Goodbye, Keith

Keith Olbermann left MSNBC last Friday. Apparently, his contract was up and MSNBC chose to not renew it. Does that mean he was fired? I'm not so sure that it does, even though so many media reports say that he was fired (but that's probably because the media sucks and not because it's true). Whatever the reason, he's gone and people are acting like it's a big deal. I'm here to tell you that it's not a big deal.

Do you know how many people watch cable news? You'd think, judging from the way everyone always seems to be going on and on about it, that it was dang near everyone. Yeah, it's not even close to everyone. In fact, it's closer to no one than it is closer to everyone. And MSNBC is no exception. For the week that Olbermann's stint with MSNBC ended, do you know where MSNBC fell in the ratings during prime time? If you guessed anything in single digits, you'd be wrong. No, those spots were taken up by stations like USA, TNT, MTV and Nick at freaking Nite. (I was paraphrasing on that last one there, of course.) According to Media Bistro, MSNBC came in 25th last week. The chart is a little hard to read (is 'Microscopic' a new font?), but it looks like prime time viewership on MSNBC averaged somewhere between 690,000 and 838,000 people. That's nothing. NOTHING. Nick at Nite's prime time viewership is practically double those numbers. But no one is talking about what Spongebob is up to, are they?! (I'm really not even sure what that means.)

You'd never guess that from all that you've heard across the Interwebs, would you? You'd have thought that Olbermann was some sort of liberal god who preached nightly to his masses of devoted followers. But no. In essence, he was spouting off his lopsided rants to an audience that was somewhere around the same number as the population of Baltimore. Big whoop. And now there's talk about him wanting to run for Congress or the Senate or something like that. (I'll support that endeavor only if he can take Al Franken's place. I'm not a fan.) Are you kidding me? I mean, if he wants to run, that's his deal. But I hope he isn't surprised if a whole lot of people have no idea who he is. Ooh! Maybe if he does decide to run for office that will mean that he'll be off the air longer! Run! Run! Run! But in the meantime, I've heard that if he needs a job, the photo below gives an inkling of who might hire him for what.

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That's NOT What Happened!

Have I mentioned how much I despise the media? I do. They suck out loud at times. And the incident I'm about to describe is one of those times.

Keith Olbermann was suspended from MSNBC yesterday. No great loss. I can't stand the guy. But, then again, I can't stand any of those folks who are so one-sided I wonder how they just don't tip right on over in the morning. Olbermann is particularly obnoxious, though. But that's not the point. The point is why he was suspended. And either I'm totally misunderstanding why he was suspended or everyone in the media is blatantly leaving that reason out. And I don't get it.

I'll start with The Huffington Post. Their article starts out: "MSNBC has suspended star anchor Keith Olbermann following the news that he had donated to three Democratic candidates this election cycle." OK. Now over to the LA Times blog which tells us (in an extremely pithy fashion which I appreciate) "Keith Olbermann was suspended because he donated a total of $7,200 to three political candidates who had been on his program or supported by his comments." All right, sir. And even from the New York Freaking Times which begins their article with: "Keith Olbermann, the pre-eminent liberal voice on American television, was suspended Friday after his employer, MSNBC, discovered that he made campaign contributions to three Democrats last month." Do you get it? Do you understand why he was suspended? You do? Trust me. You don't.

All three of those examples that I cited are fairly reputable (to say the least) sources of news. That's what makes me so angry. They're leaving out a key part! And it's the part for why he was really suspended! That's the thing! He wasn't suspended for making the donations! Did you get that impression from any of those sources above? Even an organization called FAIR, which stands for "Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting" got it wrong when they reported "MSNBC host Keith Olbermann has been placed on indefinite suspension without pay in the wake of a Politico report (11/5/10) that revealed Olbermann had donated $7,200 to three Democratic candidates, in violation of NBC's standards barring employees from making political contributions." That's not correct!

What they're all leaving out is that Olbermann was suspended because, according to the president of MSNBC, a one Phil Griffin, "I became aware of Keith's political contributions late last night. Mindful of NBC News policy and standards, I have suspended him indefinitely without pay." And the freaking policy to which he is referring to does NOT bar employees from making political contributions. No, it requires them to obtain prior approval from NBC News executives before doing so.

