O.J. Simpson, Bill O'Reilly, the Fox Network, Rupert Murdoch - [Vanity]

November 16, 2006 | snarks_when_bored

[snarks_when_bored]

 

A few minutes ago, Bill O'Reilly spent the first two segments of his Fox News Channel program, The O'Reilly Factor, condemning the upcoming Fox Network interview program featuring O.J. Simpson's quasi-confession to murdering Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman. O'Reilly's guests criticized Simpson, Judith Regan, Harper-Collins Books, and the Fox Network. O'Reilly also criticized Simpson and threatened to personally stop buying any products of companies sponsoring the program. However, O'Reilly himself did not criticize Regan by name, nor did he himself make a single negative remark about the Fox Network for broadcasting the interview.

Also conspicuous in its absence was the name of Rupert Murdoch, the multi-billionaire media mogul who owns the Fox Network, the Fox News Channel, the New York Post, and many other media properties. It's virtually inconceivable that the Fox Network announced that it was airing the Simpson interview without first getting Rupert Murdoch's approval for so doing. Indeed, ask yourself this question: How likely is it that the Fox Network suits agreed to pay Simpson a reported $3.5 million and agreed to risk the reputation of the Fox Network brand without checking with Rupert first? I'd say the answer is clear: the likelihood is nil.

Rupert Murdoch knew about this program and Rupert Murdoch approved of its airing on the Fox Network. Why, then, should he skate on this issue? Where are the stand-up guys at Fox News who are willing to call the big boss to account for giving this double-murdering monster, Simpson, the stage at the Fox Network, one of Murdoch's premier media outlets?

 

[snarks_when_bored]

The emperor has no clothes...

[snarks_when_bored]

Is it the case that all member-generated posts belong in General Chat? If so, I'll note that for future reference.

[Dick Bachert]

Guess O'Reilly has an iron-clad contract.

[snarks_when_bored]

Criticism of Rupert is grounds for dismissal? A 'no-biting-the-hand-that-feeds-you' clause? Could be...

[RKBA Democrat]

Pardon my cynicism, but I think it's just marketing. One of the best ways to sell a book is to get someone, somewhere to ban it. Conversely, one of the better ways to ensure that people watch a TV program is to generate some controversy about it.

There is rarely any such thing as bad publicity.

[snarks_when_bored]

Oh, I agree that all of this discussion is hyping the program. But my specific point was to note the apparent invisibility cloak that Rupert Murdoch is wearing through all of this. Why should his billions shield him from criticism for his willingness to immolate morality on the altar of ratings? It's pathetic.

[rightwingintelligentsia]

Did anyone just see Mark Fuhrman tear into Alan Colmes on H&C on this subject?

[snarks_when_bored]

Yes, I just saw that. Good for Mark Fuhrman...Colmes was plain wrong (as he often is, unfortunately). Sean Hannity tried to deflect some of Fuhrman's anger, defending his (Hannity's) publisher, Harper-Collins, and his (Hannity's) editor, Judith Regan, and even the airing of the interview. To his credit, Fuhrman distanced himself from Harper-Collins, even though that company published his book. Props to Mark Fuhrman, although I'd like for him to have mentioned Rupert Murdoch's name...

[jazusamo]

Here's something that I haven't heard anyone bring up yet. The Medford, OR Fox affiliate has just said they won't run the OJ interviews. There could be many more affiliates that do the same thing.

Local Fox station won't show Simpson interview (4:55 p.m.)

The Medford Fox television affiliate, KMVU-TV, won’t air a two-part interview with O.J. Simpson promoting his book, “If I Did It.”

The exclusive interview with Simpson by publisher Judith Regan is set to air on the Fox network nationwide Nov. 27 and 29.

“We have the right at this station to choose to run it or not,” said Cary Jones, KMVU’s general manager. “The decision was really easy. I don’t want to contribute one iota to the promotion of his book or keeping him in the spotlight.”

Substitute programs will be announced later, but Jones said he was considering extra episodes of “The Simpsons.”

“We like the good Simpsons, not that Simpson,” he said.

[snarks_when_bored]

Thanks, I hadn't seen that report. Could be the start of something good...

[RKBA Democrat]

"Why should his billions shield him from criticism for his willingness to immolate morality on the altar of ratings? It's pathetic."

The one network that is (arguably) most likely to criticize his actions is not going to bite the hand that feeds.

[snarks_when_bored]

Based on what we've seen this evening, it's hard to disagree...

