Naked Launch : Prologue
Rupert Murdoch hired Roger Ailes to brainwash America into thinking right-wing ideology is actually the political center. And he did. And, I'm ashamed to tell you, I helped him.
I made a lot of money that year: 1996. I owned and loved living in an elegant cooperative apartment building on Park Avenue in Manhattan, just a few blocks from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Guggenheim. The hallways were floored with inlaid marble. You placed your garbage in custom designed mahogany chests outside your front door. The doormen called me mister.
I was a Democrat. Meaning I was so important to right-wing News Corporation that I was given a piece of what they called "the heavy lifting" on a project of extraordinary importance to Rupert Murdoch — a key role in conceiving and building out the Fox News Channel. When I was done, Roger Ailes, Chairman of Fox News, “reorganized” things and had my job “eliminated”. How come? Wait and see. But hear me now: the work I did was the best I had ever done, the best that could be done, and Roger knew it.
My contract had more than 6 months to run when I was reorganized, and it contained a pay-or-play clause, meaning that if I were not employed, I would still have to be paid salary and benefits until the termination date of the contract, even if I got another job. Did Roger give a shit that I got paid after he reorganized me? Oh yes.
Roger wanted to break the contract and stop paying me immediately. The News Corporation attorney assigned to Fox News later told me that she confronted Roger and told him Fox was going to honor my contract and pay me until the terminal date. She reminded him that I had done extraordinary work, and that it was out of the question to do less than treat me with respect. Roger conceded. The contract concluded in June of 1997. Roger put that turn of events into a bank account called "ROGER AILES D/B/A DON'T FORGET TO FUCK OVER DAN COOPER FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE LLC" That bank account had been opened the day Roger was told to put me at the center of the launch team. Deposits were being made frequently, some because I had forgotten to take Groveling and Masochism 101 in school. The truth is, I'm a bit of a narcissist, and I'm quite impressed with my own opinions. So I've always gotten myself in trouble with bosses. On the other hand, I'm really fucking talented.
In July of that year, 1997, I was sweating profusely in the back of a taxi cruising down Columbus Avenue on the Upper West Side. I was wearing my favorite outfit, one I favor to this day. I call it my uniform. It features one of my dozens of Brooks Brothers polo shirts (the ones with the logo depicting a dead lamb hanging from a rope, amusingly referred to over the many decades by Brooks as the Golden Fleece), Gap jeans, Nike sweat socks and Asics shoes. The polo was soaked through from the humidity. My cell phone jingled and shook. It was my agent, Richard Leibner.
Richard Leibner was the most powerful agent of TV news personnel in the United States, representing 800 pound gorillas like Diane Sawyer and Bill O'Reilly. I had known him as a friend for 20 years and as my representative on and off for just as long. Richard shouted, "Where are you?". The street noise was deafening. I screamed "I'm in a cab on the West Side!"
"Do...you...want...to...executive...produce...a...news...magazine?" Richard shouted. This was a dumb question. Of course I did. "Turn your cab around and go see Irwin Weiner right now. Now!" Irwin Weiner had been CFO of ABC News when the legendary TV pioneer Roone Arledge was news and sports president. I knew Irwin well, having worked closely with Roone years earlier on the ABC News magazine 20/20. Irwin now ran an independent production company. Literally three days later, I had a deal to create and produce a weekly half hour for WNBC-TV. I plunged into my work. Ultimately, the series was a great success, and the people I worked for did the one thing that enables me to do my best — they left me alone. And kept complimenting me. It was a very pleasant time, except for one thing — I developed an intense crush on a beautiful 23 year old blond who worked for me, couldn't stand me, but had a clear idea how to get ahead. Which wasn't helpful with my wife. I thought I was over falling for women who didn't like me and who were blatant manipulators. Apparently not.
The fresh air of hands-on production, good ratings, and great people to work for was healing after the horrible experience of working at Fox. Of course there's a but, and the but came two months after I went to work on the NBC series.
In the fall of 1997, the writer David Brock called me and told me he was researching a cover story about Roger Ailes for New York magazine. Could he interview me?
Brock called me, I presumed, because I was the only Fox News executive who had once been in the inner circle of the inner circle, and was now in the wild. I knew pretty much everything everybody wanted to know. The question was, could I talk and live? I paused. Now, I just adore spilling the beans. It's so much fun knowing something first. But much of what I knew about Fox News was secret, presumably proprietary information presumably belonging to News Corporation. And Roger Ailes didn't like snitches. Well, screw him, right? He needed a smack. Or maybe not a smack — maybe a tap or something. To play it safe.
I went along with the interview on the condition that it be on background — meaning no quotes, no "I spoke with a former" anything, that what I would tell him was strictly for his knowledge. Brock agreed.
