The Democratic National Convention last week provided an opportunity for MSNBC to introduce themselves to a wider audience. And that they did. The channel was viewed in primetime by more than nine million people during the three days of the convention. That’s nearly 10% higher than the RNC viewership. And for the first time ever they scored a ratings victory over top-rated Fox News for a full week.
With the conventions over MSNBC still has the glow of victory about it. On Monday September 10, Rachel Maddow beat Sean Hannity by 12% in the key 25-54 year old demographic. Lawrence O’Donnell had an even bigger margin of victory (29%) over Greta Van Susteren. And for good measure, the repeat of The Ed Show beat the repeat of the O’Reilly Factor, and Maddow’s repeat beat Hannity’s. That’s four solid hours on top for MSNBC.
These wins were achieved without the help of the convention. And the programs on Fox were stacked with guests that should have been big draws for them. Hannity featured Tea Party darling, Sen. Rand Paul. Van Susteren touted an exclusive with Rep. Darrell Issa who has been hammering the Obama administration over the salacious (and phony) Fast & Furious controversy.
If MSNBC can hold just a portion of these numbers over time, it could signal a turnaround in the cable news hierarchy. MSNBC has not been particularly successful in building their audience, while Fox has masterfully captured the glassy-eyed disciples of conservatism. Time will tell if this is a blip or a trend.
In related news, the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press released their post-convention survey of attitudes and opinions of the candidates and their events. The headline notes that President Obama was overshadowed by keynoter Bill Clinton. That provides a stark contrast for the RNC where Mitt Romney was similarly overshadowed by Clint Eastwood. Who would you rather be overshadowed by? And Fox News viewers affirm Pew’s findings:
The ratings for the cable news networks on day one of the Democratic National Convention are out and they reveal much about the nation’s political divisions.
First of all, MSNBC won the night. That may seem like a given, but in reality that was a steep hill to climb for a network that rarely enjoys a single program win. Last night, however, MSNBC not only beat its cable rivals, but also two of the broadcast networks. They came in second only to their sister network, NBC.
More significant is the fact that Fox News, the number one cable news network, saw a steep decline, coming in dead last. For Fox to lose to both MSNBC and CNN is a rare occurrence and gives us a fascinating look into the audience composition of the network
We know that Fox News is the channel of choice for Republicans and conservatives. Their devotion is almost cult-like. In multiple analyses of Fox’s ratings it is apparent that their audience is fiercely loyal. They are not inclined to switch channels, even to watch a GOP debate on another network. Their core audience is stuck on their channel regardless of what else is on.
During the recent Republican convention, Fox’s ratings were up only slightly from their normal programming. And the network was down only 2% from what they did during the 2008 GOP convention. That’s how consistent their audience is on a regular basis. However, for the first day of the Democratic convention they sunk about 66%. What could account for that uncharacteristic decline?
Obviously the FoxPods were faced with a dilemma. They had no intention of tuning in some other channel. But their pet channel was broadcasting {yuck} Democrats. So the Tea-publicans that make up Fox’s audience sucked it up and turned off Fox. We do not know where where these viewers went, but it’s a safe bet that they did not venture into Lamestream Media territory. Perhaps they had DVR’ed “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.” But they weren’t watching Fox News.
This means that the Fox News audience made a deliberate choice to avoid any exposure to the party they regard as their enemy. They refused to listen to views that Fox has convinced them are dangerous and representative of foreign, Muslim, communist, and godless pagans. They voluntarily separated themselves from the heresy that might have infected their pious souls.
That is behavior consistent with cults. They make a point of disassociating with apostates and blasphemers who might divert them from the true path. Even if those “threats” are close family members. The cult leaders demand strict loyalty. And that is precisely what Fox News gets from their disciples.
Yesterday on MSNBC’s Martin Bashir program, Politico reporter Joe Williams participated in a discussion about Mitt Romney’s tendency to restrict his public appearances to carefully choreographed events and friendly media outlets. It was noted that he has appeared on the widely reviled Fox & Friends 21 times in the last year. Fox & Friends is an avowedly right-wing mouthpiece for the GOP and a program about which even Fox reporters, producers and executives “roll their eyes” when asked about.
Williams noted that Romney’s preference for Fox & Friends, and similarly partisan settings, was interesting because it was “unscripted and it’s the only time they let Mitt off the leash.” He made the point that for Romeny to be successful he needs to broaden the range of people with whom he interacts.
