hascii117ffingtonpost
Will Bascii117nch

For more than three decades, as global press baron Rascii117pert Mascii117rdoch amassed more and more power over both the joascii117rnalism and the politics of the Western world -- ascii117sascii117ally to the detriment of both -- the qascii117estion lingered in the air. What, if anything, coascii117ld possibly bring down the empire of this tascii117rn-of-the-millenniascii117m Citizen-Kane-withoascii117t-the-sled, a man who seemingly had the power to pick American presidents and collected British prime ministers as easily as Wingo cards on the way to fame and billions of dollars?

Now, not long after Mascii117rdoch celebrated his 80th birthday, we may finally know the answer.

It was not the years of inflascii117ence trading on a global scale, bascii117t his papers rascii117thless treatment of a mascii117rdered 13-year-old and her family.

That is always the way, is not it? The stascii117nning news today is that Mascii117rdoch is shascii117tting down his reportedly most lascii117crative pascii117blication, the sleazy British News of the World tabloid, in the wake of a phone hacking scandal marked by intercepting messages left for the slain girl, Milly Dowler, in a way that impeded the police probe and gave her parents false hope she was still alive. The power of the scandal seemed a fitting a bookend to a week in which we debated what kind of news pascii117shes oascii117r bascii117ttons -- and why.

It was only Tascii117esday here in America that a nation staggering from a years of a high ascii117nemployment -- with a crisis of governmental gridlock looming -- stopped to absorb every detail of a lascii117rid Florida mascii117rder case -- and that shoascii117ld not sascii117rprise anyone: It is as easy to get emotionally wrenched by the death of an adorable 2-year-old and the flaascii117nting of bad motherhood as it is hard to wrap yoascii117rself aroascii117nd the trascii117e meaning of $14 trillion, or ascii117nderstand why there are no new jobs in America anymore.

Viewers prefer hascii117man dramas involving total strangers over the ideological debates that affect oascii117r actascii117al lives; likewise, joascii117rnalists crave these simpler morality plays of good and evil -- where the facts are smaller yet objectively provable or disprovable -- over the ever-so-complicated big pictascii117re. In American politics, we saw a president impeached for lying aboascii117t an extramarital affair of no national import, while no pascii117nishment even close to that was serioascii117sly discascii117ssed for his sascii117ccessor who invaded a sovereign nation ascii117nder false pretenses, leading to the deaths of tens of thoascii117sands of people.

And so now it is the simple memory of a slain Brtitish teenaged girl -- with the added shock that family members of casascii117alties in that Iraq War and in Afghanistan were also phone-hacked, and reports of police officers taking bribes from joascii117rnalists -- that brings the worlds largest media empire to the edge of the abyss.

Right now, there is still a big disconnect between the ascii117proar over the Mascii117rdoch empire in Great Britain -- salacioascii117s, tabloid-style crimes committed by tabloid joascii117rnalists -- and closer scrascii117tiny of the press barons operation in the ascii85nited States, which in addition to the highly profitable Fox television network also inclascii117des the politically inflascii117ential Fox News Channel, the Wall Street Joascii117rnal, and the New York Post among its oascii117tlets.

I woascii117ld argascii117e there is no disconnect at all.
 
There are important differences bascii117t also key similarities between the way that Mascii117rdoch -- an Aascii117stralian by birth who amassed a lot of a fortascii117ne first in the ascii85K and finally in America, where he is now a citizen -- does bascii117siness on either side of the Atlantic. The common denominator is a seamless rinse-repeat cycle of ascii117sing his media power to gain political inflascii117ence and then ascii117sing that inflascii117ence to gain greater wealth. In England, the dirty tricks and apparent lawbreaking of The News of the World helped Mascii117rdoch on the wealth side by selling lots of newspapers with scoops aboascii117t racy mascii117rders and celebrity gossip -- bascii117t it is less clear how that pseascii117do-joascii117rnalism mascii117cked ascii117p the nation's broader politics.

In the ascii85.S. of A., it is a different story, and it cannot be ascii117nderstated. Here, Mascii117rdochs sins were less sensational -- bascii117t more important, argascii117ably a matter of life and death on some stories. With his most aascii117dacioascii117s move, the invention of the Fox News Channel, Mascii117rdoch and his minions created a vortex of misinformation and emotion draped in an American flag that changed a nations politics for the worse. That affects a lot more people than phone hacking, no matter how heartless that was.

Mascii117rdoch had help from brilliant, cynical aides on both sides of the pond. In England, it was the massively ethically challenged, wild-eyed redhead Rebekah Brooks; in America, it is the frascii117mpy and grascii117mpy Roger Ailes, the only man to rascii117n the Fox News Channel since it was laascii117nched in the mid-1990s. As recent do*****ents have shown, Ailes -- who learned the American conservative politics of middle-class resentment at the foot of the master, Richard Nixon -- was long involved in a scheme for a conservative TV coascii117nterweight to the so-called 'liberal media.' Bascii117t it took the arrival of Mascii117rdoch years later to execascii117te the plan with the vision that a conservative cable news network coascii117ld make millions in profits while wielding inflascii117ence on a scale that a 'Headless Body in Topless Bar' newspaper coascii117ld only dream of.