Brock opened the conversation with a 10 minute monologue proclaiming his ill-regard for Roger. This impressed me. Most writers were terrified of Roger, and he threatened them in no uncertain terms. I asked Brock if Roger had offered to "destroy him". Brock laughed. Yes, indeed he had. Ailes told Brock he would "never work again" if he wrote the article. Brock found this idea hysterical. I didn't.
I answered all of Brock's questions. Two hours worth. Why did I give the interview about Roger, risky as it was, even on background? Because I knew about that SCREW COOPER LLC bank account, and I saw the interview, done carefully, as a way to begin to ingratiate myself with a man I knew to be a schoolyard bully — a coward at heart. Yes, Roger, I'm talking about you.
A friend of mine had a father who plied the psychiatric trade. Dad advised, "Bullies have no ego esteem. They need respect. Always show respect to a bully". I hadn't done that when I worked for Roger. I was badly burned. Now, terrified of Roger's wrath and its consequences on my career, I figured if I filled Brock up with an exclusively complimentary picture of Ailes and my work, maybe the karma would come back around. And besides, Fox was so stupid they paid me out without requesting a non-disclosure agreement. Maybe I was safe. And it was on background.
I raved about Roger's brilliance as a marketing strategist. About his uniquely focused, intensely demanding leadership. I said I had never done anything so hard, so well, in such an exciting environment in my life. And it was all because of Roger's never-ending inspiration. I said absolutely nothing negative.
When the article was published on November 17, 1997, it was no longer a cover story. Like most articles about Roger Ailes, it was only marginally critical, with just a hint of admiration. It was at the least a toned-down version of the blast-furnace analysis Brock told me he planned to write. Nothing in it was traceable to me.
A few weeks before the article was published, I was lounging on the sofa in my study on Park Avenue, watching TV and reviewing scripts. My wife Gina was emailing strange men in foreign countries on the computer, a habit she seemed unwilling to break. I was fantasizing about the 23 year old blond, who that day walked into the elevator facing me, threw her shoulders back, projecting toward me her extraordinary breasts, stared at me, and backed up against the opposite wall, putting a sexual no-man's-land between us. The phone rang.
Which phone was ringing? That would be the one on the desk in my study, remember? I jerked out of my fantasy. The call was from my agent, Richard Leibner.
Let me repeat for you again, because I want you to hang on to these facts: the phone rang a few weeks before the New York article was published. The call was from my agent, Richard Leibner.
Richard asked me to come in to see him.
Well now. This didn't bode well. When Richard had a job offer for me, he would always tell me on the phone. Gina suggested I jump in a cab and get over there right away and not take a nap, which was usually my instinct in these sort of situations. I always listened to her. Gina had a nose
for trouble unlike anybody I had ever met. She was also the best thing that had ever happened to me. An extraordinarily brilliant, amazingly beautiful woman, she was 15 years my junior and the catch of the century. After six years of marriage, I loved to simply look at her. Her abundant strawberry hair; her incredible legs; her perfect feet; the six pack she was developing running ten miles a day in Central Park and working with a personal trainer at the most expensive health club in Manhattan. It really was conjugal contentment, just watching her there writing emails to other men.
Naturally, she had somehow psychically decoded my captivation with the blond, and things were a bit frosty.
In my jeans and polo shirt, I impatiently waited for the elevator to the antiqued-up lobby with the massive four foot bouquet of fresh cut flowers, and ran out into Park Avenue to nab a cab before any of my neighbors who were standing on the corner "ahead" of me.
Richard Leibner's waiting room was a bit over the top. The walls were overhung with framed magazine covers and articles ballyhooing Richard and the marvels of his agency, N. S. Bienstock. The greatest item on display was a front page of Variety with a huge headline reading "TOO MUCH JACK IN THE BIENSTOCK". This topped an article documenting the bitter whining by CBS News executives that Richard Leibner was sapping them dry of money by negotiating incredibly high salaries for his clients there.
Richard's receptionist showed me in right away. His familiar office was adorned with a jukebox and shelves bearing such hideous tsochkes I couldn't even look at them. Richard was leaning back in his leather chair, so far back his head was practically touching the floor — his favorite position. I plopped myself as usual on his black leather sofa. I stretched out my legs, intent on looking cavalier. I'm 6' 2", with long legs and big feet. My sneaker bottoms were up in Richard's view. But I was braced for the worst, because maybe this had something to do with the Brock article, which, remember, had not been published yet.
There was nothing in the world of the New York City news media that Richard Leibner didn't know before everyone else. Could he have found out about the interview? Richard usually opened all phone conversations and meetings with a really dirty joke. Not today. In his distinctively Great Neck, Long Island accent, Richard leaned forward and asked me, "Danny. Did yoo give an intavyoo to Noo Yawk magazine?"
