Philip Bump: Why Sean Hannity's dishonesty matters

[Nevilledog]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/12/22/fox-news-hannity-trump-2020-election/

No paywall
https://archive.vn/ZpswE

Objective observers should have dismissed the credibility of attorney Sidney Powell within moments of her taking the microphone at a news conference held shortly after the 2020 election.

This was the news conference centered on President Donald Trump’s crumbling effort to retain power at which Rudy Giuliani’s hair leaked, a cramped, bizarre affair held at the national headquarters of the Republican Party in D.C. And despite the stratospheric bizarreness of Giuliani’s unstable claims about the security of the presidential election two weeks before, Powell managed to rocket right past him.

What had happened, see, was that voting machines were corrupted by [insert a mishmash of claims looping in the internet, dead Venezuelan dictators, various other communists, “algorithms” and a cabal of Democratic actors]. It was so ludicrous that when someone in the audience asked Powell if a server had been seized in Germany — a newly emergent claim based on one tweet and picked up by One America News — Powell sagely confirmed the report, adding that she didn’t know “whether good guys got it or bad guys got it.” Sure.

That was on Nov. 19, 2020. By the end of the day, Powell was entirely discredited.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson reached out to Powell to invite her on his show. Sure, he told viewers, he was skeptical, but “we don’t dismiss anything anymore, particularly when it’s related to technology.” He noted that his show had covered UFOs, mostly because other shows wouldn’t. “There’s evidence that a lot of things that responsible people use to dismiss out of hand as ridiculous are in fact real,” he said.

*snip*

[gratuitous]

1. We used to know that there were unstable individuals out there

And that irresponsible speculation could trigger one or more of these unfortunates to take matters into their own hands. Call it self-censorship if you must, but people with a national platform like Tuckums or Buckethead need to be circumspect with their language. But they aren't, because they're seeing the results they want to see: People with poor impulse control set loose among the populace to terrorize. They rein it in from time to time when the violence strikes a little too close to home, but as soon as they aren't skeered anymore, they're right back to egging on their audience, hoping to spark the next incident.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

2. Actually, I think the result Tucker wants to see ... is money to pay his salary

Clicks, eyeballs, ratings.

They have a pathetic, hateful, and basically captive audience with a need to be filled with the kind of titillating fake news he provides.

MHO, in Carlson's case.

There's others who outright desire a violent result as you suggest, but they're much lower down the MAGA food chain. Or named Bannon or Miller or Jones.

[grumpyduck]

4. "a pathetic, hateful, and basically captive audience"

Don't forget arrogantly ignorant.

(I think you and I were typing at the same time)

[Hugh_Lebowski]

5. GMTA

[grumpyduck]

3. I don't know that it's necessarily to egg their audience on,

or just to keep them coming back so they can have large audiences and charge high prices for ads. Considering what I've seen about Faux and their viewers over the last couple of years, I suspect the latter.

IOW, and IMHO, I believe these Faux talking heads (and their overall boss) are fucking asshole prick PoSs who would sell their own mothers for the money. They found a niche and they're exploiting it regardless of the damage it's causing.

[Samrob]

6. FOX and Friends and Tucker and Hannity should be sued into oblivion. nt