There is still at least one more suit, so maybe. But probably not.

Yeah, I wanted to see Murdoch et al testify, but $787.5 million is a hell of a lot of money, and I think it took a lot of guts for Dominion to hold out for the big payday. I have a hard time seeing how Dominion could have come out of the inevitable appeals with that much money. And they also got the admission of guilt.

The settlement is something like 20 times the value of the company.

The thing I was hoping for was Tucker Carlson, et al., eating shit on-air. I'm surprised Dominion didn't hold out for some formal admission of guilt. It seems like Fox's "admission" is very carefully worded and guaranteed never to reach their audience's ears.

It's only like 3x what it was worth before Fox defamed it. It's not clear if the current private equity owners are treating it like a going concern.

5: I see that I'm looking at a 2018 price that was probably way low. Never mind.

They're not a political actor, they're a profit-maximizing company. They're not going to just say "nah, we'd rather have an apology than hard cash."

It will be interesting whether they explicitly offered more money to avoid apologizing. Seems like the kind of thing their shareholders might want to know.

That was poorly written, "they" is dominion in the first paragraph but Fox in the second!

Thanks. That makes more sense.

The thing I was hoping for was Tucker Carlson, et al., eating shit on-air.

He sort of did, but dignity wraithing to Trump rather than to the public.

Yeah. I really don't get the whole right-wing masculinity thing that coëxists with their cringing subservience to the quest for money (via Trump's approval).

11: A combination of "This is the way the world really works" and the trade-off for being able to dominate other people down the ladder.

I guess, but "at least I can abuse the weaker" really strikes me as anti-Christian.

Honestly, dominating people is probably a lot of work. I don't even like to supervise employees.

Josh Marshall had a good take on this, basically saying the other case is still pending and Fox may have been unwilling to agree to a stronger apology because it would compromise its defenses to that case.

I feel like the discovery already drew a lot of blood. I suppose getting those assholes on the stand would be extra, but I don't really get the disappointment around this. The judge wasn't going to shut down Fox News. Murdoch wasn't going to jail. Hannity wasn't going to have to go on the air with a chalkboard and write "Donald Trump was legitimately defeated by Joe Biden" 100 times. It was just going to be additional dirt like the discovery stuff, which hasn't made a difference to viewers or to "fellow" journalists at other outlets, and then it would have ended.

I don't know, Convince me I'm wrong, and that there was some sort of outcome that was meaningfully worse for NewsCorp than this one.

And yes, the last two paras of JMM's take are excellent. Take and enjoy the win; there was never an outcome where we could stop fighting anyway.

The best part of the suit for me personally is that I now have official documentation that Fox News executives consider their audience "like negotiating with terrorists, but especially dumb ones. Cousin fucking types." Which might just need to get assigned a hot key on my computer.

You know, the first couple of generations of cousin fuckers should be fine.

Even by New York Times standards, this is an appalling interpretation of the news:

After Fox Settlement, Assault on Media Protections Is Likely to Continue

As though the Fox Settlement was somehow part of the same trend as the assault on media protections.

No shit, here's the deck headline:

Those who argue that the news media should pay a steeper price for mistakes are pushing to have a landmark Supreme Court ruling overturned.

Mistakes? Is someone out there trying to argue that Fox made mistakes?

And then:

OH. MY. GOD. I wrote that bit above before reading the actual story, and when I got down to the byline, I found out that the writer is someone I know and have genuine professional respect for.

So okay, the story itself is misconceived, but it's not as stupid as the headlines, and makes an interesting point.

It's not a coincidence that a founder of one of the law firms that represented Dominion is leading a campaign to get the Supreme Court to overturn its decision in Sullivan.

But Jesus Fucking Christ, the idea that the assault on NYT v. Sullivan is of a piece with the Dominion suit is ridiculous. If Fox isn't guilty of libel, then libel doesn't exist. That was not the claim made in Sullivan.

And the reporter himself PARENTHETICALLY separates the facts from the bullshit in a way that the headlines do not:

"It's virtually impossible to bring and win one of these cases," Ms. Locke said this year. The media "have complete immunity from liability." (In fact, Ms. Locke's law firm and others have recently secured multimillion-dollar jury verdicts for public figures suing the media for defamation.)