I gave him a deadpan stare and paused. So. He knew about the article. Which hadn't yet been published. Agents were supposed to protect their clients, and knowing about articles in the works was what they did. But how could he know I gave a background interview? Brock wouldn't tell him. I used a deliberately flat tone of voice. "Do you want me to answer that question?"
"I already know the ansa. I got a phone call from Roger Ailes an owwa ago. He told me that until I drop you as a cloyent, any demo tapes I send ovah for talent jobs will sit in the cawwna and gatha dust". Drop me as a client? Threatening to damage my agent's business if he didn't drop me from his client roster? Tapes gathering dust if he didn't cut me out? This was certainly pure Roger, icing the poison cake with a darkly comic visual metaphor. Roger was part Don Rickles and part Don Corleone. He was going to leave the tapes there for years maybe, and never have them dusted. And maybe send photos of them to Richard. Unless Richard stopped representing me.
I stared at Richard. For a long time. I sat up and leaned in close to him, face to face. I made the connections. Ailes knew I had given Brock the interview. Certainly Brock didn't tell him. Of course. Fox News had gotten Brock's telephone records from the phone company, and my phone number was on the list. Deep in the bowels of 1211 Avenue of the Americas, News Corporation's New York headquarters, was what Roger called The Brain Room. Most people thought it was simply the research department of Fox News. But unlike virtually everybody else, because I had to design and build the Brain Room, I knew it also housed a counterintelligence and black ops office. So accessing phone records was easy pie.This threat against my agent was a deadly blow. What would happen when the NBC series I was working on was cancelled, which was inevitable? Everything gets cancelled. Everything depended on Richard finding me work again.
Understand that I knew Richard so well that back in 1980, when he negotiated his client Dan Rather into his client Walter Cronkite's anchor chair, he whispered the secret news to me at a party the same night he made the deal. Understand that I first met Richard in 1976, the day I was fired as assistant news director of New York's famous Eyewitness News. I had embarrassed every other manager in the ABC owned stations division by strategizing and delivering the highest ratings in New York television news history. I had to go. Leibner called me about three seconds after I was fired, and said, "OK, Danny, now you've been fired. Now you can do anything. You're going to be hugely successful". He got me my job at Fox. I was loyal to him, and a friend. I thought he was loyal to me.
"I gotta phone call from Roger Ailes, Danny. He told me I have ta drop you. If I don't, any tapes I send over for on-air jobs will sit in the corner and gatha dust", he repeated.
"You're going to drop me because of a threat from that shithead?" I was a rocket of rage, and I flushed beet red.
"What can I do? I have a business ta run". He shrugged.
"Good, Richard. You run your business. I'll take care of myself". I got up and started for the door.
"Don't just leave! I'll help you find somebody else. I'll make inchaducshins."
From outside Richard's office, looking in, I said, "I'll take care of myself, thank you, Richard".
So I had no agent. Gina and I decided it was time for me to get out of the TV news business. What was the point? The gliding globe would flatten me at every turn. And she wanted me close to her, with no more little blond cuties tempting me. Roger Ailes had won. For the time being. Or forever.
Gina decided she wanted to create an online fashion magazine. She thought it would be great fun if we did it together. And it was. But she had to be the editor, and she had to be the president of the company. This seemed unnecessary to me — I'm a sharer — but I loved her and was moderately guilty. I don't know why: Gina told me she had been stalking the blond and had threatened to break her legs. Despite living with The Godmother, I was guilty. For months my wife ordered me, daily, to fire the blond. The truth was, I couldn't. I had invested tremendous effort in training her, the staff was small, the production schedule was grueling, and there was no way to toss her out the window and replace her. She did her job really well. I was dependent on her.She was blond and productive. Regardless, on the last day of production, the blond knocked on my door and asked if we could talk.
The blond spoke: "Tell me the truth. Did you spend all that time every day teaching me stuff because you were hoping you could get into my pants?" This was very offensive. I had been very lucky that during my senior year at NYU, a news executive at CBS "discovered" and hired me, before graduation, at 22, as a writer at WCBS-TV. He started me at the top of the Writers Guild of America pay scale. At the age of 22, I swore to myself that I would always give similar opportunities to talented young people. And I always did, in every job, pick or hire one youngster to tail me, to understudy me, and to take on more and more responsibility. Some of these mentees had gone on to great success. When I first met with the blond, interestingly, I didn't find her at all attractive. But I did see her as having the mentee spark. It was only later, when she would drop her pen on the floor and bend over with her butt in my face, or get on her knees next to me behind my desk to look over my shoulder, that things began stirring. But if I took a seat in an edit room next to her, she would shift her chair six inches away, implying that I was inappropriately close at a distance of two feet. This game sucked.
