Rupert Murdoch: The captain is unapologetic and beligerent

Yesterday, Channel 4 News in the UK reported on the revelation that a secret recording of a March 2013 meeting at News International, now News UK, of journalists for his newspapers.  The report is shown below.



This shows we've all come to know over the years.  He is totally beligerent, unapologetic, and contemptuous of all authority other than his own.  This is why he shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a major broadcaster, or indeed, a major newspaper these days.  He is so out of touch with the public mood.  He lives in his own bubble, with little real connection to the world that his readers and viewers inhabit.

Leveson Inquiry, Murdoch and Jeremy Hunt

We have had an explosive day at the Leveson Inquiry, and quite frankly, this one damages not just James Murdoch, who continues to sound like an executive trying to get round claims of dodgy dealings by claiming incompetence, in which case he shouldn't have been in the role in the first place; it not only damages the Con-Dem government, by showing that Jeremy Hunt and his office and advisers had had contacts with BSkyB, News International and James Murdoch, and thus also damages the credibility and position of Jeremy Hunt to the point where he has no option but to resign; but also damages the whole newspaper industry and the Conservative Party.

Not surprisingly, Conservative Central Office have sent out the party loyalists to both BBC and Sky to defend Jeremy Hunt, but quite frankly, what we are talking about is indefensible.  Before he went into DCMS, he was pro-BSkyB, aggressively so, and his actions during the NewsCorp bid to gain full control of BSkyB do absolutely nothing to change the perception that he was a Murdoch puppet, and as such, he was the wrong person to rule on the takeover.

JEREMY HUNT MUST RESIGN!

James Murdoch resigns as Chairman of BSkyB

When this broke in the 1pm BST hour today, I was stunned.  I was not expecting this to have happened today.  In fact, I wasn't expecting it at all.  James wil stay on as a member of the board, but he's no longer Chairman.

Ofcom is investigating whether NewsCorp is a fit and proper company to hold a broadcasting licence.  There are many investigations in the UK, the USA and Australia right now.  But I cannot honestly see how NewsCorp can continue to own assets like British Sky Broadcasting, Foxtel and Fox Broadcasting Company.

I also think the FCC should take this as an opportunity to finally regulate the cable broadcasting market in the US. 

Of course, James's resignation is another line of firewall, designed to protect Rupert Murdoch and NewsCorp's investments across the world. Just last week, Panorama on BBC1 reported how NewsCorp subsidiary company NDS had been invloved in breaking the Canal Plus encryption system that On/ITV Digital was using.  Then the Australian Financial Review released emails detailing NDS's involvement in breaking other encryption systems of competitors.  Currently, Cisco Systems is seeking to acquire NDS Group.

No matter how many levels of firewalls Rupert Murdoch puts in, everything goes back to him, one way or another.  Murdoch is well known for handling things himself and being very hands on.  Because of that reputation, he will not be able to wash his hands of all the controversies that now dog him.

NewsCorp: How much longer can it survive?

So today, we've had 6 more arrests in this NewsCorp saga. One of those arrested, Rebekah Brooks, has been previously arrested in relation to this ongoing saga, the other 5, including her husband, the racehorse trainer Charlie Brooks, and News International's Head of Security Mark Hanna, are new arrests in the case.

Rebekah herself has also been a victim of the scandal, after it emerged at the end of February that her phone had been hacked by News Of The World journalists, whilst she was Editor of The Sun. Incredibly irony or poetic justice? One thing is for sure, the old adgae of there being no honour amongst thieves, seems to hold true for Murdoch employees too.

Does anybody else think she is never going to return to NewsCorp after this? More by her own choice though I believe rather than Murdoch not wanting her back. After this episode, she'll want to stay out of the public spotlight for as long as she can.

And with Ofcom currently investigating to see if NewsCorp are a fit and proper company to hold a broadcast licence, for BSkyB, how long will it take before Rupert Murdoch finally gives up and slowly dissolves the whole company, selling off assets for as much as he can so he can live out some form of retirement in relative peace, rather than ending his days in a prison cell and his assets sold off for the mere pitance of their real worth.

Thoughts on the weekend's news

Shocked to hear of the death of Whitney Houston, she was only 48, and seemed to have gotten over the darkest time in her life. I will be posting some of her music here on Viewpoint, as a tribute later.

Other thoughts...