Do you see the difference? The way that it is being reported makes it sound (because that's how it sounds) like he was suspended because he donated. No. That's not it! He was suspended because he didn't obtain the approval that was required. There's a difference! Am I the only one who sees that? Why is it not being reported that way? Either way, are we supposed to feel sorry for Keith Olbermann? I can't imagine ever feeling that way toward the man. But that aside, what the hell is going on here?!

And it's not just one news source. It's EVERY news source. ALL of them are reporting that he was suspended for making political donations and ALL of them leave off the part about him doing so without obtaining approval. Why are they doing that? It's maddening is what it is. Do I think that he needed to be suspended indefinitely without pay for doing it? Look, it's not exactly like he's a strict news reporter. He's chock full of opinion! That being said, I think it's a bit harsh, but that's not the point. The point is that the media sucks! And on this one, they suck SO bad that I am almost (almost) completely speechless.

We're so doomed. This is a pretty basic concept to try and report correctly, yet everyone has it wrong. If the media can't get this right, how are we supposed to trust them to explain and report on things more complicated than why some jackass got suspended? We can't be expected to do that at all. And it saddens me. Back to you

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More Truth Stretching at MSNBC

How in the world does Keith Olbermann even have a job? OK, maybe that's a bit harsh. (It's not, but I can try to pretend that he has employable qualities that I don't find loathesome.) How in the world does Keith Olbermann even have a job at MSNBC doing anything that involves anything more than pushing a mop? I'm not totally sure of the circumstances which enabled him to have his current job as a newshole for MSNBC and I really don't care. All I care about at this point is what circumstances it will take to have him removed from any sort of a position which involves his conveying information to the public under the guise of it being 'news'.

I'm not a big fan of cable news, mainly because the newsholes that run these shows are abhorrent human beings. They clearly have an agenda, but they act as if they don't. I don't know what purpose that serves, other than it technically allows them to have a job title with the word 'news' in it.They are far more commentary disguised as news than they are actual news. Regardless, I am aware of some sort of childish feud which seems to be going on between Keith Olbermann of MSNBC and a one Bill O'Reilly of Fox News.

I use the term 'feud' to be polite. The more correct but also more crude term for what their deal is would be a pissing match. And it's been going on since 2003! It seems to include little more than each one of them belittling the other one on their show. I don't know if they're holding their urination contest nightly these days, but if it isn't nightly, it's damn close.

And just to clarify, these are two grown men who each have their own cable "news" show. Real mature. It reminds me of the Seinfeld episode where George became obsessed with being able to use his snappy comeback for an insult that happened many days before. It was like he was going to literally explode if he didn't track this guy down and tell him, "Oh, yeah? Well, the jerk store called. They're runnin' out of you!" The problem with that was that the guy was quicker on his feet than George and managed to whip out a snarky comment immediately. When that happens, there's nothing else to do other than tell the guy, "I slept with your wife!" Gets 'em every time. Unless the wife is in a coma. But I digress.)

But here's where it goes from a pissing contest to irresponsible journalism, also known as flat out lying. It even goes past lying. This goes under the category of "Making The News What I Want It To Be" by Keith Olbermann.

It seems that on August 24, Bill O'Reilly made this statement on his show: "They have no audience. Nobody. What you just said is like saying 'All right, the Toledo Mud Hens are going to be mad.' OK? I'm not insulting the Toledo Mud Hens, but they're a Double-A baseball team....What they think about the New York Yankees doesn't matter." Wow. A Toledo Mud Hens reference. Didn't see that one coming. Anyway, that was supposed to be some sort of an analogy explaining why the White House should allow President Barry to appear on Fox News even though it would likely cause the folks over at MSNBC to go ape-dung. It shouldn't matter if the folks at MSNBC get miffed because no one watches them, so who cares if they get upset? Fair enough. Lousy analogy, but fair enough.

Mr. Olbermann over there at MSNBC didn't quite see it the same way that I did. Shocking, I know. He saw it from his perspective. The one he invented. Here is his response that he gave on his show that aired on August 25, the night after Bill O'Reilly made the infamous Mud Hens Comparison (the ol' MHC): "I hate to intrude with the facts but ours is the highest rated cable news program viewers 35 and younger and the highest rated cable news program for all viewers not on Fixed News. And since Fixed News has since now migrated completely over to serving propaganda to tin foil hatters, conspiracy theorists, paranoids and racists it is not a news organization making this show the highest rated cable news program, period." Wait. What now?