Me: "Do you think I would waste one second of my time teaching you what has taken me years to learn to get into your goddamn pants? I fail to see a connection between your pants and your work. You're an extremely valuable employee. I rely on you every day. You know that. You also know I'm attracted to you. You're very obviously not attracted to me. And I'm married." "That's right, you are," she admonished.
"I want you to be my mentor for the rest of my career," she proclaimed. Oh my fucking God. Gina wanted this over. My shrink told me to make a choice. Me: "I think it would be best if I didn't see you ever again. OK?" The blond started crying. A huge downpour of tears. "I brought you a present. It's a journal. You're such a great writer."
"Thank you. That's very thoughtful." We waited what seemed like an hour until she cried herself out. I examined her legs for the last time. I wanted to memorize them. I wanted to eat them. Then the blond stood up and, dignified, exited.
She moved about a month later to an apartment a few blocks from my Park Avenue refuge, but that's another story. Meanwhile, guilt ruled, and Gina was the President of the Cooper family.
My thinking was, marriage is forever. And I really, totally loved Gina. I never actually cheated on her, except for that one instance of emotional infidelity (unfortunately, Gina did cheat on me). But Gina was always there for me, and I had to give her everything I possibly could. She wanted a company and an online fashion magazine. It was the late 1990's. Everybody was creating web sites. So I gave it to her. We worked around the clock, schlepped to showrooms, met designers, I photographed models, the whole thing, got lots of attention, and a large following, especially of college women. Gina had great, innovative ideas. The thing was, it was costing a fortune. We had no financial backing. No ads. To understand just how stupid I was, or, on the other hand, how wonderful, I drained close to half a million dollars out of my IRA — taxable early withdrawal money — to support the online magazine. I began to freak out.
At four in the morning, seated at my computer, my fingers bloody stumps, I kept telling my wife, "This isn't a business! If we can't get ads we have to build its value and sell it! We need a proper business plan! Get an MBA and bring her in as a partner!" This didn't suit my wife. Money? That was no concern of hers. Gina had grown up in a wealthy family. She knew how to spend. Once married, it didn't make sense to her to work — earn money? That was no concern of hers. She was there to cheer me on, be my co-strategist, cook gourmet meals and follow her bliss. And she did all that. I would tell her, "Honey, I work in a very volatile business. I'm not a kid any more. One day, it's going to be over for me as far as TV news is concerned. Maybe now is that time! You're entering your prime earning years. I think this is your time to bring home the bacon, and I'll do my best to develop a second career". I must have said this 500 times. It wasn't in the cards. Meanwhile, Gina would stand up in her custom Carla Behrle leather pants (like these but in brown leather), identical to those then being made for Gwyneth Paltrow, her Stella McCartney couture original top, and her Sergio Rossi sandals (this is my photo of Gina in Rossi sandals),
and announce, "I am the President! I make the decisions! Don't worry about money, it's so Jewish, that's all you think about". You're thinking, "What a schmuck". And you're right. A few years later I wound up having to put my beloved apartment on the market, and Gina went Splitsville leaving a cloud of debt. For me. To pay. Marriage over. She snagged everything. All I had left were my clothes and a computer. And a Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
Time went by. I looked for work without an agent. I didn't find any. The jobs weren't there for me.
In 2001, I moved to Los Angeles. For 21 years, people had been telling me I could be huge if I moved there. Bob Shanks, vice president of late night programming at ABC told me in 1980 I should be working for Aaron Spelling. Roger and Michael King, the uber-programmers behind Oprah, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! told me I was insane not to come out and hang out at Canyon Ranch with them. But Gina was still in the picture then, and even though one of my college fraternity brothers was head of television at ICM, I just wasn't ready to make such a radical lifestyle change, and Gina was insisting that she was now my producing partner.
Things changed in 2001. Gina had a new plan — something "black on black" in movie CIA speak. I should move to LA. Conquer the industry. Meanwhile, she would stay behind and take on the responsibility for selling the apartment. I had six weeks before my flight to LA. Which I was to spend living at my mother's apartment.
Oh, I was angry. I had lived at 1060 Park Avenue for 30 years. My adult life had played out on that stage. I loved it. I walked out along Park and wept. Everything was intolerable. But that which could not be changed had to be accepted. And I had to have the courage to change that which I could change. I moved to my mother's. I made phone calls all day. I was booked for weeks in LA. I met with every one of my entertainment industry contacts in New York. I assumed Gina was screwing somebody, or everybody. After a month, I moved back home and told her to fuck herself, this was my home, and I would leave from here. I didn't see much of her. She was drinking seriously.
This time, when I touched down at LAX, got into a taxi and headed for the car dealership to pick up the new car that was waiting for me, a joyful calm settled over me. This felt so right. The golden sun. A fresh start. I was happy.
