On Thursday, in a move at once momentous and mundane, the 92-year-old Rupert Murdoch announced he would transition to the role of chairman emeritus at Fox Corp. and News Corp., formally passing the reins of what’s left of his international media empire to his eldest and favored son, Lachlan. The announcement predictably induced a flood of obituaries for Murdoch’s historic ascent from a provincial Australian newspaper heir, seven decades ago, to the incomparable international media baron whose indulgence with oversized-all-caps right-wing populism forever coarsened the civic and political culture in at least three of the world’s leading democracies and, in the inadvertent coup de grace, helped deliver Donald Trump to the White House. Along the way, Murdoch also fleeced Bob Iger for $71 billion.