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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Roger Ailes scandal is ballooning into something much bigger
By JOE POMPEO 08/10/16 06:47 AM EDT
THE DAILY AILES -- The Roger Ailes scandal is ballooning into something much bigger than the initial sexual harassment allegations that ignited the controversy a little over a month ago. And those were big enough: In a little more than two weeks, they drove the longtime Fox News chief out of the cable news channel he spent 20 years molding into a media powerhouse for the right and a cash cow for parent company 21st Century Fox, which is controlled by Rupert Murdoch and his sons.
In the past few days alone, there have been reports of surveillance campaigns against journalists covering Ailes (http://nym.ag/2aDOHsD); Fox News employees who believe our phones are tapped and that we are monitored (http://cnnmon.ie/2aXbX4b); and incredulity that top brass at the publicly-traded 21st Century Fox were not until recently aware, as the company has said, of a $3.15 million exit package paid in 2011 to a former Fox News booker who claims Ailes manipulated and sexually harassed her for 20 years (http://on.ft.com/2aNm3Hr).
The question now being tossed around in the private conversations, Twitter exchanges, Gchats and Slack windows of the media-obsessed: How much more dirt is going to come out, and will this sordid affair eventually make the leap from scandalous to criminal? Theres been no smoking gun just yet, but there are specters. The whole things beginning to feel a little Summer 2011, when the U.K. phone-hacking scandal that upended Murdochs other conglomerate, News Corp., was starting to catch fire. Heres the latest thats come across Morning Medias desk ...
Dark arts: Ailes black ops tactics against New York magazine reporter and Ailes biographer Gabe Sherman were apparently more menacing than just online smears and negative Google ads. A source close to high-level Fox News executives told Morning Media that during a private conversation with Ailes at an event in the period when Sherman was reporting his 2014 book, The Loudest Voice in the Room, Ailes said to this source, I know where he lives, and I'm gonna send people to beat the shit out of him. (A second source within the Fox News orbit confirmed hearing the same account and a third said Ailes has said some version of this before.)
Read more: http://www.politico.com/media/tipsheets/morning-media/2016/08/another-ailes-spectacularsecond-amendment-sagaerstwhile-ap-power-duo-reunites-001084
ms liberty
(8,596 posts)Raster
(20,998 posts)For years this was and still is, the Ministry of Propaganda. EVERYTHING OUT OF FOX IS BIASED AND SLATED. Everything. And now to find the Ministry had their own "Brownshirts" is not surprising in the least.
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,036 posts)Jerry442
(1,265 posts)vkkv
(3,384 posts)Beowulf42
(205 posts)Unfortunately he's rich. They are never never held to account. Justice for the poor. Mercy and forgiveness for the filthy rich.
aggiesal
(8,923 posts)stonecutter357
(12,697 posts)randr
(12,414 posts)and one woman stated she was asked to run his "DC bordello".
This scandal not only has wings, it has a rocket engine.
jalan48
(13,883 posts)This will become another Brian Williams story, erased by "latest news".
Midnight Writer
(21,795 posts)There was a story by a Fox News producer that Fox News had to change it's stationary logo at the bottom of the screen into a rotating icon because the logo image was being "burned" into the television screens of folks who watch nothing else.
Kablooie
(18,641 posts)Very strange.
Maybe there is a God.
rivegauche
(601 posts)The idiot Faux viewers don't care. Just as they don't care that their candidate is a lying, incompetent con artist who is an actual danger to this country. I swear to god they live in another alternate reality.
gratuitous
(82,849 posts)Surprise! It isn't just the creepy spectacle of Roger Ailes slobbering after the office women. There's much, much more.
lindysalsagal
(20,730 posts)I know where he lives, and I'm gonna send people to beat the shit out of him. (A second source within the Fox News orbit confirmed hearing the same account and a third said Ailes has said some version of this before.)
When you think you run the world, you say things you don't think you'll ever live to regret.
bluestateguy
(44,173 posts)nt
saidsimplesimon
(7,888 posts)our purpose as the face of the GOP. Long live the fat man for our entertainment and enlightenment.
SleeplessinSoCal
(9,145 posts)saidsimplesimon
(7,888 posts)of some deep seated bias against "the other". Be that women, people of color or rational human beings who challenge his power over the media. He has a "golden parachute". His only remorse will come with the prospect of spending some time in prison.
colsohlibgal
(5,275 posts)You wonder just want Trump would have to do or say to move people like Hannity and think maybe it's impossible. He could be naked on a video robbing a liquor store and Sean would rationalize it.
The damage Faux and Rush and the Glenn Becks have caused is incalculable....all done with the help of plenty of gullible and not too bright viewers/listeners.
I hope it all comes crashing down and a critical mass of people come to their senses. And maybe the republican party goes the way of the Whigs.
Oh...and one trait seems to be uniform from Ailes and his minions and Rush etc. - hypocrisy.
yellowcanine
(35,701 posts)There may be scores of women coming out of the woodwork and claiming harassment. The potential liability is huge and likely not going to be covered by insurance if it is demonstrated that Fox actively covered up abuse. Insurers look for outs when there is a lot of exposure and this is a huge one.
niyad
(113,552 posts)but that leaves out the entire puke party.
zentrum
(9,865 posts)Last edited Fri Aug 12, 2016, 11:53 AM - Edit history (1)
.40 Million plus and retire to some tropical island. Very few MSM journalists will pursue thisFOX, Murdoch etal are too powerful and have too much "dirt" on the very people who would need to pursue this story.
My observation is that the rich and powerful always skate, with just a slapped wrist.
Rose Siding
(32,623 posts)At the very least, Fox will will be on the hook for quite a bundle.