Fox-Saudi Connection Outed--By Conservative Columnist?!

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When I first read this last week in my local paper, my first thought was, “WOW–and it isn’t even my birthday!” Imagine, Fox News, that bastion of Amurrica-first patriotism, the biggest supporters of the “war on terror” and all the lovely “enhanced interrogation” tactics that go with it–my mind absolutely boggled at the possibility of their parent company in bed with an alleged supporter of terrorist groups!

Then I decided to check further. I logged on to Diana West’s website (not being familiar with her), clicked the link for “columns”, and was floored when it took me to townhall.com–a decidedly right-leaning website! Now I’m thoroughly confused–I mean, on the one hand, if this is true, I’m impressed that a conservative writer would go after one of her own considering that, up till now, the righties have been pretty much in lockstep with each other. And yet, I can’t help but be suspicious that there’s some ulterior motive here.

Anyhoo, if this story is true, it brings up questions:

OK, maybe Alwaleed has changed since 2002, but Fox isn’t one to let something like that interfere with their ideological agenda–especially when it comes to Muslims and their perceived links to terrorism.

Don’t really watch Fox that often, but I’d be curious to see what Hannity’s opinion is now.

OK, I’m willing to concede that this is just braggadocio, but money talks–and sometimes shouts.

Finally, if this story is accurate, doesn’t this put the recent SCOTUS decision in an interesting light? One of the main objections that I’ve read to it was the possibility of foreign influence on U.S. political campaigns through corporate contributions. Isn’t this exactly what the decision’s critics were talking about? And, considering the whole “war on terror” thing, isn’t this possibly a worst-case scenario?

I’d appreciate any edification the Teeming Millions could provide regarding this story and its ramifications. As I said, I’m a bit confused by all this–what say you?

  1. Fox News /= conservatism. Fox News is all of about ten years old. The conservative movement is much older and more diverse than one television network. Many conservatives were doing just fine getting their news before Fox positioned itself as a self-proclaimed independent/right voice. Some conservatives are probably outright dismissive of the more loudmouthed commentators.

  2. Fox News /= News Corp. Alwaleed owns five percent, somewhat more, of NewsCorp, which is a big, publicly traded global company only a minor portion of which involves “right wing” commentary (for instance, at times News has owned portions of satellite broadcasting companies like DirecTV). Fox News as such is a product packaged (very profitably too) by Roger Ailes.

  3. Alwaleed bought shares in the open market. You can too (News Corporation (NWS) Stock Price, News, Quote & History - Yahoo Finance), and Murdoch or “Fox News” couldn’t lift a finger to stop you. Common stock ownership, by itself, is not much of a “connection.”

  4. Murdoch (if not Alwaleed) is a businessman first and an ideologue a distant second if at all. He’s probably right-leaning from a pro-business perspective. What further ties he has with Alwaleed are probably fairly apolitical and greed driven. I wouldn’t expect otherwise. If he’s affirmatively pursuing friendship and joint ventures beyond business with a guy who’s espoused aims of Arab propaganda – ehh, it’s worth looking into, for either a conservative or a liberal commentator/investigator.

This is a fair question if her allegations of downplaying Arab-unfriendly stories are provable. I don’t know that a 5.5% share of common stock gets you veto power over content, though. And as for not describing the “Muslim riots” in France – good luck with that, I’ve never seen any MSM reference to anything other than “youths” in the “Parisian suburbs.”

Hannity’s opinion probably is: how can I possibly stop someone from buying shares of Fox on the open market?

Also, for better or worse, it’s hardly news that Western businessmen have been in bed with some fairly disreputable Saudis (read: all Saudis) for a long time – Aramco being only one example. The Sheikhs’ very spotty record on suppressing/refraining from supporting radical groups is attributable to a lot of practical and historical reasons, we’ve long been aware of it, and we’ve long chosen them as a bedfellow while trying to influence them (not very successfully).

“Doing business with Saudi Arabian sheikhs who also spend their money on other Bad Things” (the Bad Things also involve the brothels of Paris, etc.) is hard to avoid because they have an asset we all need and because the sheikhs have amassed huge fortunes that make them the equivalent of small investment banks, and banks need to put their money to work somewhere. You’ve done business with Saudi Arabia in the past week, so have I. Forget the gas pump (though that’s how I know we’ve all supported a sheikh), chances are decent you’ve strolled through a mall, gone to an amusement park, stayed at a hotel that is ultimately owned by a sheikh, a consortium of sheikhs, or an Arab sovereign wealth fund recently. And no, I can’t vouch that none of them supported terror in any way (in fact, I can just about vouch that all of them did, indirectly or otherwise).

I don’t like it, it’s what is.

I’d happily see CAIR dismantled as a seditious group, mind you.

As Huerta88 mentioned, Murdoch is probably right leaning in his personal politics, but I imagine the almighty dollar trumps whatever ideological concerns he may have. If he thought he could make as much money pandering to the left as he does to the right, Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright would have talk shows on Fox News.

Note too that 6.4% of the NY Times stock is owned by Carlos Slim, the Mexican oligarch who was declared the richest man in the world a few years ago. No one’s claiming that his ownership has influenced the NYT’s coverage of immigration or wealth/inequality. The WaPo owns / is owned by Kaplan University, and there’s no reason to believe that that’s affected its coverage of education issues. I don’t imagine Murdoch wanting any less to look independent.

Yep, extremely rich people have to put their money to work somewhere, and big-name operating businesses are attractive to them for a variety of reasons (ego not being an exception). Buffett spends a lot of time griping that there aren’t enough good businesses to merit an investment on the scale that he has to deal with and while Buffett’s value criteria/profile may be different from Slim’s or Alwaleed’s, you can bet any company any of those guys invest in will be a marquee/household name. I can acknowledge that I’m significantly more worried about any demonstrable potential for a large investment by a foreign potentate whose national/sovereign interests aren’t necessarily aligned with mine to give him undue influence, vis a vis any concern (none) that Buffett will exert his influence over Kraft or Burlington Northern to our national detriment.