Fox News: Hunter Biden, The Ye West Interview and President Biden is destroying Florida.
A condensed overview of 17 hours of Fox News for the week ending 10/9/22
The average Fox News viewer might think Ye (Kanye) West has suffered a horrible injustice, and that Hunter Biden is about to take down the entire Democrat establishment. They could also believe that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have made the recovery from Hurricane Ian much harder.
Fox fans might not realize that the month-long anti-government protests have expanded to the entire country of Iran. They could have missed the story about how a member of the Proud Boys pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy or that an investigation uncovered systemic emotional and sexual abuse in the National Women’s Soccer League.
As usual a Fox News viewer would miss out on quite a lot while being inundated with the same fear-mongering propaganda Fox spews out every week.
Last week was fairly typical for Fox News with the added bonus of an extended interview with what appeared to be person suffering from mental illness who wasn’t getting the treatment he desperately needed.
Shows covered for week ending 10/9/22
Fox & Friends - 1st hour
The Five
Jesse Watters Primetime
Tucker Carlson Tonight - Thursday and Friday only.
The Ye (Kanye) West Interview
Last week Tucker Carlson featured a two part interview with the artist formerly known as Kanye West, now known as Ye West. The interview was a response to an incident at a Paris fashion show that West threw together a last minute for his label Yeezey.
West showed up in a long-sleeved black shirt with the words “White Lives Matter” emblazoned across his back in large white block letters. He also appeared next to conservative pundit, and frequent Fox News guest, Candace Owens who wore her own version of the same shirt.
Several people at the event were outraged by West’s use of the slogan including Vogue editor-at-large Gabriella Karefa-Johnson. Some attendees walked out of the event, and multiple media outlets were critical of West’s use of the slogan.
West agreed to do an interview with Carlson to tell his side of the controversy and to talk about his struggle as a Black man who supported former President Donald J. Trump.
The Ye West interview was a major story on Fox News last week. Both “Fox & Friends” and “The Five” combined dedicated 16 and a half minutes to the interview.
The interview itself was a slow moving train wreck where West changed topics on a dime, got confused mid-sentence and repeatedly expressed thoughts about being persecuted or threatened.
He promoted a few conspiracy theories, trashed companies he previously had partnerships with and disparaged his ex-wife and in-laws.
He compared himself to the biblical David facing off after the giant Goliath. He declared he knew he would be president one day and in one of the strangest moments implied that executives at The Gap might have had prior knowledge of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
West concluded his rantings by basically saying his diagnosed mental illness was really caused by people telling him it wasn’t a good idea to openly express his love and admiration for Donald J. Trump.
“They keep on using the oh, he's crazy, crazy thing and it hurts my feelings when people say that. It hurts my feelings that people can ask me, hey, are you okay? Like, especially, like, just I got an ego, someone that's less successful than me having the right to ask me about me like their doctor,” said West.
In this clip from the first installment of the interview, Jason Whitlock of Blaze Media, compares West to the iconic character Kunta Kinte, a brutalized American slave from the groundbreaking miniseries “Roots.”
The Roots miniseries was based on a book of the same name by Alex Haley. It was one of the first cinematic realistic portrayals of the many horrors of slavery in the United States.
Whitlock is entitled to his opinion but it does seem a bit extreme to compare a man with no rights whatsoever who is repeatedly beaten and abused to one of the wealthiest Black men in America.
“I’m going to make analogy, Kunta Kinte in “Roots” they got him out on that tree and they’re whipping him. What’s your name? And they want him to say ‘Left-wing liberal” and he won’t say it. He keeps saying ‘I like Trump,’” said Whitlock.
West is free to say whatever he wants but the general public and the press can respond in kind. West has publicly expressed his opinions on any number of issues and he’s still incredibly wealthy with a huge following.
He might feel oppressed because some people have criticized him for his views but he’s still allowed to say whatever he wants.
It’s also quite relative as someone like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is regularly criticized for nearly everything she says and does on Fox News. A left-leaning media company such as “Democracy NOW” or “Mother Jones” might celebrate Ocasio-Cortez for the exact same statements.
Fox pushes the idea that criticism is censorship often.
