Disney ABC
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CORP BAD ACTOR ABC TERRY MORAN MERGER SUSIE WILES
SAVED TO TRUMP BS LAWSUIT GEORGE S RAPE
SEE CENSOR PRESS SUPPRESSION FASCISM LATE NIGHT
see ABC TV
719 merge w/ fox --> #1?!
target of desantis and trump=-=-
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an 8 26
Trump’s war against ABC and Disney for platforming comedian Jimmy Kimmel has boomeranged on him, with the entertainment behemoth suing Trump’s FCC for violating their First Amendment rights. More recently, the FCC has challenged ABC’s broadcasting licenses.
Even a conservative newspaper is siding with ABC and Disney over the Trump administration.
“ABC sued the FCC on Tuesday for ‘coercing and retaliating’ because it ‘refuses to bow to the Administration’s demands,’” wrote The Wall Street Journal editorial board on Tuesday. “The lawsuit says the government has violated its First Amendment rights ‘by launching pretextual regulatory investigations and threatening the Stations’ valuable broadcast licenses.’”
Describing FCC Chairman Brendan Carr as a “mob-boss” and agreeing with the premise of the lawsuit, the Journal opined that Trump’s FCC is indeed violating “the First Amendment by letting the FCC interfere in editorial judgments and suppress disfavored content and viewpoints. ABC’s lawsuit says the FCC’s pressure has resulted in it ‘passing on further consideration of booking several political candidates,’ and none have appeared on the program since February.”
The Journal added that Carr once criticized Democratic administrations for violating free speech rights, and concluded that “in 2020 he lambasted a progressive media group for petitioning the FCC to censor broadcasts of Mr. Trump’s Covid press conferences, calling it a ‘dangerous and sweeping attempt by the left to weaponize the FCC.’
"It’s a shame Mr. Carr won’t defend ABC’s free-speech rights today," the board added.
Trump’s war against Kimmel began in September when he falsely claimed that the talk show host had disparaged the late right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk after he was assassinated. ABC initially took Kimmel’s show off the air but reversed course after a mass protest.
"But then, you know what happened?” Kimmel said at the time. “A Christmas miracle happened. Well, it was September, it was a September miracle. But the holiday does seem to come earlier and earlier every year, doesn’t it? Millions and millions of people stood up and said: ‘No, this is not acceptable’ ... Our show came back stronger than ever. We won, the president lost and now I’m back on the air every night giving the most powerful politician on earth a right and richly deserved bollocking.”
He added, “That’s a word, right? I used it properly?"
In April Kimmel again was in the spotlight when the administration falsely claimed that one of his jokes had inspired an assassination attempt against the president.
“Kimmel’s hateful and violent rhetoric is intended to divide our country,” First Lady Melania Trump declared on social media at the time. “His monologue about my family isn’t comedy — his words are corrosive and deepens the political sickness within America.”
She continued, “People like Kimmel shouldn’t have the opportunity to enter our homes each evening to spread hate. A coward, Kimmel hides behind ABC because he knows the network will keep running cover to protect him. Enough is enough. It is time for ABC to take a stand. How many times will ABC’s leadership enable Kimmel’s atrocious behavior at the expense of our community.”
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AN 5 26
ABC strikes back at Trump’s FCC - Alternet.org
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Melania Trump demands ABC 'take a stand' against 'hateful' Jimmy Kimmel - Alternet.org
HNN GMAIL 4 26
How an Animators’ Strike Led to the Making of Song of the South
Vicky Osterweil
On the intersection of labor contract, nationalism, and white supremacy within Disney Studios. (Literary Hub)
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MMA
The year the media oligarchs bowed to Trump
Written by Matt Gertz
Published 12/03/25
We warned last year that Donald Trump’s second term as president would turbo-charge the political right’s burgeoning media-intimidation complex. Republican officials and right-wing billionaires were already trying to secure their political agenda by using their wealth, lawfare, and government power to silence journalists. And Trump, we wrote, using his authoritarian strategies, would force media moguls to choose between the journalistic integrity of the news outlets they oversee and their broader business interests, with the fate of the free press in the balance.
Twelve months later, it is clear that many of these corporate media owners have made their choice: They are damaging celebrated news outlets like CBS and The Washington Post out of some combination of personal preference and political expedience. While journalists at their outlets are still producing important stories that reveal the corruption and malfeasance of the Trump administration, it’s anyone’s guess how long they will be permitted to do so.
Trump has spent the last decade at war with the press. He has no regard for free speech, treats all dissent as inherently illegitimate, and uses every available tool to curtail critical journalism. The president’s years of anti-media diatribes have achieved their goal of destroying the credibility of potentially damaging reporting among his supporters, and in his second term, he has backed up those verbal attacks with a flurry of actions.
He and his administration have supplemented or even replaced members of the traditional press corps in favor of MAGA influencers and Trumpist outlets; defunded public media outlets in the U.S. and sought to dismantle them abroad; sued reporters and news outlets for publishing content he dislikes; and terminated rules protecting journalists from prosecutorial scrutiny, while targeting them with retaliatory immigration enforcement.
But Trump’s most unnerving assaults on the press involve his administration's use of state power as leverage against oligarchs who control broadcast and cable news operations and major newspapers. For billionaire owners or top executives at massive multimedia companies, news outlets typically represent a tiny fraction of their overall business interests. And those broader holdings create potential vulnerabilities — like regulatory scrutiny of mergers, federal contracting, and criminal investigations — that an authoritarian president can manipulate to encourage media moguls to cudgel their news outlets into line.
Trump’s strategies resemble those of Victor Orban, the Hungarian autocrat many on the American right take as a model, who has dismantled his country’s independent press and forced the sales of outlets to his allies. Trump's desired result is a cowed journalist corps that will produce Fox News-style propaganda venerating his successes and covering up his corruption and failures.
America’s media oligarchs often resisted Trump’s corrupt abuses of power in his first term, either enduring his attacks without constraining their news outlets or beating his administration in federal court. But in his second term, while some media organizations (including Media Matters) have fought to protect the First Amendment against Trump and his administration, certain wealthy magnates have chosen the path of cowardice, submission, and collaboration.
David and Larry Ellison
David Ellison is the son of Larry Ellison, the Oracle co-founder who is one of the richest men alive and a close friend and ally to Trump. The younger Ellison took control of CBS News in July after the Federal Communications Commission approved his Skydance Media’s purchase of CBS parent company Paramount. Trump-appointed FCC Chair Brendan Carr acted only after Paramount agreed to pay $16 million to settle an absurd lawsuit Trump filed over CBS News’ editing of an October interview with then-Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris — and after he secured pledges from Skydance to push the network’s coverage to the right.
Ellison followed through on his promise. The new ownership appointed “anti-woke” champion Bari Weiss as CBS News’ editor-in-chief and Kenneth Weinstein, a Trump-supporting right-wing think tanker, as its ombudsman. An October wave of layoffs hit nearly 100 CBS News employees, gutting the network’s teams focused on climate change and race and culture. Trump certainly seems happy with the changes — in a November 2 interview that marked his first appearance on the network since 2020, he praised Weiss as a “great new leader” and “great person” and described David Ellison’s takeover of CBS News as “the greatest thing that’s happened in a long time to a free and open and good press.”
With the CBS News takeover as proof of concept, Ellison and his father are each making moves to seize additional media outlets and move them in a Trumpy direction.
David Ellison is trying to buy Warner Bros. Discovery — and the administration is reportedly signaling that other bidders will face grueling oversight from federal regulators. “Trump wants WBD in the Ellisons’ hands, and insiders say it’s because he wants favorable coverage from its CNN news channel,” wrote the New York Post.
Larry Ellison has even reportedly “engaged in a dialogue” with the White House “about possibly axing some of the CNN hosts whom Donald Trump is said to loathe, including Erin Burnett and Brianna Keilar,” if the sale were to go through.
The Trump White House is also trying to broker a deal in which the social media giant TikTok, a news source for one-fifth of American adults and 43% of those under 30, would be sold to a coalition including companies controlled by Larry Ellison as well as fellow pro-Trump magnate Marc Andreessen.
- ### Jeff Bezos
Bezos owns The Washington Post, but his massive fortune comes from founding Amazon, the online retailing and web service giant, and he also owns the space technology company Blue Origin. During Trump’s first term, Bezos bore numerous potshots at what Trump termed the “Amazon Washington Post,” as well as his administration’s apparent retaliation against Amazon’s operations. But Bezos signaled that things would be different in a second term even before Trump’s election when he barred the Post’s editorial board from endorsing in the 2024 contest, blocking the publication of its piece supporting Harris.
The decision began a deterioration of Bezos’ relationship with the Post, accelerated further by his February demand that the paper’s Opinion section advocate without exception for “personal liberties and free markets.” Opinion editor David Shipley resigned rather than execute that pivot; his replacement, Adam O’Neal, an undistinguished reporter and editor previously at The Economist and The Wall Street Journal, has overseen buyouts and layoffs of the section’s veterans (my wife Alyssa Rosenberg, the section’s former letters and community editor, was among those who took the buyout) and hired several conservative writers, leading one of the paper’s right-wing columnists to boast, “We’re now a conservative opinion page.” The dramatic changes seem to have blown a hole in the Post’s subscriber numbers, with NPR’s David Folkenflik estimating “a net loss of a couple hundred thousand subscribers” at the end of February. With revenue plummeting thanks to Bezos’ decisions and the owner unwilling to eat the losses, more layoffs are reportedly on the way.
But defanging the Post — and finding a way to put money in the Trump family’s pockets — seems to be working out well for Bezos. His rewards include plum seats for Trump’s swearing-in, federal contracts for Blue Origin and Amazon Web Services, and the president publicly applauding him for “trying to do a real job with The Washington Post, and that wasn’t happening before.”
### Patrick Soon-Shiong
Like Bezos, Los Angeles Times owner Soon-Shiong has other business interests that left him vulnerable to Trump’s retaliation; he made his fortune in the biotech industry, and his medical patents and products are subject to federal oversight. Whether due to fear of retribution or a shift in his own political views, Soon-Shiong stepped up his oversight of the Times last year, beginning with the cancellation of a planned endorsement of Harris.
He subsequently shilled for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation as secretary of health and human services; announced a remaking of the editorial board, beginning with the addition of pro-Trump CNN commentator Scott Jennings; killed an editorial that criticized Trump’s Cabinet picks; announced the addition of an AI-powered “bias meter” to the paper’s opinion pieces, which was pulled after it downplayed the Ku Klux Klan; floated a conservative version of The View featuring right-wing actor Rob Schneider; launched “LA Times Studios,” a multimedia studio featuring influencers reading AI-generated scripts; sat for interviews with right-wing commentators including Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly; and put forward an ill-starred initial public offering plan which led The Hollywood Reporter to ask, “Does Patrick Soon-Shiong Want to Turn the L.A. Times Into a MAHA Memestock?”
As with Bezos’ actions at the Post, Soon-Shiong’s changes to the Times have resulted in plummeting circulation, an exodus of talent, and the diminishment of the paper’s influence. But his medical patents are still getting approved by the federal government.
- ### Bob Iger
Iger, who as the CEO of Disney oversees its subsidiary ABC, was at the center of two of the most craven media moves since Trump’s reelection.
First, his December 2024 decision to sign off on a $15 million “blood sacrifice to Trump,” settling a defamation lawsuit that ABC News’ lawyers thought they would win, only looks worse over time. The capitulation made clear to ABC staff that Iger would not support them in a stand-off with the president and set a precedent that media companies and other major corporations would knuckle under to his demands.
Second, after Carr threatened Disney and ABC’s affiliates with FCC retribution if they failed to “take actions” against Jimmy Kimmel over one of his monologues in September, Iger folded by suspending Kimmel’s show within hours. Carr’s threats made a mockery of the First Amendment — but Iger wasn’t willing to fight to uphold those rights in court. Iger relented and returned Kimmel to the airwaves only after an outcry by Hollywood talent and a spike in Disney+ cancellations.
What did Iger’s cowardice bring ABC? When ABC News chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce dared to ask Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman a question about his role in the brutal murder of the U.S.-based dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi during a joint Oval Office appearance with Trump, the president became enraged, lashing out at the journalist and calling her outlet “fake news” and “one of the worst in the business.”
“I think the license should be taken away from ABC because your news is so fake and it’s so wrong,” he later added, threatening to shut down a U.S. news outlet for producing reporting he doesn’t like in front of a foreign dictator who represses his own country’s media.
“And we have a great commissioner, a chairman, who should look at that," he added.
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Baier, Bartiromo pass on MBS criticism, score seats to his gala
Written by Matt Gertz
Published 11/19/25 MMA
Fox News chief political anchor Bret Baier and Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo, who scored invitations for Tuesday night’s lavish White House banquet honoring Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, both passed on criticizing President Donald Trump for his pathetic excuse-making about Crown Prince Mohammed ordering the brutal murder of the U.S.-based dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Khashoggi was an outspoken critic of the crown prince who wrote columns for The Washington Post criticizing his native Saudi Arabia’s repressive regime from his self-imposed exile in Virginia, London, and Istanbul. In October 2018, he was reportedly lured to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, killed by Saudi operatives, and dismembered with a bone saw, generating an international scandal stoked further by the CIA’s subsequent determination that Crown Prince Mohammed ordered his assassination. Fox, meanwhile, spent the weeks after Khashoggi’s murder running cover for both Trump and Crown Prince Mohammed.
