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Oliver Darcy here. Scroll down for what Nancy Pelosi told Anderson Cooper, Drudge's front page, a visualization of Fox News' obsession with the "Obamagate" conspiracy, Ronan Farrow's response to Ben Smith, Kevin Mayer leaving Disney for TikTok, "The Last Dance" ratings, and more. But first...
Fox vs. Fox
What are Fox News viewers to believe? Throughout the late-afternoon and into the night on Monday, the network's hosts and doctors repeatedly contradicted each other when discussing President Trump's announcement that he is taking hydorxychloroquine.
Neil Cavuto was first to react to the jarring revelation that the President had started to take the antimalarial drug as a prophylaxis for coronavirus — despite the lack of firm scientific evidence that it is effective and the warnings which accompany its use. "This is stunning," Cavuto said. The Fox News host proceeded to then issue a stern warning to his viewers: “A number of studies, those certainly vulnerable in the population have one thing to lose, their lives."
Cavuto found himself in the company of medical experts. Dr. Bob Lahita, who he brought on as a guest after his warning, said Cavuto's assessment of the life and death risk was "correct." Dr. Manny Alvarez, senior managing editor of health news for Fox News, said he found it to be "highly irresponsible" for Trump to be taking hydroxychloroquine. Dr. Scott Atlas, who appeared on Martha MacCallum's show, said the drug is "not proven to work." And Fox even published a story, which led its homepage Monday night, about "DOCTOR'S WARNINGS" about hydroxychloroquine.
That was one side of the Fox News coin. The other painted a starkly different picture. On Tucker Carlson's program, Fox News contributor Dr. Marc Siegel hyped the drug and said the media was going to "politicize" the issue. "I think it's reasonable," Siegel said of Trump taking it. In the next hour, Sean Hannity also attacked the news media, saying "predictably the mob in the media are hyperventilating" over Trump's announcement. Hannity decried journalists who he said have been "waging an unhinged, non stop never-ending PR campaign against" the drug.
And in the 10pm hour, Laura Ingraham, who has been one of the top promoters of hydroxychloroquine, asked, "Why is the media freaking out about the President taking hydroxy?" She said the "medical establishment went crazy" over his announcement, playing clips of doctors on CNN and MSNBC while ignoring what Fox's own coverage just a few hours before.
The contradictory coverage from Fox News isn't unprecedented. But it continues to be remarkable that on a basic issue of health and safety, one in which Ingraham even acknowledged that the medical establishment is in general agreement on, Fox News can't get its message straight...
Trump unleashes on Cavuto
The contradictory coverage from Fox was even highlighted by Trump on Monday night. The President retweeted a Twitter user who noted that Cavuto had warned against taking the drug, while hours later Ingraham had encouraged its use.
Trump clearly sided with Ingraham, repeatedly attacking Cavuto on his Twitter feed. Trump retweeted a Breitbart writer calling the Fox News host an "asshole," retweeted a far-right voice calling him "foolish & gullible," and retweeted a far-right radio host calling him an "IDIOT."
Trump himself tweeted, "[Fox News] is no longer the same. We miss the great Roger Ailes. You have more anti-Trump people, by far, than ever before. Looking for a new outlet!" Of course, Fox News has over the years become more pro-Trump, not less supportive.
>> Paul Farhi's point: "The 'great' Roger Ailes was credibly accused of sexual harassment by multiple women. He was fired by Rupert Murdoch and sons for his alleged behavior. He died in disgrace in 2017..."
No comment (again) from Fox
Once upon a time, Fox News would release pointed statements when Trump openly attacked the network. Back in the day, the network decried his "vitriolic attacks against Megyn Kelly," saying his "extreme, sick obsession with her is beneath the dignity of a presidential candidate." In another statement, the network even mocked him for showing "fear" by not agreeing to a 2016 debate co-moderated by Kelly. Fox News joked at the time it had "learned from a secret back channel that the ayatollah and Putin both intend to treat Donald Trump unfairly."
Fast-forward to present day. When I asked the network for comment on Monday after Trump's attacks against Cavuto, I was greeted by silence. Granted, Trump wasn't President when Fox previously released critical statements about Trump. And the dynamics are different. But the contrast between how Fox perviously handled Trump's outbursts versus today is still striking. And it's notable that Fox continues to be one of the only media organizations that doesn't vocally defend its talent from the President's barbs.
