OP-ED: Will CNN Investigate CNN?

OP-ED: JEFF ZUCKER: President of the Leftist State Media

By Jeffrey Lord

Over the weekend my old CNN boss, Jeff Zucker, participated in an interview at the South by Southwest (SXSW) gathering in Austin.

According to news accounts he said this of Fox News: https://grabien.com/story.php?id=163609

“Frankly, it is really state-run TV. It is a pure propaganda machine and I think does an incredible disservice to this country. There are a handful of good journalists there, but I think they are lost in what — what is just a complete propaganda machine, and the idea that it’s a news channel is I think really not the case at all.”

Really? With all due respect, one doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Jeff Zucker has said on occasion that he has wanted to run for political office. (And one suspects he would not be running as a Reagan conservative.)  But in fact he already holds office – as the de facto president of the Leftist State Media. Nominally he is the president of CNN, but in fact CNN is but one component part of the larger left-wing propaganda machine that composes the Leftist State Media.

One can go for one’s news to CNN or MSNBC or ABC, CBS, NBC, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Associated Press and countless internet outlets and see that Jeff’s presidential domain is considerable.

Every last one of those outlets is about pushing the left-wing agenda of the moment – and oh yes, in this day and age attacking President Donald Trump.

The Leftist State Media in modern America is what in another era, when the Soviet Union was alive and well, was called the Department for Agitation and Propaganda – or the ministry of propaganda whose sole function was shorthanded as “agitprop.” In those days there was only one official newspaper for the Soviet population – Pravda or “Truth.”

In today’s American media world the “Truth” comes from – and only from – the Leftist State Media.

Long before CNN – when Jeff Zucker was barely out of diapers – then-Vice President Spiro Agnew first discussed what he saw – way back there in 1969 – as a real problem with the media of the day. The Vietnam War was raging, and President Nixon had recently addressed the nation. Nixon had been followed by a collection of liberal television commentators who proceeded to tell the American people what they thought Nixon had really said.

In a then-famous speech in, of all places, Des Moines, Iowa, carried live by the television networks of the day (there were only three, and cable news did not yet exist) Agnew said this:

“The purpose of my remarks tonight is to focus your attention on this little group of men who not only enjoy a right of instant rebuttal to every Presidential address, but more importantly, wield a free hand in selecting, presenting, and interpreting the great issues of our nation.

First, let us define that power. At least forty-million Americans each night, it is estimated, watch the network news. Seven million of them view ABC; the remainder being divided between NBC and CBS. According to Harris polls and other studies, for millions of Americans, the networks are the sole source of national and world news.

In Will Rogers’ observation, what you knew was what you read in the newspaper. Today, for growing millions of Americans, it is what they see and hear on their television sets.

How is this network news determined? A small group of men, numbering perhaps no more than a dozen “anchormen,” commentators, and executive producers, settle upon the 20 minutes or so of film and commentary that is to reach the public. This selection is made from the 90 to 180 minutes that may be available. Their powers of choice are broad. They decide what forty to fifty-million Americans will learn of the day’s events in the nation and the world.

We cannot measure this power and influence by traditional democratic standards, for these men can create national issues overnight. They can make or break–by their coverage and commentary–a moratorium on the war. They can elevate men from local obscurity to national prominence within a week. They can reward some politicians with national exposure, and ignore others. For millions of Americans, the network reporter who covers a continuing issue, like ABM or Civil Rights, becomes, in effect, the presiding judge in a national trial by jury. 

…A raised eyebrow, an inflection of the voice, a caustic remark dropped in the middle of a broadcast can raise doubts in a million minds about the veracity of a public official, or the wisdom of a government policy. One Federal Communications Commissioner considers the power of the networks to equal that of local, state, and federal governments combined. Certainly, it represents a concentration of power over American public opinion unknown in history.

What do Americans know of the men who wield this power? Of the men who produce and direct the network news, the nation knows practically nothing. Of the commentators, most Americans know little, other than that they reflect an urbane and assured presence, seemingly well informed on every important matter.