Trump, who has a fundamentally transactional view of U.S. foreign policy, an affinity for brutal dictators, and a tendency to dehumanize journalists, offered little interest in Khashoggi’s fate at the time. And he became enraged on Tuesday afternoon when ABC News chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce dared to ask the crown prince a question about Khashoggi’s murder during their joint Oval Office appearance.
The president interrupted Bruce, calling her outlet “fake news” and “one of the worst in the business.” He then said of Khashoggi: “You’re mentioning somebody that was extremely controversial — a lot of people didn't like that gentleman that you’re talking about. Whether you like him or didn't like him, things happen, but he [the crown prince] knew nothing about it. And we can leave it at that. You don't have to embarrass our guest by asking a question like that.” Crown Prince Mohammed, for his part, said Khashoggi’s murder was “a huge mistake and we're doing our best that this doesn't happen again.”
When Bruce asked Trump a question later in the press conference about the Jeffrey Epstein files, the president blew up again, criticizing her “attitude” and complaining that she had asked Crown Prince Mohammed, “a man who is highly respected,” “a horrible insubordinate and just a terrible question.” In a depressing commentary on the current state of U.S. press freedom, he then suggested that federal regulators should strip ABC’s broadcasting license “because your news is so fake and it's so wrong.”
Trump’s repeated defenses of a foreign tyrant’s murder of a U.S.-based journalist — and his suggestion from the White House that his administration should destroy an outlet for asking “insubordinate” questions about it — drew immediate attention from news outlets and harsh criticism from many journalists.
But Baier had nothing to say about it when he discussed the press conference with Fox anchor Martha MacCallum on The Story that afternoon. Instead, sounding like a Trump spokesperson, he touted the “massive” scale of impending “deals” between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, and commented that Trump, “in his defense of all things MBS, realizes that that relationship is crucial to his thought about the way forward in the Middle East.” He added that Crown Prince Mohammed’s response on Khashoggi was the same as what Baier described as the “solid answer” the crown prince had given Baier in a previous interview.
Video
Citation
From the November 18, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Story
Baier did not directly address Trump’s outburst during Special Report that night, though correspondent David Spunt mentioned it during a packaged report, and John Roberts, who subbed in as anchor while Baier was in Washington, D.C., to attend the banquet, brought it up with the panel.
Bartiromo, for her part, did not mention the Khashoggi exchanges herself on her show Wednesday (a correspondent ran a brief headline read on it during the program, but Bartiromo did not comment on it). Instead, she touted Trump’s role in securing what she termed Crown Prince Mohammed’s “massive investment into America.”
Bartiromo is a total Trump shill, while Baier’s overhyped reputation serves to conceal his usefulness to the administration. But both have done enough for the president to garner what Trump suggested on Tuesday was a very exclusive seat at the gala honoring the crown prince.
“We could have sold the big ballroom out three times in honor of this gentleman,” Trump said at the end of their joint appearance. “So, I made a lot of enemies because I have a lot of people that are invited tonight or are unable to come because of the size constraint.”
“This would be a perfect night to have that ballroom open,” he added. “If we had that open, we'd have a lot of people very happy. Right now, we have a lot of unhappy people because they all want to be with us tonight to honor this great man.”
You don’t get a ticket to such an event by offering “insubordinate” comments about the “great man” who the U.S. intelligence community says set in motion the vicious murder of a critical journalist.
//
Jamal Khashoggi and the bloody bill for Trump's anti-press rhetoric
10/12/18 12:13 PM EDT
10/20/18 2:20 PM EDT
10/24/25
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AN 9 25
Disney and ABC announced Monday that late night comedian Jimmy Kimmel would be returning to his show on Tuesday after he was abruptly taken off the air last week.
NBC reporter Sahil Kapur tweeted the Walt Disney Company's announcement Monday, which stated that while it felt Kimmel's comments about Republicans' response to the death of Charlie Kirk were "ill-timed and thus insensitive," the company had "thoughtful conversations with Jimmy" and "reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday."
Disney's statement comes on the heels of the company losing so many subscribers to its Disney+ platform that the subscription cancellation page reportedly crashed. Business Insider reported that even Americans who didn't personally watch Jimmy Kimmel's show viewed his suspension as "the last straw" and decided to cancel not only their Disney+ and Hulu subscriptions, but to also no longer take Disney cruises or visit Disney theme parks. The Walt Disney Company lost roughly 2 percent of its total market cap in roughly a week, amounting to several billion dollars.
Kimmel's return was praised on social media, though many journalists, political commentators and others observed that the company's decision was almost certainly financially motivated. Journalist David Dayen of the American Prospect wrote that ABC "created a total mess for themselves with this," and that "saying no to bullies is always the better move." Attorney Guy Hamilton-Smith opined that Disney's "thoughtful conversations with Jimmy" were instead "thoughtful conversations with our shareholders."
"Incredible how dumb these companies are. You made everybody mad! Conservatives are gonna be mad you’re putting him back on the air. Liberals were already mad you took him off," tweeted food scientist Isaiah Walker. "All this did was show you stand for nothing, no beliefs, no morals. Just whatever you think earns favor."
"The fight to defend free speech reaffirms our fight to defend the civil rights and liberties of the American people," tweeted Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.) "The voice of the People is hard to ignore."
Author Don Winslow declared that Kimmel's return meant that "WE THE PEOPLE hold the power. Donald Trump does not. Never forget that and start USING YOUR POWER." He added in a separate post: "The ONLY reason @Disney is bringing @jimmykimmel back is because the American people stood up, called out the executives by name, Disney's stock plummeted and Disney lost a lot of money. Get it? That's the playbook for the next three years of Trump. YOU must be LOUDER than him."
'Crazy how fast fascism happens/goes away," wrote Rolling Stone journalist Daniel Boguslaw.
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an 9 25
In an article for Salonpublished Sunday, the outlet’s executive editor, Andrew O’Hehir, argues that Americans have been given a harsh reminder: Democracy isn’t guaranteed, and beyond merely consenting to be governed, citizens must take an active role to defend it.
He warned that many of the formal institutions, especially the U.S. Constitution, are showing signs of decay, undermined “from within” by what he sees as encroaching authoritarianism.
O'Hehir writes that the confrontation over late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s show is presented not as just a media squabble, but a test case.
"Jimmy Kimmel’s cancellation is a test case, designed to measure the breadth and power of the accelerating authoritarian coup now underway in America," he said.
Late-night comedy and other cultural institutions become battlegrounds, in part because they sit at the intersection of public opinion, dissent, and broad reach, he noted.
O’Hehir added that large media companies, many now under oligarchic ownership or dominated by finance capital and big tech, are becoming more reliant on those in power.
"The MAGA assault on late-night comedy — which is doubly vulnerable, as both a fading cultural institution and the veritable definition of First Amendment-protected speech — represents a kind of pincer movement, bringing together multiple overlapping fascist tendencies," he wrote.
"On one hand, we see the consolidation of mainstream media companies, now increasingly under the oligarchic control of Big Tech and finance capital, and increasingly dependent on the corrupt Trump regime to approve their corrupt cartel-building mergers and acquisitions. On the other, we see the regime’s undisguised campaign to restrict and punish dissent, and to redefine 'free speech' as a conditional benefit conferred only on its most loyal grovelers and forelock-tuggers, and subject to revocation at any time.
He cited Sinclair and Nexstar as examples of companies that pushed against Kimmel, seemingly aligning with Trump-friendly narratives.
The editor argued that many of the pillars of democracy — courts, civil service, justice departments, regulatory agencies — are weakened, co-opted, or acting as enforcers of the regime rather than checks upon it.
"The Supreme Court has given Trump free rein, the FBI and Justice Department have become his enforcers, the civil service has been co-opted and subverted, the public health agencies have been conquered by moonbats and Republican state legislatures are doing their best to rig the midterm elections. As [Bill] Curry puts it, leaders at white-shoe law firms, elite universities and major foundations have repeatedly surrendered without a shot, revealing themselves as 'traitors, cowards, rank opportunists or simply inept.'"
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NEWSWEEK 9 25
ABC has pulled Jimmy Kimmel's late-night show off the air after comments the comedian made about the recent assassination of Charlie Kirk, and following pressure from the network's affiliates as well as the nation's TV regulator.
"Jimmy Kimmel Live will be preempted indefinitely," a spokesperson for the Disney-owned broadcaster said in a statement shared with various news outlets on Wednesday.
The move has drawn praise from allies and supporters of President Donald Trump, but sparked condemnation from Democratic lawmakers and free expression advocates.
The context of Kimmel's cancellation has led to allegations that business interests—particularly those concerning a delicate merger approval process involving the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and ABC affiliate Nexstar—may have played a role.
Taken together, some have interpreted this as a form of indirect censorship of the political Left by the Trump administration. Similar concerns were raised following the recent cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
"First Colbert, now Kimmel. Last-minute settlements, secret side deals, multi-billion dollar mergers pending Donald Trump's approval," said Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren. "Trump silencing free speech stifles our democracy."
Newsweek has contacted ABC, Nexstar and the FCC via email for comment.
Why It Matters
In the wake of Kirk's killing, the Trump administration has taken a series of actions critics believe undermine longstanding commitments to free speech in the U.S.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has warned foreign nationals celebrating his death online to "prepare to be deported," Vice President JD Vance has encouraged people to report those who do so to their employers, and Attorney General Pam Bondi has come under fire for urging a crackdown on "hate speech"—a move many believe clashes with First Amendment protections.
Read moreJimmy Kimmel
Russian State TV Floats Theory Trump Planned Charlie Kirk's Killing
The administration of President Joe Biden faced similar criticism and accusations of censorship over the pressure it placed on social media companies to remove accounts and posts relating to the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 presidential election that were considered misinformation. In June 2024, the Supreme Court rejected cases claiming that these amounted to an unconstitutional violation of free speech.
Why Was Jimmy Kimmel Taken Off the Air?
During his Monday night monologue, Kimmel made remarks about Kirk's death and its aftermath, suggesting that Trump supporters were attempting to capitalize on the murder and distance themselves from the alleged shooter, Tyler Robinson.
"We hit some new lows over the weekend, with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it," Kimmel said.
Kimmel also mocked President Trump's seemingly uninvolved response to a reporter's question on Kirk's death.
In an interview with conservative podcaster Benny Johnson on Wednesday, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, a Trump ally and appointee, called Kimmel's comments "some of the sickest conduct possible," and said that there could be "a path forward for suspension over this."
"This is a very, very serious issue right now for Disney," he added. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way."
Carr also urged other media companies and local broadcasters to "push back" and stop airing the show.
:{FCC Chairman Brendan Carr testifies before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government at the Rayburn House Office Building on May 21, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Following Carr's interview, Nexstar Media Group, the owner of several ABC affiliate stations, announced that it would stop airing the show "for the foreseeable future" over Kimmel's remarks.
"Nexstar strongly objects to recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk and will replace the show with other programming in its ABC-affiliated markets," the statement read.
This sequence of events has raised questions about the extent to which this decision was guided by financial motivations rather than genuine outrage over Kimmel's comments.
Nexstar, one of the biggest station owners in the U.S, is currently attempting to complete a merger with fellow TV giant Tegna. The nature of the merger—valued at $6.2 billion—requires the approval of the FCC, and for it to loosen longstanding ownership regulations. These include federal laws barring a single entity from owning TV stations that together reach over 39 percent of American households, and guidelines on the total number of stations that can be owned in a single market.
Sinclair, ABC's largest affiliate group, similarly objected to Kimmel's remarks, and said it would be pulling the late-night show from its stations "indefinitely." Sinclair praised FCC Chairman Carr's comments, and asked Kimmel to issue an apology to Kirk's family, and to make a "meaningful personal donation" to both them and Turning Point USA, the conservative outreach group founded by Kirk.
"Regardless of ABC's plans for the future of the program, Sinclair intends not to return Jimmy Kimmel Live! to our air until we are confident that appropriate steps have been taken to uphold the standards expected of a national broadcast platform," Sinclair said.
According to CNN, Sinclair—like Nexstar—has matters awaiting approval from the Trump administration.
Newsweekhas contacted Sinclair via email for comment.
After ABC followed suit, Johnson boasted that it was his podcast with Carr that led to Kimmel's show being taken off the air.
"It's called soft power. The Left uses it all the time," he wrote on X. "Thanks to President Trump, the Right has learned how to wield power as well."
FCC Chairman Carr, meanwhile, responded to CNN's request for a reaction with a GIF taken from The Office,in which the characters Michael Scott and Dwight Schrute are pumping their hands in the air in celebration.
What People Are Saying
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, in an interview with Sean Hannity on Wednesday evening, said that broadcast licenses carry "a unique obligation to operate in the public interest."
Commenting on the decisions by Nexstar and Sinclair to pull the show, Carr added: "I'm very glad to see that American broadcasters are standing up to serve the interests of our community."
President Donald Trump reacted to the news on Truth Social, writing:"Great News for America: The ratings challenged Jimmy Kimmel Show is CANCELLED. Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done. Kimmel has ZERO talent, and worse ratings than even Colbert, if that's possible. That leaves Jimmy and Seth, two total losers, on Fake News NBC. Their ratings are also horrible. Do it NBC!!! President DJT."
