(DON THOMPSON / iNFOnews.ca)

OPINION

Some deceitful actions are heinous enough to forever tie a perpetrator to a behaviour. A Ponzi Scheme - fraudulently luring investors and paying an overly generous return to earlier investors with funds from recent investors - is named after Charles Ponzi, who perfected that scheme in the 1920s, swindling people out of $300 million.

The efforts to overthrow the duly elected president of the United States - Joesph R. Biden Jr - in 2020 was led by Donald Trump and his political minions, but Rupert Murdoch and Fox News fuelled the fire.

Murdoch and his band of calculating and greed-driven associates lied before, during and after the election. They deliberately lied to Right Wing viewers of Fox News…including the so-called Big Lie…out of fear of alienating viewers and ultimately losing hundreds of millions of dollars.

They knew - all of them - from anchors to producers to fact checkers that there was no widespread fraud in the 2020 election…and that Donald Trump didn’t win. Their emails to each other prove it. They lied - scandalously - thousands of times. Why? Because they believed in Trump? Oh, no…not at all.

Those of us who have worked as executives at publicly-held corporations know one thing if nothing else about corporate life: keeping the company’s stock price high is the most important objective…always.

And if you can keep 70 million to 100 million viewers watching by pandering to them…and ensure the stock price stays high…the self-interests of Fox employees and shareholders are served. Democracy…not so much.

So, maybe future corporate actions based on lies that threaten democracy or the overthrow of a democratic government will become known as a “Rupert” or “Murdoch” or “Fox”…who knows? It would, however, be Karma.

The day the trial was to start - April 18 - the case was settled with Fox paying $787.5 million. There was no “apology” or “admission of guilt” by Fox…but even these dolts were afraid to drag this case - with ample evidence and witnesses - through the courts.

You can’t blame Dominion for settling. The company and its employees had been damaged…and even if they had won the case against Fox…with appeals they wouldn’t have not seen a check for three or four years. As you read this, Dominion has cashed that $787.5 million check.

Had the case gone to trial, Dominion had to prove that Fox knowingly spread false information or did so with reckless disregard for the truth. In other words, prove Fox had reason to believe that the information it broadcast was false.

A trove of evidence - including emails, messages and recordings - weighed heavily against Fox, which feared losing viewers despite being the most-watched basic cable network in primetime for March (2.26 million). Fox has been the top-rated cable news network in total viewers and among Adults 25-54 for 25 months.

Fox News fans and Republicans - pretty much one and the same - have become conditioned to resisting facts, truths and legal rulings over the past decade. The great majority of Fox viewers will likely see this settlement as simply more “fake news.”

Rupert Murdoch - in his sworn deposition for the settled case - actually conceded that his top hosts endorsed election lies on the air that he knew were false. This - legal experts say - would have been a key point to the question of “actual malice” and Fox’s potential legal liability.

But Fox is far from out of the woods…several lawsuits remain, including one against the Fox Corporation, the parent of Fox News, as well as those against individuals with Fox Corporation and Fox News.

Will these liars have learned their lesson? Of course not! Fox News will continue - albeit with a sharper eye toward avoiding lawsuits - to lie and serve as the propaganda arm of the Republican cult.

But you know, that’s okay. Eventually Americans and people worldwide will see that Fox News and Rupert Murdoch and, indeed, today’s conspiring Republicans, have become synonymous with undermining democracy.

What they do will one day be a “Rupert” or a “Murdoch” or a “Fox”…no matter what.

— Don Thompson, an American awaiting Canadian citizenship, lives in Vernon and in Florida. In a career that spans more than 40 years, Don has been a working journalist, a speechwriter and the CEO of an advertising and public relations firm. A passionate and compassionate man, he loves the written word as much as fine dinners with great wines.

We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor.

News from © iNFOnews, 2023