If you still watch CNN, you are now basically alone. April was their worst month during the daytime in a decade. And their primetime lineup is all but dead. For once, I actually agree with Cenk Uygur. CNN should change everything. They can start by realizing that no one likes Wolf Blitzer. Then they can go out and find some onscreen talent that doesn’t remind people of the Clinton administration. Get rid of Carville and Begala and Brazille. I never watch CNN because I truly dislike almost everyone that they have on regularly. If I did watch CNN, I’d probably have a much longer list of people they should fire. Dana Loesch, for example, but I only know her from her incredibly stupid tweets.
If you look at MSNBC, you see that they’ve cultivated new talent. They brought Rachel Maddow along slowly until she emerged as a star. They’re grooming Chris Hayes and Melissa Harris-Perry on the weekends and as substitutes in primetime. They brought Ed Shultz over from radio. What MSNBC should do is replace the insufferable Lawrence O’Donnell and the way-past-his-selling-date Chris Matthews with Hayes and Harris-Perry. And, while I like Al Sharpton and I think he’s improving with experience, he’s had about 3 million more minutes of microphone-time in the span of his life than any mere mortal should enjoy. Give someone else a chance.
In addition to firing literally everyone who works there, CNN should play to its strengths. Cenk’s right that they should be aggressive fact-checkers, but they also should be using their resources better to bring people stories that MSNBC doesn’t have the resources to do. I mean, can the ridiculous Piers Morgan and bring us something closer to Frontline or 60 Minutes, or at least Nightline. Put some really smart people on television instead of paid political consultants and hacks. Try educating people about something. I think CNN does this from time to time with specials, and that’s fine, but people don’t form habits from watching specials. They need to know that a program is going to be on at a certain time.
Pretty much everything is wrong with CNN. It isn’t just their refusal to report the truth if it conflicts with Republican talking points. It’s unlikable no-talent talent that doesn’t appeal to partisans or non-partisans. It’s news that is both bland and noncommittal. And it’s a near 100% focus on theatrics and process, with very very little attention or value placed on policy.
The whole place should be razed to the ground and rebuilt from scratch.
I really do think CNN’s decline really began when Jon Stewart called them out on ‘Crossfire’ 8 years ago. It’s never been the same since.
Not to mention this beauty not too long ago:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/08/jon-stewart-mocks-cnn-virtual-convention_n_1329318.html
That and Ted Turner selling out to Time-Warner.
It’s not like he wasn’t always that way. All you need to know about Ted Turner is the interview he had with Carl Sagan in 1989 (7 years before the merger):
Sagan: “The money went to [increasing spending on arms] and making rich people richer.”
Turner: “Well I don’t know about rich people, being one I guess. Cause the money gets reinvested. If you’ve got money you put it in the bank, the bank lends it out to people to buy homes, cars.”
Sagan: “Not poor people. It tends to stay at the top, at that highly stratosphied layer.”
Turner: “Well people get employed…Carl are you a socialist?”
Sagan: “I’m not sure what a socialist is, but I believe that the government has a responsibility to care for people. And I’m not talking about the dole, I’m talking about making people self-reliant.”
I’m not saying Ted Turner is perfect. Just that CNN was a lot better when he owned it compared to the mess it is now.
Wow. Forget the half-joking throwaway line about socialism. Ted the CNN host actually allowed his guest to give a thoughtful, detailed answer, noting a half dozen factors, which went on for about five minutes uninterrupted. Unheard of in today’s tv or cable where a thirty second response is usually the maximum allowed before being cut off.
I also liked Ted’s sudden switch to asking about the off-beat seeming subject of time travel. And Sagan’s thoughtful response. Though I often have wondered if insider Carl was privy to more info on these sort of topics than he let on.
Great clip.
Got to say, I have become addicted to Up With Chris Hayes. There is just no place on television that does what this show does, week in and week out. It is crack for political wonks. I just don’t see this show’s kind of discussion anywhere else. When they finally make it downloadable as a podcast, I will be overjoyed. Then I can take it anywhere. Until then, I have to depend on the DVR.