Sooooo.....the highest rated cable news program for one age demographic? And you're also the highest rated cable news program amongst everyone who isn't watching Fox News? Well, that right there is an extremely handy exclusion to include! That's like if you're running a race and come in 6th and you say, "I was the fastest runner of all runners not crossing the finish line before I did." How convenient! Convenient perhaps, but hardly true or factual.

In fact, Keith Olbermann is not only misrepresenting the facts, it would appear from looking at the ratings over there at TV By the Numbers that he's flat out lying. According to their data,in the 25-54 age group and the 35-64 age group at 8PM The O’Reilly Factor managed to grab the attention of 3,440,000 viewers (916,000 in the 25-54 range and 1,593,000 in the 35-64 range). Meanwhile, over at MSNBC,Countdown with Keith Olbermann reeled in a comparatively paltry 1,114,000 viewers (323,000 in the 25-54 range and 521,000 in the 35-64 range).

Now, if you're looking at the networks viewership ratings overall, the numbers are a lot closer, with Fox reining in 94.82 million households and MSNBC garnering 93 million households, a difference of only 1.82 million households. I don't know if a household equals a viewer (let's see....three feet in a yard....four quarts in a gallon....takes one to know one....nope, not sure if a household equals a viewer), but if it did, that 1.82 million more that Fox has is just a little bit lower than how many more viewers Bill O'Reilly has than Keith Olbermann does. If I'm going to use Keith Olbermann logic and calculations here, I would conclude that Bill O'Reilly is the reason that Fox has higher ratings overall than MSNBC does. But I'm not Keith Olbermann, thank God, so technically, I won't say it. Then again, you can't go back and un-ring a bell either.

And just to clear things up even more, here are the cable news shows ratings for August 24:

The O'Reilly Factor - 3,440,000 viewers

Hannity - 2,937,000 viewers

Glenn Beck - 2,810,000 viewers

On The Record w/ Greta Van Susteren - 2,450,000 viewers

Special Report with Bret Baier - 2,066,000 viewers

Fox Report w/Shep Smith - 1,860,000 viewers

Countdown w/ K. Olbermann - 1,114,000 viewers

Larry King Live - 1,063,000 viewers

Olbermann isn't just behind in viewers to O'Reilly; he's behind in viewers to almost everyone. Olbermann is just barely ahead of 127-year old Larry King (Barely A-)Live. And those numbers were for the 8pm time slot. If the shows had aired earlier, Larry King might well have beaten Olbermann, as by 8pm, most of the people who watch Larry King (who are at least as old as he is) have been in bed for 3 hours.

For Keith Olbermann to sit there and flat out claim that he has higher ratings than Bill O'Reilly demonstrates that Olbermann has an agenda (himself) and that he doesn't care what the truth is, he will only say what he wants to say and how he wants to say it, regardless as to whether it is true or not. And in this particular instance, his statements are false. For Keith Olbermann to claim that Fox is spouting propaganda to it's brain dead audience just gives you a little insight as to how brilliant Olbermann thinks that his audience is. If Olbermann thought that his audience had half of a functioning brain cell inside of their teeny, tiny little pin heads, he wouldn't be lying to them by providing them with false information about his own ratings.

Olbermann claims that those who watch Fox News are "tin foil hatters". Mr. Olbermann likely knows a little bit about hats as he seems to be quite the asshat himself, specializing in his own brand of asshattery, apparently.

This instance makes twice in the past ten days that a purported news program on MSNBC has deliberately misled the viewers into believing that something was a fact when, in fact (ironically enough) it was not a fact AND those doing the 'reporting' knew it was not factual information that they were providing. While both O'Reilly and Olbermann are being ridiculously childish and using their platform of cable television news programs to hurl insults at each other on a semi-nightly basis, at least O'Reilly (in this instance) didn't lie. The bottom line here is that if you want to watch a cable news show that will give you the facts without distorting them or lying about them, don't turn to MSNBC for that information. I'm not saying you should turn to Fox, I'm just saying that you'll probably want to turn to a channel that has not lied to the viewers in the past ten days. That's all.

