PBS agitates to have Tucker Carlson taken off the air
The taxpayer-funded national network PBS is pushing for less viewpoint diversity, no doubt intended to accelerate the growing push for Tucker and Fox News to be taken off the air. From the PBS Newshour, May 2, 2022: "Tucker Carlson's influence and his increasingly extreme views" (Amna Nawaz interviews the New York Times's Nick Confessore, who wrote the 4/30 "How Tucker Carlson Stoked White Fear to Conquer Cable").
Excerpts (emphases added):
Nick Confessore: ... He's the highest rated cable show host in history.And it's also the most racist show in history. ... Every night, that show teaches fear and loathing. He may claim to be a person who opposes racism and prejudice, but what the show tells you every night is to be afraid, to be afraid of people who are in the street asking for police officers to not shoot Black people, be afraid of Afghan refugees who helped us in the war who are coming over here now, to be afraid of Dr. Fauci, and to be afraid of immigration in general, which he posits is part of a cabal, a plot to destroy Western civilization ... it's not just the anti-white racism kind of rhetoric on the show. He's literally taking ideas that began on the very far right, on arcane corners of the Internet, on neo-Nazi sites ...
... Amna Nawaz: Nick, he's also aggressively defended January 6 insurrectionists and played down how violent that day actually was. ... he's very much in line with the Republican Party and their message. What did your reporting find about that relationship between the GOP and Tucker Carlson?
Nick Confessore: Look, I would say he is the high priest of Trumpism.
"Amy Walter and Annie Linskey on primary election season, Tucker Carlson's role in the GOP"
Excerpts:
Judy Woodruff: ... Amy, let's start with what we just heard Amna talking to Nick Confessore about .. Clarify for us, what is Tucker Carlson's role in the Republican Party, in American politics?
Amy Walter: .. Nick Confessore put it really well when he said that he's filling the void that had been left by Donald Trump's voice being off of social media ... He's also being talked about as a potential 2024 candidate for president. And that's not idle discussion. I think his name will be very seriously floated, and we may see more to come of a Tucker Carlson trial balloon in 2024.
... Judy Woodruff: And, Annie, what — the darker side of this, which we heard in that conversation, about race... and about the role of the threat that many white Americans feel, what does that say about our politics right now?
Annie Linskey: ... I think that was one of the most stunning takeaways, for me at least, from the New York Times reporting, which was just so incredible, is just the extent to which they really documented the ways in which Carlson is normalizing discussions of race that I think would not be considered — are not considered appropriate in many parts of the country. .. But Carlson's show is moving through the window to where they're becoming more appropriate. And I think that's what many groups on the left worry about. And I think that is what The Times is reporting is kind of showing us, really the danger that Tucker Carlson and his show presents, is making it more OK to have those kinds of grievances voiced out loud...
According to the PBS NewsHour and the NYT, neither of which seems to have people who've watched Tucker's show at any depth, Tucker espouses Bull Connor–style racism and enables people like you and me to freely advocate talk that escalates toward genocide. His show should therefore be silenced, he should be jailed for insurrectionist incitement before he announces his presidential run, and you and I need to be leery of saying anything against...well, anything. Obey.