Agred 100%. My only issue is being a west coaster, the idea of opening my eyes at 3 am is a stretch. No DVR in this household. But Chris does a superb job. Have to laugh, the guy actually talks faster than I can listen, don’t know how he can engage that fast.
I thought that O’Donnell had the highest ratings for evening shows? Mmmm.
I gave up on EdShow a long time ago and now am addicted to Spitzer over at Current. He gives a good lead in to Granholm’s show but Rachel has gotten so good that it’s a tough hill to climb.
CNN is the only show on for the weekends so I go there as a last resort.
Agree with Mike and mainsail, Chris Hayes has a quality issues oriented show on the weekend. And he doesn’t have on the usual suspects.
Alas, another west coaster here sans dvr. I wish the network would switch Chris’s ridiculous time slot with Harris-Perry, whom I find a tad too soft and conventional in her thinking. Better yet, let the next host Katarina Witt take the 3 am slot, then bring on Chris.
One more thing: it would be nice if the suits would allow him a few long, uninterrupted by commercial segments per show, as they do with Morning Joe. Sadly the conversation has to be stopped — about every four minutes it seems — just as everyone is starting to warm to a topic. Ridiculous the frequency of commercial intrusions.
You all do know you can watch all the MSNBC shows on the intertubes, right? Not in real time, but soon enough.
Okay but they can leave Ashley and Zaraida in the early morning hours. I like watching them while I’m on the gym treadmill at 5:30AM.
So…to translate your post:
You don’t “like” the talking heads on CNN but you do “like” at least some of the talking heads on MSNBC, and you “like” Cenk Uygur too. You wouldn’t quote him if you didn’t. You’d “like” some new faces on CNN as well, if of course they were “likable” to you.
That about sums it up, wouldn’t you say?
What is this? Facebook? Twitter?
Not a word about content.
Did you notice that when you posted it?
I think not.
And that is how media addiction works.
Bet on it.
Lies from “likable” faces are accepted; lies from “unlikable” ones are not.
Over the width and breadth of the media, almost every mainstream (Read “voters and poll responders.”) like and dislike is covered. Trot out conflicting lies…but never the real truth of the matter…and you have almost everyone hoodwinked.
Nice scam, don’tcha think?
Or…do you? “Think,” that is.
Sometimes I wonder.
Fox people “like” Fox reporters. That takes care of the right.
MSNBC people “like” MSNBC reporters. That takes care of the left.
And CNN/ABC/NBC/CBS people “like” CNN/ABC/NBC/CBS reporters. That takes care of the vast, plodding middle.
The so-called left and right cancel each other out, to a great degree. Control the middle…and that control is plainly aimed at boosting Obama this time around…and the fix is pretty well in.
Congrats on your role in all of this.
Wake the fuck up and drop the fuck out.
Please.
AG
Because Booman posted the following about content
“In addition to firing literally everyone who works there, CNN should play to its strengths. Cenk’s right that they should be aggressive fact-checkers, but they also should be using their resources better to bring people stories that MSNBC doesn’t have the resources to do.”
What that means is CNN has an international news presence that MSNBC nor even Fox can replicate. Because of that they should be covering stories that the other 24 hour US news networks aren’t. For example there have been some stories in the last couple of weeks about the effects of Japan’s aging population on their economy. Both interesting about Japan and relevant to the United States.
Booman also posted this
“Put some really smart people on television instead of paid political consultants and hacks. Try educating people about something.”
Also about content. The issue here is the on air talent they have chosen to go with is not made for this kind of broad based and global smart reporting that should be CNN’s niche. Said talent can be unlikeable but worse yet they are bland and seem to not go deeper than repeating rote talking points.
Great.
As soon as I find a major network news system that repeatedly tells the truth about the plain fact that the U.S. has been the leading proponent of international “terrorism” since at least the onset of its involvement in the Vietnam War…albeit in a larger, more organized and mainstream military kind of way than the contemporary “terrorism” that is so trumpeted on every network (left, right and center)…I will believe that real, uncensored content is possible in this country.
Until then?
Go fish.
