The origins of the "Big Lie" have been uncovered, under oath.

[kentuck]

Just as you may have imagined, it was a huge conspiracy.

Rupert Murdoch, the owner of FOXNews, has testified under oath and has thrown many of his broadcasters under the bus, by testifying that they knew the election had not been stolen. He attempted to cover for them by saying that they had "guests" on their programs that promoted the "Big Lie", when they knew they were not telling the truth.

He admitted that he had given Jared Kushner the Joe Biden political ads information before they were aired by the Democratic nominee. He talked with Mitch McConnell to try and dissuade him from the Big Lie strategy and McConnell refused to go along.

So the Big Lie was not just the creation of Donald Trump. It was promoted by FOXNews and the Republican Party. It was a three-legged stool of conspiracy.

Now, FOX is being sued for $1.6 billion by the voting machine company, Dominion, for defamation.

The origins of the Big Lie, and its threat to our democracy, are finally being uncovered.

[hlthe2b]

1. Kentuck, I heard that reported on MSNBC this PM & thought I heard that Murdoch tried to DISSUADE

Mitch McConnell from allowing his members to use the Big Lie strategy and McConnell refused to go along. Depending on the timing (soon after Fox was getting backlash from early reporting of AZ), this might make sense.

[kentuck]

2. Yes, that is what I meant.

Thanks for clarifying.

[hlthe2b]

3. Ahh, okay... I was doing other things so wasn't sure.

[Goonch]

4. 👇👇👇

[Beachnutt]

5. Don't forget the 2.7 billion suit that Smartmatic has filed also

[kentuck]

7. It's funny that the only people that can sue successfully are corporations...

....as Nicolle Wallace also pointed out.

[onecaliberal]

12. John Q. Public doesn't have the funds to hire the kind of attorney/firm one would

Need to go against big corporations. They get away with actual murder all of the time.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Too bad Democracy Itself can't jump into the lawsuit and make it class action

But at least the payout, if any, will go to companies whose technology supports election integrity and accurate results.

[onetexan]

45. THIS!!☝️

[malaise]

8. Hope the Biden campaign team sue Fux

That is all

[Joinfortmill]

21. Would love to see them run out of town.

[calimary]

29. I'd love to see them run off the air.

[jaxexpat]

40. It might strain their finances to go after Fox.

Also, by the time the voting machine people get finished with them, they may not be worth suing.

[malaise]

41. LOL for they may not be worth suing

[Demobrat]

9. What if 70M or so Democrats got together and

filed a class action lawsuit against Fox for the harm their lies did to our mental health.

[Maraya1969]

37. I'd sign on to that. Anyone who lost someone to Covid could sign

Since that new study said that 400,000 of the dead in the US wouldn't have died if it hadn't been for tFump

[onetexan]

46. THIS!!☝️

[Warpy]

10. Please, please, 12 jurors good and true, find them guilty

and assess double damages. Put Rupert and Lachlan out of business to the point of having control removed from them so that the money making Fox Entertainment can survive, while Pox News and its demon children are allowed to wither and blow away.

May Rupert die powerless and bitter and may Lachlan spend the rest of his life in bars, telling all the other barflies what a big shot he used to be. And may all those Pox presenters get bullshit corporate jobs they're terrified of losing in every recession, which happens every time another Republican gets into power. And that's if they manage to avoid prison.

(Yes, I'm cranky, I made the mistake of watching too much of RT over on Russian Media Monitor, a woman addicted to Botox and lip gloss who is an obvious raging sociopath who lies for money without conscience....just like Pox News)

[kentuck]

11. Now we know why so many Republicans refused to certify Joe Biden after they were attacked...

...in our Capitol.

The Republicans were always a part of the "Big Lie".

[crickets]

13. 👆👆 Yes. Of course Mitch and the Repubs knew. They were in on it

Gaetz, Loudermilk, Gosar, Tuberville, Brooks, Cruz, Hawley, Jordan, Grassley, Boebert, Greene - the list goes on. Pence may have done the right thing at the last minute, but he knew as well. He knew long beforehand and said nothing.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/07/list-republicans-voted-to-reject-election-results

[kentuck]

14. I'm not sure Mr Pence did the "right thing" for the right reason?

I think it was Pelosi that was getting military and police help for the Capitol, not Pence?