Throughout the interview West referred to his ex-wife, Kim Kardashian, in a way that gave her no agency. He claims people are putting thoughts in her head, that she’s manipulated by photographers and even that she was some type of tool for Hillary and Bill Clinton.
Tucker Carlson asks West if he was manipulated by political forces through his ex-wife. West also seemed concerned that Kardashian would appear in sexualized ads. Kardashian built her brand by appearing nude or in revealing clothing. For West to suddenly expect her to change once she was married was horribly unrealistic.
Most of the instances of the use of words such as crazy, mentally ill, and mental patient were used by Tucker Carlson, not Ye West.
Hunter Biden
Every show I analyzed last week included footage of an interview from “Tucker Carlson Tonight” of Tony Bobulinksi, a former business associate of Hunter Biden. In the interview Bobulinksi made a number of accusations against Hunter Biden and President Joe Biden.
Bobulinksi is hardly a new face on Fox News. Miranda Devine, NY Post reporter and author of a book about Hunter Biden, brings up Bobulinksi nearly every time she appears on Fox News.
Last week a story broke on The Washington Post that Hunter Biden will probably be criminally charged on tax evasion and filing false information on a gun application. A federal agent involved with the investigation leaked the story to the Washington Post.
Judge Jeannie Pirro shared her insight about the story on “The Five,”
“What about Foreign Agent Registration Act? This kid was going to Europe with a vacuum cleaner, sucking up money in a pay to play for the United States. And Joe, of course, is the big guy that Tony Bobulinski has come out and said, gee, the feds came and talked to me, but they never came back,” said Pirro.
Pirro should know that the feds might have many good reasons why they didn’t think Bobulinkski was a reliable source. They might think he’s got credibility issues or things he’s said to them don’t line up with whatever evidence they’ve found.
Bobulinksi openly admits Hunter Biden burned him in some business deals. He could be motivated by revenge or to monetize the situation in some way. At this point there’s no hard evidence other than his word which honestly doesn’t mean much.
Fox has aggressively promoted the idea that Hunter’s many shady deals will all lead back to President Biden and show widespread corruption that goes back years.
So far there is no evidence of any criminal behavior linking back to President Biden. That’s not going to stop Fox News from claiming all sorts of things about Hunter Biden and his father.
Jesse Watters took this to a whole new level.
“It's no coincidence that this report comes out days after Tony B. goes on Tucker Carlson, and blows the whole thing wide open again,” said Watters.
This is a theme with Watters as he’s made this claim before regarding a number of stories. Watters tends to think absolutely everyone watches Fox News.
“My source tells me that Hunter Biden rejected a pretty sweet plea deal and they were going to have him plea no prison time. A couple million dollars in fines. And he turned it down. That was a bad idea because now I'm hearing it's about $15 million in fines and they're throwing more felonies that he has to plead to,” said Watters.
Notice Watters is vague about the source. You’d think if he had such a source he would have featured this person on his show in some way but he didn’t.
“We're hearing about whistle blowers that are coming out in the FBI. We're hearing about possible more whistleblowers who know and have done business with the Biden family, possibly coming out publicly,” said Watters.
Watters quote made me fall over laughing the second time I heard him say it. Those are some fairly grandiose accusations and of course Watters cannot backup anything he just said. If he could he would produce the source. He could disguise the person’s voice and shoot them in shadow.
Watters is the same Fox News host who claimed Hillary Clinton had “millions of documents” in her suburban New York home.
I admit openly that I tend to glaze over a bit when Hunter Biden is discussed on Fox News. The story just feels like tabloid fodder. If Hunter did commit crimes he should face consequences.
All of his alleged criminal behavior occurred long before his father became president. Unlike Trump, Biden was wise enough to not give Hunter Biden any official position in the White House.
Fox aggressively promotes the idea that Hunter Biden will be arrested at any moment and his demise will cause a complete collapse of the Biden administration along with the Democratic Party.
It’s not exactly earth shattering news that a well-connected, wealthy person might face tax evasion charges. This investigation has dragged on for four years. There is still no indication that anything Hunter Biden has done will implicate the President in any way.
How PBS covered the same story.
PBS took a totally different tone. The network’s brief segment included an interview with the reporter who broke the story, Devlin Barrett of the Washington Post.
