both.

[HoyaNyr320]

As much I enjoy seeing Murdoch and News Corp. figuratively have pie in his face from this scandal, the "behaviour" of the pie thrower is inexcusable. He should be charged with battery and punished to the fullest extent of the law.

[AustinHoya03]

While I think that phone-hacking by news organizations is both bizarre and wrong, I can't believe this story has blown up the way it has.

The majority of people still commenting on this story on my Facebook and Twitter news feeds are reliable lefties who are salivating at the thought of "Fox News" being "taken down." These are also largely people who tend to conflate personal consumption (including news consumption) with identity, and wouldn't be caught dead watching Neil Cavuto. Their view of Fox News is an amalgam of Daily Show clips and liberal blog outrage.

I have a reliable axiom: for every three self-identifying liberals that complain about the alleged corrupting influence of Fox News, two have never watched an entire Fox News program. Try it out on your pinko friends.

[Boz]

Jul 19, 2011 19:11:08 GMT -5 AustinHoya03 said:

While I think that phone-hacking by news organizations is both bizarre and wrong, I can't believe this story has blown up the way it has.

The majority of people still commenting on this story on my Facebook and Twitter news feeds are reliable lefties who are salivating at the thought of "Fox News" being "taken down." These are also largely people who tend to conflate personal consumption (including news consumption) with identity, and wouldn't be caught dead watching Neil Cavuto. Their view of Fox News is an amalgam of Daily Show clips and liberal blog outrage.

I have a reliable axiom: for every three self-identifying liberals that complain about the alleged corrupting influence of Fox News, two have never watched an entire Fox News program. Try it out on your pinko friends.

Well not to mention that such thinking is really naive.

The chances of Rupert Murdoch's empire being "brought down" by this are about the same as the chances of Liz Phair calling me up tonight and telling me she wrote "Supernova" all about me and would like to come visit for a little while. (Bear in mind, I would happily accept this trade-off!)

It is a black eye, and a pretty nasty one, but probably won't amount to much more than that. NewsCorp is too big and powerful and these things, while wrong, are not major or widespread enough.

But imagine the hypothetical for a moment that this blows up to the point that it completely brings all of NewsCorp down. Does anyone really think that will be the end of conservative news, in print, online or on TV? Or that Neil Cavuto, Sean Hannity or anyone else would be out of a job for more than five minutes? Hell, as much as CNN is drooling all over this, they'd probably be the first ones to change their business model and hire 'em all up; regardless of how liberal Ted Turner may be.

Don't get me wrong. By all means, enjoy the schadenfreude. God knows I did when Anthony Weiner was acting like an idiot. Or when the NYT got egg all over it's face for basically making up a story about John McCain. But it's not like their baldfaced lying was going to bring down liberal news or the Democratic party in America. Whatever improprieties that some of these news organizations may be guilty of, they are not going to amount to the end of NewsCorp.

On the other hand, I was wrong on this story before, so I'll be sitting by the phone I guess.

[vcjack]

Based on CNN's coverage of this, I imagine that Ted Turner has had a "Rupert Scandal" contingency on hand for decades. How long until TNT starts playing this on repeat? www.imdb.com/title/tt0120347/

And also to Austin's point, even if Fox were to magically shut down, they've successfully proved that conservative political programing is a market leader. Others would take its place

[TC]

Why would people really think that FOX would be shut down by this? They would have to do actual investigative reporting to get caught up in a scandal like this.

[The Stig]

Jul 20, 2011 22:24:06 GMT -5 TC said:

Why would people really think that FOX would be shut down by this? They would have to do actual investigative reporting to get caught up in a scandal like this.

People said the same about NotW. Their normal reporting practice was to bribe/blackmail a "witness" into signing a scandalous "first-hand account" written by the NotW journalist.

Here's a good insight into how NotW works: news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/24_07_08mosleyvnewsgroup.pdf

It's from the Max Mosley court case, where he successfully sued NotW. It has some pretty graphic details that most people won't care to read (although they are presented in a delightfully dry British manner), but if you jump down to paragraph 79, you'll get a good account of how NotW normally gets their stories.

[EasyEd]

NBC and the media in general is covering this story like it's 9-11 or the stock market crash. This story, along with the royal wedded couple and the heat index crisis, allows NBC to replace the Anthony trial in its newscasts so it doesn't have to explain why and how GE paid no income taxes last year.

[The Stig]

Jul 22, 2011 10:31:31 GMT -5 EasyEd said:

NBC and the media in general is covering this story like it's 9-11 or the stock market crash. This story, along with the royal wedded couple and the heat index crisis, allows NBC to replace the Anthony trial in its newscasts so it doesn't have to explain why and how GE paid no income taxes last year.

While I agree with your disgust over GE not paying income taxes last year, it's not like the non GE-owned TV media are all over that case.

If you want good investigative reporting on important issues in the US, you don't watch TV news, whether it's NBC, Fox, or CNN. They're all terrible. PBS is the lone exception, but nobody watches them.

[Boz]

Not excusing anything that NOTW did, but I think one of my favorite moments in this whole saga has been listening to and reading Carl Bernstein railing against Rupert Murdoch and NewsCorp for their unforgivable transgressions.

Ummm, say Carl? Shall we take a little trip in the Way Back Machine, perhaps?


Poor Carl Bernstein. Guy's been spending the better part of 40 years trying to convince the world that his last name really isn't "Garfunkel."

[AustinHoya03]

Jul 22, 2011 10:31:31 GMT -5 EasyEd said:

NBC and the media in general is covering this story like it's 9-11 or the stock market crash. This story, along with the royal wedded couple and the heat index crisis, allows NBC to replace the Anthony trial in its newscasts so it doesn't have to explain why and how GE paid no income taxes last year.

"If this does not reflect your view you should understand
That those who own the papers also own this land
And they’d rather you believe
In Coronation Street capers
In the war of circulation, it sells newspapers"

[kchoya]

Jul 20, 2011 22:24:06 GMT -5 TC said:

Why would people really think that FOX would be shut down by this? They would have to do actual investigative reporting to get caught up in a scandal like this.

Does anyone besides Yahoo! Sports and the National Enquirer really do much investigative reporting these days?

[rosslynhoya]

Why bother with paying salaried investigative reporters when you can just crowdsource all that stuff? If anyone has anything juicy to say, they'll bring it to a news organization's attention sooner or later.