Andrew Alford, President of Nexstar's broadcasting division, said: "Continuing to give Mr. Kimmel a broadcast platform in the communities we serve is simply not in the public interest at the current time, and we have made the difficult decision to preempt his show in an effort to let cooler heads prevail as we move toward the resumption of respectful, constructive dialogue."
Anna Gomez, the only Democratic commissioner at the FCC, posted to X: "An inexcusable act of political violence by one disturbed individual must never be exploited as justification for broader censorship and control. This Administration is increasingly using the weight of government power to suppress lawful expression."
The Writers Guild of America (WGA), a Hollywood labor union, said in a statement:"Shame on those in government who forget this founding truth. As for our employers, our words have made you rich. Silencing us impoverishes the whole world. The WGA stands with Jimmy Kimmel and his writers."
California Governor Gavin Newsom posted to X: "Corrupt, despicable, & spineless behavior. A coordinated effort to control the media is happening before our eyes & it needs to be called out."
Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren posted to X:"First Colbert, now Kimmel. Last-minute settlements, secret side deals, multi-billion dollar mergers pending Donald Trump's approval. Trump silencing free speech stifles our democracy. It sure looks like giant media companies are enabling his authoritarianism."
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) reacted: "The government pressured ABC—and ABC caved. The timing of ABC's decision, on the heels of the FCC chairman's pledge to the network to "do this the easy way or the hard way," tells the whole story. Another media outlet withered under government pressure, ensuring that the administration will continue to extort and exact retribution on broadcasters and publishers who criticize it."
What Happens Next?
Sinclair said that its ABC stations will air a tribute to this Friday, during Jimmy Kimmel Live's usual time slot.
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09/18/25
an 9 25
see hayes on ellison tiktok fcc etc brendan carr on benny j nextstar
Jimmy Kimmel drew the wrath of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Brendan Carr in response to the late-night host's comments on the murder of MAGA activist and Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and the suspect in his shooting: 22-year-old Utah resident Tyler Robinson.
Kimmel argued that the suspect was part of the MAGA movement, not a leftist as President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and others on the far right are saying. The late-night host never condoned the killing in any way, but rather, argued that the suspect had a MAGA ideology rather than a leftist ideology.
Disney, in response, suspended Kimmel's show indefinitely.
Now, according to Daily Beast reporter Cameron James, "America's largest ABC affiliate group," Sinclair, is saying that Kimmel must make a "meaningful personal donation" to Kirk's family.
"Media giant Sinclair also wants the comedian to 'issue a direct apology' to Kirk's family, claiming his suspension is not enough," James reports in an article published on September 18. "Kimmel has been suspended in a wave of MAGA anger, disguised as grief and decency, over comments made by the TV star about the murdered right-wing activist. Sinclair also announced they will air a tribute to Kirk in Kimmel’s Friday-night timeslot this week, and are offering the special to all ABC affiliates to air over the weekend."
James adds, "Sinclair's Vice Chairman Jason Smith called Kimmel's comments on Kirk 'inappropriate and deeply insensitive at a critical moment for our country.'"
In an official statement released on September 17, Sinclair said it "will not lift the suspension of 'Jimmy Kimmel Live' on our stations until formal discussions are held with ABC regarding the network's commitment to professionalism and accountability."
*Read the full Daily Beast article at this link (subscription required).
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'As cowardly as it gets': ABC News blasted for firing reporter who criticized Trump - Alternet.org
terry moran abc fired for saying miller 3 hateful, driving LA ICE home depot raids
PRESS SUPPRESSION
aha/hmmn gop /troll backlash against woke corps (nfl, sedition caucus) but mickey an odd enemy? just recycle of smurf commie moral panic BS? the big lie relies on outragousness? qanon cannibal pedophiles? wedge issues pink pill work well 2022, all they have?
https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/ted-cruz-complains-lesbian-toys/
buzz disney
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Misinformer of the Year: Anti-media intimidation
Written by Matt Gertz
Published 12/23/24 mma
The role of the free press, enshrined by the Constitution’s First Amendment, is an essential element of our democracy. The public cannot become informed about the problems facing our country and the efforts to improve or worsen them without robust protections for journalism.
But powerful people hate the light journalism shines on them and the dissent it can spur. A coalition of right-wing billionaires, Republican law enforcement officials, and an authoritarian once and future president are using wealth, lawfare, and government power to silence the press and carry out their political agenda unimpeded. And they are perilously close to succeeding.
Media Matters is naming anti-media intimidation the Misinformer of the Year for 2024 for its chilling effect on essential press freedoms.
ABC News’ agreement to settle Donald Trump’s defamation lawsuit is a foreboding sign of the current media climate and where it may be headed.
Legal experts and executives at ABC News parent company Disney reportedly thought that the outlet would eventually prevail. But its lawyers reportedly feared “litigating against a vindictive sitting president and risking harm to its brand.” They even worried that the suit could “become a vehicle for Mr. Trump and his allies to overturn the landmark First Amendment decision in New York Times v. Sullivan,” The New York Times reported.
If media lawyers are worried that a defamation lawsuit could ultimately demolish the bedrock legal precedent limiting such suits, then that protection functionally no longer applies.
The results of that shift could prove devastating to news outlets large and small and chill speech across the nation.
Trump’s lawyers have already filed a new lawsuit against Iowa pollster Ann Selzer, her polling firm, The Des Moines Register, and the Iowa paper’s parent company Gannett, accusing them of consumer fraud for publishing Selzer’s poll.
Other suits from anyone else who benefits from a cowed press will surely follow.
The purpose of these intimidation tactics — to which we had already been subjected — is to silence adversarial speech. If powerful individuals can force critics to pay a hefty price, they will be much more hesitant to take risks. And those without the financial resources for protracted legal fights will either back down or risk crippling costs. With journalists silenced, crucial stories will go unwritten — and the American public will lose out to right-wing power.
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an 3 25
The new book Murder the Truth: Fear, the First Amendment, and a Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful by The New York Times business investigations editor David Enrich chronicles an ongoing campaign by the wealthy and powerful to overturn the landmark Supreme Court decision New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, which in 1964 established bedrock protections against spurious defamation and libel cases in the U.S. legal system. By “subject[ing] people to this torturous, long-running and extremely expensive legal process,” those who can afford to pay for expensive and threatening defamation lawsuits can silence any public criticism and suppress others’ rights to free speech, says Enrich. “It has huge implications for our democracy and the ability of everyone to speak their mind.”
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
We turn now from attacks on the right to protest to attacks on press freedom. President Trump is escalating his criticism of the news media, claiming many outlets are engaged in illegal activity. This is part of what he said last week during a speech at the Great Hall of the Department of Justice.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I believe that CNN and MSDNC, who literally write 97.6% bad about me, are political arms of the Democrat Party. And in my opinion, they’re really corrupt, and they’re illegal. What they do is illegal. … These networks and these newspapers are really no different than a highly paid political operative. And it has to stop. It has to be illegal. It’s influencing judges, and it’s entered — it’s really changing law, and it just cannot be legal. I don’t believe it’s legal.
AMY GOODMAN: President Trump’s comments come amidst a right-wing push to overturn protections for the press to investigate public figures, a right guaranteed by the landmark 1964 Supreme Court decision New York Times v. Sullivan.
We’re joined now by David Enrich. He’s New York Times’ business investigations editor. His new book is titled Murder the Truth: Fear, the First Amendment, and a Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful.
If you can start off — it’s great to have you with us, David — by talking about what this Supreme Court decision, this landmark decision in the 1960s, Sullivan, was all about?
DAVID ENRICH: Well, it was brought on behalf of supporters of Martin Luther King, and it basically detailed this litany of abuses by Southern officials. The gist of it was completely true: Southern officials were trying to preserve white supremacy. Some of the facts were either wrong or exaggerated, and a powerful Southern official named L.B. Sullivan, sued The New York Times and won at trial. And the goal, basically, of Sullivan and his pals was that by filing lawsuits that seized on tiny little inaccuracies, you could punish the media for covering the civil rights movement.
And so, this went up to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court ruled, in a unanimous decision in 1964, that in order to preserve free speech and allow people to write and criticize and investigate powerful people and institutions, the media and the public needed breathing room so that if they got a fact wrong by mistake or made an honest error, they would not be sued into oblivion. And so, that Supreme Court ruling has really set the stage for decades of investigative journalism and for normal people, non-journalists, as well, to speak up and kind of reveal abuses and criticize people who hold positions of power, both at the national level or at a community level, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: And what does this mean for the First Amendment?
DAVID ENRICH: And it means that the First Amendment gives everyone the right to speak and to interrogate powerful people, and you do not need to worry about — there should not be a legal cloud hanging over your head when you criticize or investigate someone powerful, and you do not need to worry that an innocent mistake is going to bankrupt you because of litigation.
AMY GOODMAN: So, let’s go back to 2016, Donald Trump vowing to make it easier to sue news organizations.
DONALD TRUMP: I’m going to open up our libel laws, so when they write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money. We’re going to open up those libel laws, so that when The New York Times writes a hit piece, which is a total disgrace, or when The Washington Post, which is there for other reasons, writes a hit piece, we can sue them and win money.
AMY GOODMAN: So, that was before Donald Trump became president the first time around. Talk about the significance of what he’s saying and the overall campaign, as in your subtitle, the Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful.
DAVID ENRICH: Well, when Donald Trump made those remarks in 2016, it kind of acted as the firing of a starter’s pistol in a race, and it sent a signal to the entire kind of conservative movement, and, in particular, the conservative legal movement, that a race was on to try to dismantle some of the long-standing First Amendment protections for the media and for others. And you can trace very directly back to that speech that he gave in Fort Worth, Texas, in February of 2016 the arrival on the scene of this kind of small cottage industry of high-priced lawyers whose entire practices were devoted to suing and threatening news outlets.
And the more successes they piled up, the more the strategy caught on, so that by the time — and within a couple of years, there was a real grassroots movement, funded and fueled by the likes of the Federalist Society, the Heritage Foundation, the Claremont Institute, to really weaponize defamation laws to make it much, much scarier, really, especially for small and independent news outlets and journalists, to write about powerful people — not just the president of the United States, but across — but in their local communities, a big company, maybe a powerful real estate developer, things like that. And this strategy has now worked its way all the way up to the Supreme Court, where there is increasing support for either doing away with New York Times v. Sullivan altogether, or at least chipping away at it around the edges.
AMY GOODMAN: So, you’re the business investigations editor at The New York Times. What led you to write this book?
DAVID ENRICH: Well, we were getting, and still do get, inundated with legal threats basically every time that we start writing about or investigating someone powerful. And it occurred to me — you know, The New York Times is in a pretty good position to handle that kind of threat, but it occurred to me a few years ago that, you know, the experience might be very different if you worked at a smaller outlet or if you were an independent journalist. And, you know, there are so many independent journalists right now, which I think is a really good thing for the media and a good thing for our democracy. But it’s people with a Substack newsletter or a blog or a podcast who are uniquely vulnerable to these types of threats and these types of litigation, because they are enormously expensive to defend against.
And they’re not always meant to — these challenges are not always meant to win in court. They’re often meant to just subject people to this torturous, long-running and extremely expensive legal process. And a lot of people make the economically rational decision, which is that in the face of those threats and in the face of that litigation, they’re going to back down rather than fight, which is exactly what the people making those threats want you to do.
AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about how Hulk Hogan or, as you point out, much more relevantly, Peter Thiel fit into this story.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah, so, Peter Thiel had a long-running grudge against —
AMY GOODMAN: And explain who he is.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah, Peter Thiel is one of the most powerful people in Silicon Valley. He was an early supporter of Donald Trump, and he’s very closely aligned with people like Elon Musk. And he —
AMY GOODMAN: Co-founder of PayPal.
DAVID ENRICH: Co-founder of PayPal, yes, and one of the owners of Palantir, as well. And he had a long-running grudge against the website Gawker, because Gawker was really pioneering a form of journalism that was very skeptical of Silicon Valley elites and was kind of puncturing some of the bubble surrounding them. And so he set out in the early 2010s to destroy Gawker. And he went searching. He hired a bunch of people. He put a bunch of money into this. And he eventually settled on a case involving Hulk Hogan. Gawker had published a snippet of a sex tape involving Hulk Hogan.
And so, Peter Thiel secretly financed and organized a multifaceted legal campaign using Hulk Hogan as a vehicle for retribution against Gawker. He won — Hulk Hogan won. Peter Thiel won. Gawker was destroyed. And this became a real blueprint for other billionaires and other powerful people to really attack the media. They saw that they — a well-funded, well-orchestrated, secret legal campaign — had the ability to absolutely destroy a well-established media outlet.
AMY GOODMAN: So, Gawker was destroyed. Now talk about some of the Supreme Court justices’ views. Particularly begin with Clarence Thomas.
DAVID ENRICH: Well, Clarence Thomas, during his confirmation hearings in 1991, expressed real support for New York Times v. Sullivan. He then went through a period where he got some very negative media coverage, and his views seemed to shift. And so, by 2019, Clarence Thomas became the first sitting Supreme Court justice to openly call for the overturning of New York Times v. Sullivan.
His argument originally was grounded in the 45 words of the First Amendment, which do not mention libel or defamation, and therefore should not — he argued that should not be protected under the First Amendment. Really, though, this was a part of a campaign by Thomas and his allies to really erode the powers of the media and the protections for the media and normal people to speak up when they saw abuses and to criticize people like him.