Barrett pointed out that Hunter Biden has not yet been charged with any crime. It’s ultimately up to a prosecutor to decide if they have a case against him.
Hunter may be facing charges for failing to pay taxes on all of his income and for felony gun charges for including false information on a gun application.
In terms of the justice department Barrett said,
“One of the big questions that this case raises is if and when the Justice Department reaches its conclusions, will it change anyone's mind? Because politically, people have been arguing about Hunter Biden for years now,” said Barrett.
As much hysteria and hyperbole Fox News throws around with this case Barrett was far more measured.
“It's unprecedented, but there's always going to be politically sensitive investigations that touch upon or are near the White House. So in that sense, we've seen other cases like this, the son of a sitting president. That is unusual, but there's always going to be politically sensitive investigations,” said Barrett
Tulsi Gabbard Evokes 9/11 and the Holocaust when discussing Hunter Biden
Tulsi Gabbard uses the phrase "Never Forget" that is normally associated with the Holocaust and 9/11 to promote another version of The Big Lie. She also uses misleading stats, 44,000 is only for three swing states Georgia, Arizona & Wisconsin. Biden won Pennsylvania by 81,660 and Michigan by 154,188.
Hurricane Ian
Last week the aftermath of the Hurricane was the top story on PBS NewsHour. Most of their segments included survivors of the storm, first responders and representatives from aid organizations. Overall the network took an apolitical tone.
The segments were more about how every day Floridians are dealing with the many hardships they are facing and how the state might bounce back.
Fox News infused highly partisan politics into nearly every segment about the storm. In their first segment about the aftermath of the storm the cast of “Fox & Friends” immediately tore into Vice Pres. Kamala Harris over a comment she made about helping hurricane victims based on equity.
Fox News did not include Harris’s comment. They basically paraphrased her and then made some wild assumptions about what the Vice President had said.
Right after a live segment from Florida, Steve Doocy started the discussion.
“Regarding the Vice President and what she said about how resources would be based on equity, and she would not answer that particular question. The FEMA administrator was on yesterday and what she said, Deanna Criswell, she responded she agreed with Harris's comment, but stressed it did not mean the agency would preclude non minorities from receiving assistance. She said ‘We're going to support all communities,’ which is the correct answer,” said Doocy.
“Right. What is puzzling is why the vice president would say that. But she did.
“We're going to help whoever needs it the most, first,” said Ainsley Earnhart.
“Just a couple of things just flat out wrong. Number one, especially in this case in particular, the people with the most money lived on the beach in the coast. By the coast, they got their stuff crushed. It's gone. Number two is with FEMA. They look towards making you whole immediately. They're not going to say, oh, you didn't make a lot of money,” said Brian Kilmeade.
He continued,
“We're going to give you less. Say, look at what you lost. And they look to do the best you can in temporary housing. Temporary needs, as well as on your rebuild. The big question in that area is who had flood insurance? Who could afford it? A lot of people got those letters in the mail that say, hey, by the way, if you don't if you don't want flood insurance, don't get it,” said Kilmeade.
The next day the cast of “Fox & Friends” waited a few minutes before tearing into President Biden. Brian Kilmeade mentioned that Pres. Biden had just visited Florida to inspect the damage from Hurricane Fiona.
“Yesterday he was in Puerto Rico to say to do what basically his predecessor did to provide the aid that he says Puerto Rico needs. So he's given a lot of blank checks. The one thing that President Trump found after meeting with the governor a few times here, there's a lot of corruption and inefficiency and a lot of grift.
So please, Mr. President, don't just write a blank check. It doesn't get to the right people. You have to do some follow through in particular,” said Kilmeade.
How the Two Networks Stacked up in terms of Hurricane Ian and Hunter Biden
It would be difficult to argue that Hunter Biden was more important than one of the worst storms in U.S. history but Fox News has its priorities.
Geraldo Rivera Asks Why no one is Blaming Putin for the War in Ukraine.
At the end of a 9-minute long discussion about Pres. Biden and his policies towards Russia and Ukraine, Geraldo Rivera simply asks the panel, "Shouldn't we point to where the blame is? Isn't the blame on Putin?" He got radio silence. What's going on at Fox News?
