The right danced a jig of joy over Dr. Anthony Fauci’s invoking the Fifth Amendment before Rand Paul’s Senate Homeland Security Committee. The Kentucky Republican knew in advance that Fauci would give no substantive testimony. Yet he paraded the 85-year-old doctor before the cameras to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights over a hundred times, then […]
Rupert Murdoch
Posted inThe Monopolized Economy
Why Big Business May Wind Up Missing Lina Khan
Why Big Business May Wind Up Missing Lina Khan: Multinationals often opposed Biden’s aggressive stand on antitrust. Trump’s industrial policy by temper tantrum gives corporations what they really hate—instability.
Posted inPolitical Animal
When Fox News Spiked the Stormy Daniels Story, Was it a Campaign Contribution?
As a propaganda arm, an entire cable network would be worth a lot to a presidential campaign.
Posted inPolitical Animal
Reversal of Fortune: Progressive Media in a Democratic White House
Turnabout is fair play, no? CNN’s Brian Stelter apparently shares my concern about the excessive influence of the Fox News Channel on this administration, noting this morning that Rupert Murdoch’s creation is directly responsible for Donald Trump’s decision to deploy National Guard troops to Mexico: Yes, the nexus between Fox and the Trump administration is […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Channeling Rage: Trump and Fox News
Here we stand Remote control buttons In our sweaty little hands As one man We’re lining up and waiting For someone’s command… TV rules– Pretty soon you won’t be able To turn it off at all! All you fools Then it will turn you off— Your back’s against the wall! —“T.V. Age,” Joe Jackson, 1982 […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
The Media is the Message
I didn’t think the Fox News Channel could give us anything funnier than Laura Ingraham’s desperate attempts to garner ratings by insulting LeBron James, but the news that Fox has given another unlistenable wingnut radio host, Mark Levin, his own show—which begins tonight—is more hilarious than Redd Foxx in his prime: As previously announced, the […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
A Golden Age for Progressive Media?
30 years after the contamination of our public airwaves via the national syndication of Rush Limbaugh’s radio program–and five years after the unfortunate demise of Al Gore’s Current TV–it’s good to see some progress in the fight to ensure that the non-wingnut perspective has a solid platform in American media. Last year, the New York […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Matthews’s Sexism Needs to Be Canceled
What the hell was he thinking? MSNBC’s “Hardball” host Chris Matthews joked about drugging then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton before sitting down with her for an interview in early 2016, according to exclusive outtake footage published by New York magazine’s The Cut Friday. “Where’s that Bill Cosby pill I brought with me?” he asked. The joke […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Deaf to the Truth, Blind to the Facts: Those Divorced from Reality Don’t Care About Michael Flynn
It’s almost as though it didn’t happen. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the Michael Flynn affair is the harsh reality that a significant portion of this country simply does not care about Flynn’s acknowledged amorality and Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. They’re addicted to “news” outlets that are downplaying or denigrating the […]
Posted inPolitical Animal
Suicide Squad: Trump’s Loyalists Will Never Care About His Abuses of Power
It doesn’t even matter. That’s the shame of it. No matter what Donald Trump says, how he acts, or who he fires, there will always be a good 45 percent of the electorate that will never give a damn, and will be right in line on November 3, 2020 ready and raring to re-elect him. […]
