We’re not talking about screening the bachelor candidates here. As everyone knows by now, Rick Rockwell was not everything he was cracked up to be. His millions consist of two (most tied up in real estate); his stand-up comedy career was defined by his telling jokes for 30 hours to get into the Guinness Book of World Records; and his most notable exercise in motivational speaking was in convincing the folks at Fox to let him on the show.

And then there was that business about the restraining order …

But even before Mr. Right was revealed to be a wrong number, there were some serious moral questions raised about the show. Though most outrage was couched in feminist, marriage-as-prostitution terms, the values the show challenged were as much of the marriage-as-a-sacred institution sort. You know, old-fashioned family values — the kind that Murdoch’s publications like the Weekly Standard and the New York Post so often champion.

“It’s puzzling, at times, for us social conservatives who work for Mr. Murdoch to see the kind of material Fox airs,” confesses New York Post columnist Rod Dreher (last seen giving Salon hell over the Dan Savage affair). “That ‘Marry a Millionaire’ show was repulsive. That said, I am grateful beyond all telling to Mr. Murdoch for keeping the Post alive to be a lone conservative voice of sanity in the liberal wilderness of New York City journalism.”

I asked Post columnist John Podhoretz for his thoughts and he demurred, saying he was writing a column on the subject himself — for the Weekly Standard. It is doubtful that Podhoretz will have much good to say about one of the uglier episodes in network TV’s bottom-feeding season. That may be the ultimate privilege of having a media empire like Murdoch’s: You can make money on bad TV in one part of your empire and make money off pundits criticizing it in another part.

The conservatives’ problems with Murdoch aren’t exactly new, as indicated by the Web page titled Ten Reasons Why Rupert Murdoch is Not Really a Conservative (chief among the reasons: his willingness to do business with communist governments and his youthful enthusiasm for the teachings of Karl Marx). Fox programming has been giving folks fits since the network expanded to seven days of programming in 1992. Does anyone remember the Fox affiliate program “Studs,” a dating show with stripping males? How about “Woops!” a short-lived sitcom about a group of castaways who survived an accidental nuclear holocaust?

“We used to have a rule around here,” former Fox president Jamie Kellner told me in an interview then. “If it would work on one of the other networks, we don’t want it.”

Now, of course, the other networks can return the compliment in full. For while Fox has enjoyed some amazing successes, it has launched 20 duds for every “Simpsons,” and the current season has been particularly devastating. With the sole exception of the breakout sitcom “Malcolm in the Middle,” the network’s offerings have been tanking like the Lusitania.

Enter “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” — the next logical step in the road that started with ABC’s “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.” This sort of one-upmanship is classic Fox programming; some who have worked with him say it is vintage Murdoch as well.

“Murdoch presents a dilemma for everyone he comes into contact with,” according to Burt Kearns, author of “Tabloid Baby” and producer of last year’s “When Good Pets Go Bad II” (the last “reality-based” show Fox did before it swore to take the high road). “He is an aristocrat as well as a so-called man of the people. Fox doesn’t so much reflect conservative values as play to conservative instincts and lampoon them; it puts those values in your face. It’s one thing to get rich by answering questions on a game show. Murdoch shows just how low you can go.”

According to one Fox insider who asked to remain anonymous, the network is in real conflict over what to do — and not do — to reach an audience. “They couldn’t do reality because of the promises they had made,” he says, but they needed ratings. “This was a good idea, or so they thought. I don’t think a soul on earth thought it was going to do the ratings it delivered. We all thought it was a one-shot in the February sweeps, and see you later.”

Now it seems the only person who will be saying sayonara is Doug Herzog, the former head of programming for Comedy Central (the station that brought us “South Park”). He was brought in to bring life to Fox but seems to be going the way of all Fox programming chiefs.

Conservatives who value Murdoch’s contributions to the cause still have hope. Most are heartened by the increasingly viable Fox News Channel, which has done a competitive job of covering the primaries, and are ardent fans of the Post and the Standard. And they don’t begrudge him success with his entertainment programming — but they keep waiting for the leopard to change his spots.

“I kind of thought for a while that in order to get Fox on the map he had to cut some corners and hold his nose,” says Robert Peters of the conservative watchdog group Morality in Media. “But I thought once Fox got established, Murdoch would begin to make the network different, positively different. And in 15 years it’s gone from bad to worse.”

Even without the revelations about Rockwell, “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” might not have remained successful. Too many viewers compared it to watching a car wreck; guilt would have caught up with those watching. More important, according to the Fox executive I spoke to, “While these shows are big ratings-getters, they are not revenue producers at all. Advertisers have better standards than the networks they advertise on, and for the most part will not run their commercials in ‘When Animals Attack’ or the police chase shows or ‘Cops’ for that matter.”