And so, he, now joined by Neil Gorsuch, as well, have really embraced this call and are trying to recruit other justices, I think, and are calling for other people to file lawsuits that might make their way up to the Supreme Court that will challenge these long-standing precedents that protect, again, not just press freedoms, but the right of a person in a community to circulate a petition, for example, or make a comment on Facebook about their mayor, things like that. So this is not just about protecting journalists. It’s really about protecting anyone who wants to stand up and have their voice heard on matters of public importance.
AMY GOODMAN: Where does Neil Gorsuch stand?
DAVID ENRICH: Gorsuch has joined Thomas in wanting to have this overturned. And his views really — and he views Sullivan as protecting all sorts of online defamatory speech. The arguments that he has made — I mean, one of the things I do in this book is really deconstruct those arguments. And it turns out, a lot of them are premised on not just kind of faulty logic, but inaccurate data that he cited, that he got from a law review article that was filled with a lot of false assumptions and kind of misinterpreted data. And so, he has actually had to correct his opinion calling for the overturning of New York Times v. Sullivan, but it is still being cited to this day by the conservative legal movement as one of the real kind of sources of information and authority that should be used to overturn it.
AMY GOODMAN: You begin your book, the prologue, “A Panicked Phone Call.” You tell the story of Guy Larson [sic]. Tell us who he — Guy Lawson — is.
DAVID ENRICH: So, Lawson is an American journalist and author who wrote a book that became the basis for the movie War Dogs, with — starring Jonah Hill. And the book basically tells the story of how these three stoners from Miami Beach become international arms traffickers. It’s kind of a rollicking, really fascinating tale. Some of the action is set in Albania. And there’s a bit part in the book played by the son of Albania’s former prime minister, who is kind of an autocratic strongman. And the details in the book, as far as I’ve been able to determine, were completely accurate. But for argument’s sake, the son of the strongman claims that he was kind of smeared in the book and that some of the facts were wrong, so he filed a lawsuit against Lawson in U.S. court, and it’s worked its way — it’s been kind of years winding its way through the legal process. It got dismissed by multiple courts. But years later, it worked its way up to the Supreme Court, and it became one of the latest vehicles to try and challenge Sullivan.
:{And it was seized on by people who had been inspired by Clarence Thomas, who had basically issued an open invitation to lawyers and, you know, prospective litigants, begging them to bring him a case that he could used to overturn Sullivan. It made its way up to the Supreme Court. They did not get enough votes to actually overturn Sullivan, or even hear the case, but it became another vehicle for Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch to really, you know, bring this issue much more to public light and to argue forcefully that Sullivan should be overturned.
And those calls, while unsuccessful — they did not get the Supreme Court to change the legal standard — they inspired hordes of lawyers, activists and other judges at lower levels across the country to really lean into this argument. And you can look at cases all over the country, and you can see that they are slowing down, they are taking longer, they’re not getting dismissed as quickly. And that creates all sorts of pain and difficulties for — especially for local and independent journalists, who now have much kind of higher odds of being dragged through expensive litigation.}:
AMY GOODMAN: So, you talk about — let’s look a some of the cases that President Trump is involved with right now. He sues ABC. He sues The Des Moines Register. He sues CBS. Is he trying to bring these cases to the Supreme Court? Now, of course, ABC, there was a settlement. Explain what these cases were about and what it means to settle.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah, well, first of all, Trump is very much trying to get a case to the Supreme Court that will lead to the overturning of Sullivan. I don’t think any of those three cases you mentioned are the likely vehicles, but there are a bunch of others working their way through the federal appeals system that I think stand a much better chance.
These more recent lawsuits against ABC, CBS and The Des Moines Register are all pretty clearly efforts by Trump and his allies to weaponize the law to get — to kind of punish criticism and to deter others from speaking up and saying critical things. And they involve different legal theories. The ABC case was a straight-up defamation case. The Des Moines Register and the —
AMY GOODMAN: I mean, ABC case, where George Stephanopoulos had said President Trump —
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: — was found civilly liable for rape. Now, again —
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: — the judge in the case said, in common parlance, this case would be about rape.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah, and even in the technical details, that he was actually found liable by the jury for sexual abuse, not rape. But so, even if you assume, for argument’s sake, that that’s an important difference and that Stephanopoulos got it wrong — and I think Stephanopoulos would say he didn’t get it wrong — but for argument’s sake, let’s say he did get it wrong. That is exactly the type of mistake that is supposed to be protected by New York Times v. Sullivan, because it is an honest, good-faith error, and you should not be held liable. ABC nonetheless decided that it was prudent to settle this case.
AMY GOODMAN: Or Disney did —
DAVID ENRICH: Well, right.
AMY GOODMAN: — which owns ABC.
DAVID ENRICH: Disney, as parent company, did. And, I mean, I think the rationale for that — and we’re seeing this play out in other settings, as well — is that these big multinational companies, that have varied interests, are trying to protect their corporate interests and do not feel like having outstanding litigation against the president of the United States is in their best interest, and so they are, pretty clearly, I think, taking the side of their profits in the long term over the First Amendment concerns that many of their journalists have. And you’re seeing a very similar dynamic playing out with CBS right now.
AMY GOODMAN: And CBS is the case of 60 Minutes.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: And Trump is suing them for $20 billion, I think, at this point, for how they edited a Kamala Harris piece.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah, and this is the very definition of what I think is a meritless lawsuit. And at the time the lawsuit was filed, there were some discrepancies in the way CBS kind of cut or aired parts of Kamala Harris’s interview with 60 Minutes. We now have the full, unedited transcript. We have the full, unedited recordings of those interviews. And it is plainly clear, objectively, that the interview, while edited, was not done so deceptively. There are not material differences between the different things that aired on different CBS shows. And so, the lawsuit, clearly, to me at least, and certainly all the legal observers I’ve spoken to, with the exception of people aligned with Trump, is not a strong legal argument. And yet, CBS’s parent company, which has a multibillion-dollar merger pending, that it needs —
AMY GOODMAN: Paramount.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah — that it needs federal approval for, has started talking with the Trump side about possibly settling this. And the rationale, again, is quite clear: They are concerned, on the Paramount side, that if they do not settle this, that the Trump administration is going to essentially punish them by holding up this multibillion-dollar merger. And so, you have journalists and, I think, media executives at CBS who are apoplectic about the prospect of settling this, because, A, they are on very strong legal footing, and, B, it would set a terrible precedent that the companies are going to cave to this kind of legal extortion. But I think — we’ll see what happens.
AMY GOODMAN: How does protection of the press in the United States compare to other countries? And talk about libel tourism.
DAVID ENRICH: Yeah. So, the U.S. is — the First Amendment is a really special thing in the U.S. It’s one of the things that distinguishes America from many other democracies. So, if you look at countries like the U.K., for example, or Australia, which are, you know, very democratic — small-D democratic countries, it is much harder for journalists and others to write critical things or to investigate powerful people and institutions in those countries, because their libel laws make it much easier to sue, and that also allows you to much more easily and kind of potently threaten people.
And so, you have — in the U.K., for example, we’ve had this phenomenon, as you just said, called libel tourism, where people, rich people, like Russian oligarchs, and big companies file lawsuits against journalists from all over the world in the British court system. And that has created a real chilling effect even for American journalists, who sometimes find themselves getting sued in British courts just because you published something. It goes online. It’s accessible probably everywhere in the world. That can expose you to liability in the British court system.
Now, it’s getting a little bit harder to actually bring those suits right now, but, to me, it’s a really clear reminder of the importance of the protections we have in the U.S. It really does differentiate this country from many others. And it means we have a much more robust and aggressive media. And again, it also means that just normal people who want to circulate a petition online can do so without fear that if they get a fact wrong, they are not going to be bullied and intimidated and potentially sued because of just minor inaccuracies.
AMY GOODMAN: So, finally, after you wrote this book, Murder the Truth: Fear, the First Amendment, and a Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful, were you more or less hopeful?
DAVID ENRICH: Oh my goodness, less hopeful. We have a real problem right now in this country. We have very strong legal protections, and yet people and companies and institutions are, on a daily basis, threatening journalists and threatening normal people, and they are getting their way a lot of the time, and that’s with our legal protections in place. And the assault on these protections is very much underway. It’s a very much alive threat, I think. And we’re seeing the White House engage in this almost on a daily basis, it seems. So I think the threat is growing, and it has huge implications for our democracy and the ability of everyone to speak their mind and criticize powerful people.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to talk about some of the particular cases you look at in the book after the show, and we’ll post it as a web exclusive at democracynow.org. David Enrich, New York Times business investigations editor. His new book, just out, Murder the Truth: Fear, the First Amendment, and a Secret Campaign to Protect the Powerful.
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no lnx
alternet
Home | How CEOs are funding one of America's most dangerous shifts
Thom HartmannDecember 18, 2024
“Any person or company investing ONE BILLION DOLLARS, OR MORE, in the United States of America, will receive fully expedited approvals and permits, including, but in no way limited to, all Environmental approvals.”
—Donald Trump Dec. 10, 2024
The 1986 American Heritage Dictionary defines fascism as:
“fascism (făsh'ĩz'am) n. A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism.”
We’re about to be there.
The power of government to both reward and punish is awesome. No other entity can legally take money away from citizens at gunpoint and hand it to others it favors. No other entity has the power to deprive people of their freedom and even their lives. No other entity can use both of those powers to regulate how business must be conducted.
When Disney, a $248 billion dollar company, decided to give a $15 million donation to Donald Trump’s presidential library slush fund, they didn’t do so because they were worried about losing a defamation lawsuit.
To the contrary, they would have easily won the case. The judge in Trump’s New York trial came right out and said, in front of God and the whole world:
“The finding Ms. Carroll failed to prove she was ‘raped’ within the meaning of the N.Y. Penal Law does not mean she failed to prove Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape’. Indeed, as the evidence at trial… makes clear, the jury found Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that.”
It’s also extraordinarily difficult for a public figure to sue for defamation, per the Supreme Court’s 1964 Times v Sullivan case, which requires proof of “actual malice,” a very, very high legal standard.
An article in The New York Times this past weekend added this gem of a paragraph, although ABC insists the meeting wasn’t arranged to discuss the defamation claim:
“Debra OConnell, the Disney executive who directly oversees ABC News, dined with Mr. Trump’s incoming chief of staff, Susie Wiles, in Palm Beach last Monday, according to two people briefed on their interaction. The dinner was part of a visit by several ABC News executives to Florida to meet with Mr. Trump’s transition team.”
Whether OConnell and Wiles discussed the defamation case or not is almost beside the point; the reasonable assumption is that Disney didn’t decide to pay off Trump because they were concerned about the lawsuit but, instead, because they wanted to be on the inside, rather than the outside, of the group of corporations that will make up the “friends of Trump” as he takes over the reins of government. Disney has already gotten their nose bloody by trying to stand up to Trump’s Mini-Me, Ron DeSantis; they’ve learned their lesson well.
This is, classically, how fascists work. In fascist states, corporations and wealthy individuals fall all over themselves to gain the favor of the fascist strongman leader or they lose out big.
When Putin took over Russia, he essentially said to the richest of the Russian oligarchs, “You can be with me or against me, but there is no middle ground.” Ditto for Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán (who met with Trump in Florida last week), Turkey’s dictator Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (who Trump praised this week), and history’s fascist strongmen from Tojo, Franco, Hitler, and Mussolini to more recent versions like Pinochet, el-Sisi, and Ceaușescu.
And now America. Soon to be the newest fascist state in the world.
This goes way beyond ignoring fascism’s chronicler Timothy Snyder’s warning not to “obey in advance”: The companies whose CEOs are making the pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago right now are actively trying to get on the inside with Trump by nakedly supporting him.
They both fear his punishments (he’d called for ABC to lose its broadcast licenses, for example) and hope for his largess when he instructs his federal agencies to start cutting regulations and going easy on corporate mergers and tax evasion.
For over 240 years, America was administered by presidents who adhered to the idea that they should govern, as then-New York Times publisher Adolph S. Ochs wrote in 1896, “without fear or favor.”
Not only did they not direct the government to help or harm any specific companies or industries, those elected to the White House over the past century or so even put their own personal wealth into blind trusts to avoid even the appearance of using government to enrich themselves.
All of that came to a screeching halt when the most corrupt (and richest) president in American history came into office in 2017. Now, empowered by having gotten away with encouraging outright sedition (among other crimes), Trump is doubling down as he accepts million-dollar “donations” from corporate CEOs.
While it’s unlikely oligarchs who refuse to go along with Trump will begin to fall out of 14th floor windows like in Russia, Trump has already made it clear he’ll use regulatory agencies and the courts to punish them like Orbán does.
This is not the American way. It is, instead, how fascist nations that inevitably morph into dictatorships work. It’s a huge warning signal to us and the world.
It also sets a terrible example for other republics around the world that aspire to our (former) ideals of democracy and fair play in business and government. And it sets our country up to become a sleazy tinpot dictatorship, descending to the ethics and credibility standards of Third World caricatures.
History is taking careful note of those CEOs who are energetically brown-nosing Trump, just as it did with Thyssen and Krupp, who were prosecuted for war crimes in the 1940s.