Williams: Romney is very, very comfortable, it seems, with people who are like him. That’s one of the reasons why he seems so stiff and awkward in some town hall settings, why he can’t relate to people other than that. But when he comes on Fox and Friends, they’re like him, they’re white folks who are very much relaxed in their own company.
That is an objectively true statement. Fox & Friends are indeed white folks and they appear to be very relaxed with one another. It is also true that Romney does appear to be more comfortable with people like himself, and he does exhibit noticeable awkwardness when he tries to connect with average Americans. It is that discomfort that has resulted in his embarrassing himself by saying that he likes to fire people, that his friends are NASCAR team owners, that his wife drives two Cadillacs, that corporations are people, and that he’s not concerned about the poor.
Nevertheless, Politico has suspended Williams for these comments. This is another example of the media punishing people for telling the truth about conservatives. It seems that the only people that are ever held to account are those to whom conservatives object. Earlier this year I documented a list of the “10 People Fox News Should Fire, But Haven’t.” Media suspensions have been handed out liberally (so to speak) to Roland Martin, David Shuster, Mark Halperin, and many others. While right-wing malfeasance is ignored or even rewarded. People like Liz Trotta, Juan Williams, Don Imus, and Lou Dobbs, have managed to escape any repercussions from their bad behavior.
A recent incident involving a reporter from Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller illustrates this blatant unfairness perfectly. Neil Munro rudely shouted out questions in the middle of a presidential address. His inappropriate behavior was widely condemned, even by some staunch conservatives. However, rather than suspension, he was defended by Carlson and held up as an exemplary model of journalism. That’s the difference between the right and the left in the media. The right admires and rewards rudeness and dishonesty, and pays tribute to those who engage in it. The left punishes any hint of impropriety, even when there is no substance to it. All that has to happen is for some right-winger to complain.
As for Romney’s reputed comfort amongst his own people, I defy you find a person of color in this photograph taken from his website (click to enlarge), and then explain who he means by “us.”
Today’s big story on Fox News was not about some enormously consequential matter that will affect the nation. It was not about health care or Syria or the national debt. The big story on Fox News today was about one of their competitors. It was about Fox executing a self-serving attack on MSNBC. It was this:
That’s right – Wawagate. This is not a Saturday Night Live parody of Barbara Walters. It is really what Fox considers “news.” The story revolves around a video of Romney that shows him expressing amazement at a touchscreen ordering system at a Wawa convenience store. Fox alleges that MSNBC aired a video of Mitt Romney that Fox says was edited to make him appear to be out-of-touch with average Americans (as if Romney needs any help with that). It isn’t true, as I documented here, but that isn’t the best part of this.
The best part is that Fox is making such a big deal about NBC ignoring the furor over an allegedly misleading video, when Fox itself is ignoring their own video scandal that is thoroughly verified. Last night Jon Stewart exposed the whole scam as it played out on the Hannity Show. So while NBC did nothing wrong, they did at least make reference to the issue on the program where it originated. Fox, on the other hand, has never even acknowledged that a controversy exists. Yet they have the gall to feature a headline like the one above. That’s World Class Hypocrisy.
But that’s not all. Fox Nation also contributed to a string of hypocritical masterpieces. The first being this slander of Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz:
OK. So Wasserman-Schultz is a liar because PolitiFact rated one of her comments as false. The rating could well be disputed based on the underlying facts, but let’s not even go there. Rather, let’s just note that Mitt Romney has been rated as untruthful 54 times by PolitiFact, and 13 of those were “Pants-on-Fire” lies. So what does that say about him? And Fox never bothered to report that. For the record, Romney was less than truthful in 40% of the ratings that PolitiFact made for him. His opponent, President Obama was rated untruthful only 28% of the time (with only 5 “Pants-on-Fire”).
Then there was a story about conservative Democrats who planned on staying home in their districts during the Democratic National Convention:
Fox is apparently all worked up because a few right-wing Democrats don’t think there is much reason to travel to a convention where the outcome is predetermined, and spending a week, and hundreds of dollars, partying in silly hats. Frankly, I don’t think anyone should go to either Party’s convention. They are just choreographed infomercials that accomplish nothing. However, Fox wants to make a point about these lower tier Democrats staying home in order to imply that the Democratic Party’s unity is fracturing. So you might think that Fox would consider it significant that some members of the Republican Party are still refusing to endorse their putative nominee, including Sarah Palin and Ron Paul (who is even continuing to rack up delegates to oppose Romney). But, nope, no story on Fox.
