CNN

Uh Oh. CNN Takes A Sharp Turn Toward Hell

Posted by on September 25, 2010 at 1:50 pm. 4 Comments :

Remember the old days when CNN was the dominant cable news network? Or the even older days when it was the only cable news network? I didn’t think so. It was a long time ago. Viewers today don’t appreciate how remarkable an achievement it was to launch a 24 hour news channel when nothing like it existed at the time.

Whether or not you like Ted Turner, you have to give him credit for being a pioneer, although given the state of cable news today, I’m not sure he’d want the credit/blame. However, he recognized the unique environment in which his experiment was born, and he further recognized the changes that took place in subsequent years that preclude anyone from ever doing the same (see My Beef With Big Media).

Now CNN is mired in third place, overtaken by a bombastic, right-wing, agenda-driven, Fox News, and a lukewarm, marginally liberal, MSNBC. So it should come as no surprise that the brass at CNN would be looking to shake things up in hopes of recovering their glory days. To that end, yesterday CNN announced that its president, Jon Klein, would be leaving the network. That, in and of itself, would appear to be a routine response to poor performance in the marketplace. The problem here is not that Klein is leaving. It’s who they are elevating to his post that is worrisome.

Ken Jautz, presently the head of CNN’s HLN (formerly known as Headline News Network) has been tapped to replace Klein. He is a brash, iconoclastic, executive who is more interested in ratings than journalism. But perhaps the most disturbing item on Jautz’s resume is that he is the man who brought Glenn Beck to HLN, and to television. Looking back at that millstone in broadcast media is one of the best ways of getting a handle on what may be in store for a Juatz-run CNN. Here is what he had to say upon hiring Beck back in January of 2006:

“Glenn Beck is the next piece of the puzzle,” said HLN prexy Ken Jautz. “Glenn’s style is self-deprecating, cordial; he says he’d like to be able to disagree with guests and part as friends. It’s conversational, not confrontational.”

If Beck is Jautz’s idea of cordial, I hope never to meet anyone he considers to be rude. What’s more, Beck is not known for having guests with whom he disagrees, friendly or otherwise. And the notion that he is not confrontational is absurd on its face. Calling the President a racist; charging that progressives are a cancer; tagging anyone with whom he disagrees a Marxist; declaring his hatred for Woodrow Wilson as well as 9/11 families; these are not behaviors generally associated with being non-confrontational. Jautz went on to say…

“As part of the continued evolution of the network, we wanted another primetime show,” Jautz said. “We didn’t look for a conservative, a liberal or anyone of a particular ideology. It was about getting the best talent that would resonate with the most viewers.”

Well then, it’s a good thing he wasn’t actually looking for a conservative. He would have ended up with a modern version of Attila the Hun (or did he anyway?). It should also be noted that his desire to find the “best talent” who would “resonate” with viewers, was unfulfilled. Beck’s show was a dismal ratings failure on HLN. He would not be a success until he moved to Fox News with its built-in audience of pre-cooked FoxBots.

Given the remarks Jautz made when taking over HLN and bringing Beck into the fold, it is fair to say that he was somewhat disingenuous with regard to his public appraisals. And he was similarly disingenuous in private. In the book “Common Nonsense: Glenn Beck And The Triumph Of Ignorance,” author Alexander Zaitchik noted that Jautz mislead his employers at the time as to his intentions in reforming the channel:

“Facing a staff weary of rumored changes, Jautz gently presented Blue Sky [his programming initiative] as a trial balloon. He promised that CNN standards would not be diluted in the makeover and that soon-to-be-hired Headline News personalities would not appear on traditional CNN news programming. He broke both promises.”

Indeed he did. Glenn Beck not only appeared on CNN, he was permitted to fill in as a guest host on Larry King Live. Taking into consideration the duplicity of Jautz’s comments when he assumed command of HLN, it might be prudent to take note of what he is saying now with regard to his promotion at CNN. Jautz was interviewed by The Wrap and said…

Q: Can we expect a tone change, or any sort of ideological shift?
A: I think that CNN needs to be as lively and engaging and as informative as it is known for its reporting.

Whatever that means.

Q: For a long time, Jon Klein resisted any sort of partisan programming — especially as expressed by the hosts. Can we expect to see more opinions — or at least opinionated hosts — under your watch?
A: CNN has always been about adhering to non-partisan programming in general. And it will continue to be.