We do know that, to a man, these commentators and producers live and work in the geographical and intellectual confines of Washington, D.C. or New York City–the latter of which James Reston terms the “most unrepresentative community in the entire United States.” Both communities bask in their own provincialism, their own parochialism. We can deduce that these men thus read the same newspapers, and draw their political and social views from the same sources. Worse, they talk constantly to one another, thereby providing artificial reinforcement to their shared viewpoints.”

The media problem Agnew described all the way back in 1969 – a full fifty years ago, when Donald Trump was a mere 23 years old and barely a year out of grad school – has now metastasized, dominating the vast media complex of today.

The very prominence of New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the bartender-turned-congresswoman and media star, is the literal manifestation of Agnew’s point that the media “can elevate men from local obscurity to national prominence within a week.”

Jeff Zucker also said this of Fox anchors:

“They chose to work at Fox and they don’t get to hide behind the fact that they’re excellent journalists or anchors. The fact is they work at a place that has done tremendous damage to this country.”

That statement all by itself is a perfect illustration of how President Zucker of the Leftist State Media sees his job – which is to arbitrarily declare his decidedly liberal opinion as fact. No wonder Jim Acosta feels free to do exactly the same thing.

It is worth recalling that Fox News was created in 1996 – during the Clinton presidency, when CNN’s lavish pro-Clinton coverage had won it the derisive nickname the “Clinton News Network.” Fox was followed  three years later by Rush Limbaugh and the explosion of conservative talk radio.

The reason for the success of Fox News and talk radio is exactly the failure of the Leftist State Media. Millions of Americans, doubtless unknowing in absorbing Agnew’s long-ago point, have had it up to their eyebrows going from one “news” outlet to another only to get some version of the exact same liberal spin.

Example?

Here is CNN on the Clinton-Trump race. The headline: https://www.cnn.com/2016/08/08/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-cnn-poll-of-polls/index.html

CNN Poll of Polls: Clinton tops Trump by 10

The story begins:

“(CNN)The post-convention polls are in, and they consistently show Hillary Clinton entering the next phase of the presidential election campaign with the upper hand over Donald Trump.”

Here is the New York Times in its “Upshot” column: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/upshot/presidential-polls-forecast.html

Hillary Clinton has an 85% chance to win. 

“The Upshot’s elections model suggests that Hillary Clinton is favored to win the presidency, based on the latest state and national polls. 

Here is The Huffington Post: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/polls-hillary-clinton-win_us_5821074ce4b0e80b02cc2a94

HuffPost Forecasts Hillary Clinton Will Win With 323 Electoral Votes 

The HuffPost presidential forecast model gives Democrat Hillary Clinton a 98.2 percent chance of winning the presidency. RepublicanDonald Trump has essentially no path to an Electoral College victory. 

And on and on went this business of one Leftist State Media outlet after another all saying exactly the same thing – Hillary Clinton was going to be the next president and Donald Trump had no way open to win.

Change the subject from the 2016 election to, say, abortion, climate change, the economy or any of dozens of issues out there and time after time after time it makes no difference. You will get the left-wing agenda of the moment delivered by whatever outlet of the Leftist State Media you are choosing to watch or read.

Let’s cut to the chase. The real reason for Jeff Zucker’s angst is that Fox News and conservative talk radio, not to mention all manner of conservative internet sites have broken the stranglehold of information that once was the sole preserve of the Leftist State Media. And the only way the LSM chieftains see to get their monopoly back is to literally try and take out Fox News and conservative commentators one by one, with Media Matters and others doing the dirty work.

It is safe to say that that the Leftist State Media has in its midst “excellent journalists or anchors.” But when story after story after story is either wrong or obviously presented to further the Left’s favorite agenda item of the moment,  (Hillary certain to win! Trump friend Anthony Scaramucci tied to Russian investment fund! Trump told Cohen to lie to Congress! Trump and son tied to hacked documents from Wikileaks! Climate change report contradicts President! Covington kids confronted Indian elder and Vietnam veteran!) then in fact the Leftist State Media, in Jeff Zucker’s words, is for sure “a place that has done tremendous damage to this country.”

In fact, it is safe to assume at this point that the members of the Leftist State Media simply can’t help themselves. They are so far gone from journalism that they will say and do anything to push the Left’s agenda, damaging not only the country but themselves.

