Friday Fox Follies – The Faking of the President, 2016*

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Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 09:45 pm

The gaslighting of ‘Merka continues, with Fox “News” playing an important part in the Normalization of Trump. While Bully Boy Bolling & Kimberly Tinfoyle help during a fawning promotion of their tedious New Year’s Eve Special…

“I must have missed the memo because I think 2016 was fabulous,” Guilfoyle told TheWrap. “What a fantastic year. What an incredible presidential election. We loved covering it on ‘The Five,’ and we had front-row seats to American political history.”

[…]

“For us, we spent the summer covering the election — as Kimberly points out — accurately and our ratings have done nothing but skyrocket and we’ve held our ratings in the post-election world where some others are probably a bit envious of what we’ve been able to continue to do,” Bolling told TheWrap. “I think 2016 was great.”

[…]

“If you look at all the consumer sentiments and optimism, there is a new poll out that says 55 percent of America thinks that 2017 is going to be a better year than ’16. I think there is a whole new change in D.C. and in the media with the Donald Trump presidency,” Bolling said. “I think there is a bunch of optimism coming in with it.”

…it’s ever more important to remember how we got here: The Year Fox News Flushed Roger Ailes And His Sexual Harassment Scandal Down The Memory Hole! [Emphasis mine.] And the year it finally elected a POTUS with a never-ending stream of positive stories about the most negative political candidate in history.

There’s been a lot of recent talk about FAKE NEWS, but never forget that Fox “News” is the manure spreader at the very end of the Feces News Pipeline.

This morning: more gaslighting. While it would be ridiculous to assume the Russian hacking didn’t influence the ‘Merkin ‘lection in some way, no one is really arguing that’s the only reason Hillary Clinton lost the election. Nobody ‘cept Fox, which built that straw man from the ground up, so they can play video of President Obama saying the exact opposite as if to falsely prove he is contradicting himself.

Just today Fox can’t figure out whether President Obama’s retaliation against Russian hacking (which they are still calling alleged) is too little, too late; boxing in the Emperor-elect with “roadblocks”; attacking a geopolitical friend of the United States; whether Romney was right 4 years ago when he called Russia ‘Merka’s #1 geopolitical foe; or whether Trump is too close to Putin. And, it’s not even 9 AM yet; this is just on Fox & Friends.

That’s why it’s so disturbing that in the 2016 Ratings: Fox News Channel is Cable TV’s Most-Watched Network:

“As we close out our 20th year, Fox News continues to redefine television news and break rating records, proving it is indeed the most watched and most trusted television news source in the country,” said co-presidents Jack Abernethy and Bill Shine.

Simultaneously, I presume.

Once again Fox “News” is trying to gaslight people into believing ratings somehow equate to truthfulness. And, as for redefining news? That’s undeniable. Fox redefined “news” and we are all the worse for it. Now, having helped elect Donald Trump in the first place, Fox News Pretends Donald Trump Is A HUGE Christian.

While Pence is a true believer, Emperor Trump’s a heathen. Don’t believe me? Just ask any 2 Corinthians on any street corner in Corinthia.

TRASH TALKIN’ TUCKER TANKS: Teen Vogue writer Lauren Luca resurrected a venerable term on Dec 10th with her insightful article: Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America. Just after last week’s Friday Fox Follies went to bed, Luca was given free publicity by that jerk who goes by the name of Tucker. Watch and make up your own mind which brave young woman wiped the floor with which whiny little boy in this exchange:

Mediate reports that Teen Vogue Writer Battles Tucker Carlson: ‘You’re Actually Being a Partisan Hack’, while Entertainment Weekly rightly said that Fox News’ Tucker Carlson [was] slammed for interview with Teen Vogue writer. Yet alt-right [aka neo-Nazi] Breitbart wants you to Watch [as]: Tucker Carlson Hammers Teen Vogue Writer for Anti-Ivanka Tweet. Friar Tuck’s own The Daily Caller claimed against all evidence to the contrary (watch the video again) that Tucker Carlson Embarrasses Feminist Who Defended Harassing Ivanka.

The hypocrisy was so stunning I took to my facebookery immediately to slap Tucker, which — admittedly — I love to do as often as I get the chance:

With barrels of electronic ink spilled on The Fox Effect, one lesser reported manifestation is something you’ll never hear on the Feces News Pipeline:

Teen Vogue writer receives
threats after Fox News interview

Then the online attacks began, many too lewd to repeat. She saw an online discussion board created to encourage people “to harass me until I have a mental breakdown or go into porn.”

She said she responded to one person, asking whether it felt odd to attack a stranger on Christmas Day.

“He wrote back saying ‘get raped,’ so that didn’t work,” she said.

Just more of what Trump and, by extension, Fox “News” wrought.

THE SEASON FOR THE REASON: He may have been off this week, but that doesn’t mean he was forgotten:

2016: The Year In Bill O’Reilly

Bakari Sellers Assures Bill O’Reilly and
Others Like Him That Black People
Don’t Want Anything from Them

IN MEMORIAM: While the world mourns the Grim Reaper’s 2016 toll, I will honour one: Pops died on December 11th. More than anyone else I owe my hobby (?!) of Fox “News” criticism to him.

When I moved in with Pops after my mom died, his Go To station was Fox. At dinner I’d choke on its manure. I come from a real journalistic background in Canada, where I wrote truthful tee vee news for a decade.

“How can they say that?” I’d shout. Or, “That’s not true,” as I explained to Pops all the parts of the story they were leaving out. More often than not I’d just swear at the tee vee.

Pops would wryly joke, “Why don’t you call them?”

However, it got me researching. I discovered “Outfoxed“, which should be watched if you’ve never. It’s more true today as when it was released in 2004:

Then I found NewsHounds, which researchers for the documentary launched afterwards. Eventually, I was so prolific commenting, that I was hired to write for NewsHounds, first about Glenn Beck and then any of its regular liars.

The irony is that while I broke Pops of his Fox habit, it’s the so-called news station I watch almost exclusively. I call it research, but most days it’s a sardonic comedy.

R.I.P., Pops.

* Headly Westerfield apologizes profusely to Theodore White, who wrote some of the best political commentary of the last 150 years.