And saving the best for last, Fox Nation is featuring a shocking story by Fox News contributor Michelle Malkin:
Yep. Now Obama is responsible for wildfires in Colorado. I think Hannity actually saw him in the brush with some gas-soaked rags and a Zippo. What’s more, the explanation proffered by Malkin was that there were too few resources for firefighting equipment and personnel. You know, the very things that Obama has been struggling to get Republicans to agree to funding more of. Romney actually came out against such wasteful big government spending. Did Fox report any of that? What do you think?
If Pulitzer gave out awards for hypocrisy, Fox News would have the category sewn up for years to come. It’s getting so that I can’t even get upset enough to post an angry rant because I’m laughing too hard to type. Sure, Fox is still an evil enterprise bent on subverting democracy, consolidating the power of corporations, and advancing the agenda of the GOP (Greedy One Percent), but sometimes it’s just too hard to take these weasels seriously.
Psychological Projection: A psychological defense mechanism whereby one “projects” one’s own undesirable thoughts, motivations, desires, and feelings onto someone else.
For an alleged “news” network whose entire business model is misrepresenting facts, disparaging ideological adversaries, and deliberately twisting the truth beyond all recognition, to brazenly attack a competing network with allegations of similar behavior, is the textbook definition of “projection.” It is also unethical and uproariously funny.
Fox News dedicates its entire broadcast day to unfair distortions and dirty tricks. In recent weeks they have falsely accused President Obama of waging a war on religion for supporting women’s access to contraceptives; weakening the institution of marriage by voicing support for same-sex couples to wed; and unconstitutionally altering immigration law for exercising prosecutorial discretion to prevent young immigrants who broke no law from being deported.
Fox News has been caught airing Republican National Committee talking points as if they were news items, complete with the original RNC typos. They have distributed memos instructing anchors and reporters to use specific language that was advantageous to the GOP. Just a few weeks ago Fox aired a four minute campaign-style video that was an open attack on the President. Fox received so much criticism from the public and their peers that they tried to surreptitiously dispose of it, but not before it was captured and posted online for all to see. That’s the nature of the beast that we are dealing with here.
Yesterday MSNBC broadcast a video that accurately portrayed Mitt Romney as shocked by the technology at a convenience store sandwich counter. The video showed Romney describing his adventure ordering lunch, and using that experience to advocate for the ingenuity of the private sector. Fox News is now alleging that MSNBC inappropriately edited the video to unfairly create an impression of Romney as out of touch with average Americans. Fox said…
“To MSNBC viewers, it appeared to be a 49-second video clip introduced by veteran anchor Andrea Mitchell to illustrate her contention that GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney is ‘out of touch’ – what viewers didn’t know was that MSNBC had selectively edited the clip, manipulating viewer perception and keeping them from hearing Romney’s full message.”
First of all, Romney doesn’t need MSNBC’s help to create that perception. The man known best for saying that he likes to fire people, that his friends are NASCAR team owners, that his wife drives two Cadillacs, that corporations are people, and that he’s not concerned about the poor, is more than capable of demonstrating his own obvious alienation from the huddled masses who don’t happen to have a quarter of a billion dollars.
More to the point, however, the quote attributed to Romney is precisely how MSNBC portrayed it. Here is the whole thing with the part that was edited out in bold at the the end:
“I was at WaWas, I went in to order a sandwich. You press a little touchtone keypad – you touch this, touch this, go pay the cashier – here’s your sandwich. It’s amazing. People in the private sector have learned how to compete. It’s time to bring some competition to the federal government.“
It’s plain to see that the editing in no way changed the context or meaning of Romney’s remarks. With or without the extended segment, Romney was expressing his surprise that such sandwich assembly technology exists. And as if to underscore Romney’s unfamiliarity with the common touch-screen device, he referred to it as a “touchtone” keypad, reminiscent of old telephones from his youth.
Also, in his remarks Romney was making a comparison between a form required for a medical provider’s compensation, and a sandwich order at a convenience store. That is a stupendously inapt analogy. One involves an over-the-counter purchase of a cheap sandwich, while the other involves perhaps thousands of dollars and the need to insure correct administration and to prevent costly fraud. To be sure, there is plenty of room for improvement in how the government operates, but processing health care applications for doctors’ services is not the same as ordering a turkey on rye with mayo.
