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Fox News Paid Ousted Exec $8 Million In 'Hush Money'
Topic Started: Dec 10 2013, 06:34 AM (594 Views)
colo_crawdad
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Pat
Dec 11 2013, 03:10 AM
"Just the truth ma'am, just the truth." Sgt. Joe Friday
:tiphat:




Gawker, Huffington Post, Politico, Soros Slime Fox News Boss Ailes with Coordinated Attack

by Frances Martel 10 Dec 2013, 9:00 AM PDT

Another week, another flimsy attack in Gawker's years-long crusade against Fox News and its CEO, Roger Ailes. This time, Gawker excited liberal mass media with a scandalized report on legal minutiae related to a settlement between Fox News and a former executive, Brian Lewis, who headed up public relations for the channel.

Ailes fired Lewis last July "for cause," the story lending itself to media suggesting the departure exclusively resulted from communications with Soros-backed Ailes biographer Gabriel Sherman. In fact, a Breitbart News report cites a source close to the story then saying Lewis was "on the outs with management for years, and that he was hardly high in the Ailes pecking order."

Breathlessly reporting that Ailes fired Lewis for potentially colluding with Sherman and subsequently settled with Lewis for what a single source claims is $8 million, Gawker attempts to paint this story as unique in the world of broadcasting corporate history-- and, of course, somehow ignoble. The one source for the Gawker piece claims Lewis' department had fallen into something of a civil war over Sherman. That's an interesting rewrite of history, because back in July, Fox News made it quite clear that Lewis had committed "financial irregularities." Fox News also pointed to "material and significant breaches of his employment contract."

The various holes in the Gawker story clearly visible on its surface did not seem to deter its spread throughout the media. Within a matter of hours, Gawker's report from an anonymous source hit a wide array--the usual suspects, one might say--of mainstream media outlets: Politico, The Washington Post, Media Matters, The Huffington Post, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter. The articles surfaced rapid-fire, magically fully-formed and seemingly prepackaged from the moment Gawker published their piece.

Even so, The Washington Post's Erik Wemple noted that using one anonymous source to cover a story is traditionally considered bad journalistic practice, though a double-standard has developed recently when the story pertains to Fox News. It's a problem Gawker's editor in chief John Cook has addressed in the past, telling the New York Times in defense of Gawker's shoddy journalism: "We are dealing with a volume of information that it is impossible to have the strict standards of accuracy that other institutions have." Instead of working to minimize that volume for the sake of accuracy, Gawker publishes what it has.

The rest of the outlets repeating the latest Lewis story were not kind enough to emphasize the sloppiness of the source, instead salivating over said report's details as it reverberated wildly in the left-wing media echo chamber. Gawker benefits in publishing the story that way, in that by virtue of wanting to believe the story, media outlets will, in essence, report it blindly as if its presentation at Gawker were honest.

Whatever the legally confidential underpinnings of Gawker's hit piece may be, the sensationalist connotations of the report itself are as disingenuous as they come. Gawker's attempt to paint the story as a blockbuster look behind the curtain of a nefarious media bigwig's dealings requires the reader to accept three easily debunked premises: first, that Lewis' firing was somehow unjust; second, that Lewis was so important to Ailes that he was a "right-hand man" without whom Ailes could barely function; and third, that a settlement where parties exchange money and a confidentiality agreement is extraordinary.

As to the first, any reader should be able to easily dismiss the implication that Fox News dismissed Lewis unjustly by virtue of Gawker ignoring the most important claim in Fox News' statement on Lewis back in July: he materially breached his employment contract. Lewis' attorneys have not denied that. No one has stepped up to prove that is untrue. The source in Gawker's story only dismisses the claims of "financial impropriety" as "bull" without providing any explanation. That lack of explanation is good enough for Gawker, of course. When an employee breaches an employment contract, the employer is in their full right to fire them. Period.

The second claim the media--from Gawker most recently to The Hollywood Reporter in first breaking the news--have made regarding Lewis is that he was near-indispensable to Ailes, a "guardian" as Politico put it. The news of Lewis' firing took many who knew Ailes by surprise because of these claims, something those in the know found "laughable" at best. Greta Van Susteren described those making Lewis seem prominent as "full of ****." Rush Limbaugh, who has known Ailes for a quarter-century, declared on air that he didn't know who Lewis was.

Indeed, the idea that Ailes—executive producer of the #1 daytime TV show of its day (the Mike Douglas Show), close adviser to three US presidents (Nixon, Reagan, and Bush 41), chief of CNBC before creating Fox—would need a protector is laughable to anyone who has watched Fox’s success these last 17 years.

Moroever, as even Gawker conceded, in a rare moment of candor, that Lewis' settlement number would have been "much higher" if Lewis were as important as the media seems to hope he was, but he did not have enough confidential information to threaten to reveal to ask for more. Yes, $8 million is a big number, but not in New York City corporate circles; and once again, there’s no evidence that it’s true—other than taking Gawker’s word for it.

