Fox News stepped in a minefield by getting rid of Tucker Carlson.
The network is trying to make the best of it.
And one top Fox News host had one insane prediction about Tucker Carlson.
As Black Eye Politics reports:
Fox News’ “Media Buzz” host Howard Kurtz tried to put a good face on the network canning Carlson.
Ratings plummeted as elected Republicans like Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville called on conservatives to boycott Fox News.
Kurtz addressed the leaks planted in the corporate media by Fox News about the network firing Carlson over private text messages Carlson sent that contained some crude language.
“Several people with knowledge of Fox’s discussions said the redacted messages were a catalyst for one of the most momentous decisions Fox and its leaders — the father-son team of Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch — had made in years: to sever ties with the host of their highest-rated and highly profitable prime-time program and a face of the network in the Trump era,” The New York Times exclusively reported.
Kurtz pitched Fox firing Carlson — as well as CNN canning Don Lemon — as a good thing for the cable news industry by smearing Carlson as a serial liar and spreader of misinformation.
“The big picture raised by the dismissals at Fox and CNN is whether we are entering a new era in which some limits are imposed on what even the most popular hosts can say. Management at all the networks may be more likely to rein in their top talent and insist on fact-checking rather than risk embarrassment or lawsuits for the airing of false information. That, if it comes to pass, might just be a worthwhile outcome,” Kurtz stated.
Carlson’s firing came on the heels of Fox News paying out a record $787 million defamation settlement to Dominion Voting Systems over the network reporting on claims made by Trump lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani that voting machines stole the election from Donald Trump.
Carlson was a small part of this lawsuit and Carlson was the one Fox anchor who went on air and told viewers that Powell offered no proof to back up her claims, which turned out to be false.
Shortly after Fox News announced Carlson was out Megyn Kelly predicted that Fox News would try to smear Carlson in the media.
And right on cue, leaked video clips of off-air segments found their way into the hands of Media Matters.
Carlson’s text messages showed up in the pages of The New York Times.
And it looked to many like Kurtz was trying to make Carlson a scapegoat for the Dominion settlement and cast Fox News firing him as an act of journalistic and corporate responsibility.