Fox News simply has no moral authority to judge the reporting on other networks. They have abandoned all pretenses of journalistic integrity and made it clear that they only exist as a propaganda tool for conservative corporations, politicians, and wealthy power elites. For a more accurate impression of the Fox News brand of fairness and balance, watch this video complied by Talking Points Memo.
Last week Dylan Ratigan announced that he would be leaving his program on MSNBC. That leaves a vacancy in the afternoon for the network that could be used as an opportunity to jumpstart their stagnant ratings. Unfortunately, the programming geniuses at MSNBC seem to be more interested in committing ratings suicide.
According to Politico, MSNBC is planning to introduce a temporary program that will feature rotating hosts. Among those being considered are Steve Kornacki, Toure, Krystal Ball, Ezra Klein, and S.E. Cupp.
S.E. Cupp? Seriously? For those unfamiliar with her, Cupp is currently the host of a webcast for Glenn Beck’s GBTV. Why MSNBC thinks that adding Cupp to their schedule will benefit the network is incomprehensible. Do think that the trouble with MSNBC’s ratings is that they haven’t featured enough of Glenn Beck’s conspiratorial Tea Party dementia? Are they concerned that giving three hours every morning to Joe Scarborough, a former GOP congressman, is too little to satisfy MSNBC’s audience demand for right-wing dogma?
More likely MSNBC is adopting the Fox-Lite strategy wherein lazy programmers aspire to emulate Fox’s success with the idiotic assumption that it has something to do with their ideology. It doesn’t. CNN made that mistake and they are now floundering in third place. And falling for this fallacy is even worse for MSNBC because it risks alienating their core audience. Liberal viewers will quickly abandon the network if they perceive it as lurching rightward. And if MSNBC thinks that they will replace those viewers with converts from Fox, they are insane. Fox viewers are fiercely loyal and rarely leave the comfort of their conservative electronic hearth. Even Fox Business Network VP, Kevin Magee, recognized this when he warned his staff in a memo against employing Fox News methods:
“…the more we make FBN look like FNC the more of a disservice we do to ourselves. I understand the temptation to imitate our sibling network in hopes of imitating its success, but we cannot. If we give the audience a choice between FNC and the almost-FNC, they will choose FNC every time.”
It isn’t as if there aren’t plenty of other options. Journalist Joy-Ann Reid is currently an MSNBC contributor. As is Maria Teresa Kumar, who could fill a noticeable absence of Latino hosts in the cable news business. If they are determined to hire a Republican, how about Meghan McCain, the well-connected daughter of a senator/GOP presidential candidate? At least she isn’t kneejerk conservative, Tea Partier with ties to Glenn Beck.
Unless MSNBC is looking to trail Fox News by even greater margins, they should cease to consider S.E. Cupp as a host. Her brand of extremist conservatism is a poor fit for the network and a disservice to its audience. Just the fact that they would entertain the notion is evidence of how pathetically weak the media is and how utterly false the contention that it is unduly liberal.
Obama Derangement Syndrome has spread to infect every cell of the conservative brain. The depth of their sickness has finally become so severe that it negates any hope of recovery.
The “Moonie” Washington Times published an article with the headline: “New Obama slogan has long ties to Marxism, socialism.” There is nothing new about the rabid right’s delusional assertions that President Obama is a Marxist, socialist, Kenyan, Muslim, Anti-Christ, who is conspiring with communists, Al Qaeda, the New Black Panthers (all four of them), and Sesame Street to subvert democracy, indoctrinate our children, and deflower our women. But this particular incident is rooted so firmly in dementia that it deserves closer attention and merciless ridicule.
The problem cited by the Washington Times, and picked up by Fox Nation and Breitbart among others, is that the word “Forward,” used prominently in a new Obama campaign video (posted below), is inherently wicked and representative of dastardly evildoers seeking to establish a tyrannical, Islamic, atheist, caliphate throughout the world – or something. The article states that…
“The Obama campaign apparently didn’t look backwards into history when selecting its new campaign slogan, ‘Forward’ — a word with a long and rich association with European Marxism. Many Communist and radical publications and entities throughout the 19th and 20th centuries had the name ‘Forward!'”