[NorCalRepub]

both Hannity and Colmes looked like idiots in that interview...only Fuhrman was the rational one

[snarks_when_bored]

Yes, indeed.

[Dont Mention the War]

It's generally not a good idea to publicly attack your own boss, or your boss's boss, if you yourself wish to remain employed.

[snarks_when_bored]

That's true in most areas of business life. But news is news, and not to report it, or to skew it with ideology, is the newsperson's cardinal sin. It's possible that we see exemplified here a collision of personal interest—keeping oneself in the good graces of the boss, or even keeping one's job—and professional responsibility—reporting what is the case as the case, without regard for personal consequences.

[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]

my specific point was to note the apparent invisibility cloak that Rupert Murdoch is wearing through all of this

I may be a bit naive about this, but my opinion is that all of this stuff is far below Murdoch's level in decision making. I doubt that he watches over Judith Regan's shoulder on which books to publish, or oversees individual shows on the Fox Network. In another interview on O'Reilly, it was brought up that ABC and Barbara Walters had been offered the Simpson interview and had passed. It therefore seems that the decision on the book and on the show were separately made and related only by the generally tabloid and sensational tone of Murdoch's businesses in Australia, Britain, the U.S. and around the world!

[IIntense]

Wow, did I! I turned off the TV two minutes ago when the interview ended (in my time zone). Is Colmes's job title "Devil's Advocate", "Dense" or "Dunce"?

Whichever it is, Fuerman wasn't having any of it. He responded to Allen's stupid questions and comments with intelligence along with obvious annoyance.

Before the interview was over, Allen managed to get in his obviously planned question regarding Fuerman's past racist comment(s) which were brought up in the trial.

Fuerman wouldn't bite, and ended up telling Allen: "You have a chip on your shoulder".

Colmes belongs to the 1/1000th% of the population who believes OJ is innocent.

Hannity entertains the idea that Simpson's conscience has been bothering him these many years...ergo the TV appearance and the book.

Fuerman, countered with the experience he's had for years dealing with sociopaths. They can commit murder and then go to Kentucky Fried Chicken or have a beer afterwords.

Someone with a reasonable degree of intelligence would define "Kentucky Fried Chicken", in this instance, to mean the perp had no feelings of guilt and stopped at a fast-food place, or wherever, to grab a bite.

But not ALLEN COLMES! In his weird little excuse for a brain, he interpreted Fuerman's comment as racist...chicken? black people?

Unbelievable!

[snarks_when_bored]

I don't think the executives at the Fox Network would take the responsibility for this on their own...there's too much money involved and too much risk to the brand. In my view, Rupert Murdoch would've been consulted. This is my conjecture, of course, based on my assessment of likelihood and my distant knowledge of Murdoch's managerial style.

But even if Rupert Murdoch wasn't consulted before the interview was done and Simpson was paid and Regan was paid and advertising/publicity was prepared and then disseminated, he certainly has known about it for a couple of days now and at any time would've been in a position to cancel the broadcast of the 2-part (!) interview. To my knowledge, that hasn't happened. That makes him a responsible party, too, in my view. It's his network and the buck(s) stop with him. And somebody at Fox News (or elsewhere) should at least mention this fact.

[at bay]

" The Medford, OR Fox affiliate has just said they won't run the OJ interviews"

And you'll never be stopped for no reason in a roadblock in Oregon either. This little town is looking better and better.

[rightwingintelligentsia]

I couldn't believe Alan seizing on the KFC reference--it's amazing how liberals can't go five minutes without playing the race card. A sure sign of intellectual desperation.

[RKBA Democrat]

"Based on what we've seen this evening, it's hard to disagree..."

Owning the media has it's advantages.

[Cordio]

Judith Regan did exactly the right thing. I will not read his book or watch the interview since I already know OJ is guilty but by doing this interview she exposes the hypocrisy of the 'law' and the lawyers and the court system to abort justice. The most culpable I believe is the female judge who gave his two children back to him to raise. What hope do those children have for happiness and normalcy.
I also know about people who seemingly are leaders in their profession and 'look good on the outside', even Christian but are so disfigured emotionally that under cover of their outward goodness, in secrecy try and often achieve doing great harm to others. All of this took courage on her part. She also points out that no one criticises those who interviewed the Menendez brothers, Castro, Manson, etc.
I think she should be thanked.
Cordio

[snarks_when_bored]

Owning the media has it's advantages.

