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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   33460 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 2023

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I don't see how Tucker Carlson could have been fired over the Dominion Lawsuit because he wasn't the one pushing the allegedly defamatory allegations. They were mostly on Lou Dobbs and Maria Bartiromo's shows, and Bartiromo still has a job.

wasn't he a big witness and had a buncha texts/emails that were used as evidence against Fox? He wasn't the only one here but it was a nontrivial part of Dominion's arguments

The texts were mostly saying that Fox should be careful with the fraud claims though -- "fired for giving good advice that is ignored, then vindicated by the courts" is not impossible of course, but there's quite a few possibilities ahead of that I'd say.

Makes sense if you see the lawsuit as being actually about the company recouping losses and reputation. If you see it as the Cathedral trying to destroy anything that threatens them i.e. wanting to destroy fox news in general, then going after their top show makes more sense.

I’m really of the cathedral mindset here. Tucker was one of the biggest names they had. A huge draw, huge audience. Unless someone specifically wants him out as a condition of the settlement the move itself makes no sense. It’s probably like setting your own house on fire to get rid of your biggest draw on the heels of losing tons of money in lawsuits. It would be suicidal to try it. OTOH, I think the theory that the cathedral sees FOX and Tucker as threats to be quashed by any means necessary fits very very neatly into the general zeitgeist— Fox is dangerous and must be stopped before they create alt-right beliefs— that are common refrains among the journalists and thinkers and influential people.

The 60 minutes expose was hilarious. Also evidently the FBI is willing to tell 60 minutes Epps isn’t an agent but isn’t willing to tell congress the same. Not the latter is under oath while the former isn’t. Will let you decide why the difference. Though with the. Umber of Biden appointees perjuring themselves I don’t know what would stop the FBI.

I don’t know what would stop the FBI.

Directly lying to Congress under oath never seemed to hurt the career of James Clapper, who is still employed by CNN as a security analyst. He later apologized after the Snowden leaks, claiming that he "simply didn't think" of the Patriot Act, but was never punished.

Of course the idea that removing people like Tucker from the discourse means those who want what they want have no recourse but violence is utterly absent.

But since dissidents will just create more excuses for their own exclusion anyway the ice cream cone can just continue to lick itself.

You know what? Good. More people need to realize there are no political solutions. However lustrous RFK Jr.'s doomed hopes are.

Of course the idea that removing people like Tucker from the discourse means those who want what they want have no recourse but violence is utterly absent.

They're prepared for violence, they just Jan6 the heck out of them.

Could be indirectly. Maybe the settlement pushed Fox to ask their hosts to tighten their belt and/or the leash they're kept on and that didn't sit well with Carlson.

I've heard it suggested that since they were going to have an awful loss in Q2 because of the Dominion settlement it was the best time to pay out Tucker's contract. Firing him in Q3 or Q4 would mean another lousy quarter, at least now they might have a profitable Q3.

This is my theory - that as part of the settlement the hosts have to get permission from lawyers to run stories on certain topics, and that TC doesn't find this acceptable or was denied permission on what he thinks is a legitimately important story.

Reading about Napoleon one starts to wonder why anyone bothered following him after the second or third time he abandoned his troops. I get the same feeling from Trump. Everyone who goes to bat for him ends up getting smashed. His lawyers are lucky if they only get disbarred.

Right wing media has to be terrified that Trump wins the nomination. They’ll be put in the position of either endorsing whatever bullshit Trump comes up with next and risking a lawsuit, or losing their audience.

I don’t understand the defamation risk with Epps. What is his argument? Yes, I did incite J6 and then lied under oath; I didn’t do it as a plant and therefore I’ve been defamed. I’m not a fed; I’m a criminal seems like…an interesting argument.

You seemed to have stolen a base or two. There are no “knowing false system of facts.” For all we known, Epps is a fed and there are many curious things about Epps. The idea that is lying (let along wanton lying) is absurd. That is, it is a tough argument to satisfy actual malice.

And like mentioned, the idea that you defame someone by saying they are a criminal instead of a law abiding fed seems like a crazy argument for defamation generally.

  1. That assumes Epps isn’t a fed or fed informant. Something the FBI hasn’t been willing to say under oath.

  2. Regardless of the truth of the matter, there is a lot of oddness related to Epps. Maybe it’s all a coincidence but there is enough smoke there that it isn’t absurd to (1) believe there is more than meets the eye and (2) not accept Epps claim to the contrary.

If all you need for libel is that the Facts are X, a reasonable person could think it is not X, but it turns out they were mistaken then the media will go out of business.

Now maybe you think it is patently absurd to think Epps is a fed. That seems silly especially given what we already know (feds infiltrate these right wing protests all of the time, police presence did egg on protestors at this event, Epps was curiously dropped from the most wanted despite considerable video evidence of him actively and imminently furthering the whole thing, Epps lied to the Jan 6 committee and they didn’t say boo, Epps has been turned into a martyr by the same people who claim people like Epps are insurrectionists). If it isn’t just beyond the realm of possibility and there was no actual knowledge it is untrue, then Fox is in the clear for the actual malice standard.

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As for knowing, the fact that Epps and his lawyers and the government have been telling Fox he wasn't a fed is pretty compelling, unless Fox is going to try to go to war on a "they're all lying, including under oath" defense, which I doubt they would and would almost certainly fail if they did.

Didn't Epps testify that he wasn't doing things that he is apparently on videotape doing? It seems like there is some valid argument that he has been lying.

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I doubt that any settlement with Dominion would constrain Fox's editorial decisions beyond running stories about Dominion itself (and probably not even then), and I'd find it hard to believe that Carlson has any interest on running such stories.

My theory is that this is more of a blanket requirement for all "controversial" stories to avoid any future lawsuits.

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