Rupert Murdoch is now a shadow director of the ABC, and has been for quite a while, with the proof being his propagandists are on most, if not all, ABC news and current affairs shows pushing his lies for his own financial benefit.
This is not a coincidence. Because News Corp is little more than a press agency for the Coalition, which reciprocates by unashamedly serving its interests. Coalition MPs, well and truly knowing who is buying their next round, slavishly supplicate themselves to News Corp and its vile former Australian proprietor — a nonagenarian crocodilian called Rupert. And indeed, to a lesser degree, every other well-heeled grifter who furnishes their electoral coffers. Because these MPs, most of whom are given every advantage by birth, know they are too lazy or lacking in talent – and potentially too pissed – to ever achieve much without gaming the system, preferencing the plutocrats, or ever exhibiting an iota of integrity.
When Peter Dutton said the quiet bit out loud about how he wasn’t interested in making it easy for Labor to govern, surely that should have been the signal that he’s not interested in working with them to improve conditions for all Australians by mitigating their poor policy. In other words, Dutton was saying that he wants to screw things up as badly as he can in order to improve his chances of being elected. While he may not be the first Opposition leader to think that way, there’s a danger with making it too obvious. You might as well say, “Yes well, this is a great idea and very much needed but we’re going to try and block it because it might make the government too popular!”
He has damaged democracy and civil discourse and journalism itself. The behaviour of News Corp has on occasions been reprehensible, for which I think Rupert must take the blame.
Whatever the changes, A.J. Bauer is surely right in quashing any assumptions that Fox News “would suddenly become a bastion of journalistic integrity.” The rot, its dank and enervating properties, has well and truly set in, blighting journalism in toto and subordinating political classes too afraid to admit otherwise.
Greg Sheridan Murdoch’s Political Editor has more strings to his bow or is Murdoch the bow and Sheridan his arrow?
Senior Australian “conservative” figures continue to attend conferences backed by illiberal Hungarian leader Viktor Orban. The Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) hosted its 2023 London Summit in late June, featuring Alexander Downer and Greg Sheridan as two of the five speakers. Australians must focus on connections between our Right with Hungarian fascistic politics.
The story made its debut in that king of rags, The Sun. The howls followed. As an article headline read: “Top BBC star who ‘paid child for sex pictures’ could be charged by cops and face years in prison, expert says.”
Murdoch actually saw a godless China as an opportunity China saw him as a danger and as an aggressive takeover attempt. Stupid he might have been on their side where the money is his sign from God’s gift.
How bad is this? Australia ranks 3rd behind the state-owned print media of China and Egypt, as the most highly concentrated media in private hands. Corporate monopolies dominate the economy, and global gambling syndicates monopolise Australian sport. Both fit comfortably with the nation’s monopolised media.
Yep, I saw that on the front page of “The Australian” a few days ago and I was tempted to steal the paper but then I remembered that theft is one of those Ten Commandment things that still gets enforced by law and, more frightening than any jail term is the fear that I could go down in history as someone who thought that one of Murdoch’s papers was worse stealing.
The worst of corporatised journalism was when Murdoch & Roger Ailes took radio’s shock-jocks and put them on cable TV and called it News
As I write, we don’t yet know all the details of what led Fox to toss cash-cow Carlson to the curb. But one thing is certain: It wasn’t for his perversion and poisoning of the national political discourse. That was his raison d’etre at Fox. He was no truth-teller. He was a pro-MAGA, for-mega-profit propagandist. Carlson’s personal journey is a tale of the Trump era. Like the GOP, he was already on the path to right-wing demagoguery before Trump oozed down that escalator. As those dark political winds grew stronger, he eagerly raised the sails and exploited the Trumpification of the Republican Party and the conservative movement. But by ending up a Fox cast-off whose phoniness has been thoroughly exposed, Carlson has finally provided something of a public service. He has both emblemized and revealed the fundamental truth of the network: We distort, and we divide. No journalist could have done that better.
Rupert Murdoch and Donald Trump have had a very bad week with their numerous court cases and smoking gun evidence in the Dominion Voting Systems versus Fox News defamation case could end both of them.
The April Fool’s Day by-election in Aston is no laughing matter for Peter Dutton, who has been told the vote is a de-facto judgment on his Liberal leadership.
Australia’s American Ambassador Kevin Rudd is being quoted
“Murdoch is not just a news organisation. Murdoch operates as a political party, acting in pursuit of clearly defined commercial interests, in addition to his far-right ideological world view.”
We are at a crossroads. The Ultra High Net Worth Individual (UHNWI) class is creating a new international feudal order, assisted by the professional enabler class including politicians in pursuit of their money. One of those enabling mechanisms is the media. In Australia, News Corp serves as the strongest weapon in the creation of their desired world.
