I think you have a valid point. I don't have a problem with any media that brings an alternative viewpoint, regardless how nauseous it is. But if the media claims unbiased interviews, then they should also not be afraid to ask the hard questions and remain unbiased as possible. But this particular cnn townhall supported shittypants in their control of the interview and questions asked. It's what you don't ask that leaves a bad taste in viewers mouths.
This seemed clearly set up by shitty pants's people. I don't think it worked out well for shittypants or cnn.
Good for you. Guess i'll have to watch CNN articles more carefully, too. Did you know Murdoch supported Bush's invasion of Iraq because he thought it would lead to lower oil prices. And that he came within a hair of bankruptcy in 1990.
Citizen Murdoch buys into the beautiful game
In the early 1990s, one of Rupert Murdoch's Australian companies commissioned a 10-minute video about the great man's life
Fri Sep 11 1998 - 01:00
In the early 1990s, one of Rupert Murdoch's Australian companies commissioned a 10-minute video about the great man's life. At the annual meeting, the proud managing director lowered the lights and screened the documentary for Mr Murdoch. Replete with choruses of angels, the video told how he had steered News Corp from one small paper in Adelaide to a media colossus.
One executive who was there that day told The Irish Times: "When the lights went up, Rupert smiled thinly at the manager and asked `how much did that video cost our company?' "
But even factoring in Rupert Murdoch's renowned cost-consciousness, the early part of this decade found him, and News Corp, feeling somewhat sensitive about spare cash. Throughout 1990, Mr Murdoch bet that interest rates would fall. They rose, and this combined with a a banking crisis and an advertising market collapse, pushed the company to the brink of bankruptcy.
By December 1990, News Corp had debts of $7.5 billion (£5.1 billion). The principal lenders had sold off parcels of debt to others; the company had 146 creditors in 10 different currencies. It couldn't pay any of them.
A Citibank executive, Ms Ann Lane, put together a complex package, and set about getting all the creditors to agree. According to one biographer, Mr William Shawcross, every financial institution eventually consented to restructure the debt, except for one, a small bank in Pittsburgh owed 10 million Australian dollars (around £5 million).
The bank told News Corp it would foreclose; Mr Murdoch knew that if that happened, the move would stampede the entire media empire into receivership.
For some observers, who saw Rupert Murdoch as a monster created by a 1980s culture of greed, it would have been fitting had the company collapsed at that moment. In the preceding 10 days, his friend Mrs Margaret Thatcher had been ousted by her own party; junk-bond king, Mr Michael Milken, had been jailed for 10 years for fraud; and fellow Australian business magnate, Mr Alan Bond, had been arrested on criminal charges.
Ms Lane says Mr Murdoch was shaking when he made one last call to the chairman of the Pittsburgh bank, to beg for a debt reschedule. The chairman would not take the call. But the chief loan officer did and finally agreed not to send the company into receivership.
But that was then, and this is now. In the intervening eight years, Mr Murdoch's voracious appetite for expansion has put News Corp firmly into the black and made it a vast empire, spanning the very surface of the globe. The group has television and satellite companies in the US, Australia, China, Britain, Germany, India, Indonesia and Japan - these include powerful networks such as Fox, STAR TV and British Sky Broadcasting.
It owns film companies, such as Twentieth Century Fox, and Fox Studios Australia. It controls newspapers such as the New York Post, the Times of London, the Sun and the Australian. Its magazine empire includes the huge-selling TV Guide while its publishing realm takes in HarperCollins, with massive sales in the US, Europe, Australia and Asia.
Revenues last year increased by 10 per cent to a record $11.2 billion and trading profits were up 6 per cent at $1.01 billion.
"It is encouraging that more than 75 per cent of the world's population will soon have access to News Corporation's vast programming platform," Mr Murdoch told shareholders. From Western Australia to Sao Paulo, Brazil; from the suburbs of Tokyo to the centre of Mumbai; from the north of Scotland to the heart of Los Angeles, News Corporation will be there."
So, it appears, will its chief executive. At 67, he still earns a reputation for being what his executives have called "a details man" - he follows each business closely, and has the front pages and editorials of his newspapers faxed each day to wherever he is in the world.
At the heart of News Corporation's philosophy of business is a desire to expand the base of its markets. At times, this has meant taking a lowest-common-denominator approach. All his newspapers have veered "down-market", often seeking the sort of stories satirised in one US book by the headline: DWARF RAPES NUN, FLEES IN UFO. In India, there is a warrant outstanding for his arrest for failing to answer a summons related to allegations that STAR TV broadcast obscene films.
Mr Murdoch has also found himself mired in controversy over politics; his open support for Margaret Thatcher's Conservative party and Ronald Reagan's Republicans, his contempt for royalty, his willingness to pull political strings for financial gain, and his unashamed use of his media to promote or damage politicians - in China, Britain or the US - according to their effect on News Corp's profits.
