A whole bunch of new texts and and emails were unsealed last night in the $1.2 billion defamation case Dominion Voting Systems filed against Fox News, and boy howdy. The amount of shit these people talk about each other, about Donald Trump, and the obvious sneering contempt they have for the viewers they lie to.
Let’s read some together!
We’ve already talked about Tucker this morning: “I hate Trump passionately.” So do we. This may be the first time we’ve ever vehemently agreed with Tucker.
One More Funny Thing, Though.
Here’s another Tucker, for your “they knew they were lying to people” file.
A producer for Tucker Carlson noted “One funny thing” during a Nov. 20, 2020, exchange with an unidentified person.
“Dominion was used in Ohio and Florida,” Alex Pfeiffer wrote. “Trump won them. Did they forget to rig those or all part of the plan?”
Yep, that sure is funny.
Let’s talk about Maria Bartiromo’s garbage show now, because that is some hilarious dirt.
How Do You Solve A Problem Like …
The Washington Post reports on the deposition from David Clark, who’s in charge of the weekends on Fox, which means he’s in charge of Bartiromo’s “Sunday Morning Futures.”
Asked whether he considered that show to be a “credible source of news,” Clark answered: “I don’t know.”
A Dominion lawyer followed up, incredulously: “You don’t know as the executive in charge of Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo, whether her show is a credible source of news?”
Clark replied: “I am going to answer the question yes.”
I don’t know. Yes. Sure. Why not? Yes, my answer was yes the whole time!
Clark also did not think Hannity or Tucker were good sources of news, though he said he knew that their viewers thought so.
Speaking of Bartiromo’s lack of credibility, on November 10, 2020, she was texting with Steve Bannon (as one does), and this is what was said:
“I am watching the world move forward. & it’s so upsetting steve,” she wrote.
“I want to see massive fraud exposed Will he be able to turn this around. I told my team we are not allowed to say pres elect at sll [sic]. Not in scripts or in banners on air. Until this moves through the courts.”
Bannon wrote, “71 million voters will never accept Biden. This process is to destroy his presidency before it starts; IF it even starts.”
“But I’m scared & sad,” Bartiromo wrote.
Bannon responded, “You are our fighter. Enough with the sad ! We need u.”
He then suggested that she run for Senate against Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY). “This is your moment,” he wrote.
“1. We either close on Trumps victory or delegitimize Biden. 2. Win both seats in Georgia. 3. Win back house in 2022 4. Elect u to the Senate. 5. IF we don’t close on Trump victory now have Trump declare for 2024 the day after taking back House and you win in Nov 2022.”
Wooooooooooow.
As Wonkette’s Liz Dye wrote at Above The Law yesterday, it does appear Fox News’s defense with Bartiromo is going to be that she’s just really, really gullible.
We would add that she was “scared & sad.” It was “so upsetting steve.”
Rupert.
Some stuff in here should amaze us, but somehow doesn’t. For instance, emails where we see Rupert Murdoch slipping Biden ads to Jared Kushner under the table, just to help a buddy out. (Fox News’s spox says PFFFFFT, the Biden ad was already on YouTube.)
There’s also Rupert shooting with the shit with former House Speaker (and current Fox boardmember) Paul Ryan in a January 12, 2021, email, over whether maybe Trump could resign before Joe Biden’s inauguration and have Mike Pence pardon him and then go away forever. “Would Pence agree?” Murdoch asked.
But really, Rupert Murdoch just has an amazing kind of contempt for Trump, and for Rudy Giuliani, and for all their election fraud lies. Here’s what he had to say after that one Rudy press conference on November 19, 2020, when his hair dye was leaking out of his face:
“Stupid and damaging. The only one encouraging Trump and misleading him. Both increasingly mad. The real danger is what he might do as president. Apparently not sleeping and bouncing off walls! Don’t know about Melania, but kids no help.”
He wasn’t wrong.
