I’m taking entirely too much pleasure in hearing today that Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann have been been spanked by MSNBC for their anchoring of the national political conventions in the last couple of weeks. The FoxNews people were positively gloating over it. (Kudos to CNN for not mentioning it, at least not while I was watching.) And for those three people who still haven’t heard about the kerfuffle, the Washington Post explained it at length.
The coverage was amusing at first, although the story was supposed to be the DNC and RNC, not the goobers covering it. Matthews and Olbermann were throwing not-always-off-camera jibes at each other and at their conservative guest panelists, most of whom seemed to be there just as targets for ridicule. I probably mentioned some of this last week when I got so fed up with them and spewed my disgust here.
What I’ve been aware of, and am tacky enough to mention now, is that after Tim Russert’s death, NBC decided to wait until after the election to choose a “successor,” for want of a better word. They brought Tom Brokaw out of semi-retirement to be their primary news guy until then. I’ve no problem with that. I’ve always liked Brokaw. In the meantime, all the other news anchors at NBC know they are in an undeclared contest to be the new top dog.
It is, therefore, a particularly bad time for Mathews and Olbermann to have incurred the wrath of the powers that be. Olbermann was a sportscaster not so long ago, and nobody seems aware that sportscasting doesn’t become newscasting just by changing the label. He’s an abrasive individual who should have stayed in sports. Matthews was my tentative choice before the conventions, although his voice often irritates me. Now, I’ll have to overlook more than just his voice.
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As the first edition of “The Rachel Maddow Show” kicks off on MSNBC, I just want to say I’ve become a big fan of Rachel Maddow this summer and am delighted the network was smart enough to give her her own show. Way to go, Rachel!
I am glad to see ‘some’ of the trash taken out….or at least demoted.
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Me too. By the time the RNC was over, everyone I know — on both sides of the political fence — was screaming about the MSM’s obvious abandonment of any semblance of objectivity or impartiality.
I’m one of the three who hadn’t heard about it. This is because those two are an embarrassment to the profession and I never took them seriously enough to pay attention to them to begin with.
Plus, I’m so burned out on all of this. McCain is a misogynistic, war-mongering ass and Palin is a bible-thumping theocrat. (Yes, I called McCain misogynistic. If people can’t see the patronage in choosing Palin, they’re blind.)
I’m not all that enamored of Obama, although I do like Biden, so they’ll have to do. Everything else is a soundbite. Everything else is drama. Just get us to November already. The lines are clear. If people don’t know who they are voting for by now, they’re clueless because there are very clear lines of differentiation here.
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Just close your eyes, grit your teeth, and repeat to yourself, “It’s almost over, it’s almost over, it’s almost over … ”
Of course, on January 22, it will start all over again … 🙁
It’s about time. Matthews and Olberman are commentators and not journalists. Finally, someone realize this.
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Problem is, if we label all the commentators as “commentators,” we won’t have any “journalists” left to deliver the “news.” At the risk of sounding like the senior citizen I am, there was once a time when editorials/commentary were clearly labeled as such and confined to the editorial pages or their electronic equivalents. What an old-fashioned concept.
I’m not terribly surprised by this with either of these two dudes. They’ve been heading to this place for quite a whiles. Matthews at least, used to be pretty good, Olberman is a mean, nasty clown if you ask me. I don’t think there is any danger of either of these two becoming the top dog, so to speak. None at all.
Annie
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Mathews hasn’t been bad, til now; Olberman has never been any good. They both jumped the shark during the conventions. MSNBC has a problem if they really are trying to position themselves as the fair-and-balanced network. Bringing on conservative commentators just to be punching bags isn’t go to cut it.