However, I do not believe that “facts-only” programming … it will not work. Viewers, if they’re looking for just the news, they can get that anywhere now. The news that happened that day, they probably know already. They want context, perspective and opinion. And we’re going to give that to them. As long as it’s non-partisan, in the aggregate, from all ends of the spectrum.

In other words, we will continue to be non-partisan except when we’re being opinionated. And none of those pesky “facts” that clutter up the news.

Jautz did improve the standing of HLN. But he did it by ramping up the volume with shouters like Beck and Nancy Grace, and by diving head-first into the tabloid world of pop culture and celebrity gossip. Could that approach help to restore CNN’s prior leadership? Who cares? It isn’t what anyone who truly cares about responsible journalism would want.

And that’s the problem with contemporary corporate media: It is more interested in serving the shareholders than in serving the public. Unless Jautz has recently had a revelatory transformation, CNN has taken a giant step backwards by giving him the reins to the network. The prospect of the man who launched Glenn Beck’s television career running a cable news network is troubling, to say the least.

In related news, NBC/Universal has announced that it’s chief executive, Jeff Zucker, will also be leaving his post. This is an entirely different situation than the one at CNN. NBC is presently the number one network in evening news, morning news, and Sunday news. CNBC is still the top business channel. Plus, under Zucker’s reign, MSNBC moved up from third place to second. The staffing change at NBC is due to its imminent acquisition by Comcast. It remains to be seen who will be replacing Zucker.

Sometimes these sort of changes are merely shifts designed to put a new management’s imprint on the merged entity. But Comcast has baggage that makes it important to keep an eye on them. And they will have an unprecedented range of influence as a result of the merger. Stay tuned.

Dumbass Of The Day: Erick Erickson

Posted by on August 14, 2010 at 1:31 pm. 1 Comments :

Congratulations are in order for Erick Erickson of RedState and CNN. He has run away with today’s Dumbass Award despite many deserving contestants. Here is a series of Tweets from Erickson that lowered him to the depths of depravity:

How exactly do our founding principles require the President to support a mosque at ground zero?

People citing freedom of religion as the reason Obama says our founding principles *demand* he support the mosque are not that bright.

Paging the Church of Satan: Our founding principles demand Barack Obama support your rights to human sacrifice. Carry on.

Paging random religious sects that still practice polygamy: our founding principles demand Barack Obama support group marriage.

Paging Islamofascists: Our founding principles demand Barack Obama support Jihad.

First of all, Dumbass, The mosque is NOT at ground zero. It is three blocks away. Secondly, our founding principles include the free exercise of religion. You may not think that supporting the First Amendment is bright, but that’s just your dumbassedness clouding what remains of your reason.

Finally, your comparison of constructing a legal building to human sacrifice, polygamy, and terrorism, all of which are against the law, demonstrates how worthy you are of this award.

Congratulations Dumbass.

America Hates The Media – Thank You Fox News

Posted by on August 14, 2010 at 12:39 pm. 5 Comments :

A new survey by the Gallup organization reveals that Americans have all but given up on old media services like newspapers and television. Only about 25% of respondents say that they have a “great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in either. This puts the legacy media on a par with perennially hated institutions like banks, HMOs and congress.

It isn’t difficult to surmise the reason for this deep distrust. While the media has long been held in low esteem, there was a noticeable decline that began in the mid-1990s. Since that time confidence has dropped about 30%. And just as a point of interest, Fox News launched in 1996.

There isn’t really anything coincidental about it. Fox News has always had as its purpose the discrediting of news as an institution. I made the case for this last year in Fox News Confidential: The Truth Behind Its Secret Mission:

The real mission of Fox News is [cue trumpets] to so thoroughly tarnish the practice of journalism that majorities of the public would recoil in disgust at all of it. Murdoch and Ailes knew that the introduction of a single cable network would have a difficult time enshrouding the whole of the mediasphere in their veil of lies. So rather than try to change people’s minds, they would endeavor to poison the relationship that people have with the press.

Mission accomplished. By trivializing journalism with tabloid-style sensationalism, and diluting its authority with speculation and hyperbolic opinion, Fox has succeeded in producing large majorities of the American public who are now repulsed by the “mainstream” media that barges into their homes every day. The lies Fox News spews are secondary to the campaign of defamation that they launched against the media as a whole. As a result, their fictional accounts of current events are more enduring because people are paying less attention overall.

