This morning I had to watch Fox News for a few minutes while getting the car repaired, and I think I understand where the one third support for Trump comes from. Fox News was straight up propaganda. It was Fox & Friends in the morning, which is ostensibly a news show, but it was full-blown, Dear Leader levels of propaganda. In the ten minutes, there were four stories.
A truck full of “illegals” was pulled over somewhere down South. Not illegal immigrants, but “illegals.” Dropping immigrant humanizes them.
An Australian PM wore a burka into session. The PM (think Aussie Congresswoman) was buried, and the story opened with “A WOMAN wearing a Burka walked in, and no one knew who she was.” Here, we have inciting fear in the unknown.
Jeff Sessions scores a win against Sanctuary Cities. YAY LAW AND ORDER! There was no discussion about what Sanctuary Cities are, or whether the actions of the government are just, or legal, or even necessary, but the only defense they had was “they were breaking the law.” This is called an Appeal to the Law.
Final story, before I felt that I’d seen enough, was a ham-fisted attempt at trying to draw a comparison between Donald Trump’s support of the Nazis and Ronald Regan once being called a racist. They pulled some whataboutism and false equivalency out of their collective asses, blamed the “Main Stream Media”, as if Fox News isn’t one of the largest News Cable Channels in existence, while also completely avoiding what Trump did to draw everyone’s ire.
So, they avoided the problem, reframed the problem as something different, gave a comparison to something that wasn’t a big deal, the managed to blame everyone else for overreacting to the problem they designed, not the actual problem at hand.
Let me give an example. Let’s say back when the Jerry Sandusky mess took place, that one of the news channels decided that, instead of airing the story as it happened (arrested for child rape), it was described as a simple misunderstanding about how Jerry was caught rough housing with a kid on campus, and the coach who caught him had some problems of his own, and then it was compared to some famous person being accused of regular child abuse. If delivered the right way, that story would sound like Jerry was being set up.
That’s what Fox News does for Donald Trump. They’re setting him up as the “good guy” in the story.
Don’t be fooled. This is Not News. This is Propaganda. This is how propaganda works.
In marketing, there’s this term called Spin. Spinning a story to make is just right for a client. Sometimes it’s called “crafting a narrative.” When it’s done for politics, it’s called propaganda.
But what makes Fox News so scary is that they portray themselves as an actual source of news.
They have journalists with name recognition. They have sets and graphics. They have a lower third scrolling all the time. They have all of the appearances of a news organization, but none of the intent to be one.
They say that only they can be trusted to deliver your news. They then attack anyone who disagrees with them, creating the mentality that if it doesn’t come from Fox News, it isn’t real news. The viewers of Fox News have been trained to attack the source of the story, especially those from “liberal” sources, like the Washington Post or the New York Times, or even the Wall Street Journal, which is also owned by Rupert Murdoch.
I reported recently on a report about Sean Hannity being some serious trouble with the FBI over the Seth Rich Story, and also his role in disseminating Russian propaganda. That’s still unfolding, from what I hear. I’ll keep this blog updated when I hear more.
Fox News wants to be the kingmaker. They claim to be the only one that can be trusted. That’s like Littlefinger telling Sansa that only he can be trusted. But what happens when Fox News can taste the throne for themselves, or realizes they can get their agenda passed with someone else in command? Or, what if Donald Trump becomes so vile, even they can’t save him?
I’ve said before that the Right Wing Media helped get Trump elected. They also keep in him office. If Fox News decides to abandon Trump, it’s game over for the Orange One. But what would it take for them to give up support? Would they still carry his water if the worst rumors of the pee tape were true? What about the allegations surrounding Trump Modeling? If Trump were facing human trafficking charges, would Fox News still defend him?
None of this is Normal 