The third claim--that such a confidentiality agreement is anything but business as usual--also flops. Anyone in news media can tell you that confidentiality agreements play a key role in employment contracts. Any lawyer can tell you confidentiality is a key bargaining chip in settlements. As one article published by the American Bar Association puts it, "Being asked to espouse the positives of including confidentiality clauses in a settlement agreement is akin to being asked to take the 'pro' position in a debate titled 'Chocolate Chip Cookies—Yes or No?'"

Every case is different, though in general confidentiality benefits both parties to a suit, contract dissolution, or any disagreement with legal repercussions. This case concerns the successful management of a news conglomerate, however. A news organization cannot function without trusting its team to work as just that--a team--to promote the organization's mission. When most of mass media, Hollywood, and the White House openly hate your organization, this need for trust grows ever more acute. There is nothing sinister about that, only the inherent unfairness Fox News faces in a media marketplace that the left monopolized for decades.

Many signs point to Lewis having gravely breached that trust. Gawker's report coincides with a Breitbart News report from last August that Lewis had some communications with the aforementioned Sherman. Sherman has a patchy journalistic history at best; at worst, he has been accused of "harassing" and "stalking" both Ailes and his family for his New America Foundation-funded book. He has a history of fabricating tension among Fox News employees. Random House, Sherman's publisher, was reported to be concerned about Sherman's book as early as last April, when the first publication date was pushed back.

In any event, nothing about Gabriel Sherman screams someone a high-level Fox News employee should trust--especially one as high-ranking as Gawker et al insist on believing Lewis was. To bring the argument full circle, Fox News was in their full right to dismiss Lewis, especially if these claims about his ties to Sherman are true. Even if they are not, a material contract breach is sufficient to fire him.

Debunking such hack jobs is a necessary service to the people dependent on media for their news, but one can expect little change from these outlets in the way they cover Fox News. They rely on their coordinated echoes to magnify the volume of the original voice reporting the non-story, making it appear more robust to the casual reader solely on the basis of this many publications taking it seriously. The sad truth for those that want to make a mountain out of this molehill is that relying on Gawker--they of the laughably unnewsworthy "Fox Mole" who exploited a Fox News employee's suicide--for any Fox News "scoop" is rarely a wise choice, tempting as it always seems to be.
WOW! Breitbart defends fox news. What a surprise. That is certainly an attack on Huffington Post and others that one should believe -- NOT!

It is no wonder why Pat did not incuede a link. He was too embarrassed abut the source. JMHO
Edited by colo_crawdad, Dec 11 2013, 03:37 AM.
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Breitbart is a great source, they tell the truth, something you libs don't like.
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Mountainrivers
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Dec 11 2013, 03:45 AM
Breitbart is a great source, they tell the truth, something you libs don't like.
:hystery: :hystery: :hystery: :hystery: :hystery: :hystery:

doglaugh doglaugh doglaugh doglaugh doglaugh doglaugh

koolaide koolaide koolaide koolaide koolaide koolaide
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As I was saying.
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Banandangees
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The left news media got it orders from Obamaville.... trash Fox. He's figured out that if they ain't with us their against us. Well, we won't know the truth about all this until we hear it from Media matters or Huffy. I doubt that even the NY Times will bother lowering themselves with this story.
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Brewster
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If Breitbart ever told the truth, they'd apologize for the accident the next day.
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Pat
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quote--

"We are dealing with a volume of information that it is impossible to have the strict standards of accuracy that other institutions have." Instead of working to minimize that volume for the sake of accuracy, Gawker publishes what it has.
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tomdrobin
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Dec 11 2013, 03:45 AM
Breitbart is a great source, they tell the truth, something you libs don't like.
BS, brietbart is a blatant right wing ding propaganda site. If you read the Markel article over very carefully it reads like gobbldygook, making lots of insinuations and conclusions with nothing to back it up. This isn't objective journalism, it's the kind of trash that feeds the right wing spin machine, just like Fox.

Here is some objective journalism, take it with lots of water as the truth can be hard to swallow when your not used to it.
Quote:
 

A Settlement Between Fox News and a Former Top Executive? Perhaps
By BILL CARTER
Published: December 5, 2013

The Fox News Channel has long been described as insular and buttoned up, a reputation that has been reaffirmed in recent days over the question of whether it has reached a settlement with Brian Lewis, the former longtime chief spokesman for and close adviser to Roger Ailes.

Mr. Lewis, who was fired from the network last July, was the executive vice president who led the aggressive communications and public relations arm of Fox News. A former colleague and current worker at the channel — who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of being fired — revealed two weeks ago that Mr. Lewis had agreed to a deal that would pay him a sizable sum to remain quiet about whatever he knows about operations at the notoriously secretive company.

The truth, as is often the case with issues involving Fox News, is difficult to verify.