If only Fox could find a way to get its eyeballs and still respect itself in the morning. As it is, Murdoch’s network resembles an alcoholic in the last throes of his disease. He quits, and swears never to drink again. A few months go by and the feeling just isn’t right (“How come no one’s paying any attention to me?”). So he goes back to the bottle — in this case one labeled “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” And in the morning he hates himself all over again.

Ultimately, Murdoch — himself recently divorced and remarried (who wants to marry a multi-billionaire?) — is like the Starkist company in its relationship to Charlie the Tuna. He doesn’t care about good taste; he wants shows that taste good. Even if they leave a funny taste in your mouth afterward. Those conservatives who thought he was going to provide some wholesome family fare as an alternative to that secular, sensationalistic junk on the Big Three should remember that this was the man who published “The Hitler Diaries.” And when they proved to be false his attitude was: “Sold a lot of papers, didn’t they?”

“With the push toward abortion and euthanasia, why shouldn’t two adults be able to sign a contract to fight to the death?” Peters of Morality in Media asks rhetorically. “One guy walks away with a million and they carry the other guy out and throw him in a grave. Somebody’s going to arrange this; somebody’s got to come up with a million bucks. What a ratings grabber! We’re back to Rome.”

And Fox is taking you there.

Their findings grabbed attention not just in the UK but across the Atlantic, where headlines in the New York Times, Washington Post and Murdoch’s own Wall Street Journal must have made uncomfortable reading for News Corp. staff and shareholders.

The committee’s judgment carries no threat of sanction, but with lawsuits pending in the US over hacking and the threat of possible prosecution under the powerful Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, it will offer little in the way of reassurance.

Having conceded that the British parliamentary inquiry was right to highlight “serious wrongdoings” at the now defunct News of the World title, News Corp. took issue with the “unjustified and highly partisan” verdict on its boss.

Murdoch himself issued a statement to staff admitting mistakes but declaring that “our business has never been stronger.” News Corp.’s board also issued a statement saying it had “full confidence” in its CEO and chairman.

However, with criticism of Murdoch continuing to mount in the UK, questions were being raised as to what extent the report would harm his business interests both here and in the United States, with some shareholders suggesting it was time to shift power out of Murdoch’s hands.

A day after the report, elements of his $50 billion media empire appeared to be attempting to distance themselves from Murdoch, not just by prominently reporting the committee’s scathing assessment, but by explicitly stating their independence of his command.

There was speculation that a small surge in News Corp. share prices in the wake of Tuesday’s verdict reflected anticipation that the company would soon divest itself of its troubled UK newspaper titles and set wheels in motion to reduce Murdoch’s influence over the company.

Rupert Murdoch is “finished in the United Kingdom,” wrote Michael Wolff, author of “The Man Who Owns the News,” an unauthorized biography of the News Corp. founder. “Understanding that Britain is a lost front, he will retreat to his U.S. stronghold. From New York, the process of disposing of the British papers, which, by reliable insider accounts, has begun, will hasten.”

Of primary concern in the UK is whether the “not a fit person” verdict will have any impact on a separate inquiry by British communications industry regulator Ofcom over whether News Corp. is a “fit and proper” owner of a lucrative 39.1 percent stake in prominent broadcaster BSkyB.

Any decision that would force News Corp. to offload its BSkyB holding would be a considerable blow to the media giant, which had hoped to buy the broadcaster outright but later abandoned the deal after the phone hacking scandal inflamed opposition.

On Wednesday, BSkyB’s chief executive, Jeremy Darroch, used the publication of record financial results to disassociate his company from Murdoch and — clearly wary of the threat to its prized broadcast license — talk up its annual $1.6 billion tax contribution to the British economy.

“I would emphasize that it’s important to remember that Sky and News Corporation are separate companies,” he told reporters. “We believe that Sky’s track record as a broadcaster is the most important factor in determining our fitness to hold a license.”

Aware of the potential damage his presence could bring to the company, Murdoch’s son James last month stood down as chairman of BSkyB, saying he didn’t want to be a “lightning rod” for criticism over the hacking scandal.

Speculation is now mounting over whether the News Corp. brand will also be vulnerable to critical, financial and legal thunderbolts if Murdoch senior resists shareholder efforts to usher him into a backseat role.

“I think you have to be careful about extrapolating from what has been an appalling set of circumstances around one newspaper group … to the continuing demise of News Corp.,” said Charlie Beckett, director of Polis, a media and society think tank at the London School of Economics.

Beckett said that while the parliamentary verdict would certainly cast a shadow over any News Corp. deals, mergers or takeovers in the future, there was nothing inevitable about the demise of the company or its subsidiaries.

Likewise, he said that while there was support for scaling down Murdoch’s control over News Corp., shareholders would also bear in mind the fact that the media tycoon’s sharp business acumen has consistently paid dividends, regardless of any questions of ethical culpability.