AG
did you actually read what I wrote?
I said I don’t watch CNN because they suck on every level, but also because I hate their regulars. Let me be clearer. I can’t stand the sight of James Carville. Paul Begala is better, but he’s just annoying. Donna Brazille? She is so Al Gore. Wolf Blitzer? I just want to use a nail-gun on my face. Piers Morgan? He’s like Larry King’s half-witted understudy, and I hated Larry King. I don’t just dislike these people for no reason. I dislike them because they are as you describe them, and as I describe them.
It’s all fawning over celebrity and power, or working as paid consultants to celebrity and power, and it’s all surface level analysis. 100,000 variations of “Will that statement hurt them with white people/independents/undecides? “
Imagine watching a football game and after every play the announcers discuss the likely impact of that play on next week’s Vegas Line. That’s CNN.
That’s all of them, Booman. The only difference is in the odds they predict. And none of them are held accountable at the end of any given game.
Meanwhile…none of them carry the real story.
Whadda buncha maroons!!!
AG
Show more imagination, Arthur.
They are not all the same.
FOX announcers are stealing the plays and phoning them down to the other team. They’re spying on the refs so they can blackmail them. They’re adding points on the scoreboard. They actively trying to destroy the other team’s fan base and revenues.
MSNBC has Rachel Maddow trying to explain three or four issues of some degree of complexity to her viewers every night. The rest of them are just point at FOX and saying, “that’s cheating.”
CNN is just wondering who will win. They’re not educating, they’re not complaining, they’re not taking any side but the side of whomever they think is winning at the moment.
All quite different approaches.
All quite different
I am sorry to have be the one to tell you this, Booman, but all of the major networks are owned and controlled by corporate interests that are part and parcel of the PermaGov complex.
Yes, you are correct in saying that each network uses its own tactics to do its job. Those tactics are very finely focused, custom-tailored to the particular group that is to be controlled.
You say:
Yes, that is quite true, and that is a different approach than those of the other networks. MSNBC’s job is to control a relatively small but also relatively powerful…they vote…audience that might be described as “white, mostly middle class, no longer ‘young’ but not yet ‘old,’ college educated and in the top 10 percentile or so of the IQ range.” (PBS, on the other hand, is aimed at controlling an older, slightly more affluent subset of that same demographic.)
I repeat, however:
So far?
I would be stunned and astounded if that particular message ever got any sort of wide play on any major, commercially supported network.
Stunned. And I would have to immediately reconsider everything that I have said about U.S. mass hypnomedia.
So far?
Not a chance.
Not a fucking chance.
Of course, just as in the runup to the invasion of Iraq during which every network included one or two frizzy haired “peaceniks” of one kind or another for every 45 well suited-up-and-coiffed supporters of the war machine, there may be a designated fool tool included now and again to imply something along the lines of the above (quite plain to see if one is not in a media-induced trance state) truth in the interests of so-called “unbiased media reporting,” but in terms of overall message impact?
Fuggedaboudit.
The talking heads at MSNBC never fuggedaboudit. Bet on it. All they need do is reflect on the fate of the NBC, MSNBC and National Geographic correspondent Peter Arnett when he spoke a plain truth…a relatively minor one at that…on the air.
Hmmmmm…
“NBC initially defended him, saying he had given the interview as a professional courtesy and that his remarks were “analytical in nature”. A day later, though, NBC, MSNBC and National Geographic all severed their relationships with Arnett.”
Hmmmmm…I wonder…
I wonder just what happened in those 24 hours between “initial support” and firing.
Do ya think that maybe…just maybe, mind you…a number of private numbers were rung up by people of real power and the law was laid down about what is and is not allowable on mainstream media news telecasts?
Ya think?
Please.
Do you have any idea how profitable a main slot on MSNBC is? The mortgage!!! The retirement!!! The book deals!!! The medical coverage!!! The kids’ college fund!!! The mistress’s/lover’s/drug supplier’s/nanny’s/Mercedes’s expenses!!!
And the truth goes unstated.
Sorry, Booman, but that’s the way the scam works.