Pelosi tells Cooper "morbidly obese" Trump should not take drug
Back to Trump’s use of hydroxychloroquine... Appearing with Anderson Cooper on CNN Monday night, Nancy Pelosi zinged Trump for taking the drug. “He’s our president and I would rather he not be taking something that has not been approved by the scientists, especially in his age group and his, shall we say, weight group — morbidly obese, they say,” Pelosi said.
👀 Drudge's front page
FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE
-- Latest #s from Johns Hopkins University: There are at least 1,508,308 cases of coronavirus in the United States; at least 90,347 people have died...
-- WaPo Tuesday A1: "Trump says he's taking unproven medication..." (WaPo)
-- And on NYT A1: "President says he takes drug deemed a risk..." (NYT)
-- Dr. Sanjay Gupta: Trump "shouldn't be taking" ydroxychloroquine... (CNN)
-- By taking hydroxychloroquine, Chris Cuomo says Trump is framing the Democrats as the "whiny" party of no... (Mediaite)
-- Chris Hayes: “You can elevate the risk of unlikely events and get away with it for a while—until you don't. All these actions to reopen without a plan are high risk..." (MSNBC)
-- The knives seem to be out for Christopher Wray. Jeanine Pirro on Monday night declared the Trump-appointed FBI director to be "part of the deep-state." Sean Hannity and Jim Jordan were also highly critical of him... (Twitter)
Visualized: Fox's obsession with "OBAMAGATE"
I noted last week that Fox had dumped out of its coronavirus coverage, choosing instead to use its air time to elevate Trump's "OBAMAGATE" conspiracy. Now we have the data — and a staggering visualization of it — to prove that point. Closed-captioning data from the Internet Archive, which was analyzed by the GDELT Project, shows that Fox spent significantly more time discussing "OBAMAGATE" than the coronavirus pandemic.
The methodology was simple. The GDELT Project analyzed the caption data and scanned for key words related to both "OBAMAGATE" and the coronavirus. For the former, it searched for mentions of "Obamagate," "FBI," "Flynn," "deep state," "unmask," "unmasking," and "unmasked." For coronavirus, it included mentions of "coronavirus," "pandemic," "covid," "virus," and "vaccine." The data paints a clear picture: Instead of covering the pandemic killing tens-of-thousands of Americans, Fox flooded its airwaves breathing life into a conspiracy theory promoted by the President...
>> Margaret Sullivan's latest for WaPo: "The media is helping Trump turn the bogus ‘Obamagate’ into the 2020 version of Clinton’s emails..."
>> Brian Lowry emails: WaPo's Fred Hiatt included this line in a piece about the president’s reelection strategy, which is only remarkable to the extent we now take it for granted: “These stratagems may sound implausible, but with Fox News dependably amplifying whatever scapegoat theories Trump settles on, they cannot be discounted...”
TUESDAY PLANNER
Along with the new books we mentioned yesterday, Barton Gellman's "Dark Mirror" comes out Tuesday... The excerpt on The Atlantic's website is chilling...
ViacomCBS will follow up on its Monday presentation to ad buyers with a Tuesday unveiling of the CBS fall schedule...
Mark Zuckerberg will be interviewed by Norah O'Donnell on the "CBS Evening News," partly to discuss "a new feature" being rolled out, per CBS...
Ronan Farrow: "I stand by my reporting"
In a series of tweets Monday, Ronan Farrow and NewYorker.com editor Michael Luo addressed the blistering column Ben Smith published Sunday night in the NYT. Luo said Smith "does the same thing he accuses Ronan of" in his column: "sanding the inconvenient edges off of facts in order to suit the narrative he wants to deliver." Luo detailed those "inconvenient edges" in his 16-part Twitter thread, saying the magazine is proud of Farrow's work and stands by it.
Farrow added "additional thoughts" in his own thread. "Ben claims a central theme was whether Weinstein threatened NBC with [Matt] Lauer info. Not central, and not what the book says," Farrow tweeted. "The book establishes a pressure campaign against NBC, including talks between Weinstein and executives as they told me and my producer to stop reporting." Farrow ended his thread writing, "I stand by my reporting."