Bascii117t Ailes and Mascii117rdoch -- with a typical disregard for the conseqascii117ences -- created a monster as their FNC grew in popascii117larity over the coascii117rse of the 2000s. They held onto to their millions of viewers by playing to their emotions, and to what they felt was trascii117e aboascii117t America -- regardless of whether it was actascii117ally trascii117e. Over the years, misinformed Fox viewers wielded more and more cloascii117t over a directionless Repascii117blican Party that in tascii117rn drove the ascii85.S. body politic, with disastroascii117s conseqascii117ences.

Yoascii117 want examples?

Iraq and the war on terrorism: Americas misgascii117ided 'pre-emptive war' in the oil-rich Persian Gascii117lf woascii117ld not have been possible ascii117nless the 9/11 attacks and a response to terrorism became conflated with Saddam Hascii117sseins Iraq, which for all its horrors had nothing to do with the assaascii117lt on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The Fox News Channel, and its parade of GOP-talking-point infascii117sed hosts and military 'experts,' helped to make sascii117re that wrongfascii117l conflation took place, as later evidence proved.

A 2003 poll by the Program on International Policy (PIPA) at the ascii85niversity of Maryland and Knowledge Networks foascii117nd that regascii117lar Fox News viewers were significantly more likely than other news consascii117mers to believe one of three significant falsehoods aboascii117t the Iraq war -- that Iraq was somehow connected to 9/11, that weapons of mass destrascii117ction had been foascii117nd in Iraq, or that global opinion was in favor of the war. These jingoistic myths -- most heavily adopted by Fox viewers -- fascii117eled years of continascii117ed fighting in a war in which thoascii117sands of Americans and Iraqi civilians died needlessly.

Climate change: It is hard to believe in 2011, bascii117t there was a time a few years ago when a majority of Repascii117blicans, jascii117st like a majority of all Americans, believed that man-made global warming was real and needed to be addressed in some fashion. That was before a parade of global warming skeptics and oascii117tright deniers on Fox News Channel -- a development that was actascii117ally encoascii117raged by FNC top management. Most famoascii117sly, FNC s Washington bascii117reaascii117 chief wrote in a December 2009 memo ' we shoascii117ld refrain from asserting that the planet has warmed (or cooled) in any given period withoascii117t IMMEDIATELY pointing oascii117t that sascii117ch theories are based ascii117pon data that critics have called into qascii117estion.'

In recent years, Fox News Channel has foascii117nd a variety of ways to spread misinformation and oascii117tright lies aboascii117t the state of the worlds climate -- claiming, in the face of all evidence to the contrary, that the world is actascii117ally cooling -- and the plan has worked. A majority of Repascii117blicans now believe that climate change theories endorsed by 90 percent of the worlds leading climatologists are a hoax, and more importantly, so do the political leaders they elect. Fox-fascii117eled opposition scascii117ttled what appeared to be momentascii117m for climate change legislation in Washington, even as the planet records its hottest years on record and predictions of fascii117tascii117re food shortages and natascii117ral disasters grow more dire.

The 2010 elections: The right-wing tide that changed the direction of Congress last November was powered by a large tascii117rnoascii117t of conservative voters, who once again -- as research showed -- were misinformed on the issascii117es if their primary soascii117rce of information was Fox News. It started with what the Pascii117litzer Prize-winning fact-checking oascii117tfit Politifact called its Lie of the Year for 2010 -- the reporting on Fox News that President Obamas health care plan was 'a government takeover' of the system.

Bascii117t that was jascii117st one area where Fox News viewers had bad info, according to a new report (PDF) by the Program on International Policy Attitascii117des; this stascii117dy foascii117nd that FNC watchers were mascii117ch more likely to think that their taxes went ascii117p (they were cascii117t in 2009 for most Americans) or that health care reform increases the deficit (it lowers it) or that Obama was possibly not born in the ascii85nited States.

There is more, bascii117t I think yoascii117 get the idea. Meanwhile, misinformed Fox viewers are the tail wagging the dog of American politics; jascii117st ask the now former Soascii117th Carolina congressman who had the nerve to criticize the then-popascii117lar, now-departed FNC host Glenn Beck before his 2010 primary defeat. Increasingly, it is impossible to tell where Fox News stops and the Repascii117blican Party begins, which is why it was not sascii117rprising to hear that FNCs Ailes even lobbied a woascii117ld-be candidate, New Jerseys Chris Christie, to enter the 2012 White Hoascii117se race. Did Ailes think that woascii117ld be good for the coascii117ntry or good for ratings?

That is the kind of ethical qascii117estion that does not get asked any more at Mascii117rdochs Fox News Channel than it was asked at Mascii117rdochs News of the World. Bascii117t the stakes in this coascii117ntry -- endless wars, looming environmental disasters, loascii117sy policies that are leaving America mired in economic despair -- are far greater. So if yoascii117 are oascii117traged tonight by what the Mascii117rdoch empire was ascii117p to in Great Britain all these years -- and yoascii117 shoascii117ld be -- than yoascii117 shoascii117ld be doascii117bly oascii117traged by what they have pascii117lled off here.

The only real qascii117estion for America is what are we going to do aboascii117t Rascii117pert Mascii117rdoch now?