Worse than Russian propaganda
by digby
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that there isn't much difference:
CNN’s top executive on Thursday tore into Fox News, accusing the network of harming America and comparing it to Russian propaganda.
Asked at Financial Times’ “Future of News” conference about how CNN’s ratings stack up against Fox’s, CNN president Jeff Zucker offered some of his sharpest criticism of the rival cable-news network to date.
The CNN chief specifically cited former Fox News analyst Ret. Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, who quit the network this week and sent a note to colleagues lamenting Fox’s transformation into a “propaganda machine.”
Zucker concurred, adding that Fox’s pro-Trump turn has “shocked” him. Russia’s state-run television outlets, he remarked, “has nothing” on Fox News.
"It is really state-run TV, it is a pure propaganda machine, and does an incredible disservice to this country,” Zucker said of Fox News.
He added: “There are a handful of good journalists there, but I think they are lost in a complete propaganda machine, and the idea that they’re a news channel is not the case at all.”
He is obviously being self-serving but he isn't wrong. Fox has gone completely nuts and that's saying a lot considering where they started. But really, if you don't watch the channel regularly as I am forced to do, you probably don't fully understand just how batshit crazy they are.
They reflect the general lunacy of their audience and shine it back on them. They've always done that. But they no longer see the utility in maintaining a pretense of being a legitimate news They've decided that they are just going to be Trump TV and entertain the king with flattery and praise. And it's having a real world impact with Trump hiring the sycophantic, brown-nosers he sees on the "shows" to come into the White House. (Both his hires this week, DiGenova and Bolton are regulars.)
The network has changed a lot since Roger Ailes passed on. And by that I mean it's gotten even worse. It's destroying our country at a faster rate than ever.