Felt Luis Suarez behaved like a petulant child on Saturday at the Liverpool v Manchester United football match. FA should charge him with bringing the game into disrepute after all the petulance he showed, all the way through the match, despite his goal. Apologies the day after do not make much difference when the world was watching your petulance on display.

David Cameron and Andrew Lansley are digging themselves into a pit at the moment. Neither want to conceed that the NHS reforms they've put forward are the wrong way forward. Torbay had the right idea, putting social care and health care together under one trust. The right ideas were already out there, if they could have been bothered to look. Andrew Lansley should resign.

8 more arrests this weekend in the scandal between journalists and Metropolitan Police officers. 5 of those arrested, were journalists from the Sun. Murdoch, rather too quickly for my liking, came out to announce that he was committed to continuing to publish The Sun. Give it 3 months. I think we may be seeing a different kind of tabloid from Murdoch coming out soon. One that won't be so obvioously biased, presenting itself as straight news with opinion limited to the opinion columns. In fact, the bias will be more subtle, but it'll still be there. Then the Sun will close.

Interesting that 4 current employees from the Royal Bank of Scotland, which is now 83% owned by the state, have been arrested in a tax fraud investigation. HMRC say that the arrests concern the individuals financial affairs and are not related to their work at the bank, but surely, they cannot handle their own financial affairs without resorting to fraud, does that mean we can trust that they won't employ fraudulent methods in their work for RBS? I don't think so.

Former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carey, says that Christianity is facing a gradual marginalisation. There are hundreds of religions out there, some very real like Shinto and Buddhism, and some that only really exists in the minds of the believers, such as the Jedi religion. To claim that any one faith should be dominant over all others, is a very dangerous statement to make. Tolerance of all faiths, should be the watchword here.

Overseas, Mitt Romney pulled off a very impressive but unexpected double. He won the Maine Caucuses, which Ron Paul had been expected to win. He also won the straw poll at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference, where it had been expected that Rick Santorum would do well. Conservative Republicans may not be fully behind Romney, as they seem to have the opinion that only a Conservative is truly electable, instead of totally unelectable, but if they don't get behind Romney, they don't stand a chance. Why do you think that Democrats have been pushing for Santorum or Gingrich to become the nominee? Neither one has a hope against Obama, it would be an easy victory for Barack Obama. Mitt Romney, with the right VP candidate, probably Ron Paul, would be a much tougher challenge.

Dish Network vs FOX. On the digital battleground.

This one almost passed me by, so it's nice that I actually caught up with this story now. Dish Network is having a contretant with Fox over their sports and entertainment channels, so Fox News and Fox Business are unaffected.

This primarily affects FX, Fox Sports Net and National Geographic Channel. However, in about a month's time, Fox Television Network and My Network TV could well be affected as well.

Obviously, both sides have launched websites detailing their case. But in addition to those, I'd like to remind you of one thing.

Fox is owned by Rupert Murdoch, who also owns DirecTV, the direct opposition in the US Satellite TV market to Dish Network.

Murdoch likes people to think what he tells them to think. In that same area of satellite television, he owns Sky in the UK, Star in Asia and Foxtel in Australia. There are other subsidiary operations linked to those companies.

So Rupert Murdoch is used to getting his own way. The fact that Dish are standing up to him, is interesting. We will see how this story develops.

President Bush bites the hand that feeds him.

It's not often that a politician unknowingly bites the hand that feeds him but this is a proud moment for me.  Not only does a politician do it, but the hand belongs to mega media tycoon and mega conservative Rupert Murdoch.

President Bush, whilst in the UK, gave an exclusive interview to Sky News Political Editor Adam Boulton.  Now, Sky News is part of British Sky Broadcasting, which is owned in part by News International, which is a subsidiary of News Corporation, and owned and run by Rupert Murdoch, who also owns Fox News Channel, who have been the most vociferous supporters of President Bush.

He bit Murdoch's hand when he accused Boulton of slandering America when Boulton referenced Guantanamo Bay and Abu Gharib.  The full interview is embedded below.

Worst Person In The World: Rupert Murdoch

The Fox-ifier in Chief, Rupert Murdoch, gets the Friday award for confirming an old rumour.  Now you're wondering if Keith Olbermann has finally flipped his wig.  Well not really, since it concerned Keith in the first place...

 

 

Dishonourable mention to Michelle Malkin, who was all over Rachael Ray wearing what looked like "jihadi chic" to Michelle, but has so far said nothing about a similar scarf that Megan McCain, Senator John McCain's daughter has been seen wearing.  Two words.  Double standards.