And he also wasn’t wrong when he called Sidney Powell “that crazy, would-be lawyer.” (Everybody hates Sidney Powell, sounds like. Fox News senior vice president Raj Shah called her “MIND BLOWINGLY NUTS.”)
Another random Rupert quote: “I hate our Decision Desk people! And pollsters!” (They were fixin’ to say Joe Biden had won.)
Oh yes, and he admitted in an email to Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott on January 21, 2021, that “Maybe Sean and Laura went too far” in spreading election fraud lies to their viewers.
You know, perhaps.
The Primetimers Hate The ‘News’ People Hate The Primetimers Hate the ‘News’ People And The Network Brass Is Just LOL-ing About All Of It.
Sean Hannity at one point texted with “Fox & Friends” idiot Steve Doocy — the thing whose stray sperms helped make Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy — about how angry they were that the “news” portion of Fox News was pissing off the base. “We might as well tell ppl to stop watching at 9am and ‘turn the Tv back on tonight at 9!'” said Steve Doocy.
That comes up a lot in these documents, Fox News people going after the “news” side from all directions.
Laura Ingraham texted the other primetimers on November 15, “My anger at the news channel is pronounced.” That group text continued like this:
“It should be,” Carlson responded. “We devote our lives to building an audience and they let [Fox News Sunday host] Chris Wallace and [correspondent and anchor] Leland f—— Vittert wreck it.”
“Let’s be honest,” Hannity joked. “Without Chris Wallace where would we be? We owe him everything.”
Ingraham then prods her peers, saying “We have more power than we know or exercise.”
Ingraham also hated the Decision Desk, just like Rupert did: “We are officially working for an organization that hates us.”
Even the brass got in on the action. After then-Fox News White House reporter Kristin Fisher tore apart the Giuliani hair dye presser on November 19 on Dana Perino’s show, Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott wrote to Fox News President Jay Wallace, “I can’t keep defending these reporters who don’t understand our viewers and how to handle stories. The audience feels like we crapped on [it] and we have damaged their trust and belief in us.”
Yes, even though Rupert was saying all those mean things about Rudy and they all knew he was off his nut.
Speaking of off his nut, Fox News people said all kinds of mean shit about Lou Dobbs. Jay Wallace emailed Scott and Fox News PR Chief Irena Briganti in September 2020 and said “the North Koreans do a more nuanced show” than Lou Dobbs did. The Washington Post cites a later text from Tucker Carlson to his producer about Dobbs, saying, “I know for a fact Rupert could not stand Lou’s show and has felt that way for many years.”
Sometimes it was serious people appalled that the “news” side was selling its soul to become more like the lying primetimers. In one memorable exchange, Bill Sammon and Chris Stirewalt — the election numbers nerds who got fired for being good at their jobs and calling the 2020 race correctly — talked about how appalled they were that, one month after the election, Bret Baier, supposedly the nighttime “news guy,” was still doing conspiracy theories about election fraud. “It’s remarkable how weak ratings make good journalists do bad things,” said Sammon. “But sadly no surprise based on the man I saw revealed on election night,” said Stirewalt.
Indeed, there are quite a lot of emails and texts from people on the “news” side who have now left or been forced out. Here’s an example:
[Former “Special Report” producer] Phil Vogel wrote he was taking a pay cut and forgoing six weeks paid leave to get out. “The post election coverage of ‘voter fraud’ was the complete end,” Vogel wrote, citing the birth of his daughter. “I realized I couldn’t defend my employer to my daughter while trying to teach her to do what is right.”
We’d say we’re sympathetic, but it’s been pretty obvious what Fox News is ever since the day it debuted.
There is so much more, and we don’t know how all this will shake out. But we’ve got to think this is real fuckin’ embarrassing for Fox News, especially when you consider that the rest of the news about them this week is about Tucker’s big 1/6 recruitment porn video failures.
Really fuckin’ embarrassing indeed.
To read more Fox News texts, click every link on the internet, they are everywhere.
[NPR / Washington Post / Deadline]
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