And then the writer does it again, quoting Desantis:

"It would contribute to an increase in the ethics in the media and everything if they knew: You know what? You smear somebody, you know it's false and you didn't do your homework, you're going to have to be held accountable for that," Mr. DeSantis said at the February event, the phrase "SPEAK TRUTH" emblazoned on a screen behind him. (In fact, the Sullivan ruling does not shield journalists from liability if they know what they are publishing is false.)

So maybe this is some new journalistic innovation: You publicize bullshit, but instead of separating the truth out into a factcheck column, you put the truth in parentheses.

19: Do you think we are still in the first couple of generations?

20: I feel that a vast majority of people who "read" the news these days glance at headlines like this and formulate opinions without even reading the story. People never get to the parenthetical notes unless the headline is outrageous enough, and by then they already have an opinion that won't be changed by facts or logic. Print isn't dead, it's just mind-numbingly biased, clickbait, or somewhere in between.

Supposedly, some shareholders are thinking of suing. Fox risked losing their money in these libel lawsuits by deliberately lying.

I do think that if when the lawsuit was filed I was told there would be a $787M settlement and the string of discovery revelations I would been very pleasantly surprised. But I too felt somewhat let down when i heard the details; I think mostly for various relatively dishonorable reasons.

But more genuinely, I think it was just yet another string of events that left one (or me at least) unable to avoid staring a bit more deeply than usual into the abyss of the absurd yet frightening political and social psychosis gripping so much of the country. I pretend that I am trying not to be the creeping sense of dread I don't want to see in the world.

I recall right after the election my daughter pointing out that it mattered less what Trump would (predictably) say about the election, and more what Fox said. That was during the brief period* of confusion in the right-wing noise machine before they got their talking points straight.

*See also Charlottesville and Jan 6.

23: Fox would probably argue that the lies were good business. And they'd be right.

Sending around emails about how you are lying is probably not great business.

In a sense, this settlement is like a fine for Fox News that while expensive won't impact their bottom line. They probably made enough of a profit that they won't think twice about continuing to push their lies, and will continue to pay settlements while raking in money and viewers. I'm honestly not surprised they opted to settle given the history Fox has with lawsuits, but it's disappointing nonetheless.

27: Milo, of course, had been the big feather in his cap, although having his group bombed by Milo's planes had probably been a terrible black eye for him, even though Milo had ultimately stilled all protest by disclosing the huge net profit the syndicate had realized on the deal with the enemy and convincing everyone that bombing his own men and planes had therefore really been a commendable and very lucrative blow on the side of private enterprise.

It's still good business to them. They stifled the growth of rival networks for what will probably cost a few billion dollars and all remaining self-respect.

To be clear, I think it's a very good thing that has happened. But it's not possible to sue your way out of this.

I did not realize that Laura Ingraham has a vocally oppositional brother:

My lying sister continues to foment. Even after Fox's $800 million defamation settlement, the propaganda machine keeps humming along. This is what zero ethics and a lack of shame looks like. @FoxNews @IngrahamAngle @TuckerCarlson @seanhannity

32.last: Yes, I think electing extremely aged senators shows more promise.

Electing senators is a good idea.

Compared to most of the alternatives, yeah.

In a sense, this settlement is like a fine for Fox News that while expensive won't impact their bottom line.

Sorry to be pedantic, but it seems to me "the bottom line" includes the actual numbers in the net profit/loss row and not just the sign thereof, no? A non-zero settlement definitionally impacts the bottom line, even if it doesn't change a profit into a loss.

$700 million is indeed a lot. Plus, I would bet that there are plaintiff's firms that have someone watching Fox looking for potential clients.

This My Pillowy Ass development is also somewhat heartening:

My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell has been ordered to shell out $5 million to an expert who debunked his data related to the 2020 election, according to a decision by the arbitration panel obtained by CNN.

Lindell, a purveyor of election conspiracies, vowed to award the multimillion-dollar sum to any cyber security expert who could disprove his data. An arbitration panel awarded Robert Zeidman, who has decades in software development experience, a $5 million payout on Wednesday after he sued Lindell over the sum.

"My Pillowy Ass" would be a good OnlyFans name.

Speaking of disappointments, not political but this may be one of the weirdest tweets/story framing from the NYTimes (or anyplace) that I have ever seen:

Breaking News: SpaceX's Starship rocket launched but fell short of its most ambitious goals when it exploded minutes into its flight.

Maybe the modest goals all involved being intact for a minute or so.

Granted I fell short of my most ambitious goals, but at least I got to the western side of the Atlantic.

