With Obama, Murdoch Defies His Image

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: With Obama, Murdoch Defies His Image
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA
Published: November 16, 2008


New York Post covers that appeared from Nov. 1-6.

Big, bright pictures, including a two-page poster, show the president-elect in poses ranging from warm and fuzzy to downright heroic. Headlines blare “Top Dog,” “One Cool Dude” and “Brink of History.”

All this from a charter member of what conservatives deride as the biased liberal media, right? Not quite. This take on Barack Obama comes from The New York Post, the feisty, generally conservative tabloid that is, like the Fox News Channel, part of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire, the News Corporation.

So has Mr. Murdoch gone soft on liberals — or perhaps just reacted pragmatically to Mr. Obama’s sizable victory? The answer, according to people who have watched him operate at close range, is that Mr. Murdoch is a less predictable, less doctrinaire character than his critics imagine....

***

The Post’s editorials and columnists continued to lean to the right this year — it endorsed Senator John McCain for president — but its everyday coverage of the general election campaign was more evenhanded. The Post mentioned Mr. Obama’s damaging associations with the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright and William Ayers less often than several other large American newspapers, including its archrival tabloid, The Daily News.

Starting the day before the voting, the paper’s coverage of Mr. Obama turned positive, even admiring, sprinkled with gauzy bits about his family life, even urging him at one point to adopt a particular puppy for his daughters. A few days after the election, The Post published a 12-page special section about Mr. Obama, wrapped in that two-page photo of him....

***

(Gary Ginsberg, an executive vice president of the News Corporation) said, “Rupert met (Obama), spent a good deal of time with him, and I think he’s been very taken by his intellect, by his ability to inspire and by the opportunity that he has to truly take America in a positive direction on education issues, social issues and others,” he said.

A number of the people closest to Mr. Murdoch, in his company and his family, support Democrats. His daughter, Elisabeth, held an Obama fund-raiser — leading to some speculation that they have influenced his private views.

Mr. Murdoch arranged a meeting early this year with Mr. Obama and Roger Ailes, president of the Fox News Channel, in what (writer Michael) Wolff and News executives say was a bid to moderate Fox’s coverage of Mr. Obama. Fox remained notably tougher on the candidate than competing networks during the campaign. But people who have worked for Mr. Murdoch or like Mr. Wolff have closely followed his career, say he treats each property differently....

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/17/business/media/17murdoch.html

[Ian David]

1. The cover sells the newspaper. Once it is purchased, it's still full of reich-wing propoganda. n/t

[Deemers]

2. True

That's why I read the Daily News and the Times.