“There are some people who would welcome the defamiliarization of the company, but you could also argue that this is a guy who has an extraordinary track record on delivering profit,” he told GlobalPost.

Beckett said that plans would already have been in place to arrange a succession of command, and while these may now be fast tracked down from five years to two, News Corp. would be unwise to proceed with too much haste.

“It’s in everyone’s interest for the thing to not fall apart in the next year or two. Even those people who want Murdoch to recede don’t want him to jump out of the top floor. That would be far too destabilizing.”

Now, Murdoch appears to be fighting back.

He and his son James were in the U.K. this week to face the Leveson inquiry, a judicial investigation into press standards, begun last year in the wake of revelations that journalists at Murdoch’s U.K. titles illegally hacked the voice mails of prominent public figures.

This time, he and his family appear to have turned on the British establishment, pressuring Prime Minister David Cameron and putting a key minister in the spotlight over a controversial business deal.

In his evidence on Tuesday, James Murdoch released documents that appeared to show that Jeremy Hunt, a media minister charged with examining a $13.4 billion bid by Murdoch’s News Corp. for full control of British Sky Broadcasting, had secretly helped to progress the deal.

The revelations sent Cameron’s government into a tailspin. Cameron pledged to stand by Hunt — who is overseeing the 2012 Olympics — while Hunt himself was forced to defend his actions to Parliament, denying claims he gave News Corp. a “back channel” of influence over the bid.

In an attempt to limit the damage, Hunt’s advisor Adam Smith — a key link in communications with James Murdoch — tendered his resignation at the same time that a relaxed-looking Murdoch senior was taking the stand to deny he held any sway over Britain’s politicians.

News Corp.’s bid to buy BSkyB was ruled out last year in the wake of the phone-hacking scandal, an outcome that soured the once-cordial relations between Murdoch and Cameron. This breakdown appears to have set the tone for Murdoch’s reappearance.

Even before giving evidence at the Leveson inquiry, Rupert Murdoch appeared to be on the offensive against the government. Last month he took to Twitter to complain about “old toffs and right wingers” — a likely dig at the British establishment.

More followed when he arrived in London last weekend. In one tweet he criticizes the economic policies of Cameron’s government. “Govt sending IMF another ten bn to he euro. Must be mad,” he wrote.

Murdoch’s offensive and the question mark over Hunt couldn’t come at a worse time for Cameron. His government is already under fire for provoking a recent fuel crisis and for a financial budget that was derided in Parliament as an “omnishambles.”

A recent poll showed the ruling Conservatives have lost their command over the main opposition Labour Party, largely as a consequence of the budget.

To make matters worse for Cameron, it was announced on Wednesday that Britain had slumped back into recession despite forecasts of economic recovery.

But, despite his tweets, Murdoch insists he hasn’t been gunning for the government. Asked by Leveson counsel Richard Jay if “rumors” were true that he had not forgiven Cameron, he said they were not. He added: “Don’t take my tweets too seriously.”

Speculation had been rife that Murdoch would use his Leveson appearance to launch a “slash and burn” offensive, as one commentator put it. Some speculated his revelations could take direct aim at Cameron, possibly making the prime minister’s position untenable.

The Brookses were arrested, along with four others, “on suspicion of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.” This was the second time Rebekah Brooks, the former editor of the Sun and the now-shuttered News of the World, had been arrested — the last time it was for conspiring to intercept communications, or “phone hacking” — and this arrest suggests that News International’s extensive efforts to cover up their unethical practices may end up damaging the company just as much as the unethical practices did.

Brooks’ newspapers gathered a great deal of news by illicitly listening to the voice-mail messages of celebrities and members of the royal family and murder victims. They also had a private investigator on contract to do other law-violating things, and they had a bribery budget that would make most American newspaper publishers jealous. Once Murdoch’s British newspaper empire faced civil, criminal and Parliamentary inquiries, they went on an email-destroying binge. They have since become much more cooperative, but deleting half a terabyte worth of emails to and from executives and destroying computers used by journalists under investigation is really not a sound legal strategy.

James Murdoch, still the News Corp. heir apparent, has written a note of apology to members of Parliament. He owes them an apology because the recoverable emails among the deleted cache strongly indicate that he lied to Parliament about his awareness of the extent of phone hacking. James has also essentially fled the country, having resigned from his father’s British newspapers company and taken a job at his American-based international pay television company.

Meanwhile, British Prime Minister David Cameron is in the middle of his well-publicized state visit to the United States. Barack Obama has taken him to a “basketball match,” which Cameron found “hard to follow.” The right-leaning U.K. papers have been extremely overexcited in their coverage of the PM’s visit, because, again, national insecurity.