The saddest part of this scenario is that the non-Fox media have essentially cooperated with Fox’s disparagement of them. Rather than defend themselves and the integrity of their profession, they went along and allowed Fox to create the negative impressions that are now dominant in society. Even worse, they actually helped to reinforce those impressions.

The Washington Post apologized for not covering more of the fakery of Andrew Breitbart. CNN bent over backwards to endorse the wacko wing of the right by hiring RedState’s Erick Erickson. MSNBC continues to host disreputable characters like Joe Scarborough and Pat Buchanan. And everybody persists in covering non-entities like Sarah Palin and the Tea Party. With respect to the latter, Sarah Palin just came in fourth (pdf) amongst Republicans in a preference poll for 2012. And the Tea Party registered a measly (pdf) 30% favorable rating with an even smaller percentage (25%) saying they would vote for a candidate with a Tea Party affiliation. Yet these two subjects get wall-to-wall coverage across the media spectrum.

Perhaps if newspaper and television reporters would cover issues that actually address the interests of their audience they would not be so universally reviled. If they could manage to resist the melodramatic minutiae that Fox News has embraced they could recover some of their lost respect. And above all they need to put objectivity and honesty at the top of their agenda, not ratings and revenue.

In other words, if they deliver a product that is informative and useful, and contributes to people’s lives, profits and popularity will follow. If they continue to pursue the Fox model they will only succeed in further damaging their reputation and their prospects for the future. To say nothing about the damage they are doing to a country whose democracy relies on a well-informed population.

The Opportunity At CNN: Replace Campbell Brown With The Daily Show

Posted by on May 19, 2010 at 6:15 pm. 6 Comments :

CNN Daily ShowNow that Campbell Brown has announced that she will be signing off of her CNN show, CNN has an opportunity to advance the state of journalism. They are the network that claims to be the champions of straight news and they dismiss the partisanship that is so deeply ingrained in Fox News and, to a lesser extent, MSNBC. So if they are serious, they need to take a long, hard look at themselves and begin to construct the sort of ethical news enterprise to which they claim to aspire.

The first thing they need to recognize is that they presently have no exclusive claim to being non-partisan. The only difference between them and their competition is that their hosts are not overtly partisan. But the substance of many of their programs is just mashed together panels of left and right pundits who argue with one another. That’s not non-partisan, it’s multi-partisan. More importantly, it’s not journalism.

If they are serious, CNN needs to fill this timeslot with a program that doesn’t seek to attain some sort of fabled balance. Balance is a phony metric. Journalism is not served when you balance reporting about say, the dangers of cigarettes, with a segment about how smoking cures cancer. The standard should not be balance, it should be truth.

One of the best examples of truth-telling in the media today is The Daily Show. Sure it’s funny and the correspondents are clowns (which is something they have in common with Fox News correspondents), but there is a determined effort to cast aside bullshit and back up their humor with facts. The technique of juxtaposing video of a politician making contradictory statements was a Daily Show innovation that has been picked up by some “real” news programs.

Am I seriously proposing that The Daily Show replace Campbell Brown? Let’s just say that I’m only half joking. It’s important to note that The Daily Show is not a news information show, in that it is not a collection of reports about what happened during the day. There is a presumption that their viewers already know what’s going on. It is also not political satire. It is media satire. Almost every segment is about how the media covers stories rather than the content of the stories themselves.

I think that a daily program that addresses the way news is presented would be a welcome addition to CNN’s schedule. By eight o’clock in the evening there has been plenty of time to observe and critique the reporting that occurred during the day. If they need additional time they could do the previous day. This would be more than a dry exercise in fact-checking. While taking a more sober tone than Jon Stewart, it could still be a raucous affair that would be both fun and enlightening. They could use dynamic and fast-paced Entertainment Tonight style graphics and charming, but well informed, hosts. They could even bring in special correspondents on occasion (I would recommend Stewart or other actual Daily Show personalities).

This show could provide true competition to the O’Reilly/Olbermann/Grace block that dominates the time period. It could also be a bellwether program that holds the media feet to the fire. They would have to play fair and include CNN’s flubs. Preferably it would be produced independently. But if they executed it right, I think many viewers would find it a refreshing change from the shoutfests on the other cable nets. Then CNN could use it to anchor a slate of truly responsible newscasts.

