Yeah, Who in Their Right Mind Would Pay for That Shit?

Following demands from the right wing flying monkey "News" channel Newsmax to get paid a fee, DirecTV has elected not to renew their contract with the network.

This is not a surprise.  Previously, Newsmax had a contract in which their content was rebroadcast by the satellite network for free, and now they want to collect a fee for this.

I guess scam ads for colloidal silver (Smurf medicine) was not generating enough revenue.

I am amused:

Newsmax is no longer on DirecTV, as the satellite video provider today said it decided not to renew an expiring deal because of Newsmax's money demands.

"On multiple occasions, we made it clear to Newsmax that we wanted to continue to offer the network, but ultimately Newsmax's demands for rate increases would have led to significantly higher costs that we would have to pass on to our broad customer base," DirecTV said in a statement provided to Ars. (AT&T owns 70 percent of DirecTV.)

The carriage deal expired at midnight last night. The "rate increase" demanded by Newsmax was actually from a base of $0 because DirecTV didn't have to pay Newsmax to carry the network under their now-expired deal, a DirecTV spokesperson told Ars. DirecTV says it was one of the first pay-TV providers to carry Newsmax starting in 2014.

While DirecTV described it as a financial decision, Newsmax accused DirecTV of discrimination and censorship. "This is a blatant act of political discrimination and censorship against Newsmax," Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy said in an article on the Newsmax website titled, "AT&T's DirecTV Cancels Newsmax in Censorship Move."

Of course, the usual suspects in Congress are trying to strong-arm DirecTV, which is as expected:

………

Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-Texas) and 41 other Republican members of Congress last week sent a letter to the CEOs of AT&T and DirecTV claiming that DirecTV appears to be "actively working to limit conservative viewpoints on its system." The letter suggested the Newsmax decision is part of what Republicans called an "un-democratic assault on free speech" orchestrated by congressional Democrats and the White House in coordination with private companies.

To quote Sal Tessio,, "It was only business."  It made sense for them to carry NewsMax for free, but once they had to pay a fee for each viewer, with a share on the order of 0.1%, it no longer made economic sense.

Why do these these poor delicate snowflakes hate capitalism?