Money talks and nobody (nobody but the very occasional hero) walks.
Every time.
Are you familiar with the word “concision” as it is apllied to network news? Noam Chomsky is. Y’oughta read what he has to say on this subject. (From an interview with Laura Flanders.):
Tha’s right.
I can’t imagine the media talking about this.
I wish that I could.
I really do.
So it goes, and WTFU.
Please!!!
MSNBC is just Fox News down the rabbit hole and then back up again into control territory for progressives.
Bet on it.
Later…
AG
P.S. Chomsky’s statement “Concision is a technique of propaganda. It ensures you cannot do anything except repeat clichés, the standard doctrine, or sound like a lunatic.”
Hmmmm…
And how did they handle Ron Paul again?
Hmmmm…
Sheesh, Gilroy, who pissed in your cheerios today?
It’s not just a media thing…
Your lame, 51 character (w/spaces) so-called “comment” illustrates how this whole concision thing has affected (Infected?) public discourse. You immediately assume…cloaked I suppose by some kind of “humor” in your own estimation…that someone “pissed in [my] cheerios” because I made a rather lengthy response to a comment.
No one pissed in my Cheerios, bunky, although you certainly tried to do so. You missed, though. (I don’t eat the shit, to tell you the truth.) I am merely trying to get through to as many people as possible…and even if that number is only one I would be quite happy…the seriousness of the present technofascist media system’s control over the minds on most of the population of the United States.
You don’t want to hear this?
Fine by me. Go piss in your own Cheerios. But be forewarned…those “Cheerios” themselves have been sold to you under a false bill of goods. They are a denatured food grown with poisonous additives and preserved with a myriad of chemicals. Pissing in them will not make them much worse than they already are.
Have a nice day.
Cheerio…
AG
There’s actually one giant exception to CNN’s bland lineup and that GPS with Fareed Zakaria on Sundays. He is consistently top notch.
Thanks for watching cable news so I don’t have to. I haven’t had cable in like 15 years and I don’t miss it. The structure and premise the news shows are built upon are mostly a joke and the entertainment options are so weak. If any of the political pundits say something exceptional, I’ll get wind of it via Booman or other blogs. But those are rare occurrences.
I get my news and analysis via a few blogs and over the air. BBC, Deutsche Welle, Al-Jazeera, Japanese News, French News, Israeli News are all available to me via broadcast.
That’s the ticket!!!
Like dat.
Good on ya, JeffL.
Good an ya.
AG
Sharpton should stay. He is the only host on MSNBC who actually has a different perspective. The other hosts tend to cover the same stories from the same perspective. It gets incredibly repetitive. He covers stories that you don’t see anywhere else on TV and he isn’t afraid of supporting Obama. The other MSNBC hosts are so worried about losing their leftie cred that they invest way too much time in silly attacks on Obama.
Melissa as been a huge disappointment on her show. She lets the Republican guests go on and on without being challenged. Not much different than David Gregory.
If I was running MSNBC, I’d ditch Matthews 2nd hour and give it to a partisan Democrat, instead of yet another “progressive” voice. There is a huge audience out there for a news show that doesn’t tear down the Democrats.
Hi $2 and All,
I agree that Sharpton should stay. I’ve had my problems with him over the years, but he does bring an important viewpoint to the discussion.
Too many of the MSNBC evening shows sound like they’re written by the exact same writers. I like Rachel and (to some extent) Larry, but watching one means one rarely needs to watch the other. And there are too many commercials, and the infuriating teasers (with music) between long commercial spots. I don’t need to be told 4 times that later in the show you’ll be talking about something really cool and super important!!!11 They should charge more for the spots and eliminate about half of the time taken by them.
Chris Hays is very good and will be a star if they let him, and give him a different time slot. MHP seems to be growing into her role – she was very rough early on substituting for Rachel.
I can’t stand Ed, but different strokes. I grew out of his style of talk radio about 40 years ago… I don’t like Matthews either.