The only question is: Are the program executives at CNN smart enough to listen to me? Of course, they probably don’t even know I exist. Consequently, look for CNN to add another interminable hour of John King.

Fox News Ratings Dive: American IQ Rebounds

Posted by on April 28, 2010 at 12:34 pm. 32 Comments :

Fox News Tea BagThe latest quarterly Nielsen ratings reveal a promising trend in cable news viewership. This has been a challenging time for all media and, while cable has been relatively stable, it has not been immune from a general advertising slump and softening audience.

While all three of the major cable news networks suffered primetime declines, MSNBC held its audience best, losing only 6% in the past quarter. By comparison Fox News dropped three times as much (-19%), and CNN collapsed (-40%).

CNN’s woes are not particularly surprising. They have utterly failed to define themselves in this era of advocacy journalism. Their approach to a middleground, news-centric broadcast is admirable, but poorly implemented. If they were truly interested in focusing on straight news, they would abandon the pretense of balancing every story on the basis of partisanship and instead balance it on the basis of truth. In other words, stop booking liars just to have a counter-argument. If one guest says the moon is a barren, rocky satellite, you do not need an opposing guest to assert that it’s lime Jello. Or if you do host the lime Jello spokesman, at least offer some post-debate analysis that makes it clear that the Jello argument is known to be false.

MSNBC has benefited in an ironic way by not having had a meteoric rise. Their numbers have been depressed by poor cable coverage and placement on premium tiers. As a result, they have had less distance to fall. Their performance appears to be better on a relative basis simply by maintaining a steady course.

More surprising is the precipitous drop at Fox News. They have been enjoying a surge in the past few years, even when their competition was hurting. For them to get hit so hard this quarter is a significant development. Fox has relied upon a fierce sense of loyalty on the part of their viewers to prop up their ratings. I have described it as something of cult (the Cult of Foxonality) wherein Fox viewers are actually more devoted to the network than to any political party of philosophy. The ratings this quarter suggest that the hold that Fox has had on its audience is weakening.

As evidence of Fox’s diminishing influence, take a look at their biggest star, Glenn Beck. He has lost fully one third of his audience since the beginning of the year. Apparently people are tiring of his redundant, hyperbolic screeds pronouncing that half of the Obama administration are communists and the other half are Satanists. He may also have lost viewers when he called the President a racist and when he insulted Christians by warning them to flee their church if it practiced social justice.

Beck has other problems as well. He has undoubtedly been hurt by an advertiser boycott that has seen a couple of hundred advertisers swear off his program. In the UK he is airing with no advertisers at all. In this environment, how long can Fox News justify keeping him on the schedule? They waved off the ad boycott by bragging about his ratings. With neither ads nor viewers, the only thing they have left is an unpopular clown act that is descending further into televangelism with every episode.

The dilemma for Fox News is complicated. From the start they have been on a mission to advance the conservative philosophy of their owner, Rupert Murdoch, and his henchman, Roger Ailes. Unfortunately for them, they have failed miserably in that regard. They threw everything they had at the Democrats and still lost control of Congress in 2006, lost the White House in 2008, and lost the health care debate in 2010. Despite their ratings dominance they have not been able to convert it to their electoral advantage. What happens when their ratings dominance is gone?

The battle within the Fox executive suites will be one that pits the accountants against the ideologues. And let’s face it, in the rarefied air of Fox News, the accountants are toast. My money is on Fox News doubling down and expanding their partisan rhetoric. That’s what they’ve done in the past. In the months leading up to and following the Obama victory in 2008, Fox didn’t bother to recognize a national trend. Instead, they fortified their conservative flank by signing new long-term contracts with Ailes, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity. They axed Hannity’s foil, Alan Colmes. They hired reinforcements like Beck, Mike Huckabee, Karl Rove, Dana Perino, Judith Miller, and Sarah Palin. They are not the sort of competitors that back down in the face of adversity – or reason.

If Fox does escalate the wingnut war, they are making a poor bet. They already own the franchise on rightist zealots and are unlikely to gain viewers in that demographic. More likely they can expect to see their ratings decline further. Americans are sick of the divisive ravings of partisan shills who have to resort to making things up in order to sway the debate.

