Is there anyone left in America who is not convinced that Fox News is a shameless disseminator of disinformation in the service of Donald Trump and his ultra right-wing MAGA cult? If so, the network itself has helpfully provided an argument that ought to seal the deal.
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Trump himself has provided the best evidence that Fox News is his Ministry of Propaganda. He will appear almost nowhere else on television. The only reason he gave an interview prior to the Super Bowl was because the game and the interview were being broadcast on Fox. What's more, much of his Cabinet and White House staff (19 so far) were recruited from Fox News.
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On Monday morning the dedicated Fox News Trump-fluffers on "Outnumbered" engaged in their routine morning worship ritual wherein they fawn over their idol and endeavor to reconstruct reality in a way that makes the convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, and aspiring anti-democracy authoritarian look palatable to his gullible cult followers. To that end, co host Emily Compagno launched into a screed castigating the free press and offering her prescription for how the media ought to cover Trump...
"The fact that the media can't keep up, A) doesn't matter because we're not looking to them for the news anyway. And B) guess what president Trump is doing? His office of comms is directly emailing, putting out on Truth Social, putting on the website, every day, all day, exactly what they are doing. So all you have to do, legacy media, is simply repeat, retweet, repost, and that is the news, and that is the facts."
See? All the media has to do is to mindlessly regurgitate Trump's divine and infallible utterances, and then take the rest of the day off. What could be easier? According to Compagno, whatever Trump says "is the news and that is the facts." No need to argue or research or seek any other opinion. Just shut up and sing along with the Trump hymnal.
Never mind that Trump has actually been documented as the most dishonest occupant of the White House ever. He lies virtually every time he opens his mouth. He even continues to lie after he's been shown that what he said is a lie.
Compagno, however, characterizes Trump's fountain of falsehoods as his attempts to provide access and transparency. But putting out emails that are demonstrably false, and babbling on social media "every day, all day," is not how you keep people apprised of what you're doing. Particularly if what you're putting out is pure bullpucky. To the contrary, that's how you deceive simpletons who want to be misled.
It's also how you steamroll the press to keep them from getting substantive answers to critical questions. That's what Compagno was referring to when she said that "the media can't keep up." It's Trump's way of "flooding the zone with bullshit" (as his partner in crime Steve Bannon says) as a deflection tactic.
So while Trump is yammering about renaming the Gulf of Mexico, or banning paper straws, he is also advancing his agenda to cut taxes for the rich (paid for by cutting Social Security and Medicare), curtailing Constitutional rights, and assuming tyrannical control over the government.
Finally, it's telling that Compagno admits that "we're not looking to them for the news anyway." Of course not. Why would the leading distorter of news look to actual journalists for news when they are busy making it up themselves? Or more accurately according to her own admission, transcribing it from their messiah.
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