They do need to make some changes, like have a network policy of refusing to interview political spinmeisters unless they have a book out. I don’t care what Carville and Schmidt have to say most of the time. Spin isn’t reality. Get actual congresspeople and senators on the show. Do real versions of Colbert’s “Better Know a District”. Get actual experts on the show more often – people like heads of agencies and departments – rather than people who just talk about spin.
The biggest problem I have with MSNBC is that they’re almost always reacting. I don’t usually care what Limbaugh or Fox had to say today. If I did care, I would watch them.
Don’t tell me that Republicans are liars and think that voters are stupid. I’ve known that for a long time. Republican voters won’t watch such a show, and independents might not either. Tell me what the work and policy positions that Democrats pushed today – not the spin. Tell me what legislation is bottled up in committee in Congress and why. Tell me about important cases in the courts. Tell me what the states are doing about the economy, voting rights, civil rights, education, the environment, etc. Tell me about what’s going on in science (and, BTW, the latest social networking app isn’t science). Tell me about upcoming meetings, events and rallies. Give me information so I can help influence the outcome before it’s a fait accompli.
Of course, doing all that would probably reduce their ratings to 50% of what they have now, but news and informing the citizenry doesn’t have to be a profit center (it didn’t use to be).
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
And yet, CNN is the only news outlet brave enough to cover THIS story: http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/28/justice/california-rfk-second-gun/
Don’t can them. But I agree – more shows like 60 Minutes or Frontline. More HARD news, not Piers Morgan crap.
However, Lisa…this is CNN. The Cia News Network. I wonder when the other shoe will drop? Is she being set up to be discredited? Is there some sort of palace coup in operation at the CIA or within the whole intelligence system? Out with the old, in with the new? What’s up with this? Who’s going to go down, and why?
Or…is it just an oversight. An error, soon to be discarded down the insatiable memory hole of the media.
Watch.
AG
Right. Occasionally, every once in a long while CNN allows the truth through. (That RFK story was briefly discussed here in o/t fashion the other day.)
But usually they can be relied on to ignore, downplay or dismiss evidence that undercuts the official line while giving the big lie plenty of airtime. As with their numerous airings over the years of their lone nut documentary, by Soledad O’Brian, on the MLK case.
Still, something is better than nothing and so credit them for running this latest story and also for reporting it accurately.
Huh. Everyone I know prefers O’Donnell to Schultz.
But yes, replace CNN with AJE. Much better quality.
I agree. O’Donnell is smart and calm, like Rachel. Schultz reminds me of Limbaugh. I can’t listen to him for long.
I love Rev. Al. His is a perspective that needs to be on tv. too many of the Black folk on tv try to hide that they are Black. Rev. AL DOESN’T.
I love him too and am glad he is getting TV time. There are too many black people on TV afraid for their jobs if they just once drop their guard and speak from their heart.
But I listen to Rev. Sharpton on WVON in Chicago and on occasional web videos instead.
Definitely CNN should keep Carville and Begala. Get rid of Brazile, Wolf and Erin Burnett and eliminate all the extra RW pundits (Erick Erickson, Dana Liesch et al) they’ve added in recent times. That includes the Smiling Liar Alex Castellanos.
Keep Piers, a 150% improvement on Lazy Larry King. Of course if Piers doesn’t ask a single non softball Q of George W. tonight, then he might have to go.
CNN also needs to return to having a f/t science reporter for non-medical stuff like space, physics and engineering news.
Msnbc: ease off on all the same political reporting all the time by four or five hosts. Cover foreign news once in a while and get more live shows on the weekend. Those prison doc blocs are or should be a huge embarrassment.
Not much of a Rev Al fan — very difficult to listen to that thick voice for long.
I stopped watching CNN in 2003 because I couldn’t stomach the way they were covering the invasion of Iraq. Come to think of it I stopped watching or listening to all mainstream U.S. news media about that time. Got sick and tired of hearing about how the poor troops were coping with sand in their shorts while they were blowing a country to smithereens and kids were being killed by cluster bombs in their schoolyards.
I switched to Al Jazeera, and never looked back. Ironic that I have to go to the Middle East to get Al Jazeera English, but in the states can get Al Jazeera original (aka Arabic) just fine.