I worked at being a producer, then became a talent manager. I was becoming a player. Roger Ailes was always in the back of my head. I knew he wasn't done with me. One of his chief goons, Brian Lewis, would occasionally send me nasty, mocking notes. The Brain Room spies had me on the grid, and whenever I popped up as a former Fox News executive Brian would spit out something like "We always enjoy reading about what you imagine you did here." The game was I never worked there. As you'll see in a later chapter, this reached new heights when Ailes bullied the publisher of a major city daily newspaper. I like this game, because hundreds of people know I worked there. I own this game.
Anyway, in Los Angeles, fearful that Ailes would have some dude in a Hummer run me down on Mulholland, I determined to wage a campaign to trick him into believing that I had seen the error of my ways, and was ready to eat elephant shit, tons of it, to get past the paranoia. Hardy har. But I tried. I sent him love letters. When I heard he was talking with the other top bananas at News Corporation about launching an entertainment channel and a business channel, I called and made a rousing pitch for me to be part of the team to create the entertainment channel. I was told "Roger is interested, and he'll get back to you if it looks like it's going to move forward." Mmm hmm.
Day after day, working at my talent manager desk, always with a small TV in view, I watched Fox News. Year after year. And the more I watched, the more disgusted I became. I saw exactly what Roger Ailes was doing. I watched him shift editorial tactics in ways no one else could see or understand.
At first, Democrats were not allowed to appear on the Fox News Channel. Democratic positions were presented by "Fox News Analysts". Video of Democrats — even their pictures — wasn't allowed on the air. Years later, once the fair and balanced Big Lie had been brainwashed into all of our heads, Democrats were welcomed into the studio. And they came in droves, because by then Fox News was the most influential news source in America. The Ailes tactics shifted. During interviews, the questions asked by Fox News anchors became editorials. "Those weapons of mass destruction are going to turn up any day now! We have to topple Saddam Hussein. Those WMD's: they're there somewhere, wouldn't you agree Senator Democrat?"
Lots of people have dissected the Fox News Channel for evidence of bias. They're all missing the point. Of course it's biased. As you read ahead, you'll understand that in a manner never before understood. This is the point: Fox News is about indoctrination, not bias. The indoctrination was always hidden, as it is in the best advertising. Roger Ailes spent much of his life running political campaigns. He was never a journalist, and in fact he despised journalists. Fox News is not journalism, it’s a political campaign.
I want to quote from the most influential book I read, as a budding newsman, while in college. The book is called Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life (see below). It was written by Carl L. Becker, once a brilliant historian at Cornell University. This is from a section of the book discussing freedom of speech and of the press:
"The democratic doctrine of freedom of speech and of the press, whether we regard it as a natural and inalienable right or not, rests upon certain assumptions. One of these is that men desire to know the truth and will be disposed to be guided by it."
However: "The chief instruments of propaganda are the press and the broadcasting stations. No one who does not command a great deal of capital can establish a broadcasting station. Much less, but still a good deal, of capital is required to establish a publishing company or a newspaper"
"... the thinking of the average citizen and his opinion about public affairs is in very great measure shaped by a wealth of unrelated information and by the most diverse ideas that the selective process of private economic enterprise presents to him for consideration — information the truth of which he cannot verify; ideas formulated by persons unknown to him, and too often inspired by economic, political, religious, or other interests that are never avowed." [my italics]
Professor Becker wrote this in 1945, the year he died. He might as well have been writing tomorrow afternoon. Let's summarize his points:
- People want to know the truth, and we want to be guided by it.
- Only rich people can own mainstream media outlets (as you'll see, the first year budget for the Fox News Channel was $350 million dollars).
- The way we think about the truth of critical issues is primarily shaped by these rich people. We can't, by ourselves, verify the accuracy of the information presented to us by these rich people, and especially important, the information these rich people present to us is "too often" colored by a hidden agenda.
A hidden agenda! Fair and balanced indeed. Fox News was a political campaign, supporting politicians favored by Rupert Murdoch, and twisting information to make propaganda appear as objective truth.
Making lists, as liberals love to, of biased information broadcast on Fox News, as I said, is not the point of historic importance. What's important is that Fox News changed America. It emboldened the right. Using the red and blue analogy, it made the country redder, and it gave the reds the validation they needed to get out of their chairs and gang up to move the country to their way of thinking. The maestro conducting the Orchestra of American Right-Wing Ideology was Roger Ailes. Roger Ailes is one of the most powerful figures in contemporary world history.
