Could another head roll at Fox?

[Bob Jersey]

Gabriel Sherman (link), the NYMag writer/recent Ailes biographer, heard from sources saying that Bill Shine, one of the pair appointed by Rupert to run FNC post-Roger, is agonizing over what others in the media say about the channel and his future with the cabler, and reportedly pleaded with the magnate's sons to affirm dad's confidence, to no avail... publicists declined any approach by Shine to James and/or Lachlan, but he is still named in the suit against the company by (Allentown native) Andrea Tantaros, and Hannity (Variety link) just before his show tonight tweeted Sherman that a Shine ouster would be "the end of FNC as we know it"...

B

[Steve Timko]

Sean Hannity says someone high up at Fox News is trying to get Bill Shine fired and he knows who it is.

http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/27/media/sean-hannity-tweets-bill-shine/

On Thu, Apr 27, 2017 at 6:52 PM, Bob Jersey <bobj...@ptd.net> wrote:

Gabriel Sherman (link), the NYMag writer/recent Ailes biographer, heard from sources saying that Bill Shine, one of the pair appointed by Rupert to run FNC post-Roger, is agonizing over what others in the media say about the channel and his future with the cabler, and reportedly pleaded with the magnate's sons to affirm dad's confidence, to no avail... publicists declined any approach by Shine to James and/or Lachlan, but he is still named in the suit against the company by (Allentown native) Andrea Tantaros, and Hannity (Variety link) just before his show tonight tweeted Sherman that a Shine ouster would be "the end of FNC as we know it"...

B

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[Tom Wolper]

On Fri, Apr 28, 2017 at 12:54 AM, Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com> wrote:

Sean Hannity says someone high up at Fox News is trying to get Bill Shine fired and he knows who it is.

http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/27/media/sean-hannity-tweets-bill-shine/

What an odd situation. Gabe Sherman has been doing groundbreaking reporting about Fox News and their various lawsuits because he has developed a reliable network of inside informants and he has (as far as we know) kept them safe from retaliation. If Hannity feels that shine is being railroaded by a specific executive, why didn't he pick up the phone and talk to Sherman rather tweet that he knows who it is, and not name the name.

[Kevin M.]

And Shine is gone 

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Kevin M. (RPCV)

[Bob Jersey]

Kevin M, to Tom Wolper and Steve Timko, today (1):

And Shine is gone 

Variety (link) confirmed, but acknowledged Sherman's tweet broke the departure (two weeks notice, at least).

Rupert praised him, a lawyer in one of the suits said "this isn't enough," and watchdog group Media Matters agreed.

B

[Mark Jeffries]

And the rumors are about that an unknown group of people are discussing a new conservative cable news channel, since they feel that FNC is going Commie.  An article I saw says that they think they can get 85 million homes on board at launch, which would be a record for any cable channel.  If they can get Ailes, O'Reilly, Shine, Hannity or any of the above, it could happen.

Mark Jeffries
Saints Spotlight Editor
spotl...@gmail.com

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[Kevin M.]

Ailes may have a career as a Trump advisor or "consultant," but his days running a network are over. I wouldn't dare speculate on where O'Reilly will land when the dust settles, but right now Alex Jones has a better chance of becoming a cable TV star.

--

Kevin M. (RPCV)

[Joe Coughlin]

It's the worst time to launch a new channel ever. The cable universe is seeing record contraction, not growth, even amongst the big media companies. I am very skeptical.

--

+++++++++++++++
Joe Coughlin   
http://www.twitter.com/inturnaround

[Steve Timko]

I throw this into the mix: This place I hang out once a week has either Fox News or Fox Business on the screen. Yesterday they were watching One America News Network, which is a low budget conservative network.

The explanation is that they don't have all the nonsense that Fox News has. I don't think they just got clarity on Fox News content.

OAN is interesting. They kept repeating the same 15 minute news segment with different anchors. They heavily used still photos and social media photos. They had video from a local Fox affiliate. There was a lot of military news. They seem to be targeting current and former military.

And their female anchors were smoking hot.

So I wonder if there is widespread dissatisfaction with Fox.

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[Tom Wolper]

On Tue, May 2, 2017 at 9:18 AM, Joe Coughlin <inturn...@gmail.com> wrote:

It's the worst time to launch a new channel ever. The cable universe is seeing record contraction, not growth, even amongst the big media companies. I am very skeptical.

On Mon, May 1, 2017 at 10:26 PM, Mark Jeffries <spotl...@gmail.com> wrote:

And the rumors are about that an unknown group of people are discussing a new conservative cable news channel, since they feel that FNC is going Commie.  An article I saw says that they think they can get 85 million homes on board at launch, which would be a record for any cable channel.  If they can get Ailes, O'Reilly, Shine, Hannity or any of the above, it could happen.

Plus, if you were an investor, and someone came to you pitching a new conservative news channel, and the names he proposed were all of men over retirement age with strong ethical problems, would you be willing to pour millions into that?

[Steve Timko]

Judge rejects lawsuit against Fox by ex-host Andrea Tantaros

NEW YORK (AP) - A judge has tossed out a New York lawsuit against Fox News by former host Andrea Tantaros, citing her "vague, speculative and conclusory allegations."