Clutch your pearls - Jesse Watters has thin skin!
Jesse Watters doesn’t seem to realize that people who host television shows are sometimes criticized. He expresses outrage that two journalists, Chris Hayes of MSNBC and Philip Bump of the Washington Post, might not agree with the way he reports on crime.
Fox News spends an inordinate amount of airtime featuring clips from ay number of media companies. Personalities and hosts from Fox News are quite critical of any number of journalists. The network regularly picks apart Joy Reid, Don Lemon, Brian Stelter, the entire cast of the View in addition to anyone even mildly left of center.
Stories that Fox thought were Newsworthy that were NOT Newsworthy
Jesse Watters dedicated a lot of time and focus to a comment President Biden made in a speech about living in an area with a large Puerto Rican population. President Biden might have been exaggerating a bit but this didn’t seem like much of a story.
The accidental shooting on the set of the movie “Rust” that involved Alec Baldwin. If criminal charges are filed against someone on the set this story will move back into the news cycle
Stories Fox News Ignored
Every week I compare 15 hours of Fox News with five hours of PBS NewsHour. The following is a list of stories that PBS covered that Fox News ignored. This list is always quite long.
Jeremy Bertino, a member of the hate group known as the Proud Boys, pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy related to his involvement in the Jan. 6th riots on the U.S. Capitol.
Opening statements began in the sedition trial of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes who participated in the Jan. 6th riot on the U.S. Capitol. A witness testified that Stewart Rhodes claimed he was in contact with a Secret Service member.
A Connecticut jury is about to rule on the amount of damages Alex Jones will have to pay the families of slain children at Sandy Hook Elementary school.
The War in Ukraine - Russia illegally annexed Ukrainian territory. The Ukrainian army continues to regain territory.
The mother of one of his children accused Pro-Life Georgia Senatorial candidate Herschel Walker of paying for an abortion she had in 2009. She included a paper receipt along with a “get well” card from Walker that backed her accusation.
Anti-government protests in Iran over modesty rules for women have spread to a nationwide movement. The protests have entered their fourth week.
President Joe Biden, met with South Korea's President Yoon Suk Yeol, left, and Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida regarding increased hostility from North Korea.
Thirty-seven people, including 24 children, and the wife and stepson of the attacker were murdered in a gun and knife attack on a preschool in Thailand.
A stampede in a soccer match in Indonesia caused the death of 125 people. It was one of the worst stadium disasters in history.
A year-long investigation uncovered systemic sexual and emotional abuse in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL)
PBS included segments on various winners of the Nobel prize in medicine, chemistry, physics, peace and literature.
The jobs report for September remained strong. The economy added 263,000 jobs.
Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE) will likely resign his seat to take a position as President of University of Florida. Sasse was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict the former president of “incitement of insurrection” after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack.
Federal judge blocked some provisions of NY State new gun law.
A court ruled that the DACA program is illegal but the program is still operational.
The recent presidential election in Brazil moves to a runoff.
Criminal charges dismissed against four government workers in the Flint, Michigan water crisis.
More than 50 people were killed in an airstrike in Northern Ethiopia. The attack is part of an internal conflict over the Tigray region of the country.
Former President Donald J. Trump continues to battle with the DOJ over seized classified documents.
After backlash and a dramatic drop in the value of the British pound the UK government abandoned a plan to cut tax on high earners
The Supreme Court begins its new term - One of the first cases they are deciding involves voting rights in Alabama.
Native American actress and activist first Sacheen Littlefeather died at age 75 of breast cancer. She is probably best known for rejecting the Oscar for best actor on behalf of Marlon Brando in 1973. Brando was angry about how Native American actors were portrayed in Hollywood. Litterfeather was booed by the crowd but the academy later apologized for how she was treated.
By the Numbers
It was very telling that although Iran was mentioned 44 times the anti-government protests were not mentioned once. A viewer who watched Fox News exclusively would have no idea people had taken to the streets across the country to protest modesty laws aimed at women.
Coming up…
For this week I’ll be focused on “Fox & Friends”. “The Five” and “Hannity” with an additional newsletter/podcast dedicated to the January 6th Committee hearing scheduled for later this week.
Excellent work, as always! Thank you for doing this, we appreciate you.