Tucker Finally Taught Us Something, After All

Also: China's Covid-19 revisionist history, where U.S. intelligence agencies now weigh in on the origins of the pandemic, and Biden's announcement to run for re-election prompts Trump WWIII warnings.

Tucker Finally Taught Us Something, After All

It’s not enough to have the ear of presidents and governors, if you are propagating lies.

In media circles, there is a post-Trump era theory that has been quietly making the rounds, positing the only way to report the news is to take a strong political position – which is, traditionally, a big no-no in journalism – and that reporting the news from a nonpartisan standpoint is a losing battle and a surefire way to flaccid ratings.

Cable network stars like Fox News’s Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson (gotta’ use the full name) appeared to personify the case, with his extreme, right-wing views, propounded night after night, drawing prime-time ratings that consistently trounced every other talking head on television.

The abrupt firing of Carlson this week highlights just how quickly a major star can be torn from the media firmament. Carlson’s very public jettisoning was reportedly spearheaded by the chief executives of Fox, Suzanne Scott and Lachlan Murdoch, the eldest son of Fox’s top boss, Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire executive chairman of Fox sister company News Corp.

While the decision was made Friday, it seems Carlson was only told of his firing on Monday morning, with his senior producer, Justin Wells, also given the boot. Carlson apparently did not see it coming and, while the dust has yet to settle, more details are likely to surface in the days ahead. As of this writing, Carlson has made no public statement and his Twitter feed has gone cold.

I can still remember walking into the News Corp. Building on Avenue of the Americas to visit colleagues at The Wall Street Journal and seeing a larger-than-life wall poster of Carlson towering gloweringly over the elevator banks. To call it startling and gauche would be an understatement. I also felt a little bit sorry for my colleagues having to see it every day. Yet, here was a TV news host who had somehow managed to amass enough power – just by being on Fox – to goad presidents and governors into doing his bidding.

Could it be that Carlson’s firing was entirely predictable, as he made a point of continually pushing the outer limits of what was legal and credible, spreading misinformation about the 2020 presidential election, downplaying the Jan. 6^th insurrection and relentlessly trolling opponents with sexist, racist, and bigoted smears?

So far, it seems the reasons behind Carlson’s departure are directly related to his questionable behavior – and a flurry of lawsuits. Last week, Fox was forced to settle a defamation suit with Dominion Voting Systems for a record $787.5 million – a legal tangle in which Carlson’s false stories about the latest presidential election figured prominently.

While other big names at Fox were similarly cited in the Dominion suit for doing the same, they have not (yet) been fired. In Carlson’s case, it appears a second set of legal actions could be a factor. In March, Abby Grossman, a former Fox producer, filed a lawsuit against Carlson (which also named Wells) alleging he marshaled a bullying, misogynistic and discriminatory culture in the workplace.

In the wake of Carlson’s ejection, Grossman’s lawyers issued a statement that sounded more like a declaration of war – not just on Carlson but on Fox News itself, targeted by Grossman in two lawsuits. “Whether it’s troubling allegations of workplace discrimination and sexual harassment and misconduct, to accusations of spreading malicious lies,” Fox executives “have unfortunately to date failed to bring about actual meaningful changes to the network’s abhorrent culture of lawlessness,” they said.

The lawyers added: “Our client, Abby Grossberg, remains committed as ever to obtaining vindication of Fox News’s violations of not just her rights, but rights of others whose voices have been silenced, or who fear retribution for exposing the truth, through her two lawsuits against Fox.”

Given that Carlson took over from former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, who was fired from the network in 2017 amid a torrent of sexual harassment allegations (which he denied while paying tens of millions of dollars to settle), one might wonder if it wouldn’t be best for Fox to conduct a thorough exorcism once and for all. In fact, by firing Carlson, the network may be getting its ducks in a row to contend with the next batch of lawsuits.  

It also should not be overlooked that Carlson’s ouster may be a canary in the coalmine for Trumpism and the herculean efforts undertaken by many of the former president’s GOP satellites, political leaders and television commentators alike, to hold sway over his highly energized political base.

The revelations of the Dominion Voting Systems defamation lawsuit allowed the world to see that while, privately, Carlson despised Trump, he and other heavy-hitters at Fox were obsessed with capturing the Trump base to prop up their ratings. Something we also see America’s politicians doing.

Although an erstwhile confidante of Trump’s, Carlson never was in it to support or appease the former president – it was all about riding Trump’s coattails to wealth and power.

Will Carlson’s dramatic flameout be a one-off, or could it be a harbinger of things to come, as the U.S. gears up for the next presidential election cycle?

 

China Gets Even Shadier With Its Covid-19 Story

China is aggressively pushing a revisionist history of the pandemic, even as it continues to clash with U.S. officials about its origins. 

For those of you who missed it: The U.S. Department of Energy and federal intelligence officials informed members of Congress last month that the origins of Covid-19 more likely came from Wuhan’s coronavirus lab than natural evolution. 