So there you have it. By using a word in the English dictionary that means “ahead, onward,” the Obama camp has revealed their commitment to worldwide socialist rebellion. Never mind that the associations cited in the conservative press are a hundred years old, or that the word has been used in innumerable other contexts before and after those associations. For instance, the pinko Ronald Reagan Society at his alma mater, Eureka College, uses the phrase “Reagan Forward.” Even Fox News used it in their on-air promos:
Initially, when the Obama video was released, the cry from the right was that the campaign had lifted the slogan from MSNBC which uses the phrase “Lean Forward.” That allegation was carried by conservatives from Fox News contributor Michele Malkin to the New York Post to Glenn Beck’s TheBlaze, and others. Apparently that didn’t stir up enough bile among the right-wing faithful, so they had to escalate the attack to suggest this affiliation with ancient enemies.
Ironically, it was Fox News who took great offense to an allegation by John Aravosis of AmericaBlog late last year, that Mitt Romney’s campaign had adopted a slogan previously used by the Ku Klux Klan:
On several occasions Romney included a phrase in his stump speech that closely resembled one that the KKK used frequently in the 1920s: “Keep America American.” Subsequently there was some debate as to whether Romney actually said “Keep America America,” a small difference of the single letter “n” at the end. The outrage from the right was immediate and fierce. How could those awful liberals insinuate that Romney was a Klan member? Fox News was all over the story with even their top program, The O’Reilly Factor, devoting segments to it.
Of course, nobody ever implied that Romney was a Klan member. They merely noted that his campaign had not sufficiently researched the language that they were making such a prominent part of their strategy. And they made the additional point that, if it were a Democrat whose slogan could be tied to some past perceived ignominy, Republicans would have feasted on the gaffe. Aravosis seems prescient in retrospect for having facetiously said…
“In an era in which it’s apparently okay for Republicans to accuse President Obama of being a socialist, I guess we now need to ask if Mitt Romney is a Ku Klux Klansman. Not whether Romney inadvertently is using the KKK’s number one slogan from the 1920s on the stump, no, the Republicans would say, if this were a Democrat, that clearly the candidate was a closet member of the KKK.”
Now that speculation has been made real by a conservative effort to advance their smear campaign against Obama. And their is nothing facetious about the right’s belief that the President is a socialist. When an anchor on MSNBC reported the story about Romney’s slogan, the right swung back hard in retaliation. MSNBC then issued a quick and thorough apology on the air. And that’s where the comparison ends. The right proudly and obstinately clings to their abhorrent missteps – probably because they aren’t missteps, but deliberate slander.
Conservatives have been making unfounded claims that the President is a socialist since before his inauguration. These were not merely observations about similarities in rhetoric, but outright accusations that they assert as fact. And now they are engaging in the exact same tactic that just last December they condemned as character assassination.
This is about as good an example of the ethical vacancy of the modern right as there will ever be. Their fixation on inventing new methods of tarnishing the President has devolved to condemning him for using the English language. So today the word “forward” is off-limits. Tomorrow will it be “progress” or “justice” or “the” or [fill in the blank].
Seriously…these people have totally lost their friggin minds.
[Update] Fox Business Network joins the club castigating forwardness. Tonight Lou Dobbs jumped in with the added attraction of one of Glenn Beck’s surplus blackboards.
If you think that you have been inundated with Republican candidates yelping at one another on television for the past year, you would be right. So far there have been 17 GOP primary debates aired in a campaign season that has seen only two actual elections take place (Iowa and New Hampshire).
Here’s an interesting statistic that isn’t getting much attention. Of the 16 debates held thus far, the three major cable news networks (Fox, CNN, and MSNBC) carried eleven of them. Of those, the breakdown is five on Fox News, five on CNN, and only one on MSNBC.
Date
Network
Total Viewers
Adults 25-54
Jan. 19
CNN
5,022,000
1,717,000
Jan. 16
Fox News
5,475,000
1,573,000
Dec. 15
Fox News
6,713,000
1,865,000
Nov. 22
CNN
3,599,000
1,041,000
Oct. 18
CNN
5,468,000
1,651,000
Sept. 22
Fox News
6,107,000
1,701,000
Sept. 12
CNN
3,600,000
1,100,000
Sept. 7
MSNBC
5,411,000
1,728,000
Aug. 11
Fox News
5,053,000
1,430,000
June 13
CNN
3,162,000
918,000
May 5
Fox News
3,258,000
854,000
What makes this interesting is that the single MSNBC debate drew more total viewers than four out of the five CNN debates. It beat all of the CNN debates in the key 25-54 year old demographic. In fact, in that demo, MSNBC beat every cable news debate except for one (Fox 12/15), despite its broadcast date back in September, before the campaign had begun in earnest.
