Although I was married to an attorney for a number of years, I myself am not a lawyer, I am completely unlettered in the field. And yet even I, a complete naif, know that the First Rule of Writ Club is to never, ever put a witness on the stand -- or on teevee -- and ask them a question to which you do not already know the answer.
Itinerant hack-for-rent Howie Kurtz apparently never hearda such.
Here is the result (h/t Crooks and Liars):
The primary viewership for Fox News are old, cranky, poorly-informed white people who want those nice young men and ladies on the teevee machine to be perky and well-groomed and tell them just what they want to hear. To slightly misquote General Sternwood from "The Big Sleep", Fox News viewers exist largely on faux-controversy heat like a new born spider, and as such must be induced to keep right on believing that what they are getting from Fox News is the rill dill (to slightly misquote Sarah Palin) -- the Pure Quill, unfiltered by all of those Libruls who secretly control the media.
They must continue to believe in the immersive fiction of the superiority of their information, rather than the ugly reality that they are cage-fed morons mindlessly sucking down raw Conservative propaganda laced with news-flavored gobbets of bullshit. And as such, nothing that reminds them that Fox News is a ruthlessly for-profit enterprise can be allowed to get in front of the camera. It all falls apart otherwise, which is why any business which is built on illusion knows that the illusion must be maintained at all times.
It's the reason why the actions and movements of Disney theme-park actors are so carefully choreographed.
And its the reason you do not put someone in front of a Fox News camera who knows damn well how the business of making of the teevee sausage works and is delighted at the chance to slap the smug off of Mitah Kurtz's face and tell his audience the real rill dill.
13 comments:
I don't like TMZ. I think in general they're a bunch of vultures but that interview with Howie is worth the crappy, waste of oxygen gossip. I've never seen Kurtz look so taken aback. He's such a tool.
If nothing else, TMZ IS the new media.
Celebrity gossip and non-stories intermixed with "look at this awful picture/video and become outraged".
No policy discussion. No information. No substance.
It is TMZ's world now.
All Hail FreeMarket™
Mahhh-velous. I *never* would have seen that and believe me, that was worth the whole day -- nay, week -- of fucked up news on the internet tubez just to see that shocked look on Howie's face when he was stripped nekkid and had his smug ass flown out their flapping in the breeze for all to watch and snicker. BY TMZ!!!one!! hahahahaha
Thanks, D r i f t.
A fine example of why you never try to bullshit a bullshitter. Exquisite.
--Nonny Mouse
*wow*
speechless... that was pure gold.
Bonus points to HL for his incredibly successful FILIBUSTERING of wHoward, who could barely get a word in (only to get slapped back down every time he did). Just as the reConThugs always do when they're on the air with - or should I say against - anyone less than fully right-leaning or supportive of their lies/talking pts.
Anyway there's another person who will never, ever, Evar(!!1!) get invited onto Faux...
Thx for sharing that, DG!
- Mike from CA
Hi Drifty
Can't resist..."Mistah Kurtz...he dead." For better or worse (mostly worse) Levin exists at the level that tabloid journalism has become and Kurtz (who must believe that he covers journalism as it existed in the past or as an ideal in his mind, I'm really not sure) thought he was going to "expose" TMZ when in fact it was Kurtz who was exposed as a hypocrite on his own rotten show on the worst network. Great teevee, I say.
-SouthSide GT
Didn't Lee Camp do something similar s couple of years ago?
-Doug in Oakland
OOOoh,
I think Kurtz was edu-macated of the point on "not asking a question you do not know the answer-in legaleeze.
Kurtz experience ego failure!
He is on the FOX. He makes the big Murdoch bucks.
The mistake really came when his TMZ guest's honor was dissed by Kurtz. You know the "put you down to elevate me" self esteeming.
Kurtz dissed TMZ as a business and his guest took it personal enough to swallow the right colored pill and wake up out of the FOX-matrix.
Kurtz continued to re-fail thinking his FOX Snark would out weigh Levin's defense of business honor.
Now I do not make a habit of watching FECES DROP, so I am unfamiliar with Kurtz' show.
But why didn't Howie employ the "CUT HIS MIC" as Fox has a corporate policy of doing?
As getting through Rush's screener to punk Rush on air. I expect FOX will be experiencing this sort of snafu more often in the future.
That video made my day. It's about time we hear truth about the mainslime media.
To honor a TV great of yore, "How s-weet it is!"
I've been waiting for that pretentious to get it. To see it done by a guy who wades through bullshit every day makes it better.
Sitting in a cocoon of the beltway is not reporting. It's regurgitation.
"I'm just throwing it out there."
Uh, remind me which one is supposed to be the professional newsman and which is the gossip-monger?
There's an excellent article in WIRED by James Bamford interviewing Edward Snowden.
http://www.wired.com/2014/08/edward-snowden/#ch-2
Stuff like this and the Snowden story suggest the wheels are coming off some of the right wing's fantasy future. Reality's a bitch.
Incidentally, one of the things that surprised and dismayed Snowden was the incompetency (and servile corruption) of many of his superiors as well as how obsolete much of the equipment was.
Fox News is not a for-profit enterprise. If it were to turn out that liberal messaging makes money and conservative messaging loses billions, Fox News would be conservative.
The whole media hates making money. A strong liberal on TV stating simple truth would create the shock and controversy and yelling the media claims to love, yet it's never allowed. If the media wanted to make money, it would stop doing the stupid crap it does that loses money.
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