The briefing, given to lawmakers with the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, indicated the DOE’s position on the origins of the pandemic coming from a lab went from neutral to one of “low confidence.”

Other intelligence agencies hold the opposite view, believing with “low confidence” that Covid-19 stemmed from natural exposure to an animal infected with the virus. The Federal Bureau of Investigation backs the lab leak theory with “moderate confidence.”

Meanwhile, the National Intelligence Council does not believe Covid-19 was developed as a biological weapon, stating that rumors claiming otherwise appear to be disinformation.

(For those wondering why the DOE has any opinion on Covid-19, the agency runs an impressive network of national labs that work on energy, nuclear, climate, environmental, health and national security issues.)

At any rate, China is cracking on with its own ideas about Covid-19 this month. Those efforts entail withholding or obfuscating data on the impact of the pandemic – including how many people died in China – and scrubbing social media and other records that chronicle the impact the virus has had on daily life.

In annual financial reports released through the Shanghai Stock Exchange, Chinese companies also have noticeably avoided discussing the effects of the pandemic on their bottom line. Instead they are blaming the fallout on what they are calling “unexpected events,” geopolitics, high energy prices, or other approved euphemisms.

Perhaps most troublingly, the Chinese government stopped posting and updating records on its cremations, which are normally reported quarterly, in what some believe is an attempt to mask the nation’s death toll. That number remains chillingly unknown.

Apparently, China is looking to portray its handling of the pandemic as a triumph. As such, it is censoring statements, videos, exhibitions and even community events commemorating the anniversary of its lockdowns.

Remarking on China’s refusal to share more information regarding the origins of Covid-19, Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, who attended the DOE briefing last month, said, “It’s no secret that China’s been hugely obstructive. Hugely obstructive. And you know, that’s going to continue. But that doesn’t mean that we can sit back and say we’ll never know. And indeed, we have multiple agencies now that think they do know.”

A bill to declassify U.S. intelligence related to the pandemic, sponsored by Hawley, passed the Senate with unanimous consent on March 1. It also passed the House by 419-0 just days later. 

Right now, the bill awaits President Biden’s approval, although the White House hasn’t made clear yet whether he will sign. 

Isn’t it about time to rip open the envelope?

Biden Announces Re-Election Bid, Trump Predicts WWIII

Biden kicks off another “battle for the soul of America,” while Trump sounds dystopian warnings.  

Neatly book-ending the decline of Fox News’s Tucker Carlson was the official, fully anticipated announcement that President Biden will be seeking a second term as president. 

Biden called for Americans to unite behind causes of equity, prosperity and freedom, exhorting, “this is not a time to be complacent.”

“When I ran for president four years ago, I said we are in a battle for the soul of America,” Biden said in a campaign ad displaying dramatic footage from the Jan. 6^th insurrection, American flags waving around, and demonstrations against the overturning of Roe v. Wade. “And we still are.”

“The question we are facing is whether, in the years ahead, we have more freedom or less freedom, more rights or fewer,” Biden said. “I know what I want the answer to be, and I think you do too.”

Not to be outgunned, former president Trump released a rebuttal on his online platform Truth Social, repeating falsehoods that the last presidential election was “rigged” and calling Biden “the most corrupt president in American history.”

Taking a still darker turn, Trump also asserted that Russia would have never invaded Ukraine if he had been re-elected president in 2020, and that “Joe Biden has led us to the very brink of World War III.” 

Trump added that if he is elected in 2024, “We will prevent World War III from happening.”

Biden’s announcement came on the four-year anniversary of the launch of his 2020 campaign, and it looks like smooth sailing to the Democratic nomination. 

Even so, amid high inflation and partisan clashing, Biden’s job approval rating leaves a lot of room for improvement at 42.5 percent, and even Biden’s supporters admit to reservations about his age. At 80, he would be the oldest person to ever secure a presidential nomination by a major party.

At the same time, Trump also continues to attract the greatest backing among GOP supporters, setting him up for a possible rematch with Biden. 

If that happens, it would not only be extraordinary, but only one of a handful of times in presidential election history that two candidates from a major party have run against each other twice in a row.

The last time was during the presidential election cycles of 1952 and 1956, when Republican contender Dwight Eisenhower beat Democratic nominee Adlai Stevenson II, twice. And you could also technically count Democratic candidate Bill Clinton running against and beating Ross Perot twice in 1992 and 1996, although Perot was not really associated with any major party.

“It is almost inconceivable that Biden would even think of running for re-election,” said Trump, who, in June, will turn 77, claiming his administration was marked by “greatness,” while Biden’s is one of “failure.”

The Biden administration’s “socialist spending calamity” is feeding inflation, Trump said, adding that “our children are being indoctrinated and mutilated by left-wing freaks and zealots,” and the “dollar will soon no longer be the world standard, which will be our greatest defeat in over 200 years.”

Maybe the real question that needs to be asked is whether the world can handle another Biden-Trump faceoff.