With that kind of ratings performance you might think that the Republican Party would be anxious to get their candidates in front of such a large audience of engaged voters. You would be wrong. Republicans are not rushing to put their candidates on MSNBC and there can be only one reason. They are scared.
The GOP knows that they get treated with kid gloves on Fox News. It is their home field, it is staffed by teammates, and the stands are packed with rabid fans. CNN bends over backwards to prove they are not partisan, with the result being that they are partisan to the right. They even co-hosted one of their debates with the Tea Party Express, a disreputable political action committee that raises funds for Republicans, but pays out most of the donations to the PR firm that created it. Plus, the GOP knows that they can bash CNN, to the delight of their fans, and that the network won’t lift a finger in its own defense.
That diffidence was in evidence last night when CNN’s John King opened the debate with a question for Newt Gingrich about his ex-wife’s contention that he had proposed an open marriage. Gingrich was appalled that King would start off on such a sordid subject. Frankly, so was I. It was a boneheaded move that could have only resulted in precisely what happened. Gingrich would assert his outrage, the audience would explode with approval, and King would look like an idiot. What other possible outcome could King and CNN have imagined when they brainstormed that idea? It was, plain and simple, a gift to Gingrich.
During the 2008 presidential election, Democrats deliberately embargoed Fox News due to their blatant bias against them. At that time they were accused of being afraid to face tough questioning from Fox moderators. I’m sure those same critics would now regard the Republican candidates as cowards. And Fox News CEO Roger Ailes, who said that “the candidates that can’t face Fox, can’t face Al Qaeda,” surely feels the same about candidates who can’t face MSNBC.
Last year Republicans were advised to steer clear of the “mainstream” media altogether and restrict their debates to friendly venues. Conservative columnist Hugh Hewitt and Breitbart blogger John Nolte were amongst those who advocated this policy. I wholeheartedly agreed with them. Nothing would be better for Democrats than to have the GOP nominate their presidential banner carrier in a series of love-fests that fail to either vet the candidate nor steel him for battle.
But I also knew that they wouldn’t have the guts to follow through on that. They need the media they pretend to hate. So they will continue to fraternize with those they regard as their enemy, except for one particular foe that they just cannot abide. With the primary season winding down, the GOP may succeed in skirting MSNBC until the general election. But they will not skirt the reputation of cowardice that is evident in their evasion.
When Keith Olbermann abruptly departed from MSNBC the network’s schedule was thrust into chaos. Lawrence O’Donnell was moved up two hours. Ed Schultz went from early evening to 10:00pm. Schultz’s old slot was a menagerie that eventually settled on Cenk Uygur for nearly six months.
All of this turmoil occurred at the same time that Glenn Beck was slated for an early termination of his contract at Fox News. That made much of the Fox schedule vulnerable as Beck’s audience formed the foundation for the evening news hour and primetime. So what did MSNBC do to take advantage of this opening?
Nothing – nothing at all. Their schedule barely budged. There were no new face outside of the 6:00pm slot that Schultz vacated, and even those were often familiar faces on the network. This was the best opportunity for MSNBC to challenge Fox during a period of weakness and MSNBC slept through it.
Now MSNBC is compounding their mistakes by (reportedly) replacing Uygur with Rev. Al Sharpton. The circumstances of Uygur’s departure are disturbing, but that’s a subject for another article. While Sharpton can be an aggressive advocate for lefty issues, he is hardly the banner carrier for progressive journalism. With a background predominantly in civil rights and social activism, his lack of experience in broadcasting does not portend well for MSNBC. His areas of expertise are rather narrow and he can come off as bombastic and rigid.
The purpose of a news and public affairs network is the same as any other network – attracting and appealing to viewers. Additionally, a news network must seek to inform and stimulate dialogue. Thus, having a journalist with broadcast experience in the anchor chair gives the program a significantly better shot at success.
