Rupert Murdoch Declares War On Occupy Wall Street

Rupert Murdoch Uses His Media Empire to Declare War On Occupy Wall Street
October 10, 2011
By Jason Easley

In what amounts to a declaration of war against Occupy Wall Street, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp has launched a misinformation assault on the 99% across multiple parts of his media empire.

Here is the video from Media Matters:



Steve Doocy quoted almost verbatim from a New York Post article that highlighted the crime, drug abuse and free food at Occupy Wall Street. Here are some of the parts of the article that Doocy read almost as written on the air,

Wanted for burglary, the drug-addled fugitive said some of his hard-partying pals clued him in that the protest was a good place to be fed, get wasted and crash. "I've been smoking and drinking in here for eight days now," said Dave, booze on his breath and his eyes bloodshot as he lay sprawled on a tattered sheet of cardboard. "I need to get some methadone. Every day, I wake up, and I'm f–ked up." Drugs can be easy to score — a Post reporter was offered pot for $15 and heroin for $10.

…

The free chow offered to protesters was boosting the crowd.

"People say they are here for the cause, but the real reason is the free food," quipped Cameron, 26, of Jersey City. "On my third day, they had smoked salmon with cream cheese. You know how much smoked salmon is a pound? Sixteen dollars. I eat better here than I do with my parents!"

At one point yesterday, a speaker from Washington, DC, told protesters how to break out of zip ties and handcuffs in case they get collared. The protest vet, Ryan Clayton, 30, demonstrated how use a bobby pin to spring the cuffs open — while claiming he was "not encouraging people to break out of restraints."

News Corp owned Fox News used the quotes from the also News Corp owned Post to substantiate their claims that the people attending Occupy Wall Street are criminals, druggies, and hippies who are only there for the free food. The point of writing such stories and essentially reading them on Fox News is not only to smear Occupy Wall Street, but also to scare News Corp readers and viewers who might be having sympathetic feelings or even considering standing with the 99%.

News Corp is trying to portray the protests as dangerous places full of shady characters where drugs and sex are running rampant. The Post article even worked in a quote and a reference to Woodstock. The strategy is clear. News Corp is combining their resources to spread an anti-Occupy Wall Street message across multiple media properties and platforms. This is an escalation of their attack on the protesters and their message.

Murdoch is using his vast media empire to declare war on Occupy Wall Street and the 99%. News Corp is now coordinating their message and attacks. The anti-Occupy message has been appearing on several News Corp owned properties individually, but the media giant is now trying to unify the dissemination of their misinformation. News Corp has gone from mocking the protests, to denying the size of the protests, to launching an all-out coordinated misinformation campaign against Occupy Wall Street.

News Corp and the right wing media have been trying for over a week now to slow down the growth of this movement with no success. More people are joining the existing protests, and new protests are springing up around the country. The 99% don't have a Rupert Murdoch, but they do have thousands of people taking to Twitter, Facebook, blogs and websites to report the truth about these protests.

The one percent have their media machine churning out their propaganda 24/7, but they are fighting a message war that they are destined to lose.