During the conventions, MSNBC's coverage was anchored by Keith Olberman and Chris Matthews. The network has announced that from here on in, David Gregory will chair the debates and the election night coverage, with Olberman and Matthews relegated to commentator positions.
This is interesting. At first I thought that it was a bid by MSNBC to avoid alienating the conservative half of its audience. Olberman is one of about 4 cable news hosts who is explicitly liberal; and Matthews, as I've noted before, is in some kind of weird distorted area where no matter what side you're on, he's against you. So I'll call him neutral. Therefore the coverage for MSNBC skewed left.
However, Glenn Greenwald points out in Salon today that Olberman is by far MSNBC's greatest ratings-grabber. MSNBC is the sad-sack of Cable News Organizations. Olberman is the only guy anyone watches there. In fact, they have just signed liberal lesbian Rachael Maddow to occupy the hour between Olberman's high-rated 7:00pm show and its 9:00pm rerun.
So MSNBC had no audience to lose by keeping Olberman as election maven; in fact, there is an obvious model for making money out of biased coverage. No one watches Fox News because they believe its fair and balanced. Even when it is the reason people tune in is because they already agree with the right-wing positions it usually takes. It's classic narrowcasting strategy, and in a landscape where there are 6 or 7 all-news channels it works just fine.
So why the switch? Because MSNBC responds to complaints by right-wing organizations. If they don't, the organizations tar NBC with the same brush. And these organizations have been screaming for years that the whole network is far-left-liberal because they carry Olberman. It doesn't matter to them that 3 hours a day goes to Joe Scarborough (former Republican congressman, current Republican), or that Chris Matthews has espoused positions like this:
Hat tip to Greenwald for that.I like [George Bush]. Everybody sort of likes the president, except for the real whack-jobs, maybe on the left . . . We're proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical, who's not a complicated guy like Clinton or even like Dukakis or Mondale, all those guys, McGovern. They want a guy who's president. Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. . . . Why don't the damn Democrats give the president his day? He won today. He did well today. . . .
4 comments:
Hmm.. Perhaps some of the other folks at NBC were seeing a problem:
"But NBC News journalists, who often appear on the cable channel, did see a problem, arguing behind the scenes that MSNBC's move to the left -- which includes a new show, debuting tonight, for Air America radio host Rachel Maddow -- was tarnishing their reputation for fairness. Tom Brokaw, the interim host of "Meet the Press," said that at times Olbermann and Matthews went too far."
But Brokaw doesn't know anything about the news business.
Recent outburts have also damaged the brand:
"Olbermann was involved in several on-air incidents during the conventions that drew unwanted attention. He told morning host Joe Scarborough, a former Republican congressman, to "get a shovel" as Scarborough was defending the McCain campaign. And when GOP strategist Mike Murphy was debating Matthews, Olbermann could be heard saying, "Let's wrap him up.""
MSNBC has gotten a boost from being morer liberal, but perhaps the bigwigs at NBC see that as being a small piece of the market. Staunch Right Wing supporter Terry McAuliffe has problems with your boy Matthews as well:
"MSNBC's more liberal outlook has boosted its ratings, though it remains the third-place cable news channel. But both parties began castigating its coverage last spring. Steve Schmidt, McCain's top strategist, called the network "an organ of the Democratic National Committee," and Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said Matthews was "in the tank" for Obama."
Re Matthews: He's been in the tank for plenty of Republicans in the past - he's the ESSENSE of balance as far as that goes. Dja ever see his hour with Tom Delay? Practically made out with him!
Re Brokaw - do this Google search, "Brokaw Liberal" and you'll see lots of reasons to not trust anything he says about anything.
You guys have written off both MSNBC and NBC long ago. In fact, I cannot imagine the tone of criticism would be changed in the slightest if they switched to an all-Michael-Moore format. Like I say, nothin' to lose.
If there is nothing for them to lose by going all-lib, all the time, why haven't they?
Because like most big networks, they pay too much attention to pressure groups; in this case right-wing ones.
That's right, MSNBC lets itself get pushed around by the RNC. All the major news outlets do.
Post a Comment