XM / Sirius Merger could be approved imminently.

There are a lot of reports out there, far too many to link, but they all suggest, like this one, that approval for the merger between XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite radio is due to come imminently from the US Department of Justice.

This smells to me very similar to the British Satellite Broadcasting / Sky Television, which was allowed to go ahead, despite the fact that it was against the rules that BSB were told to work by by the IBA. Sky had the deep pockets of Rupert Murdoch and News Corp to fall back on. BSB had no such benefactor, and most of their shareholders were worried about the upcoming 1991 Channel 3(ITV) licence process.

Sky were the 'winners' in that so called merger. They basically absorbed BSB into their company with the token changing of the name to "British Sky Broadcasting" rather than tell it like it really was, Sky basically swallowing up BSB.

The real similarity here though is that XM and Sirius, like Sky and BSB, are both losing money, hand over fist, quarter by quarter. Because these two are the only competing satellite radio services in the US and Canada, this really shouldn't happen, in much the same way that BSB and Sky should not have happened. But you know it's going to. History says the merger will go ahead, the market says the merger will go ahead, my head says the merger will go ahead, but my heart does not want it to. I cannot abide the creation of a monopoly by a market that is supposed to favour competition.

The shareholders have voted for it, now we wait for the confirmation from the DoJ that, as we expect, this merger will happen, despite what we know to be in the better interests of everyone. If the market is so good, then let the market decide, and if the market decides that neither should survive, then so be it.

Rupert Murdoch's Dow Jones bid might not continue

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation is reporting that Rupert Murdoch is 'highly unlikely' to proceed with his US$5bn bid for Dow Jones.

I bet that will please the News Hounds!

First, Fair, Fox? A fair and balanced commentary

The world of 24 hour news channels is as varied and diverse as the news itself. Some, like CNN and Sky News, have been around so long that they have become familiar and accepted by us all, even those who don’t watch 24 hour news. Some, like BBC News 24, have developed to become well-respected services, whilst others, like the ITV News Channel, didn’t survive long enough to grow into the potential they were showing.

But none have ever created as much controversy, in both political and media circles, as the Fox News Channel.

Back in the mid 1990s, several commentators on the right wing of the political spectrum in the United States saw the media as generally too favourable to the liberal agenda, with not enough pressure being applied to the then-US President, Bill Clinton. That was all to change over the next few years – but nobody knew that then.

In 1996, with Clinton fighting for a second term in office, NBC closed a channel called America’s Talking. It was basically television’s version of the many talk radio stations that are available throughout the United States. It had been spun off from CNBC, the Consumer News and Business Channel, launching on July 4th 1994, and was based at CNBC’s then headquarters at Fletcher Avenue in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

The trouble was, it was a spectacular flop. It had never gained much of an audience, and little cable carriage. The only show to survive the channel was Politics with Chris Matthews which moved to CNBC and was retitled Hardball with Chris Matthews. The show then later moved to MSNBC.

America’s Talking was closed to make way for an additional news channel from Microsoft and NBC, called MSNBC. But in many ways, America’s Talking only moved networks, from NBC to Fox. In 1996, Roger Ailes, who at the time was head of both America’s Talking and CNBC, was approached by Rupert Murdoch to launch a new news channel. Murdoch, who also part-owned British Sky Broadcasting, had been behind the launch of Sky News on February 5th 1989, and wanted to launch another news channel, this time in the US.

However, unlike Sky News, the conservative Murdoch wanted this news channel to counter some of the “liberal bias” that he perceived in the US media. Ailes agreed to head up the channel and managed to persuade some of his colleagues from CNBC and America’s Talking to join him at the new venture, notably, Steve Doocy from America’s Talking AM, and Neil Cavuto from CNBC’s Power Lunch and Market Wrap. Both are still with Fox News Channel today.

Another commentator who has pretty much been there from the beginning is Bill O’Reilly. He had been a local news reporter for some years, before becoming a correspondent for CBS News. He was based in Buenos Aires and covered both the Falklands War and the El Salvador war. In 1986, he jumped across to ABC as a correspondent for the main news programme, ABC World News Tonight.

