But this prince doesn’t just own ten shares of Fox. There’s a difference between The Daily Show dancing up and down saying “ha ha ha. What hypocrites. Don’t they realize that .00001% of their corporation is going to someone who may be linked to terrorism?” As if it would even be possible to find that out in the due dilligence of any news story you aired.
This guy owns 7% of Fox. Seven percent. Mathematically, it would be impossible for him to be less than the 13th largest shareholder. In reality, he’s the SECOND largest shareholder. As in, the hierarchy goes 1) Rupert Murdoch. 2) Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf. It’s probably on their letterhead over there.
It’s not some random shareholder. They are specifically accusing the second largest owner of their own news organization of funding terroristic activities and they’re doing so without bothering to link the fact that he’s a shareholder to their their own news organization in the process. Doing so is either stupid or evil as TDS rightly points out.
Just imagine if you subbed out “Rupert Murdoch” for “Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf” in Fox’s report. Imagine if Fox never bothered to link of its own primary shareholder in that story. Would that be remotely acceptable?
Does he participate in the management of the organization in any way?
See, the mere fact that he owns 7% of the company is not meaningful. In any way. No one can stop him from owning that. NewsCorp cannot demand that he divest himself of their shares.
How is it relevant that he’s a shareholder? Specifically. Make the case: what is the relevance of his 7% ownership?
“It just IS,” by the way, is not an acceptable answer.
No – but there’s the difference: Murdoch is a majority shareholder, a controlling shareholder.
Don’t get me wrong – it’s possible for someone with 7% to swing a big stick. We might imagine 42.5% of shares owned by Joe, 42.5% by Emma, and 7% by… um… Abdul. In such a situation, Abdul is a key player, because while he cannot assert a controlling interest himself, his alliance is necessary if Joe and Emma are adversaries.
That’s not the case here, so far as I am aware. His 7% is meaningless as far as influence or control.
It’s not relevant in the least, again so far as I’m aware. I haven’t heard a thing about his asserting some controlling interest in the planned mosque or community center. There’s no relevance at all to his participation.
You’re also ignoring the fact that Neil Cavuto had him on as a guest and sucked his cock, by the way. That’s something Fox News DOES have control of. There’s also he fact that he’s good buddies with Rupert Murdoch and George W. Bush.
And I agree with you here. If the point is that the Prince can invest his money to whomever he wishes (mosques, news organizations, TCBY franchises, daycare centers) and no one should rightly care because it’s a complete non-story, then we’re on the same page.
But Fox specifically brought up the potential link between Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, this mosque, and terrorist organizations…and completely failed to link it to their very own business.
No. Fox cannot stop the Prince from owning 7% of Fox. No, Fox is not responsible for what the Prince does with the rest of his money or how he conducts activities.
But Fox has an ethical responsibility to either link Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf to Fox News Corp in a story about Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf or not run the story. And given that you and I agree this to be a complete non-story, I would have hoped for the latter. That didn’t happen and so they were obligated to go with the former.
No. Fox has no responsibility to disclose their 7% tie to the man. Fox has a responsibility to either show the relevance of THEIR claim – i.e., that his participation in the mosque project is of some import – or not run the story.
Nothing makes his 7% in Fox relevant.
I’d phrase it a bit differently. They were obligated to either show the specific link or not run the story. That they ran the story bespeaks of sensationalist journalism.
In this thread you’re doing precisely what you criticize Fox for doing. Your tone suggests that you find the idea of 7% stock ownership meaning no influence to be ridiculous. But you don’t directly rebut the claim. Instead, you speak of it slyly, sarcastically, inviting the reader to infer the ridiculousness without having to actually substantiate it.
What kind of link do you want? A wikipedia article on how stock ownership works? Come on, being a stock owner makes you an owner of the company. For each share you own, you gain more and more influence on how the company is run. Shareholder meetings take place not only to explain what is going on with the company but to influence and take direction from the very owners of that company. If you’re the second largest owner of the company, your opinion matters a hell of a lot.
