The " Newspaper Mandarins " of Politics !

When television first started in Australia in 1956 it was thought that this new way of presenting the news cycle would drive newspapers out of business.  The number of mastheads has certainly been reduced to a small number of corporations, but it is a fact that the political leanings of their proprietors has a big impact on how the news is presented.

One Australian man has dominated the press both here and in Europe and today Rupert Murdock has great influence on how the news is presented.  His company - News Corporation - is the publisher of such important mastheads as " The Australian " and the " Daily Telegraph " and in the television world he is head of Fox Corporation.  That degree of control influences the politics of how the news is presented to the public.  Murdock's goodwill is vitally important to the leaders of Australian political parties.

Rupert Murdock is now 89 years old and eventually control will pass to his heirs.  He has two sons, James and Lachlan, and both have recently worked in the family company, but now a split has occurred and it is plain the family political outlook is not equally shared.   James Murdock has resigned from News Corp and made if quite clear that the separation was not amicable.   He disagreed with the family's political direction.

Rupert Murdock's political views were directed at what are termed " right wing "  politics and James has viewed the world through a " left leaning " prism.   The flash point probably came as a result of the deadly white supremacist protests in Charllottesville, Virginia in 2017 and the slant in which it was portrayed in Murdock newspapers.  This caused James to write an open letter to the company criticising President Donald Trump's response.  He commented:  " I can't even believe I have to write this: standing up to Nazi's is essential: there are no good Nazi's - or Klansmen or Terrorists. "

There will be a degree of consternation in Australian political circles.   It seems to set in stone the direction the political outlook the Murdock empire will take when Rupert's life ends.  There was the hope of balance with two brothers with differing political views but now all hope of consensus is broken.   With the departure of James, the heir apparent is now firmly settling on Lachlan's shoulders and he seems destined to follow in his father's footsteps.

The interesting question is what James may choose to  do with the rest of his life.  He and his wife recently donated $860,000 to Joe Biden's presidential campaign so he is very interested in American politics and he certainly has newspaper " know how " in his blood.   Rupert certainly set British newspaper publishing on its head when he went rogue and broke union power in London decades ago.  It remains to be seen if James will establish his own masthead and how that would influence the direction that politics takes in Australia.

The big question is whether James will emerge as the left wing newspaper voice to trumpet the socialist view across Australia.