Ari Melber calls out Democratic leadership for treating Fox News like a legitimate news source
Chai Komanduri: “Fox's information is out to kill democracy and it does, and it has, killed Americans”
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From the January 27, 2022, edition of MSNBC's The Beat with Ari Melber
ARI MELBER (HOST): Why a president you once worked for, Obama, and the current president Biden, draw this equivalence and whether you think they’re correct?
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CHAI KOMANDURI (GUEST): The theory there is, "Oh, can't these folks get along? Can't they get together? Can't they work things out?" That's very much the media narrative. It's also the media narrative that tends to root for bipartisanship, regardless of the policy consequences for the American people. So, I do think that is a major problem. The reality is, when you talk about Fox, you're not really talking about a romantic comedy. You're talking much more about a slasher film.
You know, Fox's information is out to kill democracy and it does, and it has, killed Americans. You know, Fox News in my opinion is much more Freddy Krueger than it is Tom Hanks.
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ARI MELBER (HOST): What do you think at the political level, which is the other part of this, the Democratic party needs to do?
KOMANDURI: I think we need to really push back on the idea that conspiracy theories are somehow equivalent to conservative opinion. They're not the same the same thing.
You know, I think a lot of people, for example, will listen to me and say, "Hey, you're a Democrat. Of course you feel this way about Fox News." Well, think about this as a thought experiment. Imagine if we had Bill Kristol or George Will running Fox News. They would not run a single segment that I as a Democrat would agree with. However, it would be nothing like the Fox News that exists today, the Fox News of Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Fox News of ivermectin enthusiasts, the Fox News as the favorite news channel of Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orbán. That is what Fox News has become.
And I think that that disinformation is extremely dangerous and I think it's very necessary that Democrats really push back on the idea that this Fox is peddling conspiracy theories, not conservative opinions.