Bush associates still consolidating their hold on US media -
Diane Sweet
Published: Wednesday December 26, 2007
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Bush_associates_consolidate_hold_on_US_1226.htmlLongtime associates of President George W. Bush are consolidating their hold on American media with a string of recent acquisitions.
Conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. earlier this month announced the sale of 8 of its US television stations to a private equity firm -- Oak Hill Partners -- for an estimated $1.1 billion dollars that is expected to close sometime in 2008.
The deal leaves Murdoch with another 27 television stations in major US cities such as Boston, New York City, and Los Angeles, as well as The New York Post, a controlling interest in British Sky Broadcasting, movie studio 20th Century Fox, and Wall Street Journal publisher Dow Jones & Co Inc.
Oak Hill Partners lead investor Robert M. Bass, a longtime associate of President Bush, is also the founder of the Ft. Worth, Texas-based Bass Brothers Enterprises. Oak Hill issued a statement announcing the stations would be jointly managed by a broadcast holding company, Local TV, that was created by Oak Hill for the purpose of purchasing 9 other television stations from The New York Times previously this year.
Conservative ties for the Bass Brothers
Robert Bass, along with his brothers Lee, Ed, and Sid, from a wealthy Texas oil family, all attended Yale University where Ed was a classmate and friend of George W. Bush. The Bass family, through various political action committees, were heavy-hitting contributors to Bush's gubernatorial campaigns in Texas, according to the student watchdog group University of Texas Watch.
Robert Bass is also the founder and chairman of Aerion Corporation, which has been the recipient of several very lucrative DARPA contracts for the development of supersonic laminar flow wing studies, along with research and test flights.
News Corp. had originally intended to sell off nine of its US television stations; however Bass's subsidiary, Local TV, could not purchase WHBQ-TV in Memphis, Tennessee as it had previously purchased CBS affiliate WREG-TV: "Federal Communications Commission rules allow market duopolies but only one of the two stations under a single owner can be among the market's four top-rated stations there and there must be least eight unique station owners in the market once the duopoly is formed."
Local TV, LLC
From Local TV, LLC's homepage:
"The company will immediately focus on back office and administrative functions," adds Lawrence. "Then we will move to creating specialized knowledge teams for TV assets, addressing market-specific challenges and opportunities with special swat teams, developing vertical and homegrown content, and finding new ways to deploy capital. And that is just the beginning."
The site also lists among its holdings in a statement issued online prior to the News Corps purchase, 23 large and mid-size stations, as well as the nine small to mid-sized stations purchased from The New York Times.
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Bill Clinton’s Take On Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal
http://www.newscorpse.com/ncWP/?p=547Blake Fleetwood has a curious article at the Huffington Post that quotes Bill Clinton saying that…
“…the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal is even more right wing and irrational than most of the commentators on Fox News.”
That’s the not the curious part. The article continues with Clinton relating an incident wherein the business of a supporter of his was being dogged by the Journal’s editorial board. The supporter arranged a meeting with the board to present his case, but the board told him that they didn’t care to hear it. They told him that they were only going after him because he was a supporter of Clinton. Clinton told him to send a check to Bob Dole, which the supporter did, and the attacks from the Journal stopped.
That’s a story that is both shocking and predictable at the same time. Anybody who’s familiar with the Journal’s editorial bias wouldn’t be surprised by that sordid tale. But anybody who cares about journalistic ethics would still be appalled. The power that is wielded by influential media organs like the Journal is substantial, and that power is magnified in the broadcast media world. Clinton has something to say about that too…
“With regard to media consolidation, the rules were relaxed too much.”
That’s undeniably true. Unfortunately, Clinton doesn’t acknowledge that it was the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which he signed into law, that produced the relaxation of which he now complains. Common Cause documented the legislation, and its impact, in a 2005 study:
The Fallout From the Telecommunications Act of 1996 pdf -
http://www.commoncause.org/atf/cf/%7BFB3C17E2-CDD1-4DF6-92BE-BD4429893665%7D/FALLOUT_FROM_THE_TELECOMM_ACT_5-9-05.PDF.......................
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/09/politics/main1600694.shtmlRupert Murdoch Loves Hillary Clinton
Conservative Media Mogul To Host Fundraiser For Liberal N.Y. Senator
NEW YORK, May 9, 2006
(CBS) To call them a political odd couple would be a rash understatement.
Conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch will host a fundraiser for liberal New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, the Financial Times reports.
The mating ritual of the unlikely allies has been under way for months. Clinton set political tongues to wagging last month by attending a Washington party celebrating the 10th anniversary of Fox News, the cable news channel owned by Murdoch.
Lawsuit: Murdoch killed negative Clinton stories
Former New York Post staff member contends mogul interfered with news
Posted: May 21, 2007
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55803© 2008 WorldNetDaily.com
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch ordered his U.S. editors to kill any negative stories about President Clinton and his wife Hillary, according to claims in a lawsuit.
Murdoch, whose News Corp. of America owns the Fox News Channel and the New York Post, is being sued by former Post gossip writer Jared Paul Stern, who contends he was fired illegally, reports the UK's Press Gazette.
The Post dismissed Stern last year after he allegedly demanded $100,000 and a $10,000 monthly stipend from California businessman Ron Burkle to keep negative stories about him out of the paper.
Charges about how Murdoch controls his newspapers come in an affidavit by another fired Post staffer, Ian Spiegelman, who disputes Murdoch's claim of non-interference in daily operations.
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Follow the money! :argh: