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MSNBC is Not the Enemy

By Jeralyn

What a surprise for me to log on this morning and see all the venom directed at MSNBC and Keith Olbermann. And, for the second time in a week, liberals at odds with liberals in the blogosphere.

I will make one attempt to redirect the conversation and then I'm going back to work.

I do not think Keith Olbermann is a "hack," partisan or otherwise. I do not think MSNBC relieved him and Chris Matthews of anchoring duties at upcoming debates and election night due to pressure from conservatives or politicians.

I think the removal action was the result of pressure from journalists, other media professionals and quite possibly advertisers who convinced MSNBC that the partisan coverage of live news events was tarnishing not just MSNBC's, but also NBC's reputation as a credible news organization. The issue, as I said in my earlier post, is the distinction between anchoring of live news events and talk shows. [More...]

If MSNBC's decision was a repudiation of Olbermann or Matthews, it would have relieved them of all hosting duties, including at their own shows. They didn't.

Cable news, like all television is first about ratings. Olbermann's show has been a huge ratings boon to MSNBC. They won't kill their golden apple. Nor should they.

But cable news is also about image and branding. MSNBC is an arm of NBC News. NBC News is far bigger than MSNBC and NBC News cannot afford to have its image and brand diminished by blatant partisanship of anchors during news events.

MSNBC will continue to back Olbermann in his role as a talk show host. He's profitable for them. But it can't afford mutiny among NBC journalists which is what started to happen as a result of Olbermann and Matthew's anchoring the debates and primary night coverage.

Putting Olbermann and Matthews in anchoring positions was a logical experiment given Olbermann's increased ratings this year. It didn't work. (And Olbermann, to his credit, initiated the discussions with Phil Griffin about the blurring of his roles as anchor and partisan commentator).

The only thing as or more important to MSNBC than ratings is its parent company NBC's reputation as a news organization. That began going down the tubes with Olbermann and Matthews in anchoring positions of live news events. So, they stopped it.

Olbermann and Matthews may not be my cup of tea as talk show hosts as I wrote in my earlier post, but one million viewers a night disagree with me and like to watch him. Obviously, he's been MSNBC's biggest talk show host success to date. They will and should keep him in that role, despite the fact that millions more of us will choose to watch another channel or get our news from the Internet.

This is turning out to be a tempest in a teapot. The issue is only who should anchor live news events like debates and election night, when viewers are tuning in for news, not just commentary. The format has always been journalists as anchors with commentators as analysts. MSNBC broke that tradition this year by putting Olbermann and Matthews in journalist/anchor roles and it backfired big time, not just with viewers but with their own journalists who felt their objective role was being compromised.

Keith Olbermann is a professional, he is not a hack. It's that he's a professional talk show host, not journalist and he shouldn't be put in an anchor chair at a live news event that demands objectivity. That chair deserves a Wolf Blitzer or a Tom Brokaw, not a Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Alan Colmes, Geraldo, Greta, Olbermann or Matthews. (Although I can see Greta growing into that role as she can do both.)

MSNBC has realized its mistake and moved to rectify it. Belatedly, yes. The correct move? Yes. It's the correct move because it's necessary to restore both NBC and MSNBC's image as a credible news organization.

[Disclosure: I was an MSNBC legal analyst from 1996 - 1998, have provided commentary on the network hundreds of times over the past 12 years and Phil Griffin was the one who hired me.]

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 08, 2008 (boomark / email).