And to compound this evil, these businesses are adding to the power that Trump is rapidly accumulating as, one after another, they, politicians of both parties, and people across the media bow their heads and bend their knees.
Any company so willing to engage with such tainted government leadership should alarm us all: Going forward, the honesty, reliability, and safety of their products may well be corrupted by their praetorian relationship with Trump’s regulators, rather than responding to the competitive forces of the actual marketplace.
Which is also why, going forward, we’d all do best to avoid their programs, products, and services.
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musk demands eisner resign? pulled ads from twt?
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mma 1 24
MICHAEL KNOWLES (HOST): Mickey Mouse has to become a Nazi. He has to. Because Disney is a very, very evil corporation that wants to trans your kids and fill their heads with all sorts of crazy ideas, and Disney's gotta go. Disney's gotta go, guys. You heard all the Disney executives talking about their not-so-secret LGBTLMNOP agenda. }:}:
You've seen what Disney has done in recent years, so much so that the governor of Florida had to take political action against them to stop Disney from trying to interfere in the democratic process in Florida to stop the libs from transing your kids. OK? Disney is really, really bad. And so, one of the best things that we can do right now is make the Disney characters toxic. And coincidentally, call it providentially, whatever it is, the Disney character is now in the public domain.}:
And what this means is we need to turn Mickey into a Nazi because Nazis are bad. We're not gonna turn Mickey into a Nazi because the Nazis are good. You see, I'm quite anti-Nazi. I assume you are as well. In fact, being a Nazi is the worst thing you can possibly be today and for a very long time. So, we need to turn Disney into the worst thing it can possibly be, and it can be done. In fact, I'm shocked that the mischievous people on places like 4chan and other internet boards haven't done this already.
Remember what they did to that cartoon frog? There was that cartoon frog -- this was many years ago. I'm dating myself to think back on the halcyon years of 2016. 2016, which was eight years ago, by the way. In my mind, 2016 was like two years ago. It was eight years ago. But, anyway, back in those days, there was this cartoon frog that a regular cartoonist had made, and it was kind of a popular webcomic. And then these guys on 4chan turned the frog into a Nazi. And since then, the frog has actually, I think, come out of his Nazi phase. I don't -- it's very difficult to track memes because it's -- it's mimetic. Right? It just kind of -- it moves through imitation, and it's -- it's really hard to get your hands on.
But for a while, the frog was a Nazi. And it drove the cartoonist who made the frog completely crazy because the frog became a hate symbol. It was listed on all -- SPLC, ADL, all these different lists. And we can do the same with Mickey Mouse. It's not just enough to make Mickey Mouse a serial killer as you're seeing in these movies. Mickey Mouse has to become the most odious kind of symbol in the entire world. And we have the ability to do it, not using any major institutional power, just through the power of memes by pseudonymous accounts on random internet boards. That's what's gotta happen because Disney's bad, and Disney's gotta go down.
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Conservatives’ ‘anti-woke’ alternative to Disney has finally arrived - Alternet.org
an 12 23
as fanfare blares, female sprinters at the starting line suspiciously eye a man in a wig. A hulking, goateed wrestler slams a woman half his size to the mat. An ominous voice-over intones that women’s sports are being “trans-formed.”
No, this isn’t the beginning of a classic cross-dressing comedy. It’s the trailer for “Lady Ballers,” a new right-wing movie that farcically depicts cisgendered men claiming to be women in order to dominate women’s sports.
At first glance, it’s easy to dismiss the movie as yet another example of the meme that conservatives only have one joke, repeated ad nauseam, mocking liberal views on gender identity.
But my own research has explored the vast network of conservative comedy that bolsters right-wing political efforts.
Now, in addition to comedy, U.S. conservatives are using action films, dramas and even kids’ cartoons to build their own alternative entertainment industry, one shielded from the alleged liberal biases of Hollywood.
The most prominent recent efforts are two streaming entertainment platforms from right-wing pundit Ben Shapiro and “Lady Ballers” star Jeremy Boreing.
DailyWire+ offers documentaries, Westerns and faith-based fantasy series. Its companion streaming platform, Bentkey, which launched in October 2023, specializes in children’s programming.
To be sure, these streamers have miles to go before challenging Netflix and Disney+. But by strategically targeting their politically engaged audiences, the platforms have been successful – and could have more staying power than prior attempts at making music and movies for conservatives.
Swings, misses – and a few hits
U.S. conservatives have successfully launched and steered a number of news outlets. They have a spottier record when it comes to entertainment, whether it’s feature films, pop songs or kids’ shows.
In 2013, former Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum became the CEO of EchoLight Studios, which produced several faith-based films in the 2010s. Similarly, the pundit and documentary filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza has had a few modest box office hits centered on right-wing conspiracy theories. These efforts saw limited success because their niche political appeal was mismatched with theatrical movies’ wide distribution.
Other forms of conservative entertainment have briefly gone viral, before all but disappearing – perhaps because they’re too closely aligned with current events to have staying power. Kid Rock’s “We the People” bemoaned COVID-19 restrictions and “Bidenomics,” while Jason Aldean’s 
” tried to harness conservative resentment toward Black Lives Matter protests a few years too late.
One notable conservative entertainment hit is the 2023 thriller “The Sound of Freedom.” The movie’s surprise success had as much to do with its subject matter – child trafficking, which is catnip for right-wing conspiracists – as it did with its unique financing. The film’s producer, Angel Studios, used an equity crowdfunding model that gave 100,000 individual investors a say in creative and marketing decisions.
Then “The Sound of Freedom” used a “pay it forward” marketing scheme that encouraged the film’s fans to buy tickets for like-minded friends and family. Although Angel Studios won’t disclose how much revenue “pay it forward” generated, the movie has an overall gross of nearly US$250 million against a $14.5 million budget.
“The Sound of Freedom” allowed audiences literally to buy into the film’s success, which its marketing campaign equated with actively rejecting Hollywood’s liberal agenda. A similar dynamic informed the launch – and will likely determine the future – of DailyWire+ and Bentkey.
Packaging conservatism for kids
Shapiro is among the most vocal backers of Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis. Both are deeply hostile to LGBTQ+ rights. They’ve also routinely claimed that supporters of “woke gender ideology” like Disney are “grooming” children.
In late 2022, DailyWire+ surpassed 1 million subscribers by releasing programming that stoked these culture war concerns. Among the platform’s hits were right-wing commentator Matt Walsh’s anti-trans documentary “What Is A Woman?” and PragerU’s video shorts that advocate for conservative pet issues through sober, educational-sounding explainers. Then, of course, there are comedies like “Lady Ballers.”
Boreing has explicitly highlighted the disconnect between viewers’ politics and their entertainment options.
“[Americans are] tired of giving their money to woke media companies who want to indoctrinate their children with radical race and gender theory,” he told The Washington Post ahead of Bentkey’s recent launch.
Bentkey strives to directly counterprogram Disney with its own conservative family programming. “Chip Chilla,” for instance, is a fairly transparent rip-off of the Disney+-distributed hit “Bluey,” a cartoon about the hijinks of a family of Australian dogs.
The creators of “Chip Chilla” include “Saturday Night Live” alumnus-turned-anti-vaxxer Rob Schneider and Ethan Nicolle, the former creative director of the right-wing satire website The Babylon Bee.
The platform also aims to challenge Disney’s dominance in the princess realm. Bentkey’s forthcoming fantasy film “Snow White and The Evil Queen” stars the popular conservative YouTuber Brett Cooper and purports to emphasize the fairy tale’s traditional social values.
If politics is downstream from culture …
As media grapple with declining advertising revenue, DailyWire+ and Bentkey are betting that loyal, politically engaged subscribers will drive their growth.
Shapiro’s strategy aligns with that of X, which is backing into a subscription model as chairman Elon Musk’s impulsive tweets alienate advertisers.
In a move away from the ad-supported YouTube, Shapiro struck a deal with Musk for X to host The Daily Wire’s podcasts. Like Shapiro, Musk is a supporter of DeSantis, with X – then known as Twitter – infamously hosting the candidate’s disastrous campaign launch in May 2023.
Backed by this confluence of powerful right-wing voices, conservative entertainment can engage the Republican electorate in new ways. Liberals would do well not to dismiss its potentially galvanizing effects before the 2024 election.
The late right-wing muckraker Andrew Breitbart – a mentor of Shapiro – famously asserted that politics is downstream from culture.
If this is, in fact, the case, slapstick comedy and children’s animation just might buoy the next wave of conservative activism.
Nick Marx, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies, Colorado State University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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ct ruling?
https://www.alternet.org/biden-desantis-disney/
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an 4 23
no lnx
Here’s the real reason Disney Is defying DeSantis
Sonali Kolhatkar and Independent Media Institute April 28, 2023
Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis is eager to cast himself as the new and improved Donald Trump. He has waged a relentless war against what he calls “woke ideology” by attacking the rights of vulnerable minorities to teach and learn history, to read literature, and to get life-saving medical care such as gender-affirming treatment and reproductive health care. Now, his attack on Florida’s largest corporation is being cast in the same vein of “good versus evil.”
This article was produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media Institute.
Except that the DeSantis-Disney war ought really to be viewed as an opportunity to call Republicans out on their slavish devotion to Big Business and dare them to follow through with stripping not just the Disney corporation, but all money-hungry companies of their dependence on public financing. Both DeSantis and Disney are predatory, albeit in different ways.
Disney, a company that has deep cultural sway over Americans for being a purveyor of “magic” and “happiness,” has enjoyed a very special and extremely unusual arrangement in Orlando, Florida, where its Walt Disney World Resort occupies tens of thousands of acres named the Reedy Creek Improvement District. Since 1967, the state of Florida has allowed the corporation to govern the area and even to issue tax bonds to residents in order to pay for municipal services while being exempt from certain regulations and taxes.
Rather than viewing Disney World as “the happiest place on earth,” Sophie Weiner, writing in Popular Mechanics in 2018, explained that, “Disney World is what it looks like if you give a corporation full control over an area of land as big as San Francisco. It’s worked out great for the company, which counts on the park for 14 percent of its $2 billion yearly earnings.” Further, in 2021, the state of Florida gifted the company a massive $580 million tax break in exchange for moving about 2,000 jobs from its California locations to Florida.
But in March 2022 Disney took a stand against the Parental Rights in Education Law, which has been dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” act, prompting DeSantis’s ire. A month later Florida’s Republican legislature dissolved Disney’s special status in a law that is to take effect on June 1, 2023. DeSantis explained the move saying, “I’m just not comfortable having that type of agenda get special treatment in my state.” In other words, Disney’s special corporate arrangement would not be tolerated if it challenged his homophobia.
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Except that Disney had to be pushed hard into taking such a moral stand. For weeks after the bill was announced the company was perfectly content enjoying the largesse of Florida even as activists were demanding it speak out against a law prohibiting teachings that touch on gender identity and sexual orientation to kids in kindergarten through third grade. Disney’s own workers protested their employer’s lack of courage. The hashtag #BoycottDisney began trending. The company eventually, reluctantly, reacted by suspending all its political donations in the state of Florida to both parties—not exactly the most principled stand.
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To his credit, Disney’s then-CEO Bob Chapek also made public statements against the bill and offered a $5 million donation to the Human Rights Campaign (which the group rejected).
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But earlier this year Florida, realizing that dissolving Disney’s tax status would end up dumping a billion-dollar bond debt onto the public, quickly scrambled to restore the special district while muzzling Disney. A new law will allow the governor to appoint leadership positions of Reedy Creek Improvement District instead of allowing Disney to do so.
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Representative Anna Eskamani, a progressive Democrat in the state legislature, told the Hollywood Reporter, “The inner workings [of the special district] stay the same. The only difference is Disney won’t challenge the governor on anything anymore.” The company was initially happy and Disney World’s head Jeff Vahle said his company was “ready to work within this new framework.”
Testing this new arrangement DeSantis has revved up his culture war, approving a rule change to expand the Don’t Say Gay bill to all grades and sending a message to LGBTQ youth that their lives don’t matter. But the new board that he appointed to govern Disney’s special district voted to nullify a company plan to expand and develop the area. It was only then that Disney filed a lawsuit against DeSantis claiming he violated their first amendment rights over the homophobic law.
Every step of the way Disney was happy to suck up all the tax perks and financial autonomy it could get away with, regardless of whom its host was harming. Only when its financial status was threatened has it claimed to be on the side of LGBTQ communities.
Aside from Eskamani, few Democrats have called Disney out for its hypocrisy and for reaping special financial perks, instead supporting the corporation for being a job creator. Democratic Congressional representative Darren Soto chastised DeSantis, saying, “It’d be nice if he stopped attacking Central Florida’s top employer.” He added, “We’re talking about trying to get [Disney] to invest more money to create more jobs. And this is not helpful to those efforts.”
Soto’s words suggest that he sees Disney performing a massive favor to the state by operating its resort and parks there instead of the other way around. But the sort of jobs that Disney creates is precisely what has fueled deep income inequality in the U.S. Its presence in Florida has meant thousands of poorly paid jobs that keep Floridians in a hand-to-mouth existence, unable to cope with the rising cost of living. Aubrey Jewett, a University of Central Florida political science professor, told USA Today, “Yes, we have a lot of jobs. But they don’t pay very much. And we seem to have lost ground over time, especially when it comes to housing costs.”