Here's some really incendiary stuff for you to consider:
If it wasn't for Roger Ailes and his then-four year campaign to make Americans think the right wing is the political center, George W. Bush wouldn't have been appointed President in the year 2000. Those five Republican justices on the Supreme Court would never have had the balls to gang up, follow party orders, stop the vote count in Florida, and overturn the Democratic victory. Al Gore and the Democrats gave in to this coup d'état by the Judiciary because they knew further action would be seen not as the pursuit of justice and proper application of the Constitution, but rather that Gore and his party would be tarred and feathered by the right-wing media, pretending to be centrist, for being sore losers and a bunch of un-American scoundrels. So Gore walked away in shame: the man the majority of us elected.
The best thing that ever happened to Roger Ailes was 9/11. Even Roger Ailes, Machiavellian as he was, couldn't have dreamed up anybody as fabulous as Usama bin Laden (Allah told Roger to spell it Usama), or UBL, as Fox News called him. Because somebody up there, or down there, loved Roger, 9/11 happened on his watch. It gave him the opportunity to throw gasoline on the bonfire he had already set to scorch and destroy traditional liberal values. For those of you under 50, the United States once had liberal values. There was even such a thing as liberal Republicans. That's enough of that, because I know talking about the Devil's spawn and blond big-boobed temptresses is far more interesting. But hang on a bit.
While I was working in Los Angeles, early in the Fox-hyped action adventure America called the War in Iraq, and my marriage was going nuclear, the number of viewers of the newly American flag-bedecked, happily neoconservative Fox News Channel jumped 300%. By now, the Fox News headline readers were all-American cheerleader types (blonds with big boobs!), and I always imagined them standing on each other's shoulders during station breaks cheering on the troops and our glorious Commander-in-Chief.
By 2005, with the Iraq War worse than ever, the Fox News Channel increased its total viewership 31% over the same date the year before. President Bush had rewarded Rupert Murdoch for creating Fox News by allowing him to own two TV stations in New York City along with the New York Post newspaper. This sort of multiple ownership has been granted to no one else, and flies in the face of previous government regulation of media control. Money was pouring into News Corporation thanks to Fox News Channel's two revenue streams: cable subscriber fees and revenues from commercials. And Roger Ailes was reportedly earning $8 million dollars a year.Because of the hysterical reaction to Fox News in the mainstream media, Fox News has deprived America of any semblance of reasonably non-ideological news reporting. You watch the news every day. You read it. It's completely different from the way it was before 1996.
One day during the launch, Roger and I had a huge blowup. It was one of many, but this one shook the building. The tongue-lashing I took from Roger was so personal, and so degrading, and it was done in front of so many of my subordinates, that afterward I stormed into a Fox attorney's office and charged him with abuse. You'll enjoy the whole story later, but for now I'll just tell you that subsequently, several News Corporation lawyers apologized to me for Roger's conduct, and made him apologize to me. One of the statements they made to me was a stunning admission: "Look. Rupert knows he's having his 15 minutes, and we know about his behavior". They had already beat Roger up. They begged me to walk into Roger's office, where he would apologize to me, if I would then immediately apologize to him. I said no. Then they begged me again. They pleaded for us to get along. Finally I agreed. I walked into Roger's office. He sat me down and told me, with a shocking display of warmth, that I should understand, and this is, like everything else in this story, a word-for-word quote: "I'm a diagnosed paranoid".
Roger Ailes told me he had been diagnosed as a paranoid. A paranoid soon to launch a news channel. Following is the American Psychiatric Association definition of "Paranoid Personality Disorder" DSM-IV 301.0:
A pervasive distrust and suspiciousness of others such that their motives are interpreted as malevolent, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by four (or more) of the following:
(1) suspects, without sufficient basis, that others are exploiting, harming, or deceiving him or her
(2) is preoccupied with unjustified doubts about the loyalty or trustworthiness of friends or associates
(3) is reluctant to confide in others because of unwarranted fear that the information will be used maliciously against him or her
(4) reads hidden demeaning or threatening meanings into benign remarks or events
(5) persistently bears grudges, i.e., is unforgiving of insults, injuries, or slights
(6) perceives attacks on his or her character or reputation that are not apparent to others and is quick to react angrily or to counterattack
(7) has recurrent suspicions, without justification, regarding fidelity of spouse or sexual partner
Remember Roger Ailes, the combination of Don Rickles and Don Corleone? Let me share with you a story about a typical boy's club meeting on a typical day during launch. Roger liked boy's club meetings, five guys at the most, because we could all talk macho and compare the anatomies of women in the office. I was not macho. These meetings made me very nervous. I had no feats of daring to boast about. Roger had parachuted out of airplanes and injured one of those spit-shined leather-clad tootsies. I was too scared to make salacious comments about women in the office. Like everyone, I had taken classes in workplace behavior. Not Roger. "How about those bazookas on that Indian girl, or whatever the hell she is!" Squirm squirm. "Pussy masala on the menu today?".
