Who is Tucker Carlson?

I try not to listen to this piece of sh*t, but so many people do listen to him that he can't be ignored.
So I thought I would slap together a quick essay as a reminder of what human garbage he really is.

CIA wanna-be
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After college, [Carlson] tried and failed to persuade the CIA to employ him; the real-life agency, unlike its fictional counterparts, prefers not to hire young men who are gabby and insubordinate.

Proud of being a sycophant for the wealthy
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In another instance, the conversation on the show centered on Fox chair Rupert Murdoch’s decision to pull ultraconservative host Sean Hannity from broadcasting at a Cincinnati tea party rally in 2010. “I’m 100 percent [Murdoch’s] bitch,” Carlson said. “Whatever Mr. Murdoch says, I do. … I would be honored if he would cane me the way I cane my workers, my servants.”

But his biggest crime of all is that he's a total phony, he knows he's a total phony, and he knows that his mission is to protect the wealthy ruling elites.
He's racist, sexist and xenophobic. But since liberals already talk endlessly about that I'm going to just skip over it, not so much because it's already covered, but because I think his racism, sexism, and xenophobia are just tools he uses to protect the ruling elites.

Fact #1) Tucker was born into wealth
Fact #2) Tucker went to a prestigious boarding school in Rhode Island
Fact #3) Tucker dated the daughter of the then-headmaster, who had to pulled some strings on his behalf to get him into Trinity College

To be fair, Tucker is smart enough to realize that he's gotten to where he is because of the immense wealth of his family. So he's going to protect it.
On the other, that leaves him as an almost cartoonishly cynical, amoral character.

When asked on “Bubba the Love Sponge” in 2008 how he pays his bills, Carlson replied that he’s “extraordinarily loaded” just from “inheritance from my number of trust funds.”
In a 2009 radio segment, Carlson joked about growing up in a castle, saying that one thing you learn when you “look out across the moat every day at the hungry peasants in the village” is that “you don’t wanna stoke envy among the proletariat.”
“But see, I’m an out-of-the-closet elitist,” Carlson said in a 2008 segment. “I don’t run around pretending to be a man of the people; I’m absolutely not a man of the people, at all.”

However the most damning statement about Tucker comes from his own lips.

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Rachel Maddow is at least as bad

In response, OAN sued Maddow, MSNBC, and its parent corporation Comcast, Inc. for defamation, alleging that it was demonstrably false that the network, in Maddow's words, “literally is paid Russian propaganda." In an oddly overlooked ruling, an Obama-appointed federal judge, Cynthia Bashant, dismissed the lawsuit on the ground that even Maddow's own audience understands that her show consists of exaggeration, hyperbole, and pure opinion, and therefore would not assume that such outlandish accusations are factually true even when she uses the language of certainty and truth when presenting them (“literally is paid Russian propaganda").

In concluding that Maddow's statement would be understood even by her own viewers as non-factual, the judge emphasized that what Maddow does in general is not present news but rather hyperbole and exploitation of actual news to serve her liberal activism...

...McDougal's lawsuit was dismissed in September, 2020, by Trump-appointed judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, based on arguments made by Fox's lawyers that were virtually identical to those made by MSNBC's lawyers when defending Maddow. In particular, the court accepted Fox's arguments that when Carlson used the word “extortion,” he meant it in a colloquial and dramatic sense, and that his viewers would have understood that he was not literally accusing her of a crime but rather offering his own subjective characterizations and opinions, particularly since viewers understand that Carlson offers political commentary:

Fox News first argues that, viewed in context, Mr. Carlson cannot be understood to have been stating facts, but instead that he was delivering an opinion using hyperbole for effect. See Def. Br. at 12-15. Fox News cites to a litany of cases which hold that accusing a person of “extortion” or “blackmail” simply is “rhetorical hyperbole,” incapable of being defamatory. . . .

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mimi's picture

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@mimi
My friend used to be accused of being a "Stalinist apologist" he was so far to the left.

Now he considers his mission in life to denounce wearing masks and COVID vaccines. No other issues matter. He wants to vote for Caitlyn Jenner for governor and DeSantis for president.

This is what inspired me to write this.

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16 users have voted.

@gjohnsit

to adopt critical thinking. Good for her/him.

I find that pretty inspiring, too.

"I have nothing. Yet, I regret nothing. (June 17, 2021)

John McAfee 1945-2021

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@Blue Republic
Unfortunately critical thinking skills require being able to prioritize things by importance and put them into perspective.
So no. That isn't the case.

But I can't through to him, so I won't try with you either.

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The Liberal Moonbat's picture

@mimi ...because' he's one of those 'easy come, easy go' types.
He's a little high, and a little low.
Any way the wind blows? Doesn't really matter to him....

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8 users have voted.

In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.

Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!

and I've seen others that lead me to believe he's just a typical talking head schmuck. I think he's both.