Cameron was surely thrilled to be out of the country when the Brookses got collared. They’re neighbors and close personal friends. Charlie Brooks and Cameron go way back — they attended Eton together, and as equally ridiculous posh stereotypes they got along famously — and earlier this month it was revealed that Cameron had ridden a retired police horse that the Met had for some reason given to Rebekah Brooks. (The only way the ensuing scandal could’ve been more British is if it had involved a Tory MP and a dominatrix.)

Speaking of horses, Charlie Brooks has one running in a race today. As the Guardian noted, he had a column published the day he was arrested in which he said, tragically, that “the happiest moment of my year is about three hours before the first race at Cheltenham on Tuesday.”

As for old Rupert himself, he hasn’t tweeted anything since Saturday. But he assured employees at the Sun that they’re in the clear, and he’s headed to London to perform damage control. His British newspapers hold a special place in his heart, making it a bit poignant — or hilarious, depending on your perspective — that that tiny arm of his vast international empire is the one that is currently destroying everything he’s spent a lifetime building.

The Guardian is delightfully liveblogging the meeting, which is handy, because News Corp. banned all cameras and recording devices. Audio of the meeting was streaming on the News Corp. corporate site for investors or those willing to claim to be investors on a registration page, but it just ended while they hold their shareholder votes. As he took questions, Murdoch sounded much more involved and feisty than he did in his confused appearance before Parliament earlier this summer. “I’d hate to call you a liar, but I know exactly how you’re going to vote,” he said to a hostile questioner who claimed to have not yet made up his mind.

Watson rehashed the various criminal complaints against News Corp. and added allegations of computer hacking. Others complained about Murdoch’s management of the corporation as a sort of personal fiefdom, with nepotism rampant. One guy wanted to talk about animal rights for a while.

Media Matters has the audio of Watson’s questioning:

Murdoch is not in much danger of losing his company. As Reuters says, he has 40 percent control of voting shares, and next largest holder is Murdoch ally and Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talai. But the L.A. Times suggests News Corp. president Chase Carey could end up being promoted to CEO.

There are three crucial votes: The vote to reelect Murdoch and the rest of the board, the vote to cut Murdoch’s pay, and a vote to specifically force Murdoch to step down. He’ll probably win all three but the votes could be close enough to force the board to make some changes. And in the longer term, this could ruin Murdoch’s plan to have one of his kids run the company some day. (Son Lachlan having failed, Rupert still has to choose between Elisabeth and James.)

All the “media watchdogs” in the world will never remove Murdoch from power or shame him into changing his business practices, but once major institutional investors revolt, there’s a serious possibility of the end of the Murdoch era. Money, as always, speaks loudest.

That touched off a storm of public outrage that rocked Murdoch’s media empire and ricocheted through Britain’s political, police and media establishments.

“Nothing that has been agreed will ever bring back Milly or undo the traumas of her disappearance and the horrendous murder trial earlier this year,” the Dowlers said in the statement. “The only way that a fitting tribute could be agreed was to ensure that a very substantial donation to charity was made in Milly’s memory. We hope that projects will be undertaken so that some good can come from this.”

Murdoch met with the Dowlers in July to personally apologize to the family, saying he was “appalled” to have discovered what happened.

In the statement Friday, he said he hoped something positive can be done in memory of Milly.

“The behavior that the News of the World exhibited towards the Dowlers was abhorrent and I hope this donation underscores my regret for the company’s role in this awful event,” he said.

The revelation that reporters eavesdropped on Milly Dowler’s voice mail messages while police were searching for her — and mounting evidence that phone hacking was routine at the newspaper — scandalized the British public.

In a letter to lawmakers disclosed Thursday, Surrey Police Chief Constable Mark Rowley acknowledged that his force knew as far back as April 2002 that someone working for the News of the World had accessed Dowler’s voice mail, giving false hope to the missing teen’s family and potentially interfering with the investigation into her disappearance.

The phone hacking scandal has forced the resignation of two of London’s top police officers, ousted executives at Murdoch’s News Corp. and claimed the job of Prime Minister David Cameron’s former spin doctor, Andy Coulson, an ex-News of the World editor.

Murdoch’s global News Corp. has expressed contrition, launched an internal inquiry and set aside 20 million pounds ($32 million) to compensate victims, who could number in their hundreds.

Still, the News Corp. CEO is under pressure. On Friday, he will face shareholders with small stakes in his company for the first time since the phone-hacking scandal broke in July.

British lawmaker Tom Watson, one of Murdoch’s fiercest British critics, traveled to Los Angeles to attend the annual general meeting and has said he plans to use the event to reveal new details of what he claims are covert surveillance techniques by company employees.

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Associated Press writer Jill Lawless contributed to this report.

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Cassandra Vinograd can be reached at http://twitter.com/CassVinograd