CNN’s Brian Stelter dedicated more than ten minutes of Sunday’s Reliable Sources arguing that Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson is the “new Donald Trump.”
In an awkward fit of rage and demonstrable jealousy over Carlson’s ratings, Stelter denigrated both Fox News personnel and viewers. He smeared Carlson as a white-rage enabler, unapologetic “fire starter,” who “offend[s] millions of people”:
STELTER: I have come to one inescapable conclusion about the GOP and the media. I want to see you if you agree or disagree with me. Even though Republicans are out of power right now, the use of the media, their use of the media has a major impact on the Democrats, and on political dysfunction. So, this – what I’m about to say— directly impacts President Biden and his administration. All right. Are you ready for it? Here is my conclusion: Tucker Carlson is the new Donald Trump. Tucker has taken Trump’s place as a right-wing leader, as an outrage generator, as a fire starter and it’s all happening on Fox just like Trump’s campaign did, which means Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch are ultimately responsible.
I mean, think about all of the ways these two men are similar. Every day, Carlson is throwing bombs, making online memes, offending millions of people, also delighting millions of others, tapping into white-male rage and resentment, stoking distrust of big tech and the media, generally coarsening the discourse, never apologizing for anything and setting the GOP’s agenda. Sounds like a recently retired president, right?”
After ranting (once again) about Fox’s decision to add new, Carlson-related content to their streaming service, Fox Nation, Stelter invited on a panel of four other Fox haters to further support his theory.
The Baltimore Sun’s media critic David Zurawik—someone who was once able to aptly spot journalists’ leftist bias—was the most unhinged of the four guests. Zurawik contended that Fox News Channel should lose its access to the White House press pool and should be deprived of all journalistic access to the Biden administration. The left-wing hack asserted FNC shouldn’t be treated like a media outlet, but rather a “political tool.” As a result, the network, according to Zurawik, should be treated the “same” as the Proud Boys.
Stelter then asked CNN political analyst April Ryan if she thought Carlson was a “thorn in the side of the [Biden] administration.” Ryan responded that the Fox News host was, indeed, a thorn in “everyone’s side”—especially Biden’s. Ryan then baselessly argued that Carlson “has put a lot of people’s lives on the line for his entertainment purposes.”
Ryan’s overwrought assertion even caught Stelter by surprise, causing him to inquire: “Lives on the line?”
Failing to take the host’s interjection as a hint, Ryan doubled down:
“Lives on the line. Taylor Lorenz. Taylor Lorenz, when Tucker Carlson puts you on his target board, people throw out crazy threats and death threats and she has to, in exchange, speak loudly and publicly so people can see what is happening to save her life. Trust me because I understand, because I’ve been a target of Tucker Carlson.”
Apparently stating someone’s name more than once in a sentence constitutes endangering the welfare of “a lot” of people.
Stelter also mocked Carlson’s production team for the graphics they displayed during Biden’s address last week, despite previously admitting to writing some bizarre and nonobjective chyrons himself.
Media critic Erik Wemple, who has appeared on Carlson’s show before, analogized their efforts to constructively criticize Fox News and the Murdoch family to “pissing into the wind” and commended Stelter for doing so with him.
Brian Stelter’s animus for Tucker Carlson was supported, in part, by Fidelity. Contact this advertiser and others via the Media Research Center’s Conservatives Fight Back website, conveniently linked here.