News Corporation was full of Australians. Rupert Murdoch was born in Australia. When you worked at News Corporation in those days, wherever you went people were talking that Ozzie way, calling you "myte" and getting "aggro" if you pissed them off.
So, naturally, at News Corporation, you got used to hearing these Ozzies talking. Roger got used to it too, but not like the rest of us. Roger got used to mocking the Australians, because it never occurred to him that he couldn't bully his way out of any sort of offensive behavior.
One of the Fox News Channel launch team members was a smallish, quiet gentleman called Ian Rae — that's pronounced like a sting ray. Ian had worked for Rupert Murdoch for a zillion years.
He worked for him on newspapers in Australia and England, and he ran the news department of WNYW-TV in New York City, and he was also, incredibly at the same time, the executive producer of the long-running, tabloid TV news series called "A Current Affair". Ian was tight with Rupert; they went a long way back. Most of us knew when you have a guy like this in the office, somebody who knew the Big Boss and had been around forever, well, let's say you're rather careful around him. You didn't have to read "The One-Minute Manager" to know he's a pipeline upstairs. Not Roger Ailes.
How did Roger treat Ian? Pretty much like a piece of shit. Roger's favorite Ian-mocking bit was, of course, to imitate his Australian accent. This takes balls in an Australian company. Roger was great at creating a mental caricature of a person, and he pictured Ian as a pig. Who talked through his ass.
It was a lovely spring day in 1996. The boy's club was in session. There was a knock on Roger's door, and Ian Rae's head peeked in. In a humble manner, Ian said something to Roger. What was he saying? I got up and walked to the door, where I opened it wider. When Ian poked his head in like this, I couldn't make out a word. His accent was too thick. I knew Ian anticipated being mocked, and I think that made him shy to speak assertively. I would open the door to show him he was welcome to come in. Ian stayed at the door. He said a few words in his thick Australian burr, pulled his head back and closed the door.
When Ian opened Roger's door, for sure it was important. Opening Roger's door was a very scary thing to do. But who knew what Ian was saying?
Instantly, Roger's face was overcome with devilish glee. Roger had no idea what Ian was talking about, and he didn't care. Roger made a fist, and put it up to his mouth so he was speaking through the space between his palm and fingers, as though through a tube. "Oim Eeyan Rye!!", Roger shouted, "An oim tawkin troo me arse!!" This was supposed to be riotously funny. The other boys howled in hysteria. I sat down and slumped. Roger: "Eeooo cayn't mike out what oim sighin, becawz oim tawking troo me arse!" Roger looked at Ian and somehow saw the buttocks of a pig, and a voice coming out of the sphincter.
This was the man who created the Fox News Channel for Rupert Murdoch.
And I helped him.
So this is a creation story. This creation story has thundering gods, plagues on mankind, the parting of seas — all the special effects you want, a self-appointed Messiah, the begatting of a news channel and a fallen hero.
Let's go back to the beginning.
###
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NAKED LAUNCH: ROGER AILES ASKS FOR BOMB-PROOF WINDOWS FOR HIS OFFICE: “As soon as we’re on the air, homosexual activists are going to be down there every day protesting, and who knows what the hell they’ll do”
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NAKED LAUNCH: An aside - Why media executives can't tie their own shoe laces
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NAKED LAUNCH: ROGER AILES ASKS FOR BOMB-PROOF WINDOWS FOR HIS OFFICE: “As soon as we’re on the air, homosexual activists are going to be down there every day protesting, and who knows what the hell they’ll do”
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NAKED LAUNCH: An aside - Why media executives can't tie their own shoe laces
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Carl L. Becker's Freedom and Responsibility in the American Way of Life is out of print. The copyright is owned by Alfred A. Knopf Inc. and the University of Michigan. Get with it, Alfred, this book should be in print and read by every young adult. It's hard to find a copy, but you may try Amazon.com's used book sellers (below), or backorder a used copy at powells.com (it should be near the end of the list of similar titles).
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This page contains a single entry by Dan Cooper published on January 10, 2008 12:50 PM. Copyright Dan Cooper Media Strategies 2005-2008 All Rights Reserved
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This is so gross on so many levels. Not least of which is your own responsibility. In future what you do when offered such a job is say no.
I loved your confessional--transparency is the mother of authenticity--the fox antipode. Your rawness functions as an elegant counterpoint to Fox rhetoric. Whereas, Fox news feeds its viewers an endless menu of the same worn out conceits, your narrative arcs through time as a moving reflection upon a carefully examined life.
The sign of a genuine writer is that the fruit of such an examination, earned through a process of gradual ripening, may be tasted by the reader, the depth of flavor suddenly recalling personal memories with the same valance.