The good news is that since the audience for Fox News has declined, the collective IQ of the country has risen. OK, I made that up, but it seems entirely plausible. Fox News viewers have been shown to be notably less informed, or more misinformed, than the viewers of other networks or the public at large. So it stands to reason that the fewer people infected with Fox lies, the more intelligent we are as a nation. And going forward that can only be a boon to the development of public policy and to democracy itself.

Who’s Afraid Of Fox News? A Confederacy Of Cowards!

Posted by on March 12, 2010 at 3:08 pm. 9 Comments :

The national embarrassment to honest journalism that is Fox News continues to contaminate our country’s airwaves with false and misleading information designed to promote a conservative Republican agenda and to demonize Democrats and progressives. Almost a year ago I wrote an article that asked the question: “Who’s Afraid Of Fox News?” My answer was: “The Rest Of The Media!” It was an examination of how Fox aggressively attacked their competitors and how their competitors simply rolled over, apparently afraid to fight back. Now, a year later, not much has changed.

Sure, there have been a few disjointed, lucid moments. For instance, Rick Sanchez of CNN, who called out Fox for a thoroughly dishonest report that claimed that no one but Fox covered a Tea Bagger event in Washington. However, not only did CNN cover it, Fox used photos from CNN’s coverage to make their false claim that there wasn’t any coverage. Another example was when former White House Communications Director, Anita Dunn, honestly told Howard Kurtz that Fox News operates as “the communications arm of the Republican Party.” Her remarks were seconded by Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod. It was a promising trend.

But overall, there is still a deafening silence from most of the press. They still seem to be skittish and reluctant to offend the mighty Fox. That is, when they aren’t trying to emulate it. One voice that has arisen is that of Howell Raines, the former executive editor of the New York Times. He has written an op-ed for the Washington Post that is far more insightful and combative than anything he produced when he was at the Times. The article asks some questions that ought to have been asked long ago by every member of the media who values journalistic integrity:

Why don’t honest journalists take on Roger Ailes and Fox News?

Why haven’t America’s old-school news organizations blown the whistle on Roger Ailes, chief of Fox News, for using the network to conduct a propaganda campaign against the Obama administration — a campaign without precedent in our modern political history?

Why has our profession, through its general silence — or only spasmodic protest — helped Fox legitimize a style of journalism that is dishonest in its intellectual process, untrustworthy in its conclusions and biased in its gestalt?

Why can’t American journalists steeped in the traditional values of their profession be loud and candid about the fact that Murdoch does not belong to our team?

Why indeed? And why has it taken so long to ask these questions? And why aren’t all of Raines’ colleagues signing on to his rebuke of Fox, Murdoch, and Ailes? It shouldn’t take much courage for responsible journalists to defend their honor, but courage is in short supply in today’s press corps.

The sooner the rest of the media come to grips with the fact that Fox is NOT a news organization, the sooner they themselves can return to the business of news. Fox is in an entirely different category. It is a hybrid entertainment/soap opera/televangelist network. It is just as unnecessary for the media to worry about competition from Fox as it is to worry about competition from Nickelodeon (which, ironically, is a better source for news than Fox, and plays to a smarter audience).

It will be interesting to see if the questions Raines raises are taken up by others. And more importantly, will they provide answers? American media is in dire condition, and part of the reason is that news consumers do not perceive value in the product. That is going to have to change before things improve. And the most fruitful change would be to start behaving as real journalists and not tabloid sensationalists. In other words, abandon the Fox model and expose it for the phony, divisive, disinformation factory that it is. Of course, that would take real reporting and, at present, there is precious little of that in evidence.

CNN’s Howard Kurtz On Glenn Beck, Fox News And Whores

Posted by on November 29, 2009 at 4:21 pm. NO Comments :

Today on CNN’s Reliable Sources, host Howard Kurtz raised an issue of obvious hypocrisy on the part of Fox News. The segment addressed an incident a couple of weeks ago when Rep. Alan Grayson referred to an aide to Fed chairman Ben Bernanke as a “K Street whore.” Fox News jumped on the comment and repeatedly criticized Grayson for making an insensitive and sexist remark. Grayson has since apologized.