>> I checked in with Smith, and he declined to comment beyond his tweets. On his Twitter account, Smith didn't directly respond to Farrow or Luo, but he did engage with other critics, including John Carreyrou...
>> Joe Pompeo wrote about the dust up for his latest VF piece: "There are undeniably rich dynamics to the whole episode, in which a relative Times outsider has targeted one of journalism’s sacred cows, and, in so doing, created a sort of institutional face-off between two of the industry’s most venerable news organizations..."
>> Edmund Lee revealed: "At one point, [Smith's] column was the most read story on the site today. Everyone talked about it. Everyone..."
FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO
-- In a new filing on Monday, "Fox News rebuked the legal arguments a nonprofit organization is using in its lawsuit against the network for its coverage of the coronavirus." A judge "will hear additional arguments over the motion to dismiss later this week..." (Examiner)
-- On Monday evening the NCTA and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press filed a joint brief in support of Fox's motion to dismiss the case. The NCTA is the leading trade group for the cable TV industry...
-- Politico has extended its work from home policy through Labor Day and canceled physical events for the remainder of the year... (Twitter)
-- "60 Minutes" drew in 9.7 million viewers. Perhaps that's why Trump is zinging the show: Because he knows it matters... (THR)
Limbaugh's guest host says coronavirus measures like "Sharia"
The anti-lockdown rhetoric in right-wing media continues to become more aggressive. The latest example comes courtesy of Mark Steyn, who filled in on Monday for Rush Limbaugh (and who is also a frequent guest on Tucker Carlson's program). Steyn argued that the limiting of public music performances is akin to action seen in repressive societies.
“You know the last time I was writing about societies banning music it was ISIS and the Taliban,” Steyn said, adding, “I’m creeped out by the fact that we’re basically adopting ISIS/Taliban policies on music.” Steyn then proceeded to call the implementation of face coverings "Sharia-lite." Steyn said, "That is a sign of Talibanic societies, ISIS societies." Alternative for Steyn: It's a sign of a society trying to limit the spread of a virus during a pandemic that has upended the world...
Tapper: Trump's attempts to distract won't work here
As he opened his show Monday, Jake Tapper took a few moments to address Trump's attack on him. Trump the day before accused Tapper of "illegally smearing" him over the past few years. Tapper pointed out, "The President has been falsely accusing all sorts of folks in media and politics of breaking the law in various ways these days."
"Promoting a conspiracy theory that a different TV news anchor was responsible for a murder. His sons are out there pushing deranged memes about their fathers Democratic presidential challenger as a pedophile," Tapper explained. "And on and on. It all seems clearly designed to distract from the horrific health, death, and economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic, and that of course is what we here at 'The Lead' will continue to focus on."
FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE
-- What drove Facebook's purchase of Giphy? Sara Fischer spoke with Instagram head Adam Mosseri about it... (Axios)
-- Via Alex Weprin: The "GMA" summer concert series, "which usually packs crowds in Central Park for free performances, will instead be held virtually this year. Katy Perry will be first performer on May 22..." (Twitter)
-- The Society of Professional Journalists has awarded three college newsrooms awards for coverage of the coronavirus... (SPJ)
SmileDirectClub sues NBC
"Teledentistry company SmileDirectClub Inc. sued Comcast Corp.’s NBCUniversal, seeking nearly $3 billion in damages for what it alleges were defamatory news reports about the company’s treatment methods," Benjamin Mullin reported Monday. The suit was over a Feb. 13 segment on the "NBC Nightly News" that "described complaints by some SmileDirectClub customers and warnings about teledentistry from an orthodontics professor," Mullin added.
“NBC must be held accountable for its abuse of power and betrayal of trust,” the lawsuit said. The company asked for $2.85 billion in damages. An NBC spokesperson stood by the Feb. 13 story, saying, “We stand by our reporting and believe this is a meritless claim."
FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR
By Kerry Flynn:
-- Bob Norman reports on Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr.’s anti-media attacks... (CJR)
-- Boston Globe Media's subscriptions are up 35% (but offers are as low as $1 for six months)... (Digiday)
-- Unions at Condé Nast -- Ars Technica, New Yorker, Pitchfork, Wired -- sent a letter to CEO Roger Lynch asking for better severance packages for recently laid off staffers and to recognize Wired union... (Twitter)
-- BuzzFeed News union met with management on Monday to discuss a workshare program to cut costs while saving jobs... (Twitter)
-- Tampa Bay Times exec editor has apologized for a profane news alert sent to its app users... (TB Times)
Kevin Mayer leaves Disney for TikTok
Frank Pallotta writes: Kevin Mayer, the exec who has been leading Disney's streaming efforts, is leaving the company to become the CEO of TikTok and the COO of its parent company Bytedance. "I will be looking at TikTok and looking at closely related and adjacent businesses that are large," Mayer told the WSJ. "Gaming, music comes to mind. Video, writ large, is an interesting opportunity."
-- Bob Chapek, who beat out Mayer for the Disney CEO job, said "I am enormously grateful to him for his support and friendship..."
-- WSJ: This makes Mayer "one of the highest-profile American executives to move to a Chinese company..."
-- "TikTok and its Chinese ownership have come under a lot of scrutiny over the past couple of years, and bringing in someone with a strong, major media company pedigree in the US, is probably going to be a smart move for them," analyst Debra Aho Williamson told CNN's Kaya Yurieff...
-- Senator Josh Hawley tweeted: "I look forward to hearing from him. Under oath."
Mayer and Chapek's successors are...
On Monday, Disney named Rebecca Campbell as Mayer's successor as Chairman of Direct-to-Consumer & International. "She has been ascending quickly," the NYT's Brooks Barnes and Jack Nicas wrote. "Just last year, she was named president of the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, Calif. Before that, Ms. Campbell had a senior leadership role at Disney’s Europe, Middle East and Africa operation; she worked on the launch plan for Disney Plus." But for the bulk of her "23 years at the company, Campbell focused on local broadcasting," Deadline's Dade Hayes noted.
>> Disney also filled Chapek's former job: "Josh D’Amaro, who became president of Walt Disney World last year, has been promoted to the position of chairman of Disney Parks, Experiences and Products," per the Orlando Sentinel...
"The Last Dance" was... sorry, can't resist... a slam dunk
Frank Pallotta emails: "The Last Dance" was the Michael Jordan of documentaries for ESPN — at least in terms of ratings. The network's docuseries about Jordan and the Chicago Bulls finished its 10-episode run as the most-watched documentary ever on ESPN. The series averaged 5.6 million viewers throughout its run...
>> CNBC's Alex Sherman responded to Frank's tweet with this observation: "One of the interesting things about the Jordan doc was how consistent the audience was week after week in terms of aggregate numbers. Basically, if you started watching, you likely watched the whole thing. That’s the sign of a compelling documentary."
"Blackballed" signals the NBA's evolution as a cultural force
Brian Lowry emails: Quibi has one of its best offerings yet with “Blackballed,” a documentary conspicuously timed to pick up where “The Last Dance” left off. The feature-length film (sliced, not helpfully, into Quibi-sized parts) documents the NBA’s ouster of Clippers owner Donald Sterling due to racist remarks, and the way that story played out while his team was in the midst of a playoff run.
When will sports come back?
Brian Lowry emails: If you missed it, highly recommend John Oliver’s deep-dive Sunday into the problems associated with trying to get major sports up and running again, despite the palpable desperation among the leagues and TV industry to find some way to do it. Watch it here...
FOR THE RECORD, PART FIVE
By Lisa Respers France:
-- John Krasinski's "Some Good News" gave us some good feelings. But now it's gone on hiatus...
-- Hannah Brown, "The Bachelorette" star, has apologized for using the n-word...
-- Dropkick Murphys and Bruce Springsteen are planning to helm a historic live stream show from the infield of Fenway Park...
-- "American Idol" crowned its newest winner virtually...
"Stargirl" brings a lighter touch to DC's superhero universe
Brian Lowry emails: In a bit of synergy, the streaming service DC Universe and CW are sharing "DC's Stargirl," the latest superhero series, playfully adapted from the comics. It’s aimed at a Comic-Con-conversant audience, but should be reasonably good fun even for the uninitiated in its coming-of-age elements.
Thank you for reading! Email me and/or find me on Twitter. Until next time...
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