Steve Jobs told Rupert Murdoch Fox News was "...an incredibly destructive force in our society." Was he right?

The press is powerful, but is it that powerful?

IMO, yes, very right.

And that was from one real life James Bond villain to another, how about that?

@wundayatta Is it that powerful? Are Republican presidential candidates and mouthpieces not spouting talking points in support of every policy initiative I listed in the last paragraph of the OP? Could you imagine that having been the case in 1950?

@tedd Ha! How true.

There’s a lot of stuff coming out about Jobs now since his death, and some of it makes him look like a complete douche. Who knows if it’s true or not, yet. But to answer the question: yes, he’s correct.

@wundayatta Yes, I think so.

Yes, it is, It feeds the nutcase ideas of people.

If anything, I sure don’t believe they’re a good influence. As John Stewart pointed out the other night, several reports from FOX have been bashing the presidents withdraw from Iraq, when he is IN FACT ahead of the schedule for troop removal decided upon by Bush Jr. I believe FOX NEWS spends too much time being overly-opinionated about people in politics, and not enough time worrying about the politics themselves.

If you’re entertaining Jobs’ semantic distinction, then why are you lumping your laundry list of ills under the common semantic meaning? It leads me to believe you are shooting from the hip on this question.

It’s difficult to know what Jobs means by “conservative-destructive,” but assuming destructive means fomenting emotional hysteria and/or replacing substance with propaganda, then conservative might mean exemplifying “traditional values” for the betterment of society. In that case, I would likely lump your laundry list under “destructive.” If, for the sake of argument, this laundry list was accompanied by other “positive” conservative changes, then I might label them conservative.

That being said, it’s hard to know if he’s right, because of lack of information. Your complaints are political. Maybe Jobs is just referring to Fox News as a product, and commenting on the imperfection in the product relative to it’s market. That really doesn’t have much to do with political outcomes as it does with achieving synchronicity with the market segment that tunes in to Fox.

Yep. In fact, he was probably biting his tongue at the time to keep from being over-truthful.

That said, I’m still not sure why I’m supposed to care what Steve Jobs thought about Fox News, or most other things besides consumer technology.

Duh.

@Blackberry As with any single-minded, driven individual, Job’s life story is a mixed bag. But I want to focus on what he said, not the personality flaws of the person saying it. Thanks for answering the question about the accuracy of his statement. And I completely agree with your answer to @wundayatta regarding the power he wields with the many media outlets he owns.

@Foolaholic Good point. I don’t think even the Fox propaganda push is going to get the American people behind 10 more years and another trillion dollars spent to accomplish nothing in Iraq. Staying on when the nascent democratically elected government there asks us to leave would only make a dunderheaded move by Bush/Cheney still worse.

@XD, ”If you’re entertaining Jobs’ semantic distinction, then why are you lumping your laundry list of ills under the common semantic meaning? It leads me to believe you are shooting from the hip on this question.” Are you trying to say that today’s conservative movement has not supported the laundry list I provided? Your own semantics are a bit unclear, so please enlighten me in language I can understand just what it is you mean. Because if you are trying to deny conservative Republican support of that laundry list, I will be more than willing to provide proof they are.

”It’s difficult to know what Jobs means…” Really? Fox News is, ”...an incredibly destructive force in our society.” What part of that quote are you having difficulty understanding? I seriously doubt, given your writing skills, that such language is over your head. I think it’s far more likely that you are trying to spin this into an ad hominem attack on me and on Jobs instead of dealing with the question.

It is quite true that the dictionary definition of “conservative” is no sort of pejorative. It is equally clear that the dictionary definition of “liberal” is positive as well, and that the right has worked tirelessly for decades to turn it into a pejorative. I have both liberal and conservative opinions, but the con men who have taken over the Republican party of today are not classical conservatives in the dictinary sense. And they most certailly are pushing for the laundry list of policies I enumerated; all of which are aimed at making billionaires like Rupert Murdoch far richer while further deconstructing the middle class and punishing the poor, from whom the wealth must come.

The claim that you lack information enough to even evaluate the question is perhaps your most puzzling argument. Fox news is on 24/7. Murdoch owns a long list of other News Media properties. If you are unable to gather evidence on a news channel that is on 24 hours a day 7 days a week, just what would it take for you to be able to get enough “evidence”?

@Mamradpivo I’m pretty sure he was. He had a standing policy of not accepting speaking invitations at other corporations’ retreats. He broke his silence in this one case because he really had something he felt was important to say.

but the con men who have taken over the Republican party of today are not classical conservatives in the dictinary sense

Yes, that’s my point. Yet, in the same breath you are saying they are conservative. I am saying (according to Jobs) they are destructive and not conservative. If they are con men, then they are not conservative. Do you understand?

And, it is difficult to know what he means, because he is surely not replacing “liberal” with “destructive.” It is difficult to believe he means “conservatives” vs. “everyone who is not conservative.” So it’s entirely reasonable to be less than clear about the hair he is splitting, and it is ignorant to jump into an argument without attempting to make sense of this more novel distinction.

@XD Thanks for the clarification. I agree. I am more of a conservative than those who are working so feverishly to destroy the American Dream. By the dictionary definition, they are definitely not conservatives. But they are what is now called the conservative movement in America. It’s clear to me that Jobs was talking about today’s right-wing movement controlling Republican Politics and energizing the Tea Party, not the dictionary meaning of the word.