Which is exactly why Jeff Zucker’s CNN, the Washington Post and doubtless soon-to-be-others in the Leftist State Media now find themselves being sued for hundreds of millions of dollars for libeling sixteen year old Covington student Nick Sandmann. They simply could not stop themselves from doing it.

And the irony? It is Fox News and conservative media that has assumed the journalistic task as described by CNN founder Ted Turner the day CNN first went on the air in June of 1980.

“To provide information to people where it wasn’t available before.”

Exactly.

Pick up Jeffrey Lord’s Swamp Wars: Donald Trump and the New American Populism. Out on May 28th. Click here.

FAKE NEWS: To Russia With Love

The headline at Fox was this:  Growing questions about CNN’s airport monopoly as network veers left

The article begins:

“CNN’s ubiquitous presence in airports — where it broadcasts from thousands of screens to a captive audience of millions — is facing new scrutiny after the cable network’s hard left turn.”

Question: Has CNN taken a “hard turn left”?

I realize Fox is a competitor and the two networks have much back and forth. But this latest description of CNN as having taken a “hard left turn” makes one wonder: was CNN always “left”, and is this latest turn of the network really just another moment in the history of a network that, in one fashion or another, was always “left” because it’s founder – Ted Turner – evolved into a hard left guy himself?

Let’s start in the decade that gave birth to CNN and prominence to the admitted genius of its founder, Mr. Turner. That would be the 1980’s.

Ted Turner, Atlanta billboard impresario, edged his way into the cable media business with by purchasing a solitary Atlanta UHF station. Eventually, he secured permission from the FCC to use a satellite to transmit his “Super Station” signals across the country. Soon there was the creation of the Cable News Network – CNN. And the birth of the era of cable news that now so transfixes the country and the world was at hand.

“There’s a reason crowds chant ‘CNN Sucks'”

– Sean Hannity

 

In the beginning, Turner, replete with a Southern drawl, was seen as a seriously right-wing guy. After he had some success with CNN and it was floated that he might buy CBS – a gold-standard broadcast network – liberals foamed and fumed. It never happened. But something else did. Ted Turner, ever so slowly, was turning Left. And with one exception – his 1991 marriage to the famously left-leaning actress Jane Fonda – there was no better example of the culture Turner was incubating in his Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) than a 1988 seven-hour, three episode documentary that was his idea – the title: Portrait of the Soviet Union.

It appeared as both television episodes – with an introduction by Turner himself – and a very glossy coffee table-style book. The television show was hosted by the late actor Roy Scheider, famous for his role in the Spielberg blockbuster Jaws and an Oscar-nominated turn in The French Connection among other roles. The book version was authored by Britain’s Sir Fitzroy Maclean.

https://twitter.com/seanhannity/status/976904957348794370

Let’s recall some of the lines from the TV show, now safely stored on YouTube. The show opens with an introduction by Turner himself, promising “a look at the heart and soul of Soviet life.” A narrator’s voice takes over touting the series as Ted Turner’s idea, saying that when the Soviets were first contacted “it was never imagined” that the series would “awaken a sleeping giant” and inviting viewers to get to know “this great land.” All of this done against a backdrop of everything from polo playing horsemen to a reindeer-driven sled, young dancers and, but of course, a glorious, flag-waving parade through Red Square. Scheider is introduced and off the viewer goes into a magic land of 1988 Soviet inspiration.

Right from the start, it is clear the idea is to celebrate the Communist state as Scheider rhapsodizes, to the tune of heroic music including the Communist state’s national anthem, as follows:

“Onward into the future. The dream of the Soviet Union. In a country covering one-sixth of the world, 280 million people from over 100 races, live in a federation of fifteen Republics. The Soviet Union, draped in history, born of bloody revolution, bound together by a dream that is still being dreamt. It is the dream of a socialist nation, marching towards the first Communist state. The Soviet Union – a mighty union…..Once the Kremlin was the home of czars. Today it belongs to the people…Atheist though the state may be, freedom to worship as you believe is enshrined in the Soviet Constitution…Modernization on a grand scale. A great success.”