One Disney worker told the Guardian, “We’re grossly, grossly underpaid for the hours that we work,” and that “[a] lot of Disney workers are barely squeaking by. You have workers with families sleeping in their car.”
Disney heiress Abigail Disney, who is an outspoken progressive, even made a documentary about the poor treatment of Disneyland workers in Anaheim, California, where the company also enjoys special tax benefits in exchange for creating jobs and where it was granted an exception to a voter-passed minimum wage increase. Just as in Florida, Disney’s California jobs are worth about as little as the taxes the company pays to the state.
In addition to constantly being granted exemptions for taxes and regulations, corporations like Disney enjoy a mythical status in the U.S. for being so massively profitable that their dollar signs obscure capitalism’s ugly underbelly.
Disney should not have control over land, resources, tax regulations, or wages.And lawmakers should not be allowed to trample over the rights of minorities. It’s not difficult to oppose both Disney’s power grab and DeSantis’s dangerous culture wars. Indeed, both positions are fully consistent with progressive ideals of protecting and furthering the rights of human beings.
FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES
Virginia’s Republican governor sidesteps questions about Ron DeSantis’ feud with Disney ›
'That ship has already sailed': Marco Rubio contorts himself defending Ron DeSantis’ war on Disney ›
'They’re those people': Vanity Fair rips the DeSantis’ Disney hypocrisy ›
RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB
DeSantis responds to Disney lawsuit: 'I think it's political' - ABC News ›
Disney sues Florida governor Ron DeSantis - BBC News ›
Disney sues Florida Gov Ron DeSantis ›
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https://www.alternet.org/disneys-damning-lawsuit-targeted-desantis/
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an 1 23 maya
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has become well-known for his efforts to incite culture wars and influence the politics of education across Florida as he considers running in the 2024 presidential election.
In doing so, the potential GOP candidate has violated the First Amendment in numerous ways over the course of his gubernatorial reign, Vox Senior Correspondent Ian Millhiser reports. Millhiser offered an analysis of the ways DeSantis consistently violates the U.S. Constitution by enacting laws that blatantly challenge and disregard freedom of speech and expression.
During his reelection victory address in November, DeSantis promised Floridians that he would “fight the woke in the legislature,” “fight the woke in the schools,” and “fight the woke in the corporations,” which is what he’s already actively tried to achieve as governor.
With that, “DeSantis, in other words,” Millhiser wrote, “does not seem content to simply enact policies that hew to a right-wing economic or social vision.He wishes to use the sovereign powers of government to shape public discourse itself — punishing some ideas, rewarding others, and conscripting public schools and universities into his culture war.”
Millhiser also highlighted DeSantis’ goal of completely changing the trajectory of education across the state, as he recently chose anti-critical race theory leader Christopher Rufo to sit on the board of the liberal New College of Florida. Rufo plans to do all he can to transform the school into an institution that mirrors the conservative Michigan-based Hillsdale College, which boasts ties to Donald Trump. DeSantis also appointed conservative Republican and former Senator Ben Sasse as president at the University of Florida last week.
AlterNet previously reported that journalist Jonathan Chait likened DeSantis’ approach to education in Florida to Hungarian politician Viktor Orbán, who used several strategies to implement an authoritarian educational system.
After his “Stop WOKE Act,” which would ban race-related coursework from college classrooms, was temporarily blocked by a judge, DeSantis distributed a memo requesting course data from state colleges that teach “diversity, equity and inclusion.” And following the governor’s successful passing of the “Don’t Say Gay” bill last year, some Florida schools have already removed books with LGBTQ characters from their libraries.
READ MORE:Why 'massive bully' Ron DeSantis 'would be no better' than Donald Trump as presiden**t: columnist
However, when anyone speaks out against the governor’s authoritarian-like leadership decisions, he immediately retaliates.
After the Walt Disney Company denounced DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” bill last April, he made claims that the company “tried to attack me to advance their woke agenda,” and he retaliated by signing a law that would ultimately disband the “Reedy Creek Improvement District,” a large area of land that houses Walt Disney World, and “where Disney has an unusual amount of control over local land use and taxation.”
Prior to signing the legislation, DeSantis gloated that the “Democrat machine Disney and other woke corporations won’t get away with peddling their unchecked pressure campaigns any longer.”
Millhiser argued that the law is unconstitutional because even though the state of Florida isn’t necessarily “required to maintain” the land,the state “cannot strip Disney of a legal benefit it already enjoys in order to punish Disney for expressing a political opinion.”
READ MORE:'Tone of humility': Florida columnist issues dire warning to Ron DeSantis
Millhiser provided a list of the legislative decisions a governor can make that are actually considered constitutional, such as “give speeches arguing that the United States is somehow miraculously immune from systemic injustice,” “sign legislation repealing programs intended to cure these injustices” or “appoint officials to public school boards that share his belief that the US is immune to these injustices.
"“He may even enact policies that help perpetuate these injustices, assuming that those policies violate neither the state nor federal constitution," Millhiser added
But, the correspondent asserted that DeSantis “goes much further than that” by “sanctioning speech” he simply doesn’t like.
Although Texas Governor Greg Abbott has enacted laws that are considered “even more aggressive than Florida’s," DeSantis’ rhetoric and unconstitutional actions appear much more alarming, Millhiser warns, as he could “take his speech war national if elected president” in 2024.
Millhiser argued that even though the Constitution acts as a shield, to some degree, to DeSantis’ efforts to violate the right to free speech, “it is a worthless shield if the judiciary is controlled by partisans and ideologues who will not enforce the First Amendment against men like DeSantis.”
READ MORE:'A strange no-eye-contact oddball': Who is the real Ron DeSantis?
In the same vein, what’s most alarming about the governor’s attack on freedom of speech is that, if elected president, DeSantis could appoint conservative judges who share his views to fill courts across the country — judges who will allow him to violate the First Amendment without consequence. If ultimately elected to national office, Millhiser wrote, “with the right judges in place, DeSantis could potentially transform American society and culture in ways that would be unrecognizable to everyone accustomed to how the First Amendment has been interpreted for the last 60 years.”
Lastly, in regards to the ongoing debacle between DeSantis and Disney, Millhiser noted that although a company as vast as Disney likely possesses the necessary resources to stand its ground against unconstitutional state government laws, the main disconcerting component here is “the fact that DeSantis targeted one of the largest and most popular producers of First Amendment-protected art in the world is also a warning about how far his agenda could reach if it is successful.”
READ MORE:How 'authoritarian' Ron DeSantis has made Florida a 'laboratory of fascist politics': scholar
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https://www.drilledpodcast.com/s7-the-abcs-of-big-oil/
The photos below are from a comic book that Disney put out in conjunction with Exxon in the 1980s, at the same time that Exxon was sponsoring the Universe of Energy Center at Epcot. Both were aimed at shaping kids’ understanding of energy and the economy. [conservation?]
...Exxon’s Universe of Energy Center was at Epcot from 1982 through 1996. That’s fascinating, because that’s the exact time span that Exxon went from researching climate change to explicitly denying it. (Exxon’s denial started in the late 80s and picked up steam throughout the 90s). The exhibit was originally intended to be called The Future of Energy, and was supposed to focus only on renewable energy, but when Exxon got involved they changed the scope to include fossil fuels as well, and present an "all-of-the-above" approach to energy. Sound familiar?
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desantispicked a fight with Disney, biggest employer and beloved corp?! Gavin made offer to refugees?!
no lnx vid twt
https://www.alternet.org/2022/04/fox-news/
Fox News dangerously declares war on teachers: Calls for violence, accusations of 'inclination' to pedophilia
David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement April 11, 2022
From Tucker Carlson to Laura Ingraham to Mark Levin, Fox News propagandists have declared war on public school teachers.The dangerous attacks follow the right’s misleading claims – fueled by Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” legislation – about children inappropriately being taught about sex, homosexuality, bisexuality, sexual orientation, and gender identity starting as early as kindergarten.
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Last month, just days afterFlorida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis’ spokesperson Christina Pushaw charged that anyone who opposed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill was “probably” a “groomer” – essentially, a pedophile, pedophile enabler, or pedophile supporter, Fox News propagandist Laura Ingraham jumped into action.
“When did ourpublic schools,any schools, become what are essentially grooming centers for gender identity radicals?” Ingraham asked, as Media Matters reported. The chyron was less ambiguous: “Liberals are sexually grooming elementary students.”
In fact, on Monday Media Matters’ Matthew Gertz wrote, “With Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ law, Republicans have weaponized their Fox News base against teachers.”
Sunday night Fox News’ far-right “fringe” host Mark Levin hosted award-winning playwright David Mamet, who has no degree in childhood development, education, or sexual studies, to discuss public schools. He declared that teachers, especially male teachers, are “sexual predators.”
“Teachers are inclined, particularly men because men are predators, to pedophilia,” Mamet charged, pointing to no study that proves his claim.
That claim came just days after Fox News’ top propagandist, Tucker Carlson, called for men to engage in verbal or physical abuse of school teachers, as Media Matters reported.
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“I don’t understand where the men are. Like where are the dads? You know, some teachers pushing sex values on your third grader why don’t you go in and thrash the teacher? Like this is an agent of the government pushing someone else’s values on your kid about sex, like where’s the pushback?
But Insider reports that Carlson was “repeating calls for violence he has made previously.” And The Daily Beast apparently agreed: “The Fox News host yet again suggested that violence against educators is called for.”
Rather than apologize for its hosts and guests, Fox News is doubling down.Monday morning the conservative outlet published an article claiming: “CNN, Washington Post, Vice and more fret that Republicans are worried about child grooming, pedophilia.”
On Twitter, Media Matters Matthew Gertz adds to points he made in his article.
“Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ law effectively deputizes the most Fox-News-and-Facebook-addicted members of the GOP base to act on frenzied smears that LGBTQ teachers are ‘grooming’ children,” he writes.
“This vague law is then enforced by parents suing their school districts. Suits will inevitably come from the most anti-LGBTQ parents, and school districts will chill discussion of a wide range of topics to try to avoid getting mired in lawsuits,” Gertz adds.
“These baseless accusations that the right’s political opponents are actually pedophiles overlap with – and at times become indistinguishable from – the QAnon conspiracy theory,” he concludes, “which is moving ever closer to the GOP mainstream.”
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/david-mamet-teachers-pedophilia-fox-news-1335736/
David Mamet Comes Out as Right-Wing Culture Warrior, Claims Teachers Are Inclined to Pedophilia
April 11, 2022
David Mamet’s latest plot twist is a dud.
The award-winning playwright and screenwriter went on Fox News on Sunday to rail against pedophilia in the education system, alleging that teachers are “inclined” to pedophilia and that children are being “groomed” for sexual abuse, a popular conservative talking point around Florida’s controversial new “Don’t Say Gay” law. Said law prohibits the discussion of sexual orientation and gender in certain grade levels of the state’s public schools.
“We have to take back control,” Mamet told Mark Levin. “There’s no community control of the schools. What we have is kids not only being indoctrinated but groomed, in a very real sense, by people who are, whether they know it or not, sexual predators. Are they abusing the kids physically? No, I don’t think so. But they are abusing them mentally and using sex to do so. This has always been the problem with education. Teachers are inclined, particularly men because men are predators, to pedophilia.”
Mamet went on to suggest that sex education is a way for teachers to ensure children are familiar with sex so that they can use it to abuse them.
The idea that teachers are grooming children for sex has been used by right-wing ideologues to argue in favor of Florida’s new “Parental Rights in Education Bill” — or, as detractors dubbed it, the “Don’t Say Gay” bill — which Governor Ron DeSantis signed late last month amid controversy. Christian Pushaw, DeSantis’ press secretary, call it “anti-grooming” legislation in early March, implying that teachers are trying to force gender identity discussions on young children in an effort to “groom” them for sex.
“If you’re against the Anti-Grooming Bill, you are probably a groomer, or at least you don’t denounce the grooming of 4-8-year old children,” she tweeted. “Silence is complicity. This is how it works, Democrats, and I didn’t make the rules.”
The discourse has since spiraled to the point that congressional Republicans are now painting Disney as a pedophilia factory because the company opposed the bill. The party-wide paranoia over rampant child molestation has largely trickled down from QAnon, a baseless conspiracy theory alleging the Democratic Party and Hollywood are run by Satan-worshipping child traffickers. The fringe theory has slowly infected mainstream political discourse and now, apparently, the mind of the guy who wrote Glengarry Glen Ross.
Mamet also, it might be worth mentioning in light of his recent comments, wrote a screenplay for Lolita....
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https://archive.thinkprogress.org/how-a-group-of-parents-ended-radio-disneys-oil-funded-educational-tour-135073872209/
CREDIT: THE OHIO OIL AND GAS ENERGY EDUCATION PROGRAM
Last month, Radio Disney went on a 26-stop tour of schools, science centers and fairs across Ohio with the goal of educating kids about oil and gas drilling and transportation.
But parents in Ohio and across the country weren’t standing for that — not once they found out the tour wasfunded entirely by the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program (OOGEEP), which gets its funding from the oil and gas industry.
On Thursday, Radio Disney announced it would cancel the program, following a 80,000-plus petition organized by Climate Parents and a #DisneyFracked Twitter campaign from the Sierra Club.
“The sole intent of the collaboration between Radio Disney and the nonprofit Rocking in Ohio educational initiative was to foster kids’ interest in science and technology,” a Radio Disney spokesperson said in an email to The Huffington Post. “Having been inadvertently drawn into a debate that has no connection with this goal, Radio Disney has decided to withdraw from the few remaining installments of the program.”