A few days ago Glenn Beck used similarly offensive language when referring to Sen. Mary Landrieu. Beck said that Landrieu was “hooking” but “not cheap.” Kurtz took this opportunity to upbraid Fox News for being less than fair and balanced because they didn’t report Beck’s remarks or criticize him. Beck has not apologized.

I suppose I shouldn’t complain that Kurtz properly observed Fox’s hypocrisy. However, Kurtz left something out of the story that many people might consider relevant. You see, Mark Halperin, editor-at-large and senior political analyst for TIME, had something to say about Landrieu as well. He posted this modified photo of the senator on his TIME web site, The Page.

Why didn’t Kurtz take Halperin to task for a visual commentary that was just as offensive and perhaps more repulsive? Could it have anything to do with the fact that Kurtz’s employer, CNN, is owned by Time Warner, and so is Halperin’s employer, TIME? It is unlikely that Kurtz was not aware of the Halperin incident, as it caused such a ruckus he was forced to remove the picture.

Kurtz’s impartiality has been questioned on numerous occasions. Most frequently with regard to his role as a media analyst for both CNN and the Washington Post. Critics have complained that he cannot serve both masters and expect to be regarded as thorough and neutral, while he insists that he has always been tough on every news enterprise on which he reports. However, in this case, he blatantly lets his corporate cousin off the hook.

If Kurtz wants to be taken seriously, he needs to begin acting like an impartial observer. All that he accomplishes with this sort of hackery is to embarrass himself and the news bureaus that employ him. But on one level we can have a fair measure of confidence: When Kurtz reports on the behavior of whores, he knows what he’s talking about.

To his credit, Kurtz did challenge Jim Geraghty, the right-wing lip-servicer from the National Review, who tried to excuse Beck’s boorishness, by saying…

“Oh, I see, Grayson should be held accountable because he’s an elected official, and Glenn Beck is in the gasbag business, like many of us on television.”

That’s telling him – and yourself too.

CNN Contributor Is New RNC Communications Director

Posted by on November 24, 2009 at 9:57 am. 1 Comments :

The Republican National Committee just hired Alex Castellanos to head their communications efforts. Castellanos replaces Trevor Francis who was fired because he wasn’t getting RNC chair, Michael Steele, enough publicity.

This appears to a move toward a more aggressive posture by the RNC. Steele has been wildly ineffective in his role as chairman, generating more ridicule than anything else. His response to that is to bring in a media enforcer to harden the GOP message machine.

Castellanos is best known for his scorched earth and racially charged themes in his political campaigns, including those of former Sen. Jesse Helms. For several years Castellanos has been another talking head on CNN’s political panels even though he has remained a paid advisor to Republican candidates and causes. This has always been a clear violation of journalistic ethics, yet CNN has compounded their ethical blindness with this announcement:

“Castellanos is a CNN contributor, but the network learned independently of his new role at the RNC.”

So even though Castellanos is a CNN employee, he did not inform his bosses that he was assuming new duties on behalf of a political party. CNN had to learn this from someone else. And still, there was no indication in the announcement that CNN would cut Castellanos loose from his role as a commentator. Apparently having partisan conflicts of interest is not a problem for CNN, even when they are deliberately withheld.

Well, that’s the “liberal” media for ya.

Media Matters: A Tale Of Two Networks

Posted by on November 12, 2009 at 5:59 pm. NO Comments :

I was going to write a piece similar to this one that I found at Media Matters. However, Simon Maloy has so perfectly articulated everything I had to say on this subject that I just copied and pasted his article. I hope he doesn’t sue me.

Consider for a moment the circumstances surrounding Lou Dobbs’ abrupt departure from CNN, announced last night and effective immediately. Dobbs had been going increasingly far afield in
his programming, from spinning North American Union conspiracy theories, to indulging the Birther nonsense, to claiming that his opponents had taken to shooting at his house (the police said it was likely an errant bullet from a hunter’s rifle). Notably, CNN itself debunked each of these stories. According to the New York Times write-up of Dobbs’ exit, Dobbs’ on-air behavior was apparently too much for the network to bear: “Months ago the president of CNN/U.S., Jonathan Klein, offered a choice to Lou Dobbs, the channel’s most outspoken anchor. Mr. Dobbs could vent his opinions on radio and anchor an objective newscast on television, or he could leave CNN.”

