I’m Michael A. Cohen, and this is Truth and Consequences: A no-holds-barred look at the absurdities, hypocrisies, and surreality of American politics. If you were sent this email or are a free subscriber and would like to subscribe, you can sign up here.
Just a quick reminder that I’ll be Zoom Chatting today at 12:30. The link is here.
Also, I’m taking my kids on vacation next week in Portugal, so I likely won’t be posting as much.
Liars and Hypocrites
Yesterday’s filing in the Dominion Voting Systems lawsuit against Fox News is simply astonishing.
Newly disclosed messages and testimony from some of the biggest stars and most senior executives at Fox News revealed that they privately expressed disbelief about President Donald J. Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, even though the network continued to promote many of those lies on the air.
The hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham, as well as others at the company, repeatedly insulted and mocked Trump advisers, including Sidney Powell and Rudolph W. Giuliani, in text messages with each other in the weeks after the election, according to a legal filing on Thursday by Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion is suing Fox for defamation in a case that poses considerable financial and reputational risk for the country’s most-watched cable news network.
“Sidney Powell is lying by the way. I caught her. It’s insane,” Mr. Carlson wrote to Ms. Ingraham on Nov. 18, 2020.
Ms. Ingraham responded: “Sidney is a complete nut. No one will work with her. Ditto with Rudy.”
Mr. Carlson continued, “Our viewers are good people and they believe it,” he added, making clear that he did not.
It’s worth paging through the entire document because it is simply one extraordinary and enraging revelation after another. For example, on a group chat between Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham, Carlson demanded that Fox White House reporter Jacqui Heinrich be fired because she had fact-checked a tweet by Donald Trump spreading election lies.
It’s not that Carlson believed Trump’s claims; he was worried about the impact on Fox. “It's measurably hurting the company,” he said. “The stock price is down. Not a joke.” While Heinrich wasn’t fired, she took down the tweet (how she can continue to work at Fox — or why any viewer would trust her work — after this revelation is beyond me).
This is perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the Dominion filing: Fox continued to push Trump’s election disinformation because they wanted to win back the confidence of conservative viewers, who were enraged that on Election Night, Fox had called the state of Arizona for Biden. Trump was so angry about Fox’s actions that he started encouraging his supporters to watch Newsmax. Enabling Trump’s election mania was a cynical and purposeful effort to soothe the hurt feelings of his supporters and boost Fox’s ratings. In short, Fox executives knew exactly what they were doing in spreading 2020 election lies.
Indeed, Suzanne Scott, the CEO of Fox News, complained to the company’s director of corporate communications, Irena Briganti, that Fox had made the Arizona call and failed to protect the company’s brand.
When Neil Cavuto cut away from a White House press conference in which Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany made unsubstantiated allegations about election fraud, Fox executives complained of "the brand threat” from his actions.
Here are a few more shocking tidbits — these are executives talking about their own on-air talent.
The line about Lou Dobbs doing a more nuanced show that North Koreans is legitimately comedy gold.
Here are Fox executives and talent talking about Sidney Powell …
… and Rudy Guiliani
The major takeaway from this document (and I’ve barely scratched the surface of the cynicism of Fox executives and on-air talent) is that Fox News is nothing more than a propaganda mill selling snake oil to its viewers. It is not a news organization. It has no allegiance to any journalistic ethics, and its executives and on-air talent have no moral compass. I honestly can’t imagine how any self-respecting journalist can continue to work for an organization that operates like this.
Today In Bob Dylan
Here’s a lovely cover of “You’re A Big Girl Now” from the Australian singer Emma Swift.