Individuals Harry and Megan battle “The Firm” and the Corporation what chance do they have in a long-lasting war? Murdoch knows he can’t lose no matter what happens. Let the millions roll in.
King Charles has been colluding with Rupert Murdoch, via his wife Camilla, to destroy the reputation of his son Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle. Prince Harry has strongly alluded to this without expressly stating it in numerous interviews he has given to promote his new book.
We are at a crossroads. The Ultra High Net Worth Individual (UHNWI) class is creating a new international feudal order, assisted by the professional enabler class including politicians in pursuit of their money. One of those enabling mechanisms is the media. In Australia, News Corp serves as the strongest weapon in the creation of their desired world.
David Milner has already labelled 2022 “annus stupidus”, but 2022 was also a turning point. From Scott Morrison to Christian Porter to Elon Musk, so much stupid was met with so much comeuppance. And for that, we should be thankful. Here are 2022’s top shit-heels getting exactly what they deserve.
News Corp was a key supporter of the Iraq War — the Murdoch War. Of the 173 Murdoch papers worldwide only one, The Hobart Mercury opposed the war. Murdoch told us in 2003: ‘I think Bush acted very morally, very correctly. US troops will soon be welcomed as liberators’. His foreign editor on The Australian, Greg Sheridan, could not contain himself. ‘The bold eagle of American power is aloft, high above the humble earth. For as it soars and sweeps it sees victory, power and opportunity’. He is still in his job. Murdoch prefers loyalty to competence in all those around him, including his family.
Even some of the legacy media apologised for their support of the illegal war in Iraq. But never Murdoch nor for that matter John Howard.
News Corp in Australia for over a decade has also led the campaign of denial on climate change.
The US military/business/security complex exercises destructive and pervasive power. Legacy media supplies a favourable frame for that complex.
Our derivative media ties us to the white legacy media of the North Atlantic. It frames our view of the world.
Most political colonies have come to an end. But a colonial mind set continues in the media and promotes a ‘colonisation of the mind’.
Unfortunately, it’s not only in America where Trumpians rule despite their moral and character flaws. Think of Berlusconi, Putin, and Netanyahu the Middle East and then simply compare the leaders of the world in general and you will find that Trump is just one among many.
Trump just happens to prefer the global ratings and he isn’t the first celebrity to have turned to politics for ego-driving money and power. But, he also had Murdoch’s global PR empire behind him in a quid pro quo rating relationship dance. Good bad or ugly made no difference to Murdoch or Trump as long as they had the attention. Adding FB, and Twitter, to the mix and influence for mutual gain is easier to see than the algorithms and bots doing their work for him.
Has Trump come to attention deficit? Has Murdoch really turned it off yet?
His diabolical slipperiness does more than keep him in the news and in the public eye. Nearly everything surrounding the man is grimly hypnotic. I’ve been covering politics for just over 50 years, and I cannot recall another American politician who has proved more spellbinding in the way he lives his personal and public life, not to mention the way he has sold himself, with his New York accent, multiple ex-wives and mistresses, business scandals and all the rest of it to the American public, or to 74 million members of it, anyway.
As Queen Elizabeth is laid to rest, only one living person remains who can match her for length of service at the head of a family firm. And while Rupert Murdoch’s publications have caused the royal family plenty of grief, there are many similarities between him and the late monarch, as Crikey founder Stephen Mayne reports.
If it’s true that the three most powerful people in the government met with Lachlan Murdoch on Wednesday, what does that say about lobbying and influence in Australia?
Today we’re publishing a series of lengthy legal demands sent to us over the past two months by Lachlan Murdoch, the billionaire chairman of News Corp and Fox Corporation, as well as our lawyers’ replies to those demands.
The Murdoch’s claim to be major supporters of “free speech” but only as long as it’s not directed at them it seems. Their company Fox News has never shown it was strongly critical of what occurred that day. In fact they have shown to be major supporters and in no way apologists for what had occurred. Stronger criticism of Fox News was certainly provided by much of American media and in stronger terms but they took no action. Why is Australia the place they are taking their Godzilla like legal stand?
Lachlan Murdoch has threatened online news website Crikey with legal action over an article that suggested he and his media mogul father Rupert Murdoch were responsible for the riots at the US Capitol in January.
There is an old saying that it’s easier to break up a marriage than a business partnership making mutual profit. The talk of Trump without Murdoch or Murdoch without Trump is beyond belief.
In the space of a few weeks Rupert Murdoch has dumped both Jerry Hall and Donald Trump. One dumped for threatening to cost him money and one because he can no longer deliver Rupert’s other love-power.
Whatsmore it all began with Murdoch media and revenge for having been kicked out of China. While Abbott was celebrating his leapfrog over the ALP’s relationship with China and the FTA. Murdoch press was on the attack and the crescendo came with Trump.