Yep. Rupert's going to skate on this...

[PghBaldy]

America is getting tired of it. I can tell from hearing from my lib friends, of all people. Conservatives need to rebut libs immediately when the race card is played. It helps to reveal what exactly is going on.

[SeaBiscuit]

Media Scum.. all of them.

[snarks_when_bored]

Well, well, well...two days after I started this thread, Rupert Murdoch's name suddenly surfaces in this Simpson interview fiasco, and Rupert's running scared, nowhere to be found.

Here's the November 18, 2006, New York Daily News cover story:

Rupe is in soup with troops
BY GEORGE RUSH and CORKY SIEMASZKO
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
Saturday, November 18th, 2006

Fox News firebrand Bill O'Reilly threatened yesterday to whack Rupert Murdoch in the wallet for promoting O.J. Simpson's how-I-murdered-my-wife book.

Vowing to boycott any company that advertises on Fox's two-part special hyping O.J.'s "If I Did It," O'Reilly declared: "If every American walked away from the O.J. garbage, it wouldn't happen."

"I'm not going to watch the Simpson show or even look at the book," he added. "If any company sponsors the TV program, I will not buy anything that company sells - ever."

Geraldo Rivera, another Fox News star, piled on and called the book "appalling."

"I will bash this project every minute I have the opportunity to bash this project," Rivera said.

Simpson's book is being published Nov. 30 by ReganBooks, which is named after its head, Judith Regan, and is an imprint in Murdoch's News Corp. - which also owns Fox broadcasting.

Faced with a fusillade of fury from even house conservatives like O'Reilly, the media titan cut and run from the controversy yesterday.

"I can't reach him today," Murdoch's spokesman, Howard Rubenstein, said. "I would have no comment for him."

A HarperCollins insider called that fair-and-balanced baloney and pointed out that Murdoch should have known what kind of gory garbage Regan was trying to foist on the public.

"I know that HarperCollins CEO Jane Friedman had to sign off on the O.J. book and I would think that she would have had to run it by Rupert, considering what a [bleep] storm it would create," the insider said. "Rupert's bottom line is making money."

But appalled advertisers were already running away in droves from the TV tie-in Regan is scheduled to host on Nov. 27 and 29 on Fox Broadcasting. And some Fox affiliates told the network they would not carry the special at all.

Bob Thompson, a Syracuse University professor and pop culture expert, said he's not sure whether this whole controversy wasn't ginned up to produce ratings for Fox.

"My theory has always been that Fox News and Fox Broadcasting are the perfect synergy," he said. "One produces this outrageous programming that pundits on the other channel can complain about."

In a rambling, eight-page statement which described being punched in the mug by a former lover, Regan defended her decision to publish the O.J. book and painted herself as a defender of battered women.

Regan insisted her sneaky plan behind Simpson's supposedly hypothetical homicide book was to extract from him a confession to murdering wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman in 1994.

Regan also suggests she is unfamiliar with the reported $3.5 million her company paid for the book, saying the deal was made with a "third party" and the money was supposed to go to Simpson's children.

"It's just amazing that she's trying to spin this as her revenge against her own abusers," the HarperCollins insider said.

Lisalyn Jacobs of Legal Momentum, one of the nation's oldest women's legal rights organization, said whatever Regan's motivations were "the notion that a company is going to assist Simpson in profiting off this murder is outrageous."

Cheryl O'Donnell of the National Network to End Domestic Violence said they have gotten "hundreds of calls from survivors and their families who are outraged and have been retraumatized simply by knowing this book is being published."

I especially relished this paragraph from the story:

"I know that HarperCollins CEO Jane Friedman had to sign off on the O.J. book and I would think that she would have had to run it by Rupert, considering what a [bleep] storm it would create," the insider said. "Rupert's bottom line is making money."

[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]

I know that Harper Collins CEO Jane Friedman had to sign off on the O.J. book and I would think that she would have had to run it by Rupert

So somebody who works for Harper Collins surmises that the head of the publisher has to go to the foreigner who heads a multi-national corporation to make decisions about how Americans would react to a controversial piece of American pop-culture?? I don't consider this exactly as solid proof. Also consider the source -- a tabloid newspaper directly competitive to the Murdoch New York Post.

[snarks_when_bored]

Yes, the Daily News is a competitor of the Post. But I think the story is wider than that now. And is it really believable that a multi-billionaire businessman can't be reached for comment? Murdoch's on the run, it seems...

