444 Comments

I loved the bit about Rupert whining about 'the elites'. The man is worth over $17 billion (billion with a 'b'). Doesn't that make him one of the elites?

Expand full comment

Wow, this expose exposed Rupert Murdoch as....exactly the sort of horrible person that most on the side of reason have already concluded he is.

Expand full comment

As further proof Murdoch is not quite the business genius claimed, never forget he bought Myspace for $63 million, only to sell it a few years later for $30 million. Shades of Elon Musk and Facebook.

Expand full comment

Oooops... That should read... six hundred and thirty million.

Expand full comment

Every time I see it typed as Xitter, I hear the pronunciation from an episode of South Park. Shitter.

Expand full comment

"In her heart, it was 1985 and still a Wasp world, absent people, in Susie Carlson’s description and worldview, who were “impolite, hyperambitious, fraudulent.”

Has Susie actually MET her husband?

Expand full comment

"[S]ince Fox viewers wanted as much Trump as the network could air, possibly more, then by golly Fox and Trump would be synonymous."

No surprise there. It's entirely consistent with Murdoch's fundamental business principle: "Tell the rubes what they want to hear."

Expand full comment

I love that picture of Tucker because it shows him with an adult hair cut.

Expand full comment

It’s hilarious that Hannity was offered up as the sacrifice first. Bet he was happy to hear that Murdoch thought he was more expendable than Tucker.

Expand full comment

But he's the last man standing. Apparently he had a rivalry with Bill O'Reilly, like they were fighting over who was the biggest star. Then Bill O'Reilly got fired and Carlson replaced him. It seems like Murdoch never really does his research because Carlson was a known piece of shit. He was fired from CNN, MSNBC, and....even PBS years and years ago (dramatic musical sting, considering how tame PBS is).

Expand full comment

The fact that he thought Carlson was a moderate shows how little research he did.

Expand full comment
Sep 22, 2023·edited Sep 22, 2023

I liked the part where Susie Carlson burned the roast and Tucker had to sneak out and bring back dinner from the burger place across the street without the DeSantises noticing

Expand full comment

What, too good for Swanson's TV dinners?

Expand full comment

I bet the DeSantises fell for the old "steamed hams" routine as well.

"It's more of an Albany expression."

Expand full comment

"which made Fox News the closest thing to official state media the US has ever seen"

Operation Mockingbird

Expand full comment

what a long strange trip it’s been … thanks newt …

Expand full comment

... 𝑴𝒖𝒓𝒅𝒐𝒄𝒉’𝒔 𝒃𝒂𝒇𝒇𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕 𝒂𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒇𝒂𝒄𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒏𝒆𝒕𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌 𝒉𝒊𝒓𝒆𝒅 — 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒈𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒑𝒓𝒊𝒎𝒆 𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒆 𝒔𝒉𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒕𝒐 — 𝒑𝒆𝒐𝒑𝒍𝒆 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝑱𝒆𝒔𝒔𝒆 𝑾𝒂𝒕𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑮𝒓𝒆𝒈 𝑮𝒖𝒕𝒇𝒆𝒍𝒅: “‘𝑫𝒐 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒌 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒚’𝒓𝒆 𝒇𝒖𝒏𝒏𝒚?’ 𝒂𝒏 𝒖𝒏𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒗𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒅 𝑴𝒖𝒓𝒅𝒐𝒄𝒉 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒂𝒔𝒌𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒑𝒆𝒐𝒑𝒍𝒆.”

Doesn't matter, Rupert. If Fox tells the brain-rotted that they're funny, that's all they need.

Expand full comment

Hey! You're using bold and italics. On substack! How'd you do dat?

Expand full comment

There are a few conversion sites that replace plain text characters with corresponding Unicode bold or italic or italic-bold characters. The original spacing is retained, however, so the results can look weird, as above.

𝙃𝙚𝙧𝙚'𝙨 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙨𝙞𝙩𝙚 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙘𝙖𝙣 𝙪𝙨𝙚: https://capitalizemytitle.com/italic-text-generator/

Worth a bookmark, I think! Unicode has tons of maybe-useful symbols, and emojis/emoticons like ☕ and 😎. You can copy/paste them from https://www.vertex42.com/ExcelTips/unicode-symbols.html (It's a vast selection; you might want to copy your favorites into a convenient file on your computer.)

Expand full comment

Thanks! One small step toward making Substack non-comments more expressive!

Expand full comment

Do they use laff tracks on their "news" shows?

Expand full comment

Why am I not surprised that Desantis is a dog-kicker? Although Tucker calling someone else a fascist is ironic.

Expand full comment

Xitter...is the X pronounced with an "sh" sound? Inquiring minds want to know.

Expand full comment

Of course it is.

I keep trying to go back and sometimes it's ok.

Expand full comment

It's the perfect name, actually.

Expand full comment

"So yeah, agreeing to shitcan Tucker, Fox’s biggest ratings draw — without putting it into writing — was mostly a way of holding the settlement to a smaller number; $787 million, to be precise."

So this mean that canning Carlson was one of the CONDITIONS of the settlement set by Dominion? Because if it Was, I kinda owe Dominion an apology...

Expand full comment

Like a baseball trade. Tucker, plus cash considerations. Would have been great if Dominion had their own show and made Tucker read out corrections and apologies. Then DFA his ass.

Expand full comment

Smartmantic has a MUCH bigger ask - Lachlan is going to have to do a B - billion.

Expand full comment

welcome to your big boy pants Lachlan

Expand full comment

Why do you owe Dominion an apology? Did you think they settled for too little otherwise?

Expand full comment

apologies are meaningless...Their condition that Carlson step down is MUCH more impressive and meaningful...

Fuck apologies, ESPEIALLY from RW filth...They're meaningless...With RW filth, you gotta hit 'em where it hurts....

Expand full comment

Dominion settled instead of pursuing the case to a judge-rendered verdict. For that they took a >1 billion payout, but taking Tuckems off the air is a pretty good add-on.

Expand full comment

It is interesting that they didn't make that condition known publicly...

Expand full comment

Well, the question is, how much would they have gotten from a jury? And is it worth it to take less money to get rid of Tucker Carlson?

Expand full comment

I'm pretty sure the loss of revenue from losing carlson pushes the total well over $1B.

Expand full comment

I've also heard that many advertisers, who shunned Carlson, are returning. So that has to be factored in. I truly have no idea what the bottom line is here.

Expand full comment

When it comes to RW garbage there IS no bottom

Expand full comment
Sep 23, 2023·edited Sep 23, 2023

I'm pretty sure they were suing for 1B+, but looks like they were happy with their payday. Before the trial Dominion was valued at @ $1M or so; $800M still enriched their balance sheet substantially.

The Tucker thing is hilarious icing on that cake.

Expand full comment

I believe the original request was for $1.6 billion. However, you have to wonder what a jury would have awarded them?

Expand full comment

If Murdoch didn’t share the ideology of the monsters he pushed propaganda for, then what did he believe in? Money and greed for power are common denominators among that group. He thinks himself different?

Expand full comment