China’s Foreign Minister told Penny Wong that inflammatory statements by the Coalition government soured diplomatic relations that led to Australia being cut off from official communications, according to a statement issued from Beijing on Sunday.
Misinformation breeds the misconception that our climate isn’t up shit creek which in turn leads to governments not feeling much pressure to actually do something about it. And even ostensibly left-wing governments need to feel pressure on this issue.
This is why activists of the sort that pissed off half of car-owning Sydney this week are so important. They serve as a counter-balance to the mainstream narrative that things are just fine and dandy the way they are. Yes, being late on the road sucks, but you should have seen the traffic in Lismore earlier this year.
The con: Is the delay. It is in and money to be made in distracting the transition to a more rapid closure of the fossil fuel industry even if the case for renewable clean energy has been proved. If you can’t beat the argument’s direction of progress then delay it for as long as possible. Just as the LNP, IPA and Murdoch are a coalition for the defense of fossil fuels and will now continue to be, while declaring they are on board with reducing emissions and profiting from their efforts.
the Institute of Public Affairs, a rightwing group with a history of climate science denial that is supported by fossil fuel and mining interests, released what it described as polling showing people were open to the idea of nuclear energy. News Corp newspapers ran its arguments uncritically.
Why does the case for nuclear energy persist?
There is an assumption by some people, including Coalition MPs, that renewable energy cannot do the job, despite the expert advice that says otherwise. These critiques rarely address that advice head on.
But there is also a long history of nuclear energy being used as a delaying tactic for acting on climate change in Australia, including by fossil fuel interests.
Will the News Corpse business model change? Not at all because the money and wealth that they feed off is not Democratically distributed. Harvey Norman still advertises with them and remembers Frydenberg gave him the money.
Australia has voted for a new government as Labor’s Anthony Albanese gained enough seats to form a minority government and stop Murdoch’s Liberal-National Party Coalition’s attempt at governing for a fourth consecutive term.
The Publicly owned broadcaster of our media News and Information service is the conservative’s enemy as far Morrison, the LNP, the IPA and Murdoch media are concerned. They are a coalition in Australia that simply view the ABC as the enemy of government rule. As far as they are concerned the ABC as News and Information service shouldn’t exist. Morrison’s and Abbott’s relationship with the ABC has been fractious and so for the past decade, their primary aim has been to extract revenue via an annual “efficiency review” which translates to always breaking the LNP promise of no cuts.
Scott Morrison has shown an aversion to appearing in ABC interviews, preferring to be represented by the right-wing mainstream media, writes Jeremy Epstein.
The biggest poll of 16,000 has the ALP with a majority of 12 seats and an increased number of Independents
My thought for the day I find it impossible to imagine that the Australian people could be so gullible as to elect for a fourth term a government that has performed so miserably in the first three. Especially when it has amongst its members some of the most devious, suspicious and corrupt men and women, but they could.( John Lord )
If the west could find the courage, it would order an immediate freeze of Rupert Murdoch’s assets. His Fox News presenters and Russia’s propagandists are so intermeshed that separating the two is as impossible as unbaking a cake.
Bias exhibited by the Murdoch press is having too much political influence and slowly degrading our democracy, writes Dr Victoria Fielding. HAVE YOU EVER HEARD the fable of the boiling frog? The tale goes like this. If a frog is placed in boiling water, it will jump straight out. But if it is placed in tepid water and the heat slowly rises, the frog will stay cooking in the water until it is boiled to death. The frog fails to pick the exact moment the water became dangerously hot. This analogy is a great way of understanding how Australian democracy is being boiled in the water of Murdoch media bias. For many years, we have known the once tepidly biased Murdoch media was “dialling up” its bias. News reporting, commentary and opinion at Murdoch outlets were increasingly biased towards conservative ideas and right-wing political campaigning.
Murdoch couldn’t save the LNP in South Australia the State that gave birth to his propagandist empire
The ABC had a choice this week: amplify Murdoch’s toxic “Mean Girls” coverage, or expose News Corp for exploiting the death of Kimberley Kitching for political purposes. It made the wrong choice. New management is in order. Michael West reports. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is the story, not the sad, sudden death of Senator Kimberly Kitching. And certainly not the grotesque narrative being peddled by News Corp’s rabid propagandists. Manslaughter, that is, manslaughter by Labor senators Penny Wong, Katy Gallagher and Kristina Keneally.
Fox News figured out how to mine the best output of the online lie-generation machine long ago. It was just a matter of time until Putin did. For the moment, most Republican voters say they oppose both Putin and the invasion of Ukraine. But those same folks also used to be pro-vaccine. That changed after months of being caught in the QAnon-Fox News feedback loop. But even if Carlson and company can’t convince their audiences to love Putin and hate Ukraine, this situation has already done immense damage. Every day, Russian troops are murdering and kidnapping Ukrainians in this unprovoked war — and using American-made propaganda to justify it.
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