During his Monday night monologue, Fox News Channel host Tucker Carlson stated the blunt, honest truth that, from CNN to The Washington Post, many in the liberal media see it as their life’s mission to not only shut down Fox News (and we would add like-minded outlets), but send every last person who worked there to the unemployment lines.
“Their new idea is that this channel shouldn't be allowed. No, they're not arguing that Fox News is inaccurate and dishonest and you shouldn't watch it. They're arguing that you shouldn't be able to watch Fox News because Fox News should be eliminated by force,” Carlson stated as he pivoted to the left’s new front in their love of censorship.
After reading a tweet from MSNBC regular Anand Giridharadas about how Fox News was supposedly illegal, Carlson went on a tear against the poisonous CNN and how, as a “direct competitor” of FNC, “they would love one less news channel on the dial.”
He added that, as part of this fight, Jeff “dwarf king” Zucker “summoned a pair of his most pliable minions up from the cellar and turned them loose” on Reliable Sources “to explain that, actually, allowing people to watch what they want to watch on TV is a massive threat to democracy.”
Following a montage of clips from Brian Stelter’s show, Carlson mocked CNNers for their use of “existential” and tied in the calls from Fox-hating Post columnist Max Boot and Margaret Sullivan insisting FNC shouldn’t be allowed to exist because, if they’re taken out, America could then move forward with honest debate (click “expand”):
CARLSON: No, it's existential, it's existential, existential. Now, you should know that no one on CNN has ever been asked to spell or define the word existential. The day that happens is the day they stop using the word. Instead, they called in reinforcements from Jeff Bezos, who you should also know has expressed interest in buying CNN because, of course, Bezos' employee Margaret Sullivan at The Washington Post wrote an entire column about how the continued existence of a single news channel that, at times, disagrees with all the other news channels is, you guessed it, a threat to democracy. That's too much choice. That's not democratic. “Corporations that advertise on Fox News should walk away,” Sullivan wrote, “and citizens who care about the truth should demand that they do so.” Again, Margaret Sullivan didn't ask people to stop watching Fox News, she asked for us to be unemployed. Her colleague, Max Boot, agreed with that. Max Boot also labors for Jeff Bezos at The Washington Post. Noticing a theme here? When you work for the world's richest man, people tend to listen to you when you call for government officials to crush dissent. That's not a small thing.
BOOT [on CNN Newsroom, 01/19/21]: And there's also I think, the possibility of reviving the Fairness Doctrine, which the F.C.C. enforced until 1987 and which mandated some minimal standards of factuality and balance on the part of TV stations, and since that's disappeared, it's just been a complete free for all with all sorts of lunacy being fed directly into the right-wing ecosystem.
CARLSON: Max Boot. Ladies and gentlemen, on the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine is pretty amusing, ignoring the fact that the Fairness Doctrine does not even apply to cable news since the U.S. government doesn't own the cable lines. Well, what you should consider is the idea that Max Boot just explained that it's, “unfair” for one news outlet to disagree with every other news outlet in the country. So diversity of opinion is unfair. Sameness is fair. That's why it should be mandatory. It's inclusive. Hilarious. In addition to everything else, you may have figured this out already, these people are stupid. Of course, they're stupid. That's why our country's in trouble, because the people who run our country can't find their butts with both hands. Max Boot has no choice but to work at The Washington Post. No self-respecting landscaping company would have Max Boot. But that doesn't mean Max Boot won't win. It's a mistake to imagine that simply because an idea is wrong or stupid or immoral, that it cannot prevail, at least for a while. Of course, it can prevail.
Carlson also brought up MSNBC’s Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough as yet another person calling for the heads of Fox News staffers, but made sure to throw some shade: “Look up animal cunning in the dictionary and you will find Joe Scarborough's picture. What Joe Scarborough is, is a herd animal, he's flexible. If all the kids are doing it, he wants a seat on the bus. He wants in.”
A few minutes later, the FNC host pulled back to speak about his own show (which would include man on the right) and brought up the frightening comments that a former Facebook executive made on CNN (click “expand”):
CARLSON: We're not fascists or for that matter, middle-aged performers running away from their own consciences. We're Americans. We think people we disagree with should still be allowed to talk in public. The tech monopolies have never believed that. They're not American companies. They're global conglomerates that don't answer to voters. They're more powerful than our government at this point. You should know. Last week on CNN, the former chief security officer at Facebook — how’s that title strike you — a man called Alex Stamos said all of this out loud.