40: That was the framing on CNN too. I guess Musk did a masterful job of lowering expectations.

I guess Musk did a masterful job of lowering expectations.

Destroying Twitter was part of the long game.

43: Yes. Elon plays 9-dimensional backwards chess.

"Maybe the modest goals all involved being intact for a minute or so."

I mean, yes, they did, SpaceX said in advance that failure was extremely likely any flight that cleared the tower would be valuable and would be considered a success.

The first US satellite launch attempt reached an altitude of four feet before exploding.

"Maybe the modest goals all involved being intact for a minute or so."

I mean, yes, they did, SpaceX said in advance that failure was extremely likely any flight that cleared the tower would be valuable and would be considered a success.

The first US satellite launch attempt reached an altitude of four feet before exploding.

I'm willing to bet people made fun of that too.

If they knew about it.

47. Late 1950s joke: :Kid whose dad works on the space program tells kindergarten teacher, "I can count to 10!"

"OK, let's hear you."

"10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-zero-Dammit!"

I still remember some of the tasteless Challenger jokes ("What does NASA stand for?" "Need Another Seven Astronauts")

Yeah. That's what I think every time I see the name. Childhood is a time things get stuck in your brain.

I have such a strong recollection of the culture of sick jokes around the Challenger and the Ethiopian famine. What changed in the culture to make that stuff go away? I don't think it's that we've gotten more compassionate, on the whole.

52: there are just as many assholes out there, but fewer among your friends in particular?

Or we haven't become more compassionate but we have become more inoffensively corporate in our media? The stand-up comics telling those jokes don't exist anymore, or don't get roles you'd hear about.

52: Me too! I think joke culture has moved on and that brand isn't considered edgy and offensive in the same way anymore. There's the same impetus to be edgy/offensive, but it has to travel constantly lest it become stale and harmless.

I think it's just that junior high schoolers don't talk to me these days. And the few that do, don't feel free to say whatever.

I liked seeing the picture of the Hindenburg burning with the caption 'Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly.' Which is how SpaceX described their rocket launch.

It wouldn't be funny if people had been killed.

One of our alums reposted a guy on mstdn about the inference of carelessness you could draw from the casual reaction to the environmental damage caused by the thing. Move fast and break things has a Tom and Daisy Buchanan vibe, for sure.

I hear from a lot of jr high school age kids. I think "Need Another Seven Astronauts" wasn't ever inherently funny beyond the shock value.

I mean, I haven't polled them on that precise question.

57: But you were too young when it happened.

53: These were street jokes. The mores of professional comedians doesn't enter into it.

Do the kids these days still tell each other dead baby jokes?

The dead babies are the ones laughing now.

What's worse than a worm in your apple?

The Holocaust!

Do the kids these days still tell each other dead baby jokes?

Or quadriplegic jokes (uggh, I'm embarrassed to remember a couple of those).

55 is right- these jokes have definitely not gone away, but they aren't told in most polite settings. How many people here know the one with the punchline "that's a big word for a ten year old" or "you're scared? I've got to walk back by myself!"

There's a famous but unfunny series of math puns along the lines of:

"What's purple and commutes?"
"An abelian grape!" (group)

"What's yellow and complex differentials everywhere?"
"A bananalytic function!" (ananlytic)

"What's green and very far away?"
"The lime at infinity!" (line)

"What's yellow and equivalent to the Axiom of Choice?"
"Zorn's lemon!" (lemma)

Anyway there's another version that goes:

"What's purple and commutes?"
"A dead baby in a briefcase!"

I didn't realize the Axiom of Choice was so dark.

Quasi-proud to know all the jokes in 66 and 67 already.

But not 68!

There is a bus company in the UK called Abellio and I would be absolutely delighted to discover that it is a pun about commuting.

When I was 8 or 9, I bought a joke book called something like Truly Tasteless Jokes at the local strip mall bookstore, specifically for the Challenger jokes. As you can imagine, most of the truly tasteless jokes were extremely R-rated, but I didn't realize that before I bought it, nor did my parents or, apparently, the bookseller. I was well-stocked with AIDS and pig-fucking jokes for many years thereafter.

"you're scared? I've got to walk back by myself!"

This joke is decades old and, like dead baby jokes and unlike Challenger jokes or Rock Hudson jokes, is not about a specific real person that you've decided doesn't merit your empathy.

We definitely had some of the Truly Tasteless Jokes compendiums.