No one contacted for confirmation of the settlement has contradicted the information that an arrangement has been reached, though some have gone to great lengths to avoid providing either a confirmation or denial.

News of Mr. Lewis’s firing – he was also escorted out of the 21st Century Fox building in Manhattan — was accompanied by a Fox News statement that accused him of being guilty of “issues relating to financial irregularities, as well as for multiple, material and significant breaches of his employment contract.”

At the time, Judd Burstein, the lawyer Mr. Lewis hired in the wake of his firing, responded with a statement of his own: “Roger Ailes and News Corp. have a lot more to fear from Brian Lewis telling the truth about them than Brian Lewis has to fear from Roger Ailes and his toadies telling lies about Brian Lewis.” Mr. Ailes is the chairman of Fox News.

When contacted two weeks ago for confirmation of the settlement, Mr. Burstein responded with a short sentence: “I have been advised to refer you to Dianne Brandi at the Fox News Channel.”

Upon being asked four more questions related to the possibility that a settlement had been reached, Mr. Burstein repeated the same sentence. Contacted on a second occasion this week, Mr. Burstein searched through notes to retrieve the agreed-upon statement and repeated it again.

Ms. Brandi is the lawyer for the Fox News Channel. Every attempt to seek information from Ms. Brandi — which included both phone calls and email — had the same result: silence.

A series of corporate communications executives who work either for the channel or its parent organizations 21st Century Fox and News Corporation, offered the same response to inquiries about the settlement: “I can’t help you on this.”

The official stonewalling on every attempt to confirm or deny the existence of the settlement speaks to how aggressively the Fox News Channel seeks to tightly control all information about its operations.

If Mr. Lewis is no longer subjected to the charges of improprieties while he served Fox News, he also has presumably cut himself off from any of the truth-telling Mr. Burstein threatened. Mr. Lewis could not be reached for comment.


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/06/business/media/a-settlement-between-fox-news-and-a-former-top-executive-perhaps.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=1&
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So don't read them then and stay low info! Really simple, stick with Media Matters and Daily Kos.
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tomdrobin
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Dec 11 2013, 07:12 AM
So don't read them then and stay low info! Really simple, stick with Media Matters and Daily Kos.
You need a good dose of mediamatters to clean out your system and encourage some rational thinking. :teeth:

Quote:
 
Why Does Roger Ailes Pay Former Employees Millions To Keep Quiet?

News that Fox News reportedly paid a former PR executive at the company "approximately $8 million in hush money" after firing him this summer raises questions about why Fox News chairman Roger Ailes apparently feels the need to approve seven and eight-figure payoffs to keep former employees quiet.

After Brian Lewis was escorted out of the Fox News building in July, and Fox made public allegations against him, Lewis' attorney warned that "any confidentiality obligation" he had with the company no longer applied. "Lewis knows many of Ailes' secrets," noted New York magazine. But the $8 million "hush money" settlement seems to guarantee that Lewis won't discuss his time at Fox.

Lewis however, isn't the only senior Fox News employee who's reportedly been paid handsomely to keep quiet about his or her time working under Ailes.

Lewis' settlement recalls the $10.75 million payoff Judith Regan secured after the former host was fired by then-Fox News parent company, News Corp.* Like Lewis, who at the time of his firing this summer was publicly accused of "financial irregularities," Regan was also the target of a smear campaign, accused of making anti-Semitic comments. But like longtime Fox News veteran Lewis, Regan appeared to cash in by threatening to release damaging information about Ailes and turned her firing into a big payday.

Specifically, Regan claimed to have a tape recording of Ailes instructing her to lie to federal investigators in order to protect Ailes' longtime friend and political ally, Rudy Giuliani. The tape reportedly may have played a role in the settlement Regan secured in her wrongful termination suit against News Corp. (Company officials did not deny Ailes was heard on the tape.)

Question: What other news organization spends nearly $20 million in order to keep two fired employees from talking publicly about their time of employment?

From New York [emphasis added]

Back in 2007, Judith Regan alleged in a lawsuit against News Corp. that a senior executive there urged her to lie to federal investigators about her affair with Bernard Kerik. Kerik had been nominated for the position of Homeland Security Chief under Bush, but was then dismissed after his personal foibles came to light. The executive hoped to keep Regan quiet because Kerik's mentor Rudy Giuliani was running for the Republican nomination, and further embarrassment might injure the campaign. It was a double-punch scandal: News Corp. was revealed simultaneously to have pressured an employee to lie to the government and also to have thrown its weight around on behalf of a presidential candidate. But at the time, the executive in question remained nameless. Now, he's been identified in court documents that have surfaced due to a filing error in a related case. It was Fox News mastermind Roger Ailes.

If Regan received more than $10 million in part because she had a taped recording of Ailes urging her to lie to investigators, what information does Brian Lewis have that warranted an $8 million payoff?


http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/12/10/why-does-roger-ailes-pay-former-employees-milli/197212

Apparently there is no honor between thieves and liars.
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