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His Shirt Was White

I can go on and on (and I have) about how the media sucks. But this is not a case of the media sucking. This is a case of the media lying. And just because something isn't said out loud it doesn't mean that it is not a lie. IN the case of the media, if you are "reporting" and you are editing, altering, omitting or in any other fashion misrepresenting the facts of anything, then you are lying. And the folks over there at MSNBC are reprehensible "journalists" and liars. (Please note that "liars" is not in quotes.)

The other day a one MSNBC newshole, Contessa Brewer, was doing a story with her cohorts, a one Dylan Ratigan and a one Toure. (That's his name. Toure. That's it. Like Prince. Or Cher. Only he's on MSNBC. What does that tell you? We're doomed, that is correct.) It started out going in one direction and ended up in a completely different direction. Perhaps all of the misdirecting was due to someone having their head up their arse. (Quite difficult to accurately navigate from that position I'm told.) I thought it was going to be on the Second Amendment issue, as there have been folks showing up to places where President Barry is speaking and
they have had guns in holsters strapped to their legs or strapped over their shoulders. My first thought upon hearing this was that the folks who were toting arms were way out of line. Upon further consideration, I realized that we can't just trample all over the Constitution of this fine land because something makes us a little uncomfortable or uneasy. I'm a huge fan of the right to bear arms (and to arm bears). Regardless, I thought it was going to be about that.

Turns out, it wasn't about that AT ALL. Here's what Contessa Brewer opened with: "Yesterday...A man at a pro-health care reform rally just outside, wore a semiautomatic assault rifle on his shoulder and a pistol on his hip....And if the scene looks familiar, that’s because it should, last week a guy stood outside Obama’s health care town hall in Portsmouth, New Hampshire with a gun strapped to his leg and police arrested a 62-year-old before that New Hampshire event for carrying unlicensed loaded gun. And the reason we’re talking about this, a lot of talk here, Dylan, because people feel like, yes, there are Second Amendment rights for sure but also there are questions about whether this has racial overtones. I mean, here you have a man of color in the presidency and white people showing up with guns strapped to their waists or to their legs."

Um, what now? I'm sorry, I mean, WTF?!

Racial overtones?! Racial? Overtones?! So just because there was a white guy carrying a gun outside of where Obama was speaking, THAT implies that there are "racial overtones" to the story? What?

What's that?

Who wasn't?

Who wasn't white? The guy with the gun? Well, that wouldn't make any sense! How could the guy with the gun not be white?! She specifically mentioned that particular guy. And though she didn't say he was a white guy, when she got to her shpiel about the "racial overtones" she didn't NEED to! Everyone thought that the reason that there were "racial overtones" is because she told us that there was a white guy wearing a gun at a town hall meeting where the half-white president was speaking. How can he NOT be white?!

Oh. Well....his shirt was white.

What. The. Hell.

Not only did the trio of false reporting idiots fail to make the viewers aware of the fact that the man with the rifle slung over his arm was a black guy, they also failed to make the viewers consciously aware that they had edited the tape of this particular individual so that you could not tell that he was black.

Now, just because you can't tell that he's black doesn't mean that you wouldn't have been able to tell if he were white, either. IN what I would assume was the only unintentional part of the editing process, you do see the arm of a white guy in such a fashion that you don't consciously think about it, but the arm kind of looks like it could go to the guy with the guy. But that wasn't intentional. I'm positive of it. What WAS intentional was to take the footage which clearly shows that this was a black guy and edit it so that you couldn't tell what the race of the person was and so that newshole Contessa Brewer and her faithful sidekicks, Dylan and Toure, can make this issue about race instead of the Second Amendment. Nice job, newsholes.

What was the purpose in that? Why did they feel the need to MAKE it about race? WHY couldn't it be about the Second Amendment? Was Toure not up on his pop-culture 2nd Amendment references? I've never even heard of that guy until I learned of this atrocity, but he angers me. It wasn't enough for him to back up newshole Contessa Brewer and her reasoning that people were bringing guns to places where President Barry was speaking was because they were angry that there was a black President. No, he had to go just a bit more and suggest that:
"I’m not going to be surprised if we see somebody get a chance and take a chance and really try to hurt him or really-You know, and I mean it’s up to the Secret Service to make sure that it doesn’t actually become history, but, you know, I think we’re going to see somebody, you know, some sort of Squeaky Fromme, some sort of Mark Hinckley figure, because there’s so much anger in the country about him, about what’s going on with government."

