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After reading Devona Walker's piece on Fox News's blatant use of racism to promote its far right agenda ( "Glenn Beck Outdoes David Duke In Shameless Race Baiting", Alternet, 8/10) I came to a rather simple conclusion. A subsequent reading of Max Blumenthal's updated epilogue to his book "Republican Gomorra" on the same site only kicked in the point.
Rupert Murdoch ain't no friend of mine.
Now here's a guy who's built a media empire using our lesser instincts to construct a temple (FOX News) dedicated to our own hatred, a hatred that, coincidently, makes a "ka-ching" sound for our boy every time it rears its ugly head. As if a demented charlatan, Murdoch's turned our self-loathing outward with an exaggerated, pre-packaged flourish featuring clinical aberrations the likes of Orly Taitz, Andrew Brietbart and Ryan Sorba to tease the show along. And, like it or not, it's still working like a charm.
I knew Murdoch was trouble from the day I first read about him back in the day. A driven Aussie -- all pluck and cheek and outsized ambition with enough charisma to reach the stadium seats -- out to conquer the world. There was a hint of menace to the article, an almost veiled indictment of future crimes, a kind of "What if?" that seemed almost too horrible to contemplate. But contemplate we must as "What if?" rapidly devolves to a grim and flustered "What now?"
A rich boy from the get-go (his father ran a chain of Australian dailies), Murdoch bared his teeth early on, dropping into Pop's shoes and never looking back as he clawed his way through home media (and politics) before extending his reach to include New Zealand, then England and then beyond. Dropping anchor on these shores in the late 70s he soon cast aside citizenship in the country of his birth, the newly-minted eminence grise taking the star-spangled pledge just in time for Clinton's media de-regulation -- and that's a knife, mate.
No slouch, Murdoch caught the right-wing wave as the swells had only begun to churn, picking sides with the calculated audacity of a Machiavelli all dolled up like Lonesome Rhodes. Launching Fox News in 1996 he cuddled up to any corporate shoulder that would have him... and they were soon paying way more than scale. Aligning himself with the right if only for business purposes he cultivated the emerging neocon faction like a florist with an orchid, nurturing the principle characters until they near burst.
And what characters; The "Chicago Boys," Milton Friedman acolytes once no more than bushy-headed, grandma-tethered schmucks slipping off alone after the RISK tournament on long-lost university nights to masturbate over yellowing glossies of Patricia Neal while the hippie guys were out getting laid in realtime. But now (1999) the supply-side gang had their own babymakers hanging out of their dry-cleaned trou expecting payback ad infinitum -- and Rupert was there to help them see that they got it. After all, that's where the money was. And Murdoch knows all about money.
The 117th richest guy in the world, it's almost inevitable he'd be carrying water for the other 116; the last guy in locks the door, but not before hurling a couple of goobers out into open air in his wake. It seems Murdoch's sacred duty to render us as dumb as rocks and lusting after Megyn Kelly like ravenous hounds too stupid to know the difference between carrion and fresh meat. In fact, he's counting on it. After all, it's his job.
As it should be blindingly obvious by now, the rich -- a group with whom Murdoch unstintingly sides -- have a plan, a plan that doesn't include you and me, at least on the receiving end of the equation. Aristocrats didn't support Bush because of his religious convictions. They supported him because he'd promised them the world -- and they still intend to collect. Obama's nothing more than a curveball they've already side-stepped, Murdoch's minions countering the naiveté of the president's benign approach with bucket after bucket of puke and slime, often aimed right in the poor bastard's face.
Virtually inventing the "Tea Party" phenomena Murdoch has been raising the ante of late -- death panels, unchecked socialism, the right to abort a rapist's child -- slapping Middle America's face with just enough force to get them out of their armchairs and just enough savvy to convince them they've been assaulted by a third party who has consequently just left the room.
It's all so laughably transparent you can't but wonder how the hell he gets away with it... until you realize that we let him. It's like the old saying "Bush is us," but there are no term limits this time, Murdoch blithely laying out the kitchen scraps upon which he knows we'll feed. He also knows we'll like it for he's trained us that way, waving his wand across our consciousness until our brains leak out of our ears but a step away from disintegration and pleading "Enough! Enough! ENOUGH!"
But it never stops. It's not supposed to stop as he hectors us into a new feudalism where up is down and black is white and right is something somebody else decides -- often to your own detriment. It's the New World Order spun on its head by an amoral tycoon intent on enriching his own derriere regardless of the cost. In fact, I doubt cost -- cost to us at any rate -- ever even enters his mind.
However, I could be wrong, addling myself in a mad dash to vilify the rapscallion I hold responsible for the mess that remains of my country. Perhaps, like my impatience at the no-show of Obama's oft promised grand sucker punch, I'm just not cutting the guy enough slack. Who knows? Maybe this whole Fox Nation exercise is just some elaborate ruse to turn us left by first marinating us in the right, imbuing conservatism with a bewilderingly bitter aftertaste as if to remind us of our own indiscretions once the trouble has passed.
But I don't care. For me, if only in the light of his having again played us like a pack of rubes, the verdict doesn't change.
Because Rupert Murdoch still ain't no friend of mine.
