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TUCKER CARLSON, MARTIN LUTHER, & THE NEW MEDIA: a 🧵
Perhaps I’m the only one who sees @TuckerCarlson’s departure from @FoxNews as good news.
If I’m a Democrat strategist, I want him there so that I can, by applying pressure to Murdoch, at least control him a little….
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Carlson, for example, after an initial rollout of the #Jan6th tapes, went silent on the subject.
He also gave no coverage to @DineshDSouza’s 2000 Mules film which exposed massive election fraud. Perhaps these reflect Carlson’s own opinions, but one suspects he was…
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…receiving pressure from above.
In 1519, Martin Luther was invited to debates Papal representative Johann Eck, a ruthless rhetorician without scruples. Luther, still a naive academic, sought a fair hearing for his ideas. Eck’s goal was to label Luther a heretic.
When Eck…
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…asked Luther if he agreed with the ideas of John Hus—who was burned at the stake as a heretic—Luther, taking the question seriously rather than seeing the trap that it was, deliberated and said he agreed with many of Hus’s ideas.
Eck, replied that if Luther agreed…
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…with the heretic Hus, then Luther was a heretic.
In strictly debate terms, Luther lost. He left Leipzig shaken. Heretics were burned, and Luther now carried the label. But Leipzig was Pyrrhic victory for the Papacy.
To date, Luther had largely confined his criticism of…
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…the Papacy to the sale of indulgences. After the Leipzig Disputation (as it became known), however, Luther had nothing to lose. Henceforth, he’s let them know what he really thought, and the Protestant Reformation began in earnest.
Carlson isn’t Luther, but I think you…
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…get my point. Media has changed massively in the last decade, and with @elonmusk’s $44 billion Twitter purchase, it has changed yet more in just the last six months.
Carlson’s audience on Fox, the largest in cable television, averaged 3.5 million. @joerogan’s podcast…
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…averages 11 million per episode.
Carlson, now free and with nothing to lose, enters into those waters where his potential reach, and thus his influence, would dwarf that of cable television, a rapidly diminishing medium.
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Add to this that Musk is hinting that he intends to turn Twitter into a media platform that will challenge the space Instagram currently occupies.
So, don’t cry for Tucker Carlson. He can write his own ticket. This was the Left’s Pyrrhic victory and Fox’s suicide.
THE END
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