Representatives from Radio Disney and OOGEEP did not respond on time for publication.
The program, “Rocking In Ohio,” was an interactive presentation by Radio Disney hosts that engaged children in activities such as creating pipelines out of drinking straws to learn how oil and gas is transported. Its ties to the oil and gas industry sparked outrage from many groups, including the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, which sent a letter to Radio Disney on Thursday asking them to end its partnership with the oil and gas industry and stop the Rocking in Ohio program. The letter called the program an “attempt to fool and brain wash Ohio children and families” and was signed by 23 Ohio-based organizations.
other groups found the fact that Radio Disney was taking an oil-industry backed educational program into schools particularly worrisome.
“It’s troubling in the first place that they’re going into elementary schools, and it’s even more troubling that Disney is getting involved,” Alison Auciello, an organizer with Food and Water Watch in Ohio, told Al Jazeera America. “They’re not giving a balanced education on (oil and gas). Public schools should also be inviting anti-fracking people into schools. That doesn’t seem to be happening at all.”
Lisa Hoyos, co-founder and director of Climate Parents, which organized the CREDO Action petition, told ThinkProgress that though she was happy with the outcome, the fight to ensure that Radio Disney doesn’t get involved with other programs like Rocking in Ohio in the future wasn’t over.
“Disney took a first really important step,” Hoyos said. “However, Disney has broad and deep access to public school kids all over the U.S…. We believe that a family company like Disney should promote kid safe, climate safe energy exclusively.”
#BIG OIL, #CLIMATE, #CLIMATE CHANGE, #DISNEY
https://yyy.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/mar/25/bp-google-alec-exodus-climate-change
no lnx guk
BP and Google leave Alec:are companies finally taking climate change seriously?
Kellen Klein
BP and Google have both cut ties with Alec. Does this exodus mean climate change is finally a top business priority?
BP is latest company to leave Alec. What do the recent high profile exits from the organization mean for business?
Wed 25 Mar 2015
It began with Microsoft in July, then Google in September – and now Facebook, Yelp, Yahoo, SAP America, AOL and eBay have all followed suit. These companies have now ended their relationship with the controversial American Legislative Exchange Council, or Alec.
This isn’t the first exodus Alec has seen. Companies such as Amazon, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and Walmart also pulled out of the group after it supported Florida’s 2005 “stand your ground” gun law after an unarmed black teenager, Trayvon Martin, was killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer, George Zimmerman, in 2012.
But the recent exodus is the first that is largely attributable to the organization’s views on climate change. The trend highlights a major change in business attitudes towards climate change, indicating – perhaps for the first time – that major tech companies see environmental regulation as key to business.
This tech shift has sent shockwaves through climate advocacy circles. But perhaps even more fascinating has been the simultaneous distancing from Alec by major corporations affiliated with the fossil fuel industry.
Since September, Occidental Petroleum, Emerson Electric, Wells Fargo (a major O&G investor), Union Pacific, Northrop Grumman, and BP have all announced they too are discontinuing their Alec membership. And while these companies were more elusive about the rationale for their respective withdrawals, recent campaigns and engagement by shareholders likely had them feeling the heat on climate action.
Companies across all industries would be wise to take heed of this case study. Perhaps more than any other story on this topic in recent months, the Alec climate saga illustrates the rapidly evolving landscape in which sustainable businesses are expected to play. In this new, polarized and hyper-connected world, action on climate change is increasingly framed as a moral issue on par with social causes like workers rights and racial equality. To deny climate change is to risk alienating millennial consumers and open the door to activist campaigns.
The Alec emigration is also a lesson to companies that sustainability cannot be separated into its own silo. Google, for instance, has made strong strides reducing its carbon footprint, but this progress has not been reflected in its political spending and partnerships. Businesses and nonprofits alike (see the recent Susan G Komen Foundation-Baker Hughes debacle) committed to responsible causes must vet all departments and communications for actions that could be seen as hypocritical, and ensure that the company they keep aligns with their sustainability vision.
Lastly, the remarkably short time frame in which an entire sector shifted its rhetoric shows that lagging behind on climate change – either in action or in posturing – is increasingly likely to lead to brand damage. Campaigners are growing incredibly savvy and innovative. Companies might feel far removed from the climate change debate, but to stay silent or partner poorly is to risk going viral for all the wrong reasons (see Greenpeace’s Lego-Shell campaign or Climate Parent’s Radio Disney-Ohio Oil & Gas Association campaign).
Climate change is not the only issue facing growing stakeholder concern, of course. The Alec example is just a small part of a larger trend occurring in the consumer marketplace, one that we at Future 500 call “brand politics”.
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https://yyy.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/mar/25/bp-google-alec-exodus-climate-change
no lnx guk
BP and Google leave Alec:are companies finally taking climate change seriously?
Kellen Klein
BP and Google have both cut ties with Alec. Does this exodus mean climate change is finally a top business priority?
BP is latest company to leave Alec. What do the recent high profile exits from the organization mean for business?
Wed 25 Mar 2015
It began with Microsoft in July, then Google in September – and now Facebook, Yelp, Yahoo, SAP America, AOL and eBay have all followed suit. These companies have now ended their relationship with the controversial American Legislative Exchange Council, or Alec.
This isn’t the first exodus Alec has seen. Companies such as Amazon, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and Walmart also pulled out of the group after it supported Florida’s 2005 “stand your ground” gun law after an unarmed black teenager, Trayvon Martin, was killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer, George Zimmerman, in 2012.
But the recent exodus is the first that is largely attributable to the organization’s views on climate change. The trend highlights a major change in business attitudes towards climate change, indicating – perhaps for the first time – that major tech companies see environmental regulation as key to business.
This tech shift has sent shockwaves through climate advocacy circles. But perhaps even more fascinating has been the simultaneous distancing from Alec by major corporations affiliated with the fossil fuel industry.
Since September, Occidental Petroleum, Emerson Electric, Wells Fargo (a major O&G investor), Union Pacific, Northrop Grumman, and BP have all announced they too are discontinuing their Alec membership. And while these companies were more elusive about the rationale for their respective withdrawals, recent campaigns and engagement by shareholders likely had them feeling the heat on climate action.
Companies across all industries would be wise to take heed of this case study. Perhaps more than any other story on this topic in recent months, the Alec climate saga illustrates the rapidly evolving landscape in which sustainable businesses are expected to play. In this new, polarized and hyper-connected world, action on climate change is increasingly framed as a moral issue on par with social causes like workers rights and racial equality. To deny climate change is to risk alienating millennial consumers and open the door to activist campaigns.
The Alec emigration is also a lesson to companies that sustainability cannot be separated into its own silo. Google, for instance, has made strong strides reducing its carbon footprint, but this progress has not been reflected in its political spending and partnerships. Businesses and nonprofits alike (see the recent Susan G Komen Foundation-Baker Hughes debacle) committed to responsible causes must vet all departments and communications for actions that could be seen as hypocritical, and ensure that the company they keep aligns with their sustainability vision.
Lastly, the remarkably short time frame in which an entire sector shifted its rhetoric shows that lagging behind on climate change – either in action or in posturing – is increasingly likely to lead to brand damage. Campaigners are growing incredibly savvy and innovative. Companies might feel far removed from the climate change debate, but to stay silent or partner poorly is to risk going viral for all the wrong reasons (see Greenpeace’s Lego-Shell campaign or Climate Parent’s Radio Disney-Ohio Oil & Gas Association campaign).
Climate change is not the only issue facing growing stakeholder concern, of course. The Alec example is just a small part of a larger trend occurring in the consumer marketplace, one that we at Future 500 call “brand politics”.
:{
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3 22 digby
no lnx
Former president Donald Trump had another of his interminable rallies this weekend. He said the usual things delighting his South Carolina crowd and boring the rest of us into a coma. This time, however, he did add one memorable new line to the script which got people's attention:
As we watch the horrific carnage unfolding in Ukraine and the repressive crack down in Russia, comments like that are all the more chilling. He truly does want to emulate Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong Un. As the Washington Post reported recently, he has repeated his earlier admiration for Kim's "total control" as well:
He espoused praise for North Korea's brutal leader, marveling at how Kim's generals and aides "cowered" when the dictator spoke to them. "Total control," Trump said of how Kim ran the country, describing generals snapping to attention and standing up on command. "His people were sitting at attention," he added. "I looked at my people and said I want my people to act like that."
I have little doubt that if he wins another term, he will be much worse than he was in the first. He won't make the mistake of hiring people who might stand in his way a second time.
However, as we know, Trump isn't really serious about governing and wouldn't know how to do it efficiently even if he were. It doesn't make him any less dangerous, of course. His chaotic narcissism can do as much damage as a serious ideological authoritarian could. But he's laid out a style template for someone who is serious, showing them exactly the attitude that appeals to the MAGA base. And nobody in GOP politics is as ready to seize the mantle as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Trump 2.0.
The personality and affect have been evident since DeSantis won the governor's seat back in 2018. The Trumpian pettiness, the contempt, the reflexive hostility seem to come naturally to him. He treats the press like dirt and thinks insults are the highest form of humor. If he has any personal warmth or human compassion it's certainly well hidden. He even gestures like Trump.
But with DeSantis, it's more than just style. He's got the Republicans in Florida working together like clockwork to enact the most authoritarian agenda in the country, calibrated perfectly to appeal to the base in advance of his re-election campaign --- and a potential presidential run in 2024.
Florida has been at the leading edge of COVID denialism from the very beginning, but in recent days DeSantis and his hand-picked science-denying surgeon general have taken it to a new level. They had already turned masks into a battleground with the governor taking it upon himself earlier this month to scold high school kids for wearing them in his presence, declaring that it's time to end the "COVID theatre." This was ironic since it turned out that many of the kids had been told by their parents to wear them and DeSantis' numerous assaults on education over the past year have been rationalized as a defense of "parental rights." Then last week the surgeon general went even further, defying the CDC and most physicians by recommending that kids not get vaccinated for COVID-19. DeSantis and his medical henchman seem determined to keep the virus circulating as long as they can.
Meanwhile, the legislative season just coming to a close has produced such an astonishing array of right-wing culture war victories delivering on Desantis' "anti-woke" agenda that it's hard to know where to start. Building on last year's education wrecking ball in which they banned Critical Race Theory from schools despite the fact that they were not teaching it, instituted a requirement that schools teach about the "evils of communism" and passed a higher education law that allows for budget cuts to colleges based on student and faculty surveys about "viewpoint diversity" (which DeSantis defines as "indoctrination") this year they took it to a whole new level. Salon's Amanda Marcotte offered this tart analysis of the "Stop WOKE Act" "
The legislature also passed the "Stop WOKE Act," which bars both schools and businesses from having any training or program that supposedly causes an "individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race, color, sex, or national origin." This has been largely covered as a ban on any kind of diversity training, but it's even more expansive than that. As I note in Friday's Standing Room Only newsletter, conservatives can also block anti-sexual harassment trainings by claiming it's guilt-tripping men to tell them that ass-pinching is not allowed in the workplace.
The "fuck your feelings" crowd sure are sensitive snowflakes, aren't they?
Maximum leader DeSantis also got his wish for a first in the nation election police force which will report directly to him. I've got a tip for them: it turns out that the Republican Party in south Florida changed the registrations of hundreds of Democrats to Republican without their permission. That's a crime. In fact, DeSantis might end up regretting this one. If the election police are on the level (which is unlikely, I know) it's almost certain they will be putting many more Republicans behind bars than Democrats. Even Trump's Chief of Staff just blatantly committed it in the last election.
And then there is the grotesque "Don't Say Gay" law which prohibits teachers from discussing the subject in grades K-3. But because it uses the new vigilante system of civil law harassment, and is written so poorly, it will result in a chilling effect on all school districts and will result in small kids with gay parents being treated like aliens and many LGBTQ kids being shoved in the closet. If you doubt their intentions, just listen to DeSantis' vile press secretary:
Those of you who are of a certain age will hear the echoes of one of Florida's original homophobic crusaders Anita Bryant whose "Save Our Children" campaign was based upon the noxious lie that gays were "recruiting" the nice Christian children of the sunshine state.
Under pressure, the CEO of Disney, the state's largest employer and a major DeSantis donor belatedly objected to the bill and spoke to the Governor about it. DeSantis didn't budge and Disney announced that they will be suspending all political donations in the state of Florida after which the governor had a full blown meltdown:
Florida Republicans believe these Commie Symp mega corporations have no right to criticize them.
There was a time when business property rights were sacrosanct in the GOP as a matter of principle. But in the new authoritarian right, if a business doesn't toe their bigoted line, the government "won't stand for it."
Donald Trump is still likely to get the nomination and we can only hope and pray he doesn't win. His dictatorial impulses are well known. But Ron DeSantis is the future of the Republican Party and he's figured out how to take all that right-wing hate and grievance and put it into practice. You don't want to know what he could do on a national level.
https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/disney-rejects-desantis-mask-order-for-floridas-theme-parks/
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a beloved corp?
disney rejects DeSantis mask order for Florida's theme parks
May 04, 2021
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) may have signed new legislation ending all COVID-related government mandates, restrictions and mask requirements but Disney is making it clear that their parks will not be
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https://ucsc.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01CDL_SCR_INST/gfkjds/proquest2328945200
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A University Wanted to Improve Its Culture. So It Called Disney.