My brother also had a bunch of Mad Magazine books (and the magazines, which are long gone) and recently Ace came across his old copy of Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions which I'm finding fascinating as a time capsule, and they're finding fascinating because they're the right age for it.

Dating myself but does anyone remember the one that ended "and Thurman Munson in the ashtray?"

76.2 by Al Jaffee! NMM

Ruben Bolling just did a decent tribute.

That's great

53: These were street jokes. The mores of professional comedians doesn't enter into it

After the Challenger disaster someone decided to track down where these jokes originated, and the answer was--no joke--Wall Street. You had smart(ish), douchebro (avant la lettre) guys with free time and nationwide networks (in part via fax IIRC). Obviously they didn't compose every tasteless joke of the '80s, but especially newsy ones tended to start there, then spread and metastasize.

76: I heard it as Indira Gandhi.

We had a lot of Hellen Keller jokes. I guess it was funny/acceptable to mock disabilities.

Polish jokes are another one. Or blonde jokes. They were very abstract, in a way.

De Niro's making s film about the Harold Shipman case. It's called "The Old Dear Hunter."

Maybe it's a sequel.

Someone on the internet says that the SpaceX blew up because Musk rushed the launch so it would be on 4/20. It would be irresponsible not to pass this on so you can use your own judgement.

There was a wonderful anecdote I found online years ago about a non-native English speaker botching the Abelian grape joke. (Friend tells him the punchline and he responds, "what's a grape?" Once the whole thing is clear, he goes around delightedly telling it to his friends: "Hey, do you know what's purple and commutes? Abelian fig! Hahahaha!") I've never been able to find the source again, though.

I think I've told the story here about how rfts gave a talk in my graduate department and we took her out to dinner -- three tenured profs, her, me, maybe one other person. At some point during the meal jokes were told, and when they asked if I knew any good jokes, THE ONLY THING I could think of was the most offensive dead baby joke I had ever heard. I think I pulled out my phone and semi-awkwardly played Norm Macdonald's moth joke, which went over okay.

86 is so on brand that it's probably Elon making up excuses.

(SpaceX launches a rocket successfully) Musk had nothing to do with this, he isn't an engineer, he knows nothing about rocketry, he's just bandwagoning on the hard work of thousands of engineers...

(SpaceX rocket blows up) HAHA LOSER MUSK LOSES AGAIN. WHAT A LOSER HE IS.

"Someone on the internet says that the SpaceX blew up because Musk rushed the launch so it would be on 4/20"

The launch was scheduled for 4/18. They cancelled it 40 seconds before lift off because of a frozen valve and delayed it two days. If that story were true, why not schedule it for 4/20 in the first place?

I don't know. It would be irresponsible not to speculate.

89: It's been a real PR mistake for him to display mind-boggling incompetence so publicly.

He is a complete headcase, but I'm against gloating over rockets exploding just because we don't like the fact that they were built by a company owned by a weirdo.

Not gloating. Speculating.

The substandard launch pad seems like a big and typical cost-cutting Musk fuck up and may have contributed to the rocket blowing up.

If we were in the same room, you could tell because I'm wearing my speculating glasses and not my gloating hat.

Which isn't even in the house because it is being reblocked.

||
Had a thought back on the original topic. A good thing about the suit and various revelations (and a reason for disappointment in it being settled) was that it caused mainstream media to treat Fox News as a "story" in and of itself. This is something they usually avoid even when Fox is engaging in something like undermining public health for the benefit of one political party. For instance, most media (and the NYT most visibly) barely connected the anti-vax stuff to the Republican party in its stories about the post-vax pandemic*much less even hint at the completely shameless role Fox was playing in that effort. Instead we got thing like David Leonhart showing his ass every few weeks.**

*They *would* bring it up in some specific politics-centered pieces, but hardly at all in pure pandemic stories. And even in the political stories they almost never mentioned Fox/RW media.

**Just to be clear, there is a lot of very legitimate discussion and reporting to be done on questionable choices done in the name of public health at all levels, but the frame of the reporting on it was total shit (and the decisions were absolutely shaped in many cases by the bad-faith opposition.)
|>

90.2: Obviously, Elon was so stoned, he got the dates confused, and didn't realize his mistake until the last moment.

That's very responsible of you.

my speculating glasses

Spectacles

I asked an entomologist and that's how they were called "spectacles."

I have a joke about an entomologist but I forget where it came from.

I just ate tacos that were made in a truck.