In the area of sport, Mr Murdoch has often been viewed as the harbinger of doom. Articles in this and other newspapers have characterised his relationship with sport as "rape", suggesting that News Corp consistently fails to respect the deep emotional attachment of communities to their great sporting teams and fixtures.
For his part, Mr Murdoch has admitted openly that he uses sporting events as "the battering ram" of his strategy to get more subscribers for his pay television channels.
In the US, News Corp's channels have bought the rights to broadcast first American football, then ice-hockey, then baseball, all at the highest level. In Britain, News Corp's Sky Sports channels - which viewers must pay around £160 a year to watch - bought the rights to soccer's Premier division, and now screens 60 live matches a year.
However, already past retirement age, corporate insiders note that his sons, Lachlan and James, and daughter, Elizabeth, are being given growing responsibility.
Mr Murdoch may also need more time to deal with another issue. Despite the fact that both he and his wife Anna were awarded papal knighthoods earlier this year, the couple are to divorce. Mrs Murdoch has filed her suit in California, where spouses traditionally receive half of the couple's combined wealth. If it ever does get to court, the authorities will have a fine time deciding how much Mr Murdoch's controlling interest is truly worth.
Am sure i posted one on that years ago. Yep, a 16 year old post
[...]Who is Rupert Murdoch? July 16, 2004
[...]
WONDER IF HE IS STILL A 2 to 1 OPTIMIST ON THAT .. HE ALMOST CAME CLOSE .. WE REMEMBER WHEN ONLY ONE SMALL BANK COULD HAVE STUFFED HIS WHOLE SHOW.
"Corporate expansion and the stock market crash of 1987 conspired to create a financial crisis for Murdoch in 1990, when News Corp. reported revenue of $6.7 billion and saw more than $7 billion in debt come due. With News Corp. shares plummeting from $24 to $8 as a result of the Black Monday crash and Murdoch's buying sprees continuing unabated, creditors became nervous. A refinancing plan was put in place, but at the last minute, one small bank in Pittsburgh refused to go along with the scheme, demanding repayment of a $10 million loan.
That $10 million loan nearly caused the entire collapse of News Corp.: An extraordinary race against time ensued in which Murdoch and his financial advisers struggled to convince the company's 100-plus creditors to agree to a deal by which they would all be paid at the same time. Only at the eleventh hour did the Pittsburgh bank capitulate, to Murdoch's great relief." http://heartlanddiaryofbettyb.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_archive.html
Lachlan Murdoch explains settlement, says no change at Fox
Have to be a bit more careful, but we're just gonna go on being a conservative propaganda company as long as it makes us bucks.
By DAVID BAUDER May 10, 2023
FILE - Lachlan Murdoch appears at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Feb. 9, 2020. Fox News paid $787 million to settle a recent lawsuit on its reporting after the 2020 election to avoid a divisive trial and lengthy appeals process, its parent company's chief executive said on Tuesday. Murdoch, executive chairman and CEO of Fox Corp., said a Delaware judge “severely limited” Fox's defenses against Dominion Voting Systems, which said the network defamed it by airing bogus charges of election fraud that it knew was untrue. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — Fox News paid $787 million to settle a recent lawsuit on its reporting after the 2020 election to avoid a divisive trial and lengthy appeals process, its parent company’s chief executive said on Tuesday.
Lachlan Murdoch, executive chairman and CEO of Fox Corp., also noted that a Delaware judge “severely limited” Fox’s defenses against Dominion Voting Systems, which said the network defamed it by airing bogus charges of election fraud that it knew was untrue.
Fox Corp. announced Tuesday that it had lost $50 million the previous three months, which it attributed to the lawsuit settlement. Murdoch, who answered questions from financial analysts, was speaking in public for the first time since the case ended and Fox fired its most popular anchor, Tucker Carlson.
Murdoch said viewers, and investors, should expect no change in direction from Fox News.
“We made the business decision to resolve this dispute and avoid the acrimony of a divisive trial and multi-year appeal process, a decision clearly in the best interests of the company and its shareholders,” he said.
That’s important, since Murdoch said Fox intends to use the same defense against a similar lawsuit by another elections technology company, Smartmatic. That case is not expected to go to trial until at least 2025, he said.
Despite being asked directly about Carlson’s exit, Murdoch didn’t mention the former prime-time host’s name and referred to his reign obliquely. Fox has not explained why it cut ties with Carlson.
“There’s no change in programming strategy at Fox News,” he said. “It’s obviously a successful strategy. As always, we are adjusting our programming and our lineup and that’s what we continue to do.”
VIDEO
Although hurt by the Carlson exit, Fox News remains the leading cable news network.
Fox has lost viewers following Carlson’s firing. Last week’s substitute host, Lawrence Jones, reached between 1.28 million and 1.7 million last week in a time slot where Carlson usually drew around 3 million, the Nielsen company said.
Yet Fox has gained more than 40 new advertisers in that hour, the network said, confirming a report in Variety. Advertisers like Gillette, Scott’s Miracle Gro and Secret deodorant that had considered Carlson’s show a toxic environment have signed on.
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