Author
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The Chronicle of Higher Education, Nov 6, 2019
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Summary, etc.
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Disney concluded, from the survey results and also from in-person interviews, that a “pervasive, long-held, and debilitating fear of making a decision or a mistake” grips “most everyone in their daily routines — staff, leaders, and faculty alike,” according to a January internal email that summarized the feedback. “An absence of transparency” exists at the university, Disney found, along with a “debilitating apathy in the workforce,” widespread “values” misalignment, and a highly “transactional” nature in the student experience. Are the results of the climate survey and related focus groups scientifically valid? ‘Not Aiming to Make Students Smile’ This fall, employees in managerial roles, like department chairs, were asked to attend a training session led by the Disney Institute’s staff, George Washington’s student newspaper reported. The attendees watched videos and were given cards printed with seven core values (integrity; collaboration; courage; respect; excellence; diversity; openness),...
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320 heated
...Exxon’s Universe of Energy Center was at Epcot from 1982 through 1996. That’s fascinating, because that’s the exact time span that Exxon went from researching climate change to explicitly denying it. (Exxon’s denial started in the late 80s and picked up steam throughout the 90s).
And this exhibit touting fossil fuels—which again, was to KIDS AT DISNEYWORLD—opened in the same year that Exxon’s manager of environmental affairs, M.B. Glaser, sent a memo out to company executives about the greenhouse effect. This memo noted that fossil fuel combustion, along with clearing of virgin forests, were the primary contributions to the warming trend.
The memo added: “Our best estimate is that doubling of the current concentration could increase average global temperature by about 1.3 degrees celsius to 3.1 degrees celsius.”
Despite that knowledge, the comics and Epcot center explicitly promote fossil fuels as a method of environmental conservation, noted Carroll Muffet, the president and CEO of the Center for International Environmental Law.
“[Exxon] put out these in conjunction with Disney to teach kids about renewable energy and energy conservation and environmental concerns,” she said. “And it's perhaps unsurprising that what children learn from Mickey and Goofy about energy conservation and environmental concerns was we really need gas, we really need fracking, we win. Nuclear energy is fine. There are a lot of problems with wind and solar. It may work out eventually, but thank goodness for this bountiful resource of oil, gas and tar sands.”
Exxon wasn’t the only one using comic books to reach the youths. In the 1970s, Amoco put out a wildly racist comic book about “The Mochans,” a “primitive” people who wanted to do unseemly things like use renewable energy. The comic was released as part of a study guide for 7th to 12th graders studying economics—which Amoco graciously provided 40,000 copies of to Indiana public schools.
“The industry was teaching kids to be skeptical of regulation, skeptical of the agendas of environmentalists or people who were socially concerned, from their very earliest ages,”Muffett said, “and [they were] constantly emphasizing that anyone who talks about the environment, who talks about human health, should immediately be weighing that and defending it against the economic costs.”
Sound familiar? It should. These are the same refrains the industry uses today in its various attempts to shape the minds of young people, both in schools and in the media. And it’s reflected in the way most political pundits seem to think about what’s possible for climate action. You want to preserve a livable world? Well, how much will it cost?
Here’s one more example of the oil industry getting into teaching economics: Phillips’ Petroleum’s American Enterpriseeducational film series—hosted by none other than William Shatner. (I got my hands on the VHS but it hasn’t arrived yet—it’s taking forever!)
The subtitle is: How Did this America, in its 200 Years on Independence, Become a Nation of Supermarkets, Stock Markets, Skyscrapers and Split Levels; A Country With the Greatest Economic Output in the World? ...
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no lnx pix many
hilarous disney? propaganda
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Disney heiress who went undercover to Disneyland ‘livid’ at conditions and pay
“Every single one of these people I talked to were saying, ‘I don’t know how I can maintain this face of joy and warmth when I have to go home and forage for food in other people’s garbage.'”
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wolff: fight for 15, 50cent bonus b/c of tax cut
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https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/disneyland-workers-are-paid-so-little-many-are-hungry-or-homeless
blk panther movie 1 mil boy's club
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http://www.rawstory.com/2010/09/disney-monsanto-discovered-blackwaters-hidden-clients/
on list: Royal Caribbean, Deutsche Bank, Chevron
Almost three years ago exactly — Sept. 17, 2007 — a cadre of guards from the security firm then known as Blackwater shot and killed 17 Iraqis at a public plaza in Baghdad.
The company, long in the public eye, has been known for brutal tactics and as a mercenary for the US State Department in countries where the US has boots on the ground. What hasn’t been known, however, is that the same company was handling intelligence ops for publicly-traded US companies.
Atop the list is Monsanto, the biotech giant, who The Nation’s Jeremy Scahill revealed Wednesday accepted a proposal through a Blackwater subsidiary which “offer[ed] to provide operatives to infiltrate activist groups organizing against the multinational biotech firm.”
Monsanto doesn’t stand alone. Through a network of 30 subsidiaries and shell corporations, Blackwater-linked entities provided “intelligence, training and security services” to a cache of major multinational firms, including: Monsanto, Chevron, the Walt Disney Company, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, Deutsche Bank and Barclays, according to documents Scahill obtained.
Blackwater’s owner and founder, Erik Prince — who has himself been linked to the CIA — helped train companies through two other firms he controlled: Total Intelligence Solutions and the Terrorism Research Center.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, no one responded to requests for comment.
Monsanto topped the list of firms using Prince’s services, Scahill writes.
“According to internal Total Intelligence communications, biotech giant Monsanto—the world’s largest supplier of genetically modified seeds—hired the firm in 2008–09,” the reporter writes. “The relationship between the two companies appears to have been solidified in January 2008 when Total Intelligence chair Cofer Black traveled to Zurich to meet with… Monsanto’s security manager for global issues.”
“After the meeting in Zurich, Black sent an e-mail to other Blackwater executives…. saying that Wilson “understands that we can span collection from internet, to reach out, to boots on the ground on legit basis protecting the Monsanto [brand] name…. Ahead of the curve info and insight/heads up is what he is looking for.” Black added that Total Intelligence “would develop into acting as intel arm of Monsanto.” Black also noted that Monsanto was concerned about animal rights activists and that they discussed how Blackwater “could have our person(s) actually join [activist] group(s) legally.” Black wrote that initial payments to Total Intelligence would be paid out of Monsanto’s “generous protection budget” but would eventually become a line item in the company’s annual budget. He estimated the potential payments to Total Intelligence at between $100,000 and $500,000. According to documents, Monsanto paid Total Intelligence $127,000 in 2008 and $105,000 in 2009.
….In an… e-mail to The Nation, Wilson confirmed he met Black in Zurich and that Monsanto hired Total Intelligence in 2008 and worked with the company until early 2010. He denied that he and Black discussed infiltrating animal rights groups, stating “there was no such discussion.” He claimed that Total Intelligence only provided Monsanto “with reports about the activities of groups or individuals that could pose a risk to company personnel or operations around the world which were developed by monitoring local media reports and other publicly available information. The subject matter ranged from information regarding terrorist incidents in Asia or kidnappings in Central America to scanning the content of activist blogs and websites.” Wilson asserted that Black told him Total Intelligence was “a completely separate entity from Blackwater.”
Walt Disney?
The Walt Disney Company hired Total Intelligence and TRC to do a “threat assessment” for potential film shoot locations in Morocco, with former CIA officials Black and Richer reaching out to their former Moroccan intel counterparts for information. The job provided a “good chance to impress Disney,” one company executive wrote. How impressed Disney was is not clear; in 2009 the company paid Total Intelligence just $24,000.
And Deutsche Bank?
Total Intelligence and TRC also provided intelligence assessments on China to Deutsche Bank. “The Chinese technical counterintelligence threat is one of the highest in the world,” a TRC analyst wrote, adding, “Many four and five star hotel rooms and restaurants are live-monitored with both audio and video” by Chinese intelligence. He also said that computers, PDAs and other electronic devices left unattended in hotel rooms could be cloned. Cellphones using the Chinese networks, the analyst wrote, could have their microphones remotely activated, meaning they could operate as permanent listening devices. He concluded that Deutsche Bank reps should “bring no electronic equipment into China.” Warning of the use of female Chinese agents, the analyst wrote, “If you don’t have women coming onto you all the time at home, then you should be suspicious if they start coming onto you when you arrive in China.” For these and other services, the bank paid Total Intelligence $70,000 in 2009.
Prince, now the owner of Blackwater successor Xe Services, has his eyes on another target: the Democrats.
He’s now writing a book alleging that officials in the Clinton and Obama administrations “approved of his most sensitive and controversial operations,” according to a report by veteran intel reporter Jeff Stein published in *The Washington Post* earlier this month.
The Post‘s Jeff Stein cited two unnamed sources who say Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater, is hurrying to sell his company before he can go public with a book that takes aim at the Democratic Party. One of the sources told Stein that Prince and his friends “think this will destroy the Democratic Party in the elections.”
The source, who is described as having a “business relationship with Xe,” said Prince had “given his people three weeks to complete the sale of the company and the book will be released then,” in time for the November elections.
The effort to defeat the tougher food standards heated up late last spring and summer, when lobbyists said they went on high alert.
On July 12, White House visitor logs show a who's who of food company chief executives and lobbyists visited the White House. The group met with Valerie Jarrett, Obama's senior adviser, and Melody Barnes, then director of the president's Domestic Policy Council. Among the group at the meeting: CEOs of Nestle USA, Kellogg, General Mills, and top executives at Walt Disney, Time Warner, and Viacom, owner of the Nickelodeon children's channel -- companies with some of the biggest financial stakes in marketing to children. Those companies have a combined market value of more than $350 billion.
Two people who attended -- lobbyist Scott Faber of the Grocery Manufacturers Association and Kolish of the Better Business Bureau -- said the group told the White House that it opposed government action and favored voluntary initiatives. Other participants and the White House have declined to describe the meeting or did not respond to requests for comment.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/07/disney-trademark-dia-de-los-muertos_n_3231929.html
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http://grist.org/list/mickey-mouse-pushes-fossil-fuel/
Mickey Mouse pushes fossil fuels in this 1985 comic book
Matt Novak of Paleofuture has been posting photos of a 1985 Disney comic touting the benefits of oil pipelines and coal. What’s really striking is how much it genuinely sounds like Republican talking points. I guess Goofy is the American public, Mickey is the GOP, and whoever does Mickey’s voice is the Koch brothers.
"Sure, Goofy! Oil can supply your car's energy needs for many years to come!" (1985) http://instagr.am/p/MgvUVuJbMu/
—
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FACT: Comcast owns NBC; Disney owns ABC; and News Corporation owns Fox Broadcasting Company.
Comcastowns NBC, Telemundo, E Entertainment, Versus, 14 television stations, Universal Pictures, and Hulu. Disney holdings include 10 television stations, 277 radio stations, ABC, ESPN, A&E, the History Channel, Lifetime, Discover magazine, Bassmaster magazine, Hyperion publishing, Touchstone Pictures, Pixar Animation, and Miramax Film Corp. Viacom owns 10 television stations, The Movie Channel, Comedy Central, BET, Nickelodeon, TV Land, MTV, VH1, and Paramount Pictures. CBS owns 30 TV stations, Smithsonian Channel, Showtime, The Movie Channel and Paramount Network Television. News Corp. owns 27 television stations, the Fox Network and Fox News Channel, FX, National Geographic Channel, The Wall Street Journal, TV Guide, the New York Post, DirecTV, the publisher HarperCollins, film production company Twentieth Century Fox and the social networking website MySpace. Time Warnerowns HBO, CNN, the Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. Time magazine, Turner Broadcasting and DC Comics.
Currently, six major companies control most of the media in our country. The FCC could decide to relax media ownership rules, which would allow further consolidation and put decisions about what kinds of programming and news Americans receive in even fewer hands.
DISNEY - ABC
(Donated $640,000 to George W Bush's 2000 political campaign)
TV Holdings:
* ABC: includes 10 stations outright, many affiliates, Penetration in the market: 24% of US households.
* ABC Network News: Prime Time Live, Nightline, 20/20, Good Morning America.
* ESPN, Lifetime Television (50%), as well as smaller holdings in A&E, History Channel and E!
* Disney Channel/Disney Television, Touchtone Television.
Other Major Media Holdings.
* Miramax, Touchtone Pictures.
* Major Magazines: Jane, Los Angeles Magazine, Discover.
* Three recording labels, twelve major local newspapers.
* Hyperion books.
* Infoseek search engine.
Major shareholders include Sid R. Bass, oil and gas baron.
Disney's environmental and social record: Source wikipedia.org
- The company has been accused of human rights violations regarding the working conditions in factories that produce their merchandise. Numerous environmental groups in Florida and California have criticized development procedures used in building theme parks including damage to wetlands.
- An environmental management plan for a zone of Great Guana Cay, in the Abaco Islands, criticized Disney for poor management of a 90-acre (36.4 ha) tract of the island. Disney partially developed but then abandoned the place, which was to have been a cruise ship resort called Treasure Island. The report, by the University of Miami and the College of the Bahamas, blames Disney for leaving hazardous materials, electrical transformers, and fuel tanks, and for introducing invasive alien plants and insects that threaten the natural flora and fauna of the island.