I'm referring to Musk and Murdoch.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news...Dhm?ocid=socialshare

The one man who has the strength to finish off Donald Trump
Opinion by The Conversation • 2h •
7 min read

Excerpt:

If Rupert Murdoch becomes a white knight standing up to a rampantly bullying US president, the world has moved into the upside-down.

This is, after all, the media mogul whose US television network, Fox News, actively supported Donald Trump’s Big Lie about the 2020 presidential election result and paid out a US$787 million (about A$1.2 billion) lawsuit for doing so.

It is also the network that supplied several members of Trump’s inner circle, including former Fox host, now controversial Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth.

But that is where we are after Trump filed a writ on July 18 after Murdoch’s financial newspaper, The Wall Street Journal, published an article about a hand-drawn card Trump is alleged to have sent to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. The newspaper reported:

A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president’s signature is a squiggly “Donald” below her waist, mimicking pubic hair.

The Journal said it has seen the letter but did not republish it. The letter allegedly concluded:

Happy Birthday – and may every day be another wonderful secret.

The card was apparently Trump’s contribution to a birthday album compiled for Epstein by the latter’s partner Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence after being found guilty of sex trafficking in 2021.

Trump was furious. He told his Truth Social audience he had warned Murdoch the letter was fake. He wrote, “Mr Murdoch stated that he would take care of it but obviously did not have the power to do so,” referring to Murdoch handing leadership of News Corporation to his eldest son Lachlan in 2023.

Trump is being pincered. On one side, The Wall Street Journal is a respected newspaper that speaks to literate, wealthy Americans who remain deeply sceptical about Trump’s radical initiative on tariffs, which it described in an editorial as “the dumbest trade war in history”.

On the other side is the conspiracy theory-thirsty MAGA base who have been told for years that there was a massive conspiracy around Epstein’s apparent suicide in 2019 that included the so-called deep state, Democrat elites and, no doubt, the Clintons.

... (skipped)

Murdoch and Trump’s relationship is longstanding but convoluted. The key to understanding it is that both men are ruthlessly transactional.

Exposure in Murdoch’s New York Post in the 1980s and ‘90s was crucial to building Trump’s reputation.

Not that Murdoch particularly likes Trump. Yes, Murdoch attended his second inauguration, albeit in a back row behind the newly favoured big tech media moguls. He was also seen sitting in the Oval Office a few days later looking quite at home.

But this was pure power-display politics, not the behaviour of a friend.

Remember Murdoch’s derision on hearing Trump was considering standing for office before the 2016 election, and his promotion of Ron De Santis in the primaries before Trump’s second term. Murdoch’s political hero has always been Ronald Reagan. Trump has laid waste to the Republican Party of Reagan.

Murdoch knows what the rest of sane America knows: Trump is downright weird, if not dangerous. This, of course, only makes Murdoch’s complicity in Trump’s rise to power, and Fox News’ continued boosterism of Trump, all the more appalling.

But, in keeping with Murdoch’s relationship to power throughout his career, what he helps make, he also helps destroy. Perhaps now it’s Trump’s turn to be unmade. As a former Murdoch lieutenant told The Financial Times over the weekend:

he’s testing out: Is Trump losing his base? And where do I need to be to stay in the heart of the base?

And here is Murdoch’s great advantage, and his looming threat.

A double-edged sword:

The advantage comes with the scope of Murdoch’s media empire, which operates like a federation of different mastheads, each with their own market and aspirations. While Fox News panders to the MAGA base, and The New York Post juices its New York audience, The Wall Street Journal speaks, and listens, to business. Each audience has different needs, meaning they’re often presented with the same news in very different ways, or sometimes different news entirely.

Like a federation, though, News Corp uses its various operations to drive the type of change that affects all its markets.

... (skipped)

Beware the legal microscope:

From Trump’s viewpoint, two prominent media companies have been cowed. But his campaign against critical media doesn’t stop there.

Last week, congress passed a bill cancelling federal funding for the country’s two public-service media outlets, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and National Public Radio (NPR).

Also last week, CBS announced the cancellation of Stephen Colbert’s stridently critical comedy show, although CBS claims this is just a cost-cutting exercise and not about appeasing a bully in the White House.

Presuming the reported birthday letter is real, Murdoch will not bend so easily. And that’s when it will be important to pay attention, because at some point Trump’s lawyers will advise him about the dangers of depositions and discovery: the legal processes that force parties to a dispute to reveal what they have and what they know.

If the Epstein files do implicate Trump, the legal fight won’t last long and the media campaign against him will only intensify.

The global bully threesome:

Right now we have the spectre of Murdoch joining that other disaffected mogul, Elon Musk, in a moral crusade against Trump, the man they both helped make. The implications are head-spinning.

As global bullies, the three of them probably deserve each other. But we, the public, surely deserve better than any of them.

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IMO, ironically, the above article validates the belief by many of us that the media manipulates us by explaining how Murdoch's WSJ could break Trump. Hopefully the article isn't blocked and you can read that part, which I mostly skipped.

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And here's a recent article from WSJ that is in keeping with the above predictions:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news...xav?ocid=socialshare

Trump Sees Emergencies Everywhere. Judges Are Considering Whether to Rein Him In.
Story by Jess Bravin • 1h • 4 min read

Here's an interesting video, relevant to the OP.

https://youtu.be/SwdpQiHMrMo?si=kWa1Aq9_S-PPs1NH

Trumps’s Lashing Out at Murdoch and the WSJ | Explainer

I hesitate to post anything from the Lincoln Project because it's nasty and speculates and I think hype is counter productive.

But this video says something that may be gaining traction.

But the main reason I post it is because of the flash picture at exactly 0:33. I've seen that picture in several videos but haven't been able to see the faces of the girls clearly.

The picture flashes by quickly, so to study it you have to pause on it quick.

What does it say? It puts Trump and Epstein and underage girls in the same picture. That's all. But it is a lot, in context.

https://youtu.be/_cmt9Bx-NpU?si=BAAhW0599a0qRDWB&t=33

The Plan

9 hours ago