When you think of the words FUX News, three names immediately come to mind. Rupert Murdock, Roger Ailes, and Bill-O The Clown O’Reilly. Murdock founded the empire, Ailes turned it into a world class conservative mouthpiece, and O’Reilly became the marquee talent that put it on the map.
But OH!, how the mighty have fallen. Ailes and O’Reilly are both long gone, victims of their particular sexual kinks, and Murdock himself is threatened with the loss of billions of corporate dollars for playing too fast and loose with the truth.
But like so much else with the swashbuckling persona of Rupert Murdock, it is by and large carefully crafted PR media bullshit. And while Dominion is asking for $1.6 billion on compensatory damages, the punitive damages could end up making the compensatory damages look like toll change. And as it turns out, Murdock is not as omnipotent as he likes to portray.
Everybody thinks that Murdock is in sole control of FUX News, I know I did. But nothing could be further from the truth. According to reporting on The Last Word tonight, a whopping 61% of outstanding FUX News shares are held by other, mostly large institutional investors. As long as Murdock keeps shoveling in the dividends, they let him play king. But Murdock personally don’t control shit.
And that’s about to become a huge problem for Murdock’s survival at FUX. Remember, a $1.6 billion judgement is roughly equivalent to one year of FUX News net profits. Now throw in billions more in punitive damages, and you have some very pissed off shareholders.
And any one or more of those shareholders can file a civil lawsuit against Murdock for negligence, mismanagement, and neglect of fiduciary responsibilities. After all, Murdock is the CEO, it’s his responsibility to manage the resources he’s given wisely, not to piss away the company’s reputation and long term viability on some short term con to maintain viewership on behalf of a poltroon with a dead muskrat on his head. If successful, they could literally drive Murdock from any leadership or management responsibility position in the company. So could a shareholder revolt.
Which, even if it were successful, as satisfying as it would be, wouldn’t solve the institutional investors long term problem. Murdock, in his own deposition testimony in the Dominion lawsuit, admitted that he could have pulled the plug early on the election fraud bullshit, but personally chose not to do so. For fear of losing short term viewership, impacting profitability and the stock price.
And as a result, FOX News is now not only a national laughingstock, but an international laughingstock as well. I refer to it as FUX or FAUJX News, and other less charitable writers and commentators call it the original propaganda arm of Trumpmenistan. Murdock’s craven lust for power and money has tarnished FUX as a reputable news source for at least a generation.
How do the post Murdock investors even start a rehab project like that? The obvious start is to purge themselves of misfit toys like Hannity, Carlson, Ingraham and Shapiro. Which means an almost immediate 20-25% drop in viewership, with a corresponding drop in the advertising rates they can charge for their prime time programming. They can start by going to confession, admitting their lying sins, and promise to be honest brokers of the news going forward.
So what? Because even if you do, who do you find to replace the likes of the Manatee, Fucker Carlson, the Judge Judy knockoff, and Cruella de Ingraham in prime time? Pray tell. What up and coming television journalist with integrity and a solid reputation is going to want to sign a contract with FUX, with its dogshit reputation for being a bullshit propaganda network? And FUX continues its conservative bent, how do they attract the moderate conservative viewers who fled in the era of Trump?
This is bad juju for FUX. And when the denouement comes, and it’s coming quickly, the drop is going to be hard and fast. And when they hit bottom, it’s going to take a long time to crawl out from under the rubble. Rupert Murdock is the living example of Icarus, the mythological Greek character who covered his body in wax, stuck in feathers, and flew. Until he flew too close to the sun, where the wax melted and he did a header back to earth. Welcome to FUX News.
Murf, you like to think there is a greater good. I appreciate that. I disagree on the willingness of investors being upset with fox, murdock may be evil, but I suspect the investors behind fox are as evil or more evil than murdock. Who knows what that dark money is coming from but they are expecting a fox type network whether it makes money or not.
I fear there’s no shortage of corrupt or willingly corruptible wannabe talking heads who’d love a shot at being on-air at FUX, if indeed the current disgusting crop ever gets turfed out … which I doubt. Imagine wanting to be the next Fucker Carlson!
No.
If Murdoch causes shareholder value to plunge bc he knowingly let on air talent lie and loses the Dominion suit, a shareholder derivative suit is almost assured.
People love their money over any political kinship.
Besides, it only takes one shareholder to prove liability and Murdoch’s in real trouble for damages.
There is no financial punishment that matches their crimes that have gotten people killed. That being said, it’s clear all they care about is money. Let the damages roll. A powerful rich guy, who’s family has been in charge of the law since 1920 just got two life sentences. Maybe karma does exist. Let’s hope so.
Damn! I should’ve bought popcorn futures….
This is what happens when you sell your soul to the devil (or the Antichrist in Donald j. Plump’s case). As with murdering Murdaugh, liars don’t just stop lying. Gullible members of the FUX cult don’t change their stripes either. People that are this detached from reality don’t just snap back to reality. They will call the whole lawsuit and all of its revelations fake news just like they have for years now about everything else that’s true but doesn’t match their narrative. for the good of the country FUX snooze needs to be shut down and burned to the ground. and have the ashes buried deep. Any entity that tries to come up in its place had better have far more scrutiny than the liars and misinformers that were allowed to go on and on at FUX. A great thank you to Dominion voting systems for exposing what was already in plain sight. Best of luck to them going forward and also best of luck to Smartmatic when they get their turn at the plate. Is this what the orange bozo was talking about when he said we would be tired of winning? As for me, I’m still on the edge of my seat munching hot popcorn waiting for the rest of the tea to spill.
I hate to be ‘that guy’, but it’s spelled Murdoch, with an ‘h’.
Furthermore, their viewers will simply move to another network, one that airs what they WANT TO BELIEVE, not what’s true.
some dude on Nextdoor was whining about Newsmax getting booted from his cable. it’s the only news channel he trusts 😵💫
Easy solution: nullify his citizenship and deport him. Of course, he’ll be dead in a few years regardless — the point of the litigation is to financially wipe out his toxic family.