I've nothing against him growing up rich.

Tucker's job is to comment on current events so to draw an audience, he does that very well, so does Rachel Maddow and any number of other talkies. Often they are factually wrong, that's ok, they are only entertainment. It's a real inexpensive way to pull in lots of eyeballs.

It's not the news. Tucker is only as informed as the briefings prepared for him on each segment, his writers. I wouldn't spend any time thinking about him. I don't have a TV and so am not in danger of watching his show.

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13 users have voted.

@ban nock Some things, oddly, he gets very right.
Still, it pains me to say that when the judicial ruling today about the Maddow defamation suit is about audiences listening to hear what they like.
Is he, or Rachel, right? Or, do they occasionaly parrot what I think is right?
I truly miss Cronkite journalism.

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11 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

@on the cusp

“literally is paid Russian propaganda"

You could, for example, go for decades in the belief that you actually knew what "literally" means, and then one day...

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1 user has voted.

@ban nock

but watch him semi-regularly on Youtube (evil censoring scum though they be).

Might have missed the Glenn Greenwald interview, though, if Moonbat hadn't provided
the link. Pretty epic - and very timely - stuff, IMHO.

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The Liberal Moonbat's picture

...some of you may already be aware that Van Halen's pickiness about brown M&Ms was actually something to be admired by all 'collars': https://www.grunge.com/217840/the-real-reason-van-halen-hated-brown-mms/

That said, having watched the clip, I'm not sure what part of it you meant us to key in on as "most damning" - that Bill O'Reilly is more talented than he is?

Strange that you should post this here, now, too - I literally just read this article where confirmed hero Glenn Greenwald talks authentic anti-fascism with...guess who?: https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2021/06/18/greenwald_fbi_involve...!

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5 users have voted.

In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.

Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!

@The Liberal Moonbat

I'm not sure what part of it you meant us to key in on as "most damning" - that Bill O'Reilly is more talented than he is?

That he just described himself. A decade later.

He has Dore and Greenwald on only shows that he's no dummy.
He is fully aware that this makes him look heterodox, not an insider.

But it couldn't be further from the truth.

All he's done is put himself outside of the Liberal v. Republican culture war battle.
He's still fully on one side of the Class War battle.

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10 users have voted.

@The Liberal Moonbat

rabidly attacked by the MSM and Dem politicians for strongly suggesting that the FBI had
informers in the groups that are being accused of fomenting the January 6 Capitol "insurrection".

Greenwald says that to suspect that is anything but conspiracy wackiness and all too plausible.

Maybe the Columbia University Human Rights Law Review is really just a front for Infowars?

The Anatomy of a Federal Terrorism Prosecution: A Blueprint for Repression and Entrapment

HRLR Online December 8, 2020

Federal Anti-Terrorism Operations in the Wake of September 11, 2001

The events of September 11th sparked a massive transformation in both the shape and scope of United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) surveillance and counter-terrorism operations. In the wake of September 11th, the FBI shifted from being an agency that investigated past or ongoing crimes to one focused on proactively gathering information to prevent future crimes. The FBI not only developed a new framework for identifying likely future terrorists—the so-called ‘radicalization’ spectrum—but also created new investigative tools, expanding the strategies of surveillance and entrapment that it had honed during the Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) era.

While many have highlighted the diagnostic flaws and political implications of the FBI’s use of the radicalization spectrum as an analytical tool,[4] few have attempted to draw a concise blueprint of the actual practices of entrapment and surveillance used in a typical terrorism sting following 2001 so that community members can learn to identify and combat them.[5] This article is an attempt to remedy this lacuna, and offers a step-by-step breakdown of the tactics regularly deployed by law enforcement during federal terrorism sting operations, surveillance, and informant recruitment. The piece also provides an overview of the statutes governing these operations, and the legal hurdles defendants face when presenting an entrapment defense.

Full report here

So, COINTELPRO comes back on steroids and TC shouldn't talk about it? Maybe what we though was bad and repressive stuff is now OK since it's being directed at Trump supporters?

Letters from a D.C. jail

Joe Biden’s Justice Department routinely requests—and partisan Beltway federal judges routinely approve—pre-trial detention for Americans arrested for their involvement in the January 6 protest. This includes everyone from an 18-year-old high school senior from Georgia to a 70-year-old Virginia farmer with no criminal record.

It is important to emphasize that the accused have languished for months in prison before their trials even have begun. Judges are keeping defendants behind bars largely based on clips selectively produced by the government from a trove of video footage under protective seal and unavailable to defense lawyers and the public—and for the thoughtcrime of doubting the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election.

The rule of law for anyone involved in the events of January 6 has been flipped on its head by the U.S. justice system; defendants are presumed guilty before proven innocent. The right to a speedy trial and the right to participate in one’s own defense are ignored, as are other constitutional protections.

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2 users have voted.

