MSNBC To Double Down as the Liberals Favored Network
MSNBC—of the cable news networks my favorite—found themselves with an O’Reilly level star in Keith Olbermann. Since then, they’ve seen their ratings inch upwards on a pretty consistent and significant basis. For the last couple of years at least, they’ve clearly been realizing that taking the Fox model works, and that liberals have felt shut out of cable news (James will guffaw at that, but when you think that the figureheads on most of the other networks—O’Reilly, Hannity, Dobbs, Novak and Carlson at one time, etc—skew right,and being “fair and balanced” in a world where news media is terrified of being labeled liberals means to bend over backwards to over-inflate the Republican voice, you can understand a bit their frustration). The MSNBC execs seem to have finally decided that Olbermann isn’t a fluke (it took them longer than anybody else to realize that), and have decided to go further along that route.
Rachel Maddow—she of Air America fame, and who has become a figurehead over there—will be replacing Dan Abrams in the 9 PM slot. That puts her on directly after Olbermann.
I like Maddow, incidentally. She’s rabidly partisan, of course, but has been a very strong color commentator of sorts on the political sidelines. We’ll see if the wider audience and ensuing toning down dilutes her, but still, good choice, I’d say. Now if Chuck Todd takes over for Russert, they’ll be shaping up to be the smartest news network on television.
What I wrote back in March:
http://thecrossedpond.com/?p=2904
Comment by Kaligula — 8/20/2008 @ 7:06 am
Shame. Olbermann is the most annoying anchor on the channel and Maddow is also fantastically annoying. I watched hours of MSNBC every day until they cut Tucker Carlson but I can’t watch Olbermann and I can’t bear Maddow, who is an irritating and smug partisan hack.
Back to relatively little cable news for me, I guess. I like Scarborough and I can bear to watch Chris Matthews if I have to. David Gregory’s show (assuming it does come back after the Olympics) may become more tolerable now that Maddow’s probably not going to be on it so much.
Comment by Adam — 8/20/2008 @ 10:05 am
MSNBC sucks worse than most of FOX news, and that’s saying something.
Comment by James — 8/20/2008 @ 10:42 am
The only bright side is that she’s replacing Dan Abrams, who also annoys the hell out of me. However, the move to more and more obvious partisanship is a shame (for the same reason I don’t watch FOX I am disliking the shift at MSNBC) although it makes sense from the commercial point of view (and in the same way that I refrain from putting money FOX’s way, I suppose I shall do the same for MSNBC, not that they’ll mind given the increasing viewing figures).
Comment by Adam — 8/20/2008 @ 1:11 pm
I like Olbermann and I like Maddow, and I’m more or less okay with them choosing the flagrantly partisan angle, if anything because, James’ favorite boogeyman aside, there is no clear explicit liberal response on television at the moment, just a bunch of rabid right-wingers, or a bunch of faux-neutrals.
Glad someone else mentioned that Dan Abrams annoys them. I wasn’t sure if that was just me.
Comment by Brad — 8/20/2008 @ 2:38 pm
Brad isn’t a communist yet.
Comment by James — 8/21/2008 @ 2:47 am
The irritation for me is only because they are replacing their more analytical content with the irritating partisan stuff. Maddow has completely failed to attempt objectivity on issues about which she’s stoked (such as Hillary versus Obama, back when the race was on) and turned every question she was asked into an ad for Obama or an attack on McCain. Contrast that with Pat Buchanan asked questions in the same way and he manages to attempt an analytical response and generally delineates his political opinions (shared by relatively few) from his logical analysis. I’m glad Abrams is going but that she’s the replacement and further signal of the direction they wish to go is, to me, a shame, if only because they were the most bearable news channel. They’re welcome to go this route, as are Fox to go theirs — that it’s a winner is a reflection on the audience, not the networks — but I personally shan’t watch so much of their output.
I never thought I’d end up back watching CNN as my US news channel mainstay but it seems that I shall, after all.
Comment by Adam — 8/21/2008 @ 1:12 pm
I don’t watch television news anymore. I flip on the the TV for news or political discussion only when something is happening where video is important or some major event is happening when the internet isn’t enough of a data stream, in which case TV supliments my internet news. The exceptions to that are CSPAN here and there and ocassionally a local news broadcast.
I never watch prime time NBC, CBS, or ABC news shows. When I do flip on the TV for news it’s usually CNN.
Actually, aside from the internet, my only other news source is The Economist which I devour every weekend.
Comment by Cameron — 8/21/2008 @ 3:14 pm
That can’t be good for your digestion.
Comment by Rojas — 8/21/2008 @ 4:03 pm