In the archives of the Media Research Center is this assessment of the project:

“Perhaps the most amazing piece of pro-Soviet propaganda produced in the 1980s was Ted Turner’s seven-hour Portrait of the Soviet Union, shown in the United States on the CNN founder’s TBS Superstation. Even the New York Times, in a March 20, 1988, review, deemed it an embarrassment, saying that the three-part series ‘is possessed by the same spirit that once led George Bernard Shaw to throw his dinner out the window of a Soviet train — because food was redundant amid socialist milk and honey.’”

By the 1990’s, the Soviet Union may have gone but there was a new left-leaning cause to be defended: the Clinton White House. And sure enough, another Ted Turner property – CNN – took up the cause. The Media Research Center documented the doings of then-CNN president Rick Kaplan, Clinton pal and what was becoming known as “The Clinton News Network.” A few were:

• At CNN, Kaplan attended an insiders-only Gore campaign mock debate.
• At CNN, Kaplan produced a two-hour special on Clinton’s 1996 fundraising scandal. The special was biased in favor of Clinton, as Kaplan instructed CNN staff to “limit their use of the word ‘scandal’ in reporting on Clinton’s campaign fundraising woes.”
• At CNN, Kaplan became a repeat overnight guest in the Lincoln Bedroom.

All of this comes to mind as one takes in the recent criticism of Fox News by CNN’s current leader, Jeff Zucker. Note this as written up in The Hollywood Reporter:

“CNN president Jeff Zucker lashed out at competitor Fox News at an industry conference Thursday afternoon, saying that the network “is really state-run TV. It is a pure propaganda machine, and I think does an incredible disservice to this country.”

He said Fox News has changed substantially in the last two years, following the departure of late founder Roger Ailes. He described the change at the network as “shocking.”

“There are a handful of good journalists there, but I think they are lost in what is a complete propaganda machine,” said Zucker, who claimed Fox News “has nothing on” the Russian government-run TASS Russian News Agency.

Zucker added: “The idea that it’s a news channel, I think, is really not the case at all.”

Without a trace of irony, Zucker actually compares Fox to TASS, the Russian News Agency. This when the founder of CNN itself came up with the idea in the 1980’s of a salute-to-the Soviets series that even the New York Times found embarrassing because of its gushing Leftist salute. And the network became infamous in the 1990’s as “The Clinton News Network.”

CNN Chief Jeff Zucker, “the porn king off cable news”

 

Which raises the question. If Fox News is a “complete propaganda machine” – isn’t CNN? Except instead of being “pro-Trump” or “state-run TV” as is the Zucker accusation about Fox, CNN is the opposite – “liberal state-run TV”. And it is the latter because liberalism has always been part of the CNN culture thanks to the formative culture established by its founder.

As noted here by the Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, CNN’s coverage of President Trump’s first 100 days in office was, along with NBC’s, “the most unrelenting”. CNN’s coverage scored a full 93% negativity on its Trump coverage. That is nowhere close to the idea that CNN is a “just the facts” network

Among other things, this has resulted, as noted here at RealClear Investigations, in a push to remove CNN from the ubiquitous television monitors that permeate U.S. airports on the grounds that it has now become nothing more than leftist propaganda.

Zucker is obviously well within his rights to take CNN any direction he wishes. God bless a free press. But when one goes back and takes a look at the Portrait of the Soviet Union as presented by CNN’s founding father, then looks at the Clinton years coverage plus the Shorenstein analysis of the first hundred days of Trump administration coverage – 93% negative – it is more than fair to ask if CNN hasn’t become exactly what it is criticizing at Fox. A propaganda machine – for the Left. And that it is that in the first place because culturally speaking its corporate culture has always been thus.

If the “porn king of cable news,” Jeff Zucker, left CNN tomorrow, there is every reason to believe that the corporate culture would not change as it was clearly well-established long before Zucker ever arrived. As typified by what was effectively Ted Turner’s documentary – a documentary that might more accurately have been titled To Russia With Love.

Which, not to put too fine a point on it, was something the very media savvy late Roger Ailes understood in his bones. And which explains why exactly the conservative Fox News keeps relentlessly winning the ratings – and Sean Hannity is called “the King of Cable News.”

Jeffrey Lord is a frequent contributor to Hannity.com.  You can follow him on Twitter @realJeffreyLord