Now that the pandora's box has been opened, is there no escape?
I'm a relatively young guy- I barely remember the launch of the fox news network, though I was in high school at the time. I was not really politically aware back then,and not untill after college did I even begin to pay attention (you can thank GWB for that). So all I have known in cable news, in my life, is that fox news has always existed, so to speak.
However, even though fox news has "always been there" I have always felt, somewhere in the back of my mind, that it was run by a deplorable group of people. The way the talking heads chatter, the way they gussy up their female anchors like cheap midwestern prostitutes- all pointed to something crass that I couldn't identify. As time goes on, more and more justification is being granted to that inner dialouge. So far your narrative seems to say that it was much less a group as it was one man. I'm loving the story so far- and I'm eagerly awaiting the next submission.
Keep up the good work!
Your emotions are overriding your intellengce - by-far!
This writing, though rich in content,is very negatiave to say the least. Do you know the word balance? Trade-in your neuroticism for it.
You are too good to perpetuate this kind of petty Tom-Foolery.
Your Artistic sensitivity is not to be reduced to a competiton.
All the best , Cooper Tomlinson
Really, really, really sleazy all around. From this excerpt, I would find it hard to have any respect for Dan Cooper or Fox or Cooper's wife. It's nice of him to let us know all about his lusting over an attractive co-worker --- that was really important --- It was also nice to hear this all from an obviously inflated ego that probably shouldn't be... Great read, I might have picked this book up if I hadn't read this!
Interesting to read, but your style comes off as tabloid. You're speaking against NewsCorp, and so your audience, ultimately, isn't going to be those who are fooled by its shoddy interpretation of journalism. You might try a tone more simple and clean, especially here in the prologue: your reader doesn't know you yet, and you don't want to approach them too casually, with "exclusives" of what really happens behind closed mahogany doors. Strike the parts about Gina and your blonde assistant and pussy masala and Ian Rae. Not strike them from the book, necessarily, but from the prologue--set them aside for when we know you a little better and, more importantly, after you have established your main point. You have a deeper, more serious subject to address, and you need to aim to have your work shelved not under "true crime" but "media criticism," where it will be taken as seriously as it deserves.
Also, consider structure. This looks like a collection of short-burst writings glued together. I say this because you start so many paragraphs out by establishing time. And you compound that disjointed feeling by frequently telling the reader "more on that later," or something to that effect. Nonfiction writing will always be more powerful when it flows the way nonfiction time does: forcefully, surely, and in one direction. There can be flashbacks and elaborations, but be as aware of them as a writer as we are as readers.
The best part of your prologue so far is where you speak of bias versus indoctrination. It's interesting, it's a good broad point appropriate for an introduction, it's true, and it's important. If I had written this, there's not a bit of it I would toss out. But aside, yes--I would try putting it all aside except for that one segment, and start over using that serious tone. The sordid details can wait for later chapters when we know you better, know your story and your position, and have had time to consider the deeper implications of your work. The prologue is where you sit the reader down and convince him that you have something to say.
You have two stories here (or maybe 3). One is your personal story, the relationship with your wife and this woman you lusted after. The other is your story at Fox.
I'm sure in your own mind they're very intertwined. But as a writer, you're going to have to separate them a bit. You can still tell both stories in the same book if you want -- it will be a big, fat, book -- but they at least have to be in separate chapters. A little bleed-over is over, but get that separation.
I love the title of the book (nice allusion to Burroughs). I am really interested in the Fox story. And it seems plain that for your own mental health, you need to tell your personal story.
I look forward to reading them. Please do yourself a favor and get a good editor, one who dares to say "no" to you.
I love the sex, the greed, the nastiness of all of this.
This is the best potboiler I have read in years and years.
I am horrified and fascinated.
Keep it up.
Keep mixing the sex with the greed and the hustle and the worldwide political drama that this really illuminates.
A great story.
We still don't know how this turns out, after all.
I am waiting with bated breath.
Writer wannabees giving directions about style and content of your piece are like strangers criticizing the choice of plants in my garden. The appropriate reaction is, “Get lost, it’s my yard”.
I look forward to your further discourse. As a Canadian with paternal roots in the USA, I struggle to understand America’s abdication of moral leadership and eagerness to betray freedoms in the name of security.
No doubt, acquiescence of the citizenry depended upon a news media staffed by people who valued economic gain above democracy and human rights. Mr. Cooper, you appear to have been qualified accordingly. Perhaps you now can make amends.
Jefferson’s words are often worthwhile and these particularly cogent:
- "The only security of all is in a free press. The force of public opinion cannot be resisted when permitted freely to be expressed. The agitation it produces must be submitted to. It is necessary, to keep the waters pure." –
I suspect that Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes would consider Jefferson a naive fool.