Reply #12: The doctor thought he could control the monster. [View All]

The Fox-Murdoch Feud

by Lloyd Grove Info
The Daily Beast
Jan. 9, 2010

Wendi Murdoch encouraged Rupert’s son-in-law to fire a rocket at Fox News boss Roger Ailes—the first salvo in an escalating war between Murdoch’s heirs and the company brass for the future of one of media’s hottest enterprises.

The long-simmering feud between Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch’s adult children has finally erupted into full-scale war—a death struggle over the future of News Corporation, the financially beleaguered media and entertainment conglomerate that the 78-year-old Murdoch continues to control as chairman and chief executive.

The first shot—really a nuclear device—was fired today on The New York Times’ Web site by British public-relations executive Matthew Freud, Murdoch’s son-in-law. Freud’s on-the-record quote, for a front-page profile of the 69-year-old Ailes, who launched and runs News Corp.’s most profitable division, is stunning in its condemnation—a frontal attack on Ailes and an apparent attempt to force News Corp.’s founder to choose between blood and money, between his progeny and his most-prized executive.

“I am by no means alone within the family or the company in being ashamed and sickened by Roger Ailes’ horrendous and sustained disregard of the journalistic standards that News Corporation, its founder and every other global media business aspires to,” Freud told the Times. A News Corp. spokesperson fired back: “Matthew Freud's opinions are his own and in no way reflect the views of Rupert Murdoch, who is proud of Roger Ailes and Fox News.”

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-01-09/the-fox-murdoch-feud/#