FOX - Murdoch's Crown Jewel

 What do FOX News and North Korea have in common?   Possibly, quite a bit.

Rupert Murdoch's American crown jewel apparently has a very dark underbelly, at least according to Dan Cooper, FOX managing editor in 1996.   Dan Cooper spoke out in a 1997 article about Roger Ailes, FOX president.  He said FOX ran a "war room" where it conducted "counter-intelligence" on the network's enemies.

Another former senior executive said the channel ran a spying network on staff, reading their emails and making them “feel they were being watched”. 

And there are other accounts of Ailes spying on his employees.  Read more on FOX here, and here and here and here.

It's also being reported that the News International fiasco makes Roger Ailes a clear winner in his long-running rivalry with Murdoch's wife and children.

There are, practically speaking, now two factions inside of News Corp., Ailes and Fox News, and the Murdoch children—with Rupert caught between them. Ailes is the big money maker inside of News Corp.—all the more meaningful during a recession and when his boss, Rupert Murdoch, has hitched his star to the newspaper business and the failing Wall Street Journal—and Ailes’ power has risen accordingly (this summer and fall he helped push out COO Peter Chernin and Rupert’s flack and aide, Gary Ginsberg—both Democrats). But he can’t last against the enmity of Rupert’s children.

Murdoch sometimes tries to resist his children; he believes, for the sake of the dollar, he sometimes must. But he thinks they are the most brilliant people on earth and he is desperate to be loved and adored by them (as they are by him). And, what’s more, he’ll shortly be 79—and shortly the four votes of his four adult children will control the company (and Ailes’ fate). Also, his wife, Wendi, hates Ailes. Indeed, Rupert himself doesn’t like Ailes—except for the money he makes him.