(Ben Sellers, Headline USA) “From livid curtain’s hue, a tangram emerges: a country.”
I am reminded of the line in one of my favorite poems, John Ashbery’s postmodern sestina “Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape,” as the pieces of yet another vast left-wing conspiracy begin to take shape amid a seemingly disparate series of “coincidences” that culminated last week in the shocking ouster of Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
Like the ’90s-era “Magic Eye” posters (which I never was able to see), those who do crack the code may find it hard to unsee how these interconnected events must fit together in a sinister nexus designed to curtail Americans’ rights to free thought and expression.
Media outlets, including Headline USA, have speculated wildly on the circumstances surrounding Carlson’s abrupt exit. As one of the few journalists to cover Carlson’s now historic speech in person at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th anniversary gala, I, too, was eager to indulge in gossip over the palace intrigue.
However, it now appears, in almost perfect focus, that the woke investment company BlackRock was behind it in one form or another, and that it has been at least two months in the making, operating in plain sight while going largely undetected.
THE RED (HERRING) & THE BLACK(ROCK)
It is worth noting that several so-called fact-checking sites already have pounced in their effort to quell a viral Facebook post that speculated that BlackRock had effectively sued itself in the defamation suit by Dominion Voting Systems that resulted in Fox’s $787.5 million settlement with the company blamed for widespread irregularities on Election Day 2020.
“The posts misrepresent BlackRock’s ownership of 59 million shares in Dominion Energy Inc., a Virginia-based power and energy company that is unrelated to the voting technology firm,” noted the Associated Press.
But like many leftist schemes (think anything involving allegations of “Russian disinformation” to conceal actual transgressions by our own deep state), this may be a clever canard to misdirect people from going farther down the rabbit hole to where the truth resides.
The key takeaway from the revelation was not that BlackRock was linked to Dominion Voting (although they may well be so in a litany of other ways that don’t involve financial records) but that the company had gone on a spending-bender earlier this year to gain a 15.1% stake in the Fox Corporation.
As Fox News itself reported in its halcyon days of relative journalistic independence, such an acquisition has all the hallmarks of the sort of ESG tactics that BlackRock, which boasts in its control more than $10 trillion in assets, has become notorious for.
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink “has previously warned companies in which BlackRock invests to either adopt ESG standards or face pressure in so-called proxy battles, during which investors vote on corporate governance issues,” Fox News reported in 2021.
SECRETIVE SELL-OUT
It should have been a giant red flag when BlackRock’s commercials began airing on Fox News between its regular stable of MyPillow and Balance of Nature ads.
Yet, less astute viewers may not have known the company’s questionable ties to both the Chinese Communist Party and the Biden administration. And even those who were aware might have seen BlackRock’s ads as a sort of damage-control effort to soften its image among a key consumer group that it had so callously alienated with its partisan investment strategies.
Few might have surmised that conservatives’ lone seat at the mainstream-media table was, in fact, Fink’s next target.
But with Fox News founder Rupert Murdoch so old that even 80-year-old Joe Biden jokes about his age, and current CEO Lachlan Murdoch decidedly less loyal to the conservative cause, a sell-out of some kind seems, in retrospect, to have been inevitable.
DRUDGING UP OLD MEMORIES
Fox’s flip–flop evoked an earlier move that has remained shrouded in mystery: the subtle-yet-shocking transformation of the Drudge Report from a conservative stalwart to yet another leftist mouthpiece.
When the shift began, in the months leading up to the 2020 election, Drudge experts like biographer Matthew Lysiak insisted that it was a personal dispute between site founder Matt Drudge and then-President Donald Trump, who had courted Drudge ahead of his successful 2016 election but snubbed him afterward.
“Matt’s leftward shift is a business calculation,” Lysiak told me in September 2020. “And by the looks of his page views, not a very good one.”
He suspected at the time that Drudge would veer back to the conservative side based largely on market factors and not his own private vendetta.
Yet, three years later, despite a Biden presidency ripe for his wry lampooning, the Drudge Report has yet to pivot rightward. That suggests that, perhaps, there was a behind-the-scenes buyout of his site or other form of coercion, intended not to drive Drudge’s traffic upward but to neutralize his influential voice—paired with a nondisclosure agreement that would keep him from even publicly acknowledging the transaction.
Some suspect that Drudge himself may be behind Citizen Free Press, one of several aggregator sites to emerge as an alternative when the Drudge Report’s betrayal became too obvious to ignore.
The site, run by an enigmatic figure named “Kane,” has several similarities: sardonic and editorializing headlines, a bare-bones staff and a haughty disregard for other conservative media.
CFP’s outsize share of traffic for what amounts to a glorified list of links also indicates that its behind-the-scenes access and infrastructure may give it a competitive edge.
WHAT DOESN’T THE FOX SAY?