Now, contrast CNN’s Dobbs situation to Fox News and its handling of Glenn Beck. In terms of delusional conspiracy-mongering and spittle-flecked invective, Dobbs is a stripling compared to Beck. Fox News’ steady transition from untrustworthy cable news network to conservative political action committee can largely be attributed to Beck, whose 9-12 Project is wrapped up with the Tea Party movement. Except for those that buy into his fevered shtick, Beck is an embarrassment, an embodiment of everything that is wrong with cable news, and there is no greater example of this than when he called the President of the United States a “racist” who has “a deep-seated hatred for white people.” The network lost scores of advertisers over that remark, and, as NBC’s First Read pointed out, “[t]here was a time when outrageous rants like this would actually cost the ranters their jobs.”

But what happened to Beck? He got a pat on the head from NewsCorp president Rupert Murdoch, who said Beck “was right” to call the president a “racist.”

CNN’s movement on Dobbs was long overdue, but they eventually decided that their credibility as a news network outweighed Dobbs’ (rapidly dwindling) ratings. Fox News, on the other hand, shows no such concern with Beck, maybe because they didn’t have a whole lot of credibility to sacrifice in the first place.

Well said, Simon.

Lou Dobbs Runs For The Border: Yo Quiero Zorro Noticias

Posted by on November 11, 2009 at 10:50 pm. 9 Comments :

CNN’s resident immigrant basher and birther booster, Lou Dobbs, has announced that he is leaving the network effective immediately.

This comes as somewhat of surprise, as Dobbs was considered to be secure in his position despite significant protest from civil rights groups. But it is hardly out of the blue. There has been frequent speculation about Dobbs’ future with CNN. His opponents have mounted well publicized campaigns to persuade CNN to drop the anchor. And many observers have thought that he would be a better fit for a right-wing network like Fox, particularly its struggling business channel. A Fox News spokesman (not a notoriously credible source) said that there have been no discussions with Dobbs. However that would contradict reports a month ago that Dobbs was seen dining with Fox CEO Roger Ailes in September.

However plausible a Fox/Dobbs partnership may appear, Dobbs’ on-air farewell struck a tone that suggested another possibility entirely:

“Over the past six months it’s become increasingly clear that strong winds of change have begun buffeting this country and affecting all of us, and some leaders in media, politics, and business have been urging me to go beyond the role at CNN and to engage in constructive problem solving as well as to contribute positively to the great understanding of the issues of our day.”

Dobbs went on to lament what he called “the lack of true representation in Washington, D.C.” There was an unmistakable ring of political aspiration in his remarks. Does this mean he might seek political office? Dobbs lives in New Jersey where they just elected a new governor. The next available senate seat doesn’t come up until 2012. It seems unlikely that Dobbs would give up a multimillion dollar TV gig for anything lower.

If I had to guess, I would venture that he may want to mount an independent campaign for President in 2012. While there would be no realistic scenario in which he could prevail, it would be just the sort of thing to stroke his immense ego. And there is a vocal and motivated minority that is primed to get behind a third party protest candidate. He would sweep up the Beck/Palin malcontents and, in all likelihood, smooth the way for Obama’s reelection.

Closer to home, CNN now has a hole to fill at 4:00pm. Judging by their past timidity, it is unlikely that CNN will replace Dobbs with a partisan from either side of the aisle. The last opening they had was given to Campbell Brown, who is notable for…um…..

If CNN is serious about establishing itself as a straight up news provider in contrast to the modestly left-leaning MSNBC and the raving histrionics of Fox, they will need to find an anchor with journalistic bona fides. They will need to avoid the trap of personality-driven spokesmodels. It would be wise for them to build an investigative news group as the central point of their programming. Adding more news readers like Blitzer or Cooper simply won’t lift them from their cellar dwelling. They need to demonstrate that there is a place for reporting that is probing and informative. And that passion for journalism is not twisted into rancorous blathering.

That’s a tall order, but getting rid of Dobbs is a step in the right direction. Now they have to show that they can embrace this opportunity and aim for something higher. Yeah, I know…I’m not holding my breath.

Update: CNN has announced that their own John King will replace Lou Dobbs. King is an old-school, straight news reporter. This means that CNN is properly moving away from the Fox model of news screeching, but it also means that they are probably not planning on innovating and advancing the state of media. Oh well.