MSNBC already has people on the payroll who fit the bill, and also expand the diversity of the roster, which is sorely needed. However, even some members of the National Association of Black Journalists are reticent about Sharpton. Instead, MSNBC should consider someone like Joe Madison, a long-time radio host based in Washington, D.C. with a record of success on the air and in the streets. Another attractive candidate would be Melissa Harris-Perry, a professor of political science at Tulane University and a frequent guest on Rachel Maddow’s program.
Maddow presently has the highest ratings on MSNBC. That makes someone like Harris-Parry particularly compelling. A black woman with intelligence, insight, and personality could reproduce at 6:00pm the success Maddow has in primetime.
Ideally MSNBC could significantly strengthen their lineup by pitting Joe Madison against Fox’s lame Glenn Beck replacement “The Five.” Then give Hardball a single airing at 6:00pm, followed by Harris-Parry at 7:00. Leave primetime in tact with O’Donnell, Maddow, and Schultz (although I wouldn’t mind seeing Schultz replaced by someone like Chris Hayes or – don’t laugh – Anthony Weiner, an articulate, passionate progressive who didn’t really do anything that should forever disqualify him from public service).
If MSNBC is serious about competing with Fox News, they need to consider more dynamic solutions. Al Sharpton is never going to beat Bret Baier. And without a stronger leadin, the primetime schedule is unnecessarily hampered. The network has come close to Fox in important demographic ratings and they could put Fox away if they act now while Fox is wobbly and their management is being investigated internationally. The travails of Rupert Murdoch and company will make it difficult for them to concentrate on issues other than staying out of jail. MSNBC should capitalize on that distraction. The question is: Is MSNBC really serious about competing with Fox News?
The recent May ratings data revealed the weakness of Fox News, particularly when compared to their competitors. But Fox is also getting whipped by an old adversary about whom their CEO, Roger Ailes, once said…
“He openly admits he’s sort of an atheist and a socialist. […] He hates conservative views. He hates conservative thoughts. He hates conservative verbiage. He hates conservatives. He’s crazy.”
That attack on Jon Stewart came right after Ailes said of the folks at NPR that “They are, of course, Nazis.” And who can forget Bill O’Reilly dismissing Stewart’s audience as a bunch of “stoned slackers.”
Well, Stewart is getting the last laugh. His program on Comedy Central averaged 2.3 million total viewers this May and was 19% higher than May of 2010. The Fox News primetime lineup for May averaged only 1.85 million viewers and declined by 10%. In fact, Stewart beat every program on Fox in total viewers except for Bill O’Reilly. However, projections for demographic breaks of 25-54 and 18-49 suggest that Stewart beat even O’Reilly, likely delivering twice as many demo viewers as O’Reilly.
Jason Easley at PoliticusUSA provides additional detail as well as the observation that Stewart’s victory was achieved in the late night time period against Fox programs that air in primetime.
“This is why Fox News both hates and fears Jon Stewart. Not only is he more popular than they are, but he devotes much of his program to exposing the biased reporting of FNC. […] He is literally teaching his audience, which is bigger than FNC’s, how to see through the partisan propaganda that Rupert Murdoch has based his network on.”
The May ratings book also noted that MSNBC is the number one cable news network among 18-34 year-olds. This reinforces the growing conclusion that the next generation of television news consumers is rejecting the Fox News model of a hyperbolic, sensationalized, rabidly partisan, lie factory. Young viewers are clearly more discriminating, more intelligent, and more open to diverse news sources. That is a formula that can only contribute to Fox’s problems as they continue to lose market share.
Fox is a network that relies on a closed loop of information and opinion to keep their audience ignorant and obedient. They can circulate their disciples amongst their own programs, talk radio, and a few sanctioned web sites, but they cannot tolerate free-thinking individuals. The young viewers who made MSNBC first in the category, and those who watch the Daily Show, can’t be fooled into attending Tea Parties or believing that the president is socialist Muslim from Kenya. So the more impact programs like the Daily Show have on illuminating the inanities and hypocrisies of the media, the better for our society, our country, and our world.
This means that the Fox News audience made a deliberate choice to avoid any exposure to the party they regard as their enemy. They refused to listen to views that Fox has convinced them are dangerous and representative of foreign, Muslim, communist, and godless pagans. They voluntarily separated themselves from the heresy that might have infected their pious souls.
The recent May ratings data revealed the