Mock a Trump bribe on Monday, get canceled by Thursday. The Late Show’s death reveals how billionaires and presidents are reshaping American
Excerpt that gets to the heart of the matter...
"Let me explain how we got here.
To understand why The Late Show is really ending, you need to know about Larry Ellison. The Oracle founder is worth $180 billion, making him the fifth richest person on earth. He’s also a Trump supporter.
Last year, Ellison invested $6 billion to help his son David’s company, Skydance Media, acquire Paramount in an $8 billion deal. That’s right: Larry Ellison is essentially buying CBS.
But here’s the thing about buying a major broadcast network: you need approval from the Federal Communications Commission to transfer the broadcast licenses. And guess who controls the FCC? Trump’s hand-picked chairman, Brendan Carr, who wears a gold pin of Trump’s face on his lapel and has made it clear he sees his job as doing the president’s bidding.
This is where things get really ugly. Last fall, Trump filed a ridiculous $20 billion lawsuit against CBS, claiming the network committed “election interference” by editing a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris. The lawsuit was obviously frivolous. Paramount’s own lawyers said it was “completely without merit.”
So why did Paramount settle for $16 million? Because they needed Trump’s FCC to approve the Ellison merger. Democratic senators called it what it was: extortion. Oregon Senator Ron Wyden was even more blunt, posting that “Paramount just paid Trump a bribe for merger approval.”"