The lawsuit U.S. District Judge George Daniels dismissed Friday had alleged Fox tried to torment Tantaros after she complained about sexual harassment.

Fox News Channel had urged the lawsuit be rejected, saying the claims were a paranoid fantasy or a deliberate hoax.

In August 2016, Tantaros sued the network, its ousted chairman and other top executives in a separate lawsuit, saying they retaliated after she detailed unwanted sexual advances made by her onetime boss Roger Ailes. A state judge ruled those claims were subject to closed-door arbitration.

Tantaros worked as a host and political analyst for Fox News from 2011 to 2016.

Ailes died last year.

[PGage]

A few weeks ago I agreed in passing with one of Kevin’s periodic dismissals of cable news channels as not worthy of that name, as they are purveyors of opinion and propaganda and worse. It was not the place to give a more nuanced take on cable news, but I have been wanting to, and will briefly now.

There was a time when I got most of my news from CNN, but some years into the Bush Administration and its unnecessary war, and CNN’s complete spiral down into theatrical and empty yelling matches, I opted out. For a while I recorded Newshour every day and watched it when I could, but often found that by the time I did it was already 5 hours or more old, so I would update online. Soon I found I could get better and more timely news solely online - which paradoxically meant for the most part that I now get my news they way my father did before me, from newspapers - though I don’t have to wait to get it delivered in the morning, and I can read three or four from around the country and world. I now pay for an online subscription to the NYT, which I use many times each day, and max out my free access to the WaPo and LAT. I also regularly read stories from NPA, the AP and BBC, and The Hill and Politico, supplemented by long form journalism produced by places like the Atlantic, New Republic, Economist and Vanity Fair. Unless it is literally breaking news that happens to break while I am watching MSNBC’s live coverage (which is for a half hour early in the morning and 30 to 60 minutes around 6:30 or 7:00 in the evening) I almost never learn about anything in the news for the first time from a television source. 

I do spend more time (for the last couple of years) watching Cable News than I used to, and almost always it is MSNBC. The programs I watch (mostly the evening shows) provide relatively little of what I used to consider a traditional newscast. Clearly there is a liberal slant to the POV, and an even more transparent and self-conscious anti-Trump commitment. Much of this is not news, it is opinion and analysis- and the quality varies greatly, from thoughtful, informed and penetrating to superficial and pandering. For this kind of opinionated analysis I get the most from Rachel Maddow, who at least a once or twice a week dives deeply into the mountain of information and surfaces with a complex and relevant story that illustrates something more than just the headline of the day. She is of course very much a voice from the left.

But I find that MSNBC (and, I gather CNN does much the same thing these days, though they have left such a bad taste in my mouth that I rarely watch them any more. Perhaps Fox News does something similar as well in their own way) provides something other than analysis (done well or poorly), opinion and propaganda. Its bread and butter seems to be panels of actual newspaper reporters, brought on to actually discuss the day’s news. There is relatively little yelling and melodramatics on these panels (though I’m sure Trumpests would be irritated by the amount of head shaking that does on about the latest outrageous thing uncovered about the Administration).  I find often that reporters who have written stories in the NYT or WaPo or Atlantic or VF or AP that I have already read are on for 10 to 15 minutes and able to not just summarize their story but put it into some perspective - often relating it to stories they published the previous week or month or year. They are often on panel with other reporters who have published similar or related stories, and the panel then provides a means of fitting together pieces that form part of a puzzle. 

By far the best program for this kind of thing is Brian Williams “The 11th Hour”, which comes on at 8:00 pm in California, but I guess 11:00 pm on the East Coast (hmm, I just got that). I know Williams has come in for a lot of scorn on this list and other places for his self-aggrandizing memory illusions (which I have tried to contextualize in the past), but his fall from grace has made him a bargain for MSNBC - a top rank broadcaster operating in a less charged environment, with more time to actually explore the day’s events. And coming at the end of the day, when many reporters have filed their stories for the next morning already, he actually has a head start on tomorrow’s news. I said I rarely learn new things from TV news anymore, but when I do it is because a newspaper reporter is on Williams’ show discussing a story that has just posted on their website and will be in the next day’s paper.

So, yes, I agree with Kevin that cable news is not a place that provides much independent, reliable, objective news, and it is rife with opinion and pandering. But I do not agree with dismissing cable news as worthless, and (at least on MSNBC, and I suspect on CNN as well) in recent years cable news has become a place where you can find informed and fairly serious and nuanced discussion of the very best journalism being currently produced by newspaper and magazine reporters. If I ran MSNBC the main change I would make would be the addition of three hour-long actual newscasts (morning, midday and evening), which would also give them some more objective news voices to handle big breaking stories.

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[Kevin M.]

So your contention is that, on networks claiming the description “cable news” there is a small percentage of news programing, so they aren’t entirely worthless. OK, that’s one viable perspective. But I prefer the viability of my take — that calling oneself a cable news channel should mean the channel is devoted almost entirely, if not entirely, to works of journalism and reporting. 