I agree that he knew all about it and said nothing.

[crickets]

15. Pence presided over the electoral vote count as he was supposed to

because Dan Quayle convinced him he had no wiggle room to do otherwise. That was what I was referring to. As for finally getting more military and police help, Pence may have been in the loop on the phone but I absolutely agree that Nancy Pelosi was the one who leaned hard enough to get things done.

[calimary]

30. Good to remember. From what I've read recently, Pence

actually wanted to find a reason to give trump what he wanted. And he was finally talked out of it by Dan Quayle, of all people. But Pence held out for awhile, hoping somebody somewhere could provide him with some justification for doing what the donald wanted. And he finally gave up waiting for rescue because the facts just didn’t support asserting a trump win, and he went ahead and finished the certification process in a timely manner.

[jaxexpat]

43. Had Pence played his role, he'd be the lightning rod for all the ensuing bloody chaos.

Normally, he barely has enough mental coordination to walk while chewing his cud. The bulb that blinked on when he finally realized just how his part in the "plan" would unfold must have shone like a floodlight in the muddled darkness between his ears. I'm betting he called Ben Carson for advice before he tried Quayle.

[ShazzieB]

19. The one "right thing" Pence did was to conduct the certification in the proper manner.

As we all know, Trump wanted Pence to assert power that the VP does not actually have in order to help Trump steal the election. Pence declined to do do, after ascertaining that Trump's scheme was illegal and couldn't possibly work. That was the "right" choice, whatever his reasons may have been.

He did do some wrong things, too (like leaving it up to Pelosi to step up and call in additional help from the National Guard, etc.), and the reasons for some of his actions that day are not completely clear and may never be. But I think it's reasonable to say that he did the "right" thing where the certification was concerned.

Beyond that, who knows.

[crickets]

22. Thanks for adding more to my sparse explanation.

I still want to know why Pence refused to get into the car in that underground garage. Why didn't he trust those Secret Service agents? What did he know that we (and his own security agents) didn't? I hope that answering questions about his safety concerns will be part of his testimony.

[kentuck]

27. I have a hunch there is much more that we do not know about Mr Pence...

He is trying to hide something and it is not that he believes he can be president, in my opinion.

[calimary]

31. He's trying to have it both ways. And it's not possible.

[kentuck]

35. Just because he refused to go along with that one part of the conspiracy does not mean...

...he did not go along with the rest.

At what time did he decide to go back into the Capitol?

It would be interesting to know why he didn't want "to get in the car"?

[onetexan]

47. THIS!!☝️

[Lonestarblue]

36. I doubt Pence feared for his safety. He likely refused to get in the car because he knew he would

not be returned to the Capitol and Chuck Grassley would preside over the electoral count in his place. Grassley even let it slip beforehand that he expected to preside over the count. Pence knew that Grassley would accept the fake electors and all hell would break loose. It would be nice if he would explain all that under oath.

[onetexan]

48. Maybe a combo of both

[crickets]

51. 👆 This, or some combination of the two.

Excellent point about Grassley. No telling whether Pence knew beforehand or found out because Grassley couldn't keep his mouth shut. It's a good bet Pence knew he wouldn't make it back to the Capitol if he got in the car, but I still wonder if he worried about more than not being able to return on time.

[calimary]

16. Too bad it's only for 1.6 billion. Add a zero or two.

We need to break Murdoch and friends. We need to break Pox Noise, and OAN and Newsmax, and any other outlet trying to poison the discourse and lie and misrepresent the facts.

And we need to do it in any way available to us, in vehicles big and small.

[gab13by13]

24. Oh but it may not be just for 1.6b.

Dominion may be entitled to damages which could bring down Fox.

[calimary]

32. I hope so! That might help save America.

The penalties have to be big enough to HURT.

Seriously.

[Justice matters.]

17. One of the penalties should include a mandatory statement at the start of

each and every 'show' on Faux Entertainment Tonight: "We knew the 2020 election was not stolen but we chose to lie to you, and host commentators who lied while we knew they were lying, in order for our stock to not lose value" ...