In 1989, he joined Fox’s syndicated current affairs programme, Inside Edition as Senior Correspondent and reserve anchor for Sir David Frost. However, David left the show and Bill O’Reilly became the Senior Anchor. In 1995, O’Reilly was replaced by Deborah Norville, who had anchored NBC News at Sunrise, and was famously remembered as “the other woman” in the Today set alongside hosts Bryant Gumbel and Jane Pauley. When Pauley left Today, Norville was promoted to co-host with Bryant Gumbel, but disastrous ratings followed and she left the show, initially only on maternity leave to have a child, but since temporary co-host Katie Couric had helped boost ratings, NBC announced that Norville would not return. Deborah Norville still holds the fort at Inside Edition today.

In 1996, Bill O’Reilly joined Fox News Channel as host of The O’Reilly Report, which later became The O’Reilly Factor. O’Reilly has faced much the same claims about his own political standing as Fox News has about the channel’s perceived political bias. He has often been referred to as a Conservative pundit, despite constant denials.

The programme advertises itself as a “No-Spin Zone”. His style is often confrontational, and always direct. He described himself is his book, The O’Reilly Factor, as being “conservative on some issues, liberal on others and sane on most.” Exact percentages, though, have yet to be determined.

The Fox News Channel itself has been on the wrong end of many accusations about its own bias. The infamous documentary, Outfoxed, directed by Robert Greenwald, made a lot of claims regarding Fox News and its perceived right-wing bias. The film had been researched by a team of volunteers sitting down and watching Fox News Channel non-stop for a period of several months. That research project has gained a life of its own outside the film and continues online under the name News Hounds, with the slogan, “We watch FOX so you don’t have to.”

However, the film has received substantial criticism itself. Claims, for example, of editing clips so that comments were taken out of their real context, and former employees who in fact never worked for Fox News, continue to hang over the production.

Personal ‘Talking Points’

Having been a fairly consistent viewer of the channel over the past six months or so, I have to say that, personally, I find some things about the channel quite disagreeable. So, in true Fox News style, here are my own ‘Talking Points’ about the channel.

For a start, I do not like the channel’s reliance on dramatic music and sound effects, ominous sounding stings and flashy graphics. It says to me that the channel places more emphasis on the presentation of the story than on the content. To my mind, that is like putting the cart before the horse.

I also find the channel’s continual assertions about supposedly being “Fair and Balanced” come across too strongly, as though they want that impression to be uppermost in people’s minds when talking about the channel. It reminds me of the quote from Hamlet, “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”

I also dislike the way some anchors and presenters interrupt some of their guests when the guest is giving a different stance to the anchor/presenter. Now, there’s nothing wrong with the presenter or anchor taking the opposite viewpoint or taking a challenging viewpoint in an interview situation – it’s their job after all, and they want to get the best from the interviewee. However, by talking over their victim, it gives the impression that the viewpoint they are taking is in fact their own strongly held belief, and rather than trying to get the best from the interviewee, they are in fact trying to talk them down and make them look bad.

I find the ‘Fox News Alert’ use to be inconsistent. Sometimes, you hear those sweeping sounds, and that ominous chord, and it gets followed by a very important piece of breaking news. On other occasions, such as one time during an edition of Your World with Neil Cavuto, the sting was played, and then they proceeded to announce that the UN was still in deadlock on the third day of discussions about Iran. That’s hardly breaking news. In fact, when it comes to the UN, it practically seems to be business as usual: I don’t see what the justification was for playing the Alert.

I personally dislike the way News and Opinion get mixed in the schedule. The channel comes across much more like a News/Talk radio station than a 24 hour television news channel. Their breakfast programme, Fox and Friends has discussion between the hosts at the top of the hour about the top stories as they see them, rather than just reporting the facts. Also, some of the hosts seem to regard themselves as the stars of their shows, instead of being just a facilitator. I find this especially to be the case with Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity. I have never liked the style of news programmes where the anchor’s name is part of the title. For instance, why does it have to be NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams? Why not just “NBC Nightly News”? I do not see these people as the stars of their particular shows: I see them as people with big egos who need to be taken down a peg or two.

Whilst Fox News might be one of the higher-rated news channels in the US, it has far fewer viewers over here in the UK. Official BARB ratings show that whilst BBC News 24 reaches 5.7 million viewers a week and Fox News’s sister channel, Sky News, reaches 4.2 million viewers over the same period, Fox News limps in with around 200,000. While it might be to the taste of many Americans, and some other viewers around the world, it seems that Brits are not so embracing of it.

Those are my ‘talking points’. And one more thing: while you’ve been reading this article, you have been in a ‘No-Spin Zone’.

(Also published on Transdiffusion.)