Looking at coverage of the tragic school shootings yesterday (really only the bigger of the two was covered because cable is lightly staffed on a Friday evening), it reminded me that news channels used to have bureaus all across the country (and internationally). Lacking that, what we ended up with was a video feed from a local Texas tv station, or — worse — they used the audio of the local Texas tv stations. I realize this expands the thread beyond just cable news, but even if the local TV “reporters” could grasp covering such a story at the local level (they can’t), they are frankly incapable of framing the events in a national context (i.e.-gun laws that differ from state to state, comparing NRA campaign contributions to Texas politicians vs those from other states, differing law enforcement techniques/reactions by LEOs). 

No, what viewers get during breaking news is the opposite of journalism. It is a camera pointed at the site of where something occurred while a talking head points and says, “look!” Then they have talking heads in a panel who blame political parties or lobbyists, which both might be true, but they aren’t researched and fact checked opinions... they’re just talking heads babbling between offering thoughts and prayers. Most of what occurs are “recaps” of information already known and already given, which — again — something already known is the opposite of news. 

And that is why I feel these channels fail us. I don’t know who they are serving, other than themselves. I can feel more informed following Twitter than I can watching cable news (I did both yesterday). “Informed and nuanced discussion” about the news is still miles apart from reporting the news. And I’m not saying there isn’t a place for that on TV; I am saying the place for that should not be on channels calling themselves cable news. 

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Kevin M. (RPCV)

[PGage]

No, my contention is that cable news channels do not really provide much original, reliable news reporting, But they do provide a significant amount of useful discussion of original, reliable reporting done by others, mostly newspapers and magazines.

The original idea of CNN as a place that provides 24 hours of something like the CBS News was never viable anyway. A cable news channel at best would be something like a big city newspaper. The LA Times (which will always be my model of my daily paper) was always a huge, unwieldy and uneven animal. For about 15 years I got up every day and read it while eating breakfast (and then again when I got home). I would read the front page, the sports page, go back and read a few stories deeper in the first section, the local section (Section 2) and the Calendar section., including the comics. As you know, the Horiscope was always the most read part of any newspaper, and the LATs made most of its money on its extensive classified section and the shameless amount of ad space it sold (and for a lot of people the most useful part of the paper were the ads).

The point is, even newspapers in their glory years were not completely, or even mostly, about hard news. I would not mind at all if a television cable news channel spent most of its air space on fluffier stuff - their problem is that they dont put on even as much hard news as CBS or NBC did back in the 1970s. But “News” has always been a title that covers a hodgepodge, and if cable news channels are almost barren of real, independent news reporting, they do provide a lot of serious, useful discussion and contextualizing of the very high quality reporting being done almost every day in American newspapers and magazines, and that is not nothing.

Sent from Gmail Mobile

[Steve Timko]

Details of Bill Shine's severance package released.

HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

"The White House communications chief got an $8.4 million package and will receive $3.5 million from 21st Century Fox this year and next."

[Steve Timko]

On Tue, May 2, 2017, 6:46 AM Steve Timko <steve...@gmail.com> wrote:

I throw this into the mix: This place I hang out once a week has either Fox News or Fox Business on the screen. Yesterday they were watching One America News Network, which is a low budget conservative network.

The explanation is that they don't have all the nonsense that Fox News has. I don't think they just got clarity on Fox News content.

OAN is interesting. They kept repeating the same 15 minute news segment with different anchors. They heavily used still photos and social media photos. They had video from a local Fox affiliate. There was a lot of military news. They seem to be targeting current and former military.

And their female anchors were smoking hot.

So I wonder if there is widespread dissatisfaction with Fox.

John Oliver does a whole segment on OAN after they made the news this week.

https://youtu.be/UnSILVWDKL8

[Melissa P]

I have a new hobby.  I bicker with Trump fans on a Fox News website.  (Why do I do it?  I am fortunate to be represented in Congress by two excellent Senators and one fine Representative, so I have some extra energy to burn off.  No, I don't expect to change minds.  But I do hope that some of my comments show up in the news feeds of these Trump fans and that their friends, relatives, and neighbors will judge them for their deficiencies in thinking.)

So, I can answer your question.  I'm not sure I would call it "widespread" but I often see dissatisfaction with Fox News among Trump supporters.  For example, just now I saw:  "I stopped watching him..he is so biased..as is most of Fox now...OAN isthe best."

Comments like that one always show up whenever a Fox News host says something that implies that Trump isn't perfect.  Chris Wallace is probably the major target, but there are also comments about other on air talent (e.g., Juan Williams), Murdochs turning liberal, and changes attributable to Paul Ryan being on the board.

I've never seen OAN, so I appreciate your posting the Oliver clip.

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[Doug Eastick]

LOL.  Melissa doing what many people do not have the energy for.

[Greg Diener]

On Tuesday, April 7, 2020 at 1:33:39 PM UTC-4, Doug Eastick wrote:

LOL.  Melissa doing what many people do not have the energy for.

On Mon, Apr 6, 2020 at 6:37 PM Melissa P <takingu...@gmail.com> wrote:

I have a new hobby.  I bicker with Trump fans on a Fox News website.

Truly doing God's work.

Greg