Then name the shows' hosts who lied while they knew it was a big lie, and what they thought about their viewers believing them.

I don't watch Faux so I don't know if they report about that lawsuit, but I suspect they don't.

[onetexan]

49. One penalty wld be to take ALL the election denying hosts off the air completely

And i hope thoae treasonous SOBs get sued themselves.

[oldsoftie]

18. I'm a bit confused; I dont remember McConnell ever disputing the election results.

When I read Mudoch tried to dissuade Mitch FROM the "big lie" and he refused, wouldnt that mean Mitch was a denier too? Did I miss where he went along with the Hawleys Pauls & Greenes?

[Ligyron]

20. I must have missed it too.

I don’t know where but I got the impression he didn’t support or promote the Big Lie.

[kentuck]

28. It is reported that Murdoch said that under oath...

Why would he lie about Mitch?

[dmr]

39. Here's why, I think. Murdoch wanted McConnell to dissuade others in the Senate from going

along with TFG's big lie. McConnell didn't want to get involved, and refused to speak to the others.

McConnell, isn't a denier, but by doing nothing, he played it safe for himself. By staying out of it, he didn't have deal with the wrath of TFG, and the crazed MAGAT base.

[GuppyGal]

23. Wow ..I mean we all knew but to see it in black and white is something else

[gab13by13]

25. It happened long before the election

Trump planned to lie about the election way before it even happened.

[Prairie_Seagull]

26. Does anyone remember the 2 journalists who were fired by the fox corporation-

for not being willing to report what they (fox) wanted them to report? They sued for wrongful termination and lost due to the fact (as i recall) the judge or jury said that basically no sane deliberative person would believe what fox says. I have looked around and been unable to find anything which seems to indicate that there was a settlement and maybe a NDA. Or did fox scrub the internet of this?

I am not the best searcher and run out of patience quickly, maybe one of our lawyerly folks remember this, I believe it was during the Ailes years. Regardless this should be brought to the forefront of our minds these days

[calimary]

33. Here?

Fox News Launches ‘Purge’ to ‘Get Rid of Real Journalists,’ Insiders Say
‘BLOOD BATH’
Diana Falzone
Contributing Editor
Lachlan Cartwright
Editor At Large
Updated Jan. 19, 2021 7:32PM ET
Published Jan. 19, 2021 4:13PM ET

https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-news-launches-purge-to-get-rid-of-real-journalists
______

Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity discussed wanting a Fox News reporter fired after she pushed back on Trump's election lies
Erin Snodgrass and Jacob Shamsian Feb 16, 2023, 9:04 PM

https://www.businessinsider.com/tucker-carlson-sean-hannity-fox-news-reporter-fact-checking-trump-2023-2?amp

_________

And maybe this, too…

2 Fox News commentators resign over Tucker Carlson series on the Jan. 6 siege
Updated November 22, 202112:06 PM ET
Heard on Morning Edition
David Folkenflik 2018 square
DAVID FOLKENFLIK

https://www.npr.org/2021/11/21/1052837157/fox-resignations-tucker-carlson-patriot-purge-documentary

[oldsoftie]

34. Heinrich still works for Fox now. I remember Shep Smith resigning because of Hannity

Hannity is such a dick too. And more than two left because they just got tired of the lies

[Prairie_Seagull]

38. Thank you very much but this was like a decade ago. Shit I wish my memory was better.

Further it was a bit more than a flash in the pan story. Just thought of a couple of places I can check.

[uponit7771]

52. +1, Fox will say they're entertainment to squirm out of lawsuit

[kpete]

42. Darcy: "Top personnel knew that the narrative they were pushing to viewers was not true"

"and we have evidence now that shows they did this in search of profit”
https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnns-oliver-darcy-dominion-filings-prove-fox-news-knowingly-lies-its-viewers-and-not-its-core

[Wednesdays]

44. K&R.

[Xolodno]

50. Well Fox (News Corp) did get a big chunk of change from Disney...

...when they bought their I.P.s, distribution, etc. Now they are about lose that bank

And the irony of it, DeSantis, Trump, etc. may not have a well oiled machine that is Fox News for a bit. And some have been going after Disney.