But I don’t care about that. I don’t care about this guy. But Fox does. Fox is attempting to link Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf to terrorism while completely ignoring the fact that the same guy is linked to Fox News. Now, you can sit back and say “well Fox News can’t choose who its shareholders are” and, to some extent, you’re right. But since it’s also established that Murdoch owns just as much of the Prince’s stuff as the Prince does of Murdoch’s, I think we can see there very much was a choice. IF Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is in bed with the terrorists, then Murdoch and Fox are as well. You can’t possibly separate that.
As I explained above, the question is highly fact-dependant. Even a 2% owner could be highly influential, as a king-maker between coalitions that each controlled 49%. I was involved in a proxy fight a couple years ago, when a venture capital company that owned 35% of a company sought to replace board members and initiated a proxy fight (before ultimately reaching a concession with the board and the nomination of a unity slate). In that battle, a 3% owner was a key player, even though he wasn’t in the top fifteen largest owners.
But the mere fact that you’re second largest means nothing. If I own 93% or control the votes of 93% of the stock, and you own 7%, I am perfectly free to tell you to piss up a rope. There’s nothing magical about being the second largest – and indeed, if the second-largest owner holds only seven percent, he is virtually guaranteed to be powerless.
But you think otherwise, so tell me, specifically: in what way might the 7% owner exercise his influence?
And where did you get your ideas about how this works? The movies?
Well, since I deny the first part of your claim, I guess I agree. I don’t need to reach the question of whether it’s true that NewsCorp is in bed with them, since I deny that Feisal is in bed with terrorists.
It’s not “to some extent” that I’m right. It’s simply that I’m right.
Nor have we established that Murdoch owns just as much of the Prince’s stuff as the Prince does of Murdoch’s. At best, we have learned that Murdoch owns 9% of one company that Prince owns.
If you have 7% holdings in a major corporation you possess a pretty significant threat to the ownership of that corporation out of proportion to the size of your holdings. And that threat is to dump the stock at one time, causing a pretty seismic effect on the market cap of the firm.
Of course, it only works if you are a phenominally wealthy person with significant other sources of income who can take that sort of financial hit. So clearly not relevant here.
I remember Gretchen Carlson from her days as a news anchor in NE Ohio, and she never came across as particularly ditzy. I think Jon Stewart might be on to something with his “acting dumb to pander to her audience” theory. She already fills the role of the MILF-y, wholesome newswoman for the Extenze demographic to ogle over; they don’t need her to be deep thinker, too.
All absolutely true and wonderful. We can both play hypotheticals til the cows come home. Here’s my hypothetical: News Corp has more than just two stockholders.
Craaaazy and mindblowing I’m sure.
Problem is, I don’t think anyone can find an accurate list of stockholders. Here’s what I found from their most recent filing to the SEC two weeks ago:
In other words, it’s not open to the general public and only open to other stockholders for a select period of time. Since I’m not one, I don’t have access to it.
But I’m going to go out on a limb again with another craaaazy scenario and say that there are enough stockholders out there that a 7% voting swing is pretty darn huge.
Here’s what I do know for certain. As of January 1st of 2010, there were 1.8 billion A-level outstanding shares at $13.65 per share. 7% of that is 127 million shares or 1.7 billion dollars.
Seeing as this is the best information I have access to, I guess we’ll just have to form our own opinions as to whether a 7% stake in News Corp is influential. I know which craaaaaazy theory I’m supporting.
is a Wikipedia article on News Corp and our prince holds a larger share than a guy they did a divestment to avoid having any influence.
Keep in mind fellow dopers that Bricker is once again engaged in splitting hairs for the sake of staying well practiced in splitting hairs, not sharing his truest and innermost feelings of love for Rupert Murdoch, which he does have, but which he keeps to himself.