Barackface: 18: India

The Business Decision Behind Taking Jimmy Kimmel Off Air Disney’s abrupt move to suspend the late-night host came after political pushback — and concerns about the media company’s relations with affiliate owners.

Trump Tightens his Grip on the Media A president shouldn't be allowed to use defamation to suppress criticism of him. Big businesses likely to surrender to this shouldn't be allowed to buy major media. .......... The lawsuit says he’s moving against "one of the worst and most degenerate newspapers in the History of our Country, becoming a virtual ‘mouthpiece’ for the Radical Left Democrat Party.” .......... Last year, Trump sued ABC and its host George Stephanopoulos for having said that Trump was found liable for rape rather than "sexual abuse" in the civil suit brought by E. Jean Carroll. The network settled for $16 million ......... Trump sued CBS for allegedly editing an interview with Kamala Harris on "60 Minutes" to make her sound more coherent. CBS also agreed to pay $16 million. ............ Defamation lawsuits are a longstanding part of Trump’s repertoire, which he first learned at the feet of Roy Cohn, one of America’s most notorious legal bullies. ........... In the 1980s, Trump sued the Pulitzer-winning Chicago Tribune architecture critic Paul Gapp for $500 million, for criticizing Trump’s plan to build the world’s tallest building in Manhattan, a 150-story tower that Gapp called "one of the silliest things anyone could inflict on New York or any other city.” .......... Trump charged that Gapp had "virtually torpedoed" the project and subjected Trump to "public ridicule and contempt." A judge later dismissed the suit as involving protected opinion. ........... But such lawsuits are far worse when a president sues. He’s no longer just an individual whose reputation can be harmed. He’s the head of the government of the United States. One of the cardinal responsibilities of the media in our democracy is to report on a president — and often criticize him. ............ there’s no chance Trump will prevail in his latest lawsuits against the Times or Wall Street Journal. Nor would he have won his lawsuits against ABC and CBS, had they gone to trial. ......... Trump hasn’t filed these lawsuits to win in court. He has sought wins in the court of public opinion. These lawsuits are aspects of his performative presidency. ............ Which presumably is why CBS caved rather than litigated. Its parent company, Paramount, wanted to be able to sell it for some $8 billion to Skydance, whose CEO is David Ellison (scion of the second-richest person in America, Oracle’s Larry Ellison). But Paramount first needed the approval of Trump’s Federal Communications Commission — which held up the sale until the defamation lawsuit was settled. ............. the central danger of Trump’s wanton use of personal defamation law. The mere possibility of its use — coupled with Trump’s other powers of retribution — have a potential chilling effect on media criticism of Trump...........

CBS ended Stephen Colbert’s contract. Colbert’s show is the highest-rated late night comedy show on television. He’s also one of the most trenchant critics of Trump.

............ Among the capitulations CBS’s owners made to the Trump administration was to hire an “ombudsman” to police the network against so-called bias — and the person they hired was Kenneth R. Weinstein, the former president and chief executive of the conservative-leaning Hudson Institute think tank. ............. on Wednesday ABC pulled off the air another popular late-night critic of Trump — Jimmy Kimmel — because Kimmel in a monologue earlier this week charged that Trump’s “MAGA gang” was trying “to score political points” from Charlie Kirk’s assassination. ......... ABC announced the move after Brendan Carr, the chairman of the FCC, appeared to threaten ABC, and its parent company Disney, for airing Kimmel’s monologue —ominously threatening: “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” .............. Trump hasn’t sued the Washington Post for defamation, but Bezos presumably understands Trump’s potential for harming his range of businesses and wants to avoid Trump’s wrath. .......... The richest person in the world was allowed to buy X, one of the most influential news platforms on earth, and has turned it into a cesspool of rightwing lies and conspiracy theories.......... The family of the second-richest person in the world now owns CBS. ......... The third-richest person now owns the Washington Post....... Democracy depends on a fearless press. Trump and the media that have caved in to him are jeopardizing it and thereby undermining our democracy