Forget Ashbery and Stendhal—no self-respecting column would be complete without a reference to Ylvis, the Norwegian musical duo who brought us one of the greatest 21st century creative masterpieces to date.
The question they famously asked may be particularly relevant to the discussion at hand: What does (or rather, what doesn’t) the Fox (News network) say, now that its political transformation has been set in motion?
• 2020 Vote Fraud: There is, of course, the network’s decision to settle the Dominion lawsuit, which will create a chilling effect for anyone seeking to raise valid questions about vote fraud that do not fit the proper narrative.
The case, for all intents and purposes, was a winnable one if Fox had gone the same route as embattled podcaster Alex Jones and fought it on appeal.
While the burden of proof traditionally falls on the plaintiff in a defamation case to prove falsity, the decision shockingly went to a Wilmington, Delaware superior court judge, Eric M. Davis, who was appointed by former Democrat Gov. Jack Markell (who, in turn, served concurrently with former Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden).
Davis unilaterally determined that Dominion had proven falsity before a jury was ever empaneled.
Yet, the precedent of his one-man decision will likely stand in any future lawfare attacks on conservative news organizations, endangering other Dominion targets like Mike Lindell and Rudy Giuliani, who may be forced into settlements of their own.
Given BlackRock’s deep ties within the Biden administration, it certainly had a vested interest in urging Fox News to settle.
• Ukraine Skepticism: As Headline USA’s Ken Silva noted previously, BlackRock’s end-game may also revolve around the war in Ukraine, of which Carlson was a vocal critic and skeptic.
“Clearly, he spooked a lot of members into not being fully supportive of Ukraine,” a senior Republican congressional aide reportedly told Semafor.
Carlson’s exit “probably reduces the loudest voice out there against U.S. support,” the aide added.
Incidentally, the most powerful Republican currently in elected office, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., recently reiterated his own unconditional support for Ukraine, which is looking more and more like a quagmire into which the U.S. will be drawn for direct military support.
Of course, if BlackRock were to be backing Ukraine’s war effort, that would put it at odds with China, where much of the company’s business is conducted—unless BlackRock were hedging its bets by funding both sides of the war.
• Abortion: At least one media outlet that suggested that Carlson’s Heritage Foundation speech was to blame for his exit said a key issue was the religious—and borderline apocalyptic—language he used, notably referring to abortion in terms of child sacrifice.
“That stuff freaks Rupert out. He doesn’t like all the spiritual talk,” a Fox insider told Vanity Fair.
Since then, an op-ed posted on Fox News’s website has sought to make the case that GOP support for pro-life causes is a losing issue that it must abandon before the upcoming 2024 election.
Not surprisingly, BlackRock has been outspoken about its support for abortion by offering to cover abortion travel costs following the overturn of Roe v. Wade, and also adding abortion to its list of ESG criteria used to exert pressure on other companies.
• Other Culture-War Issues: Carlson was not the only recent Fox casualty. Popular weekend host Dan Bongino also found himself on the street after failing to come to terms on a contract extension, he claimed.
Bongino was one of the network’s most outspoken culture warriors, which likely put him at odds with the network’s editorial direction on things like transgenderism.
• Socialized Banking: Blogger Tom Luongo noted recently that BlackRock “is Davos’ main arm-twisting subsidiary” in foisting a Great Reset of the global economy.
Recent warning signs—from the debt-ceiling standoff to the collapse of several high-profile financial institutions to China’s efforts to turn the yuan into an alternative global reserve currency—point to a grim economic forecast in years ahead.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen may use this crisis as pretense to move toward a nationalized banking system relying on digital crypto-dollars that can track and regulate all Americans’ purchases.
As the nation’s leading private investor, BlackRock undoubtedly will have a central role in this transition. And the Fox Business Network may be a useful tool in disseminating its message.
Luongo’s website, “Gold, Goats ‘N Guns,” goes into much greater depth on an elaborate financial ruse involving a federal BlackRock bailout that is best left to him to explain.
• 2024 Election: Suffice it to say, the woke corporations and news media who played a significant role in dictating the 2020 presidential outcome will once again try to flex their power by colluding on a predetermined victory for whoever promises to do their bidding.
Fox News suffered severe backlash after its questionable decision to call Arizona prematurely in 2020, despite evidence of rampant vote fraud under its then-secretary of state, Katie Hobbs.
However, the decisions to oust Carlson and Bongino while selling out to woke corporations like BlackRock offer every indication that Fox will double-down next year on its dubious election forecasting.
As was the case with Drudge, the silencing of Fox News will help to empower smaller conservative outlets. Nonetheless, the splintering off of a strong, centralized information source on the Right is likely to take its toll on candidates trying to get their message out in an election where the stakes could not be higher.
Ben Sellers is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/realbensellers.
