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Why I Don’t Watch Tucker Carlson
Three reasons I won’t tune in to his ‘outrage machine’
2 min readAug 14, 2022
I’ve started writing a pop culture column for FanFare, and it’s been a welcome excuse to watch a few TV programs I’d normally skip. But I refuse to watch one show: Tucker Carlson Tonight.
Media critic Margaret Sullivan of the Washington Post recently listed all the reasons anyone might need to spurn the egocentric blowhard and “outrage machine” whose rants have made him the biggest star on Fox News. Here are three:
- As Russia prepared to attack Ukraine, Carlson defended Vladimir Putin as “some kind of sanctimonious warmonger.”
- “Carlson’s pro-Putin act is so helpful that Russian state television has been rebroadcasting it with Russian subtitles.”
- “In 2020, Fox’s own lawyers successfully made the case in court that Carlson shouldn’t be taken seriously. And a Trump-appointed federal judge agreed.”
Sullivan is leaving the Post on August 24 to teach at Duke University, and I hope the Post will replace her with a media watchdog with similar bite.
