Is Keith Olbermann Actually ‘The Worst Person In the World?’

http://bigjournalism.com/mopelka/20...actually-the-worst-person-in-the-world/print/

Is Keith Olbermann Actually ‘The Worst Person In the World?’
Posted By Mike Opelka On May 2, 2010 @ 1:57 pm In MSNBC | 71 Comments

Did MSNBC’s prime time clean-up hitter go crazy in the locker room last week? That’s the story bouncing around the web and even the New York Times [1]. Olbermann has denied derailing the Donny Deutsch train, but he admits doing nothing to stop Deutsch’s early dismissal from the 3 p.m. time slot. As the Left likes to say, silence is consent, Mr. Olbermann.

What could be so offensive that would have Keith Olbermann (allegedly) going “full diva,” demanding Deutsch get put on double-secret probation? Simply this: the most famous graduate of Cornell Cow College [2]’s name was mentioned in a segment about some of the loudest media voices on the first episode of “America The Angry.” Remember, Keith Olbermann is the guy who spends an hour a night, calling other people names, on a show featuring a segment where he nominates and crowns someone the “Worst Person In The World.”

Perhaps Olbermann’s rage is fueled by fears of his own demise? According to the ratings, Mr. Olbermann’s spot atop the MSNBC Star Chart is in danger [3]:



“During the month of April* MSNBC’s Countdown With Keith Olbermann trailed the Rachel Maddow Show in primetime adults 25-54 ratings, the demo group that news advertisers target.”

Star performers acting like divas and throwing temper tantrums is nothing new in the world of entertainment and sports, worlds where Olbermann has spent considerable time. Many pro sports teams put up with this kind of behavior. However, tantrums are only accepted by ownership/management when the team is winning. And MSNBC is not winning, unless you consider “winning” to mean regularly earning half the ratings of the leading cable news channel [4]. (That would be FOX NEWS, for the record. But they’ve only been #1 for the past 100 months in a row.)

History also teaches us that Olbermann may have started to see his own end coming a year ago when Maddow apparently aced him out of a much-coveted Ben Affleck interview [5]. He stomped his feet, demanded the interview be moved into his show, Maddow and company reportedly said “no” and Keith took some much needed time off, without warning. Gawker.com [6] reported the story, Olbermann denied it, Gawker stands by their story.

In June of 2008, the New York Post printed a story about Mr. Olbermann’s [7] alleged berating of MSNBC staffers when he did not get a first-class seat on a train to DC and ketchup could not be found at the Kennedy Center. Again, Olbermann denies the allegations, the Post stands by their reporting.

Anyone seeing a pattern here?

Angry anchors and testy TV hosts are not breaking new ground. We’ve all seen the YouTube clips of Bill O’Reilly ranting at his staff – Bill even addressed this on his show [8]. However when a network devotes so much time to pointing out the anger of those opposing the current administration’s plans, and how that anger could possibly, maybe, just might have a ghost of a chance of fomenting some sort of domestic terrorism ala Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing… you have to wonder about MSNBC and their apparent, unquestioning support for Keith Olbermann.

 

i'm usually all for looking at sources, but seriously, jlprk, are you denying their transcription of the Brewer quote? Or the Bloomberg quote? Or Katie Couric's non-response?

 

You missed the one saying CNN is the most trusted source in news.

 

Since I've probably only seen 5 Beck shows in my life, can someone enlighten me on what's so bad about him? I mean, the ones I've seen have been "specials" I guess (the one about what Mao, Che and the like actually did to deserve the love they get from quoted members of Obama's administration was interesting) and one that talked about Founding Fathers letters and speeches and documents vs. those of Marxist/Socialist, and how things that the Congress and Administration were saying were much more in line with the latter than the former seemed spot-on and hard to disagree with. Unless you just don't like whoever's on Faux news.

I mean, earlier in the thread some were bashing the website that was "attacking" MSNBC as an in-credible source. Yet all they did was post the video and transcript the words that those people actually said. What's the problem there, and when are we going to get around to discussing "the problem" instead of which biased media source