:::: sigh :::: (He's pretty skinny looking. I think I could take him.)

First of all, it's John Hinckley. Perhaps he was thinking of Mark David Chapman, the tool who gunned down John Lennon. John Hinckley was the one who shot President Reagan. Squeaky Fromme was a delusional follower of Charles Manson. Is he suggesting that another Helter Skelter awaits us, but this time, at the White House? (Yes, I know she tried to shoot President Ford.) In all of these cases however, there is a common theme. The first one being that they are idiotic comparisons to what is being talked about. The second one is that I don't believe that any of those people had a valid permit for their weapon. But really, neither one of those is the point. The point is that IT'S NOT THE SAME!


Contessa the Newshole EVEN specifically made it a point to make this story about race by asking Toure "...do you think if Barack Obama were white, though...let’s say if it were Bill Clinton – you would not see people showing up with weapons strapped to their legs?" (Does Hillary count for the evaluation of that question? I'm quite certain that after MonicaGate, she probably DID have something strapped to her leg for a while. She probably strapped something to Bill's leg as well, but I don't think it was a gun.) His eventual reply, after Dylan suggested that it was unknowable, was "...that’s hard to say. It is unknowable. But you do see a rise in hate group activity throughout the country."

Oh. My. God.

In a state where you CAN carry a gun out in the open like that, if you have a permit, how does that constitute "hate group activity"? How does that NOT constitute exercising your rights under the Second Amendment? How? Where did they find this guy? 1961?I have no idea what the point of this stunt was, other than to ignore, disregard and blatantly dismiss every single rule of reporting that there could be in order to fabricate (yes, LIE) a story to fit a particular narrative that you have in mind. They simply created their own truths by taking the truth and making it into a lie.

I'm not one to go around and suggest that folks boycott something. Do you know how many successful boycotts of things there has actually been? Ever? Not many. The Montgomery bus boycott is the only one that comes to mind at the moment. Calls for a boycott are generally useless. (Most people have the attention span of a gnat is why they're not more successful.) And I'm not usually one to go around advocating for people to be fired. These folks and anyone else who was involved in the production of that segment should be fired.

This isn't a "I don't like what they said" issue. They're not Don Imus (who, by the way, shouldn't have been fired. He shouldn't have said what he said, but he shouldn't have been fired.). They lied. They purposefully and willfully misled the viewer into believing something that wasn't true AT ALL. It's more than just irresponsible journalism. It's rogue reporting. The media is supposed to be neutral. They are supposed to be presenting the facts without a slant so that people can know what's going on without having to sort through someone's opinion to get to what the issue is about. For some reason, Contessa Brewer and Toure (poor Dylan pretty much just sat there, but it's not like he wasn't aware of the situation) wanted to make the issue of people bringing LEGAL firearms to a public event an issue about racism. Personally, I'd like to know why. I'd like to know why they felt that it was imperative that they not only go that direction with the issue, but do so in a deceptive manner. I'd like to know the answer the that and then I'd love it if they were fired.

Look, when you hire someone for your business, you want to make sure that the person you have in whatever position can do the job. If they can't do the job, are you going to keep them at your business? I don't think that's likely. What if they were lying to you while doing their job? Would you keep them then? I think that's even less likely. Contessa Brewer and the Newsholes (which isn't that bad of a name for a band)cannot do the job that they were hired to do AND they lied to us. If they can't do the job, which they obviously can't, they should be fired.

And if I thought that was going to actually happen, I probably wouldn't have mentioned it until it did happen. But I don't think that's the case. The good folks over there at Politico contacted MSNBC about this issue and they responded that the claim was "utterly ridiculous" and that "Contessa was speaking generally and not about that specific person with the automatic weapon." Yeah. That's why the cropped footage. That's why the not mentioning that there were black people with weapons also. That's why not mentioning that the guy with the gun strapped to his side shown in the cropped footage was black. That's why only mentioning that white people were coming to these public meetings wearing firearms. Yeah, she was speaking generally.

The footage of Contessa and the Newsholes is below. And it frustrates the hell out of me.

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