[RKBA Democrat]

"Bob Thompson, a Syracuse University professor and pop culture expert, said he's not sure whether this whole controversy wasn't ginned up to produce ratings for Fox."

"My theory has always been that Fox News and Fox Broadcasting are the perfect synergy," he said. "One produces this outrageous programming that pundits on the other channel can complain about."

Give the man a prize!

This is all about marketing. This "controversy" will be forgotten about 3 weeks from now. The boycott, such as it is, will fizzle. And Mr. O'Reilly and Mr. Rivera will have used this tempest in a teapot to bolster their future credibility (and ratings) because, after all, they were willing to go up against their own boss on this. What's Mr. O'Reilly's marketing schtick again? "Who's looking out for you?"
With all respect, their boss Mr. Murdoch won't be running anywhere. Except maybe to the bank. Laughing all the way.

[snarks_when_bored]

A fitting coda to this whole smelly mess:

About time

Monday, November 20th, 2006

The big boss of the whole thing, Rupert Murdoch of News Corp., finally came out into the open yesterday because there was no longer anywhere for him to hide. Murdoch is smart enough to know what everybody knows, that there is no O.J. Simpson book unless he signs off on it, no Judith Regan interview with Simpson on the Fox television network, that this wasn't just on some shrill, grasping book publisher, it was on him.

There is an expression for this in Hollywood, where Murdoch is such a top guy now. There is only one person at the studio who can green-light a project this big, and it is the head of the studio and that means Rupert Murdoch himself.

Now he stops the book, "If I Did It," and stops Regan's television special. Murdoch stops a cockroach of a project not out of any sense of decency, but out of self-preservation, because in the last week or so he figured out that the stain of something like this wasn't just on Regan, it was on him, and wasn't going away anytime soon.

Murdoch stops it because the mud he likes on other people ended up on him this time and he didn't like it.

Here is what Murdoch said in a statement issued yesterday:

"I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project."

There are always splendid examples of people, famous or not, getting religion a little late in the church service. You will never find a better one than this. Still you want to say this to Murdoch: Now? Now it's an ill-considered project? When was it anything else? When was it anything besides something out of Murdoch's senior management to make the world a little dumber and a little lousier?

Murdoch's statement goes on this way:

"We are sorry for any pain this has caused the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson."

Now. They're sorry now.

But where was their conscience before this? You think Murdoch and senior management found out about this book last week when the first stories about it hit the newspapers and the rest of the media? Books don't get published like that, even when you have somebody like Regan telling you how noble it was all going to be, how she wanted all profits to go to O.J.'s children.

They say Murdoch will lose a million dollars or so on the 400,000 copies of "If I Did It" that don't make it to the bookstores.

And he will lose whatever the payout was to O.J. It is tipping money to the CEO of News Corp. The real cost here, to the sky, is to his reputation, even if he now wants the country to give him the game ball for calling the thing off.

"It's amazing that it ever got this far," a publishing executive who knows all the players said yesterday. "[Regan] must have whipsawed anybody who got in her way."

Now Murdoch says no to Regan, now he acts like this was some kind of outrage, because of the public's outrage over the past week, because of the outrage in this newspaper and other newspapers and even outrage from Murdoch's own news network.

"Judith Regan was always the Teflon Don of publishing," the same publishing guy said to me yesterday. "But they finally got her, too."

Regan has made too much money, from both good books and bad books, to be through in publishing. But she is through working for Murdoch, whatever anybody says. Maybe it doesn't happen today, or tomorrow, or even next week. But she's through. Because she has committed the one unforgivable sin in the world of somebody like Murdoch:

She has made him look bad, not just in front of the whole country this time, but in front of the world.

Regan never saw it playing out this way. In her mind, her self-obsessed view of things, she was going to walk away from this interview as the new Barbara Walters. She had gotten this "confession" out of O.J. and somehow didn't think people would notice, or care, that it was the same as going into business with him.

Why would she think that way? She had always gotten her way and now she got her way with Murdoch and she would take all the heat on O.J. because she thought she was going to be bigger than ever.

Then the only person who could stop her did. Murdoch didn't do it because a Fox affiliate in Green Bay wasn't going to put O.J. on television, didn't do it because Bill O'Reilly was mad at him, or because of his concern for the Brown and Goldman families or because some moral alarm finally sounded. He did it because the mud got him this time.

So he killed a bad book and a bad television show. You know what you call that with Rupert Murdoch?

A start.