Ivy League graduates? While it's tempting to conclude that Carlson didn't make the cut for a personal shortcoming, he could have been rejected because he hadn't gone to one of the "right colleges."

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Bollox Ref's picture

Two CIA wannabes...

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

Carlson has always played to me like he was doing a bit, performing a character. Kinda like Andrew Dice Clay, with an over the top offensive persona that isn't entirely fictional but also isn't quite who he really is offscreen either; a character cobbled together from various cultural artifacts to create a specific effect in its audience. Anderson Cooper hits the exact same way. And of course Cooper has CIA and immense wealth in his background, as well. Whether employed by the agency, handled by it, or just having had a passing acquaintanceship with it, Cooper and Tucker are effectively the same dude doing the same job.

At this point, I assume several of the influential TV personalities (definitely not just the dedicated news shows) are either directly employed by the CIA or get their talking points handled by someone else who is. Those assholes are in the movie studios too, adjusting scripts and plots and dialogue.

This stuff seems lowkey obvious to me, and I'm always a bit confused when other people say they don't see it, but not everyone who sees light also watches shadows I guess. I remember all my Grandma's Catholic friends who loved them some Liberace and not only did they NOT see the gay in that guy, they would take off a shoe if you brought it up. And all my stuffy little religious friends in school who loved them some Culture Club and Elton John, same deal, they'd fight you for saying those guys were gay. But I've always been like, "Oh honey I have some very upsetting news for you about Judas Priest..." lol

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9 users have voted.

I can tell right away if I am going to disagree with Tucker and I immediately turn him off. It's usually on a traditional right-wing topics so I know where he will land. However, he will talk about US imperialism, he disagrees with Russiagate and he is properly skeptic of the Democrat Party. As compared to Rachel Maddow, who is always wrong. He clearly doesn't report to Chuck, Nancy, Hillary, Bill, etc. and that's a huge positive. Whereas the mainstream media will never have a real Progressive on their show, Tucker will have Jimmy, Glenn and others on his show. It's pretty obvious that he steers the conversation in the area of agreement, and they do too, but that's OK, I understand exactly what is going on.

He has a folksy, isn't this obvious, style to his monolog, and I enjoy it when I agree with him, and I find it off target and presumptuous when I don't.

So he's a mixed bag. But who would you prefer to listen to from the Right?

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Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.

@The Wizard

But who would you prefer to listen to from the Right?

Answer: Someone not on cable news.

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dystopian's picture

In general I agree gj. He has his act, his show, which is so big as you say, one must consider that. A lot listen to him. Such a cute preppy boy with that bow tie. How come he always looks like a dog trying to understand a magic trick? As others have pointed out, he does at least have Glenn, Jimmy, and others the MSM won't allow a word from, on his show. Moreover, didn't he have Julian Assange on? That carried weight for me. Of course the daily damage he is doing, like Maddow, O'Reilly, Scarborough, and a thousand others, is huge.

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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein

have our panties in a twist.

I don't suppose you'd care to expand on your essay to include something (anything at all?) well, *substantive*?

Like something he has demonstrably been wrong about? Something that proves he is racist?

Was he wrong, say, about Bernie Sanders?

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Bob In Portland's picture

Considering the number of journalists covertly employed by the CIA et al, little Tuck did the next step. The Agency, when it gets a good one, doesn't let him/her go.

So if Tuck wasn't hired, it wasn't for his desire but competence. Or maybe he's moved up the ladder since his college days.

There are many levels of cooperation among CIA-prone journalists. There's an old expression: Agents, assets and assholes. Tuck may not be a full agent, but I'm sure he could be an asset, doing something and getting a sort of kickback for his work. Or then, if not competent enough to be an agent or asset, maybe he's just an asshole.

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I really do not understand the point of this essay. Tucker Carlson works for Rupert Murdoch and you don't have to read the dude's bio to make him for a quintessential preppy.

He's a talking head. Nothing more and nothing less. I have never tuned in his broadcast but I have seen probably a dozen or so clips with interesting interviews with other people. His preppiness and his CIAness have no bearing on the value or lack of value of the interview.

As several have noted on this thread, Carlson does put people on his show that will never be seen on any of the un-Fox national "news" outlets. I would guess that the majority of those interviews are with fellow travelling wingnuts and I never see them, just as I never see the assholes who show up on MSNBC to tell us about how evil Russia and its asset Trump are. The snippets of him talking with Jimmy Dore and the like are somewhat interesting and valuable from my point of view.

What is more interesting is the dogpile that lands on top of Dore or Greenwald for getting Conservative Cooties for going on Carlson's show.

Like all cable news shows, the audience is NOT like the old Walter Cronkite following -- he is currently leading all cable talking head shows with an average audience of just under three million viewers. Less than one percent of the country. Small as it is, Jimmy Dore is never going to reach a crowd that size unless he commits some spectacular violent crime.

Worrying over talking heads strikes me as counter productive.

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I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.