STAMOS [on CNN’s Reliable Sources, 01/17/21]: It’s really hard because what’s happening is people are able to seek out the information that makes them feel good. That is what happening — you know, people have so much choice now. They can choose what their news sources are. They can choose what influencers they want to follow. We have to turn down the capability of these conservative influencers to reach these huge audiences. There are people on YouTube, for example, that have a larger data — larger audience than daytime CNN, and they are extremely radical and pushing extremely radical views.
CARLSON: So in the name of democracy — clearly the term of the moment — in the defense of the people's will, we must censor people and make certain that individuals can't read and hear what they choose to read and hear. At least they're being honest about it. Information is power. They want the power. Therefore, they must control the information and so they are. That's what's happening. We told you a moment ago that nobody seems to be fighting back against this tide of repression, but that's not entirely true.
Carlson concluded with a quote from Fox founder Rupert Murdoch about the increasing hostility to opposing views:
For those of us in the media, there is a real challenge to confront: a wave of censorship that seeks to silence conversation, to stifle debate, to ultimately stop individuals and societies from realizing their potential. This rigidly enforced conformity, aided and abetted by so-called social media, is a straitjacket on sensibility. Too many people have fought too hard in too many places for freedom of speech to be suppressed by this awful woke orthodoxy.
For his part, Carlson concurred with the term “awful woke orthodoxy” as “[t]here is nothing worse for the country or for journalism” and thus there’s “[n]o wonder they hate us.”
To see the relevant FNC transcript from January 25, click “expand.”
FNC’s Tucker Carlson Tonight
January 26, 2021
8:10 p.m. EasternTUCKER CARLSON: Once politicians attempt to control what you believe, they are no longer politicians. They are by definition dictators. If they succeed and controlling what you believe then you are no longer a citizen. You are not a free man, you are a slave. So, yes, Tom Friedman, it's frightening. It's everywhere all of a sudden. No one is pushing back. Instead, they have all — almost everyone of them — join the mob of sensors, hysterics and Jacobin destroyers are working on behalf of entrenched power to take total control of everything. Overstatement? No, it's not. Their new idea is that this channel shouldn't be allowed. No, they're not arguing that Fox News is inaccurate and dishonest and you shouldn't watch it. They're arguing that you shouldn't be able to watch Fox News because Fox News should be eliminated by force. A few days ago, a former New York Times columnist, Anand Giridharadas, posted this question on Twitter, quote, “Should Fox News be allowed to exist?” No, he quickly concluded: Fox News, “shouldn't be legal.” No one online seemed especially surprised by this view. Among a certain group, it is a gathering consensus. CNN certainly agrees with it. CNN is our direct competitor, of course. So you might imagine they would recuse themselves from this conversation. But just the opposite. CNN is staring down the barrel of some pretty lean years ratings wise. Now that their reason for existing has departed from Mar-a-Lago, they would love one less news channel on the dial. So over the weekend, the dwarf king summoned a pair of his most pliable minions up from the cellar and turned them loose to explain that, actually, allowing people to watch what they want to watch on TV is a massive threat to democracy.
[STELTER CLIPS]
CARLSON: No, it's existential, it's existential, existential. Now, you should know that no one on CNN has ever been asked to spell or define the word existential. The day that happens is the day they stop using the word. Instead, they called in reinforcements from Jeff Bezos, who you should also know has expressed interest in buying CNN because, of course, Bezos' employee Margaret Sullivan at The Washington Post wrote an entire column about how the continued existence of a single news channel that, at times, disagrees with all the other news channels is, you guessed it, a threat to democracy. That's too much choice. That's not democratic. “Corporations that advertise on Fox News should walk away,” Sullivan wrote, “and citizens who care about the truth should demand that they do so.” Again, Margaret Sullivan didn't ask people to stop watching Fox News, she asked for us to be unemployed. Her colleague, Max Boot, agreed with that. Max Boot also labors for Jeff Bezos at The Washington Post. Noticing a theme here? When you work for the world's richest man, people tend to listen to you when you call for government officials to crush dissent. That's not a small thing.
MAX BOOT [on CNN Newsroom, 01/19/21]: And there's also I think, the possibility of reviving the Fairness Doctrine, which the F.C.C. enforced until 1987 and which mandated some minimal standards of factuality and balance on the part of TV stations, and since that's disappeared, it's just been a complete free for all with all sorts of lunacy being fed directly into the right-wing ecosystem.
CARLSON: Max Boot. Ladies and gentlemen, on the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine is pretty amusing, ignoring the fact that the Fairness Doctrine does not even apply to cable news since the U.S. government doesn't own the cable lines. Well, what you should consider is the idea that Max Boot just explained that it's, “unfair” for one news outlet to disagree with every other news outlet in the country. So diversity of opinion is unfair. Sameness is fair. That's why it should be mandatory. It's inclusive. Hilarious. In addition to everything else, you may have figured this out already, these people are stupid. Of course, they're stupid. That's why our country's in trouble, because the people who run our country can't find their butts with both hands. Max Boot has no choice but to work at The Washington Post. No self-respecting landscaping company would have Max Boot. But that doesn't mean Max Boot won't win. It's a mistake to imagine that simply because an idea is wrong or stupid or immoral, that it cannot prevail, at least for a while. Of course, it can prevail. History is filled with examples of this. New Coke was a real beverage. The French Revolution actually happened, so we should be worried when large numbers of people start saying irrational things and they definitely are sayin them. Joe Scarborough as a morning show over on MSNBC. Joe Scarborough isn't stupid, hardly. Look up animal cunning in the dictionary and you will find Joe Scarborough's picture. What Joe Scarborough is, is a herd animal, he's flexible. If all the kids are doing it, he wants a seat on the bus. He wants in. Watch Joe Scarborough explain the people who appear on Fox News need to be forced to shut up immediately.
[SCARBOROUGH CLIP]
CARLSON: Oh, I'm saying this for Fox News sponsors, so how honest do you want to be here? The man you just saw has been accused in public by the President of the United States of murdering a young woman. Not many cable news hosts can say that. Now, we're not taking a position on Joe Scarborough's guilt or innocence in that case, we're not a law enforcement agency. It's not our place to do that. But one thing we did not do and would never do is go on TV to demand that because Joe Scarborough was accused of violence by a politician, American companies should not be allowed to sell their products to his viewers. Doing that never even occurred to us. Not for a second. We're not fascists or for that matter, middle-aged performers running away from their own consciences. We're Americans. We think people we disagree with should still be allowed to talk in public. The tech monopolies have never believed that. They're not American companies. They're global conglomerates that don't answer to voters. They're more powerful than our government at this point. You should know. Last week on CNN, the former chief security officer at Facebook — how’s that title strike you — a man called Alex Stamos said all of this out loud.
ALEX STAMOS [on CNN’s Reliable Sources, 01/17/21]: It’s really hard because what’s happening is people are able to seek out the information that makes them feel good. That is what happening — you know, people have so much choice now. They can choose what their news sources are. They can choose what influencers they want to follow. We have to turn down the capability of these conservative influencers to reach these huge audiences. There are people on YouTube, for example, that have a larger data — larger audience than daytime CNN, and they are extremely radical and pushing extremely radical views.
CARLSON: So in the name of democracy — clearly the term of the moment — in the defense of the people's will, we must censor people and make certain that individuals can't read and hear what they choose to read and hear. At least they're being honest about it. Information is power. They want the power. Therefore, they must control the information and so they are. That's what's happening. We told you a moment ago that nobody seems to be fighting back against this tide of repression, but that's not entirely true. This weekend, Rupert Murdoch, the man who started this company, won an award from a foundation in the U.K. and here's part of what he said when he accepted it. “For those of us in the media, there is a real challenge to confront: a wave of censorship that seeks to silence conversation, to stifle debate, to ultimately stop individuals and societies from realizing their potential. This rigidly enforced conformity, aided and abetted by so-called social media, is a straitjacket on sensibility. Too many people have fought too hard in too many places for freedom of speech to be suppressed by this awful woke orthodoxy.” This awful woke orthodoxy. Now, we don't quote our boss on the show very often, ever, actually, but that is exactly right. Awful woke orthodoxy is precisely what this is. There is nothing worse for the country or for journalism by the way. Every publisher, every owner of every media company should be saying this in public every single day, but they're not only ours is. No wonder they hate us.
