Allow me to retrieve my 10-foot pole to handle this. Today, Gawker announced that they have a mole inside Fox News who will be leaking information about the media giant to them. They announced this via a column from the mole him-or her-self wrote accompanied by leaked outtakes from a Sean Hannity interview with Mitt Romney. Is this all fairly immature and perhaps unethical? Yes. But it also is a little bit funny.
Alright, how about a nine-foot pole.
The story, as “The Fox Mole” puts it, is that he (I’m going to say “he” from now on for brevity) has been a Fox News employee for years who has grown more and more frustrated with the company’s practices. He explains that the breaking point was with the Fox Nation website, its frequently racist commenters, and the infamous “Obama’s Hip Hop BBQ” headline.
From Gawker:
“The post neatly summed up everything that had been troubling me about my employer: Non sequitur, ad hominem attacks on the president; gleeful race baiting; a willful disregard for facts; and so on. It came close on the heels of the Common controversy, which exhibited a lot of the same ugly traits. (See also: terrorist fist jabs; Fox & Friends madrassa accusations; etc.)
The worst thing about the Hip Hop BBQ incident is that we didn’t back away from it. Bill Shine, who is a rather important guy—sort of Roger Ailes’ main hatchet man, and the go-between for Ailes and most of the top talent—bafflingly doubled down and defended it. The story still exists on the Fox Nation site, headline and photo montage intact, to this very day.
That was it for me. It wasn’t that the one incident was so bad, in and of itself. But it was so galvanizing, and on top of so many other little incidents, that I guess it just finally pushed me over the edge.”
And so, the mole decided to cause some trouble. That’s where we are now..
Look, I’ve written before about how ridiculous some of Gawker’s anti-Fox “investigations” have gotten and the mole, while certainly an amusing writer, doesn’t do himself any favors by comparing himself to the main character of Die Hard. Last time I checked, John McClane didn’t spend years working for the terrorists before turning against them. And he certainly didn’t receive tons of money from Hanz Gruber (it’s common knowledge pays some of the best salaries in the industry).
But, this could still be a little fun to watch unfold. I mean, aside from their salaries, it’s also common knowledge that Fox News is run with the militaristic uber-organization of a hornets’ nest. And hornets’ nests are fun to watch when they’re poked. Just as long as you’re far enough away to not get stung.
So we here at Mediaite will gladly take a seat, pull out some popcorn, and watch while Gawker tries to duke it out with Fox News (lord knows it’s not the first time) until the mole is caught. Which he will be. Soon.
Trust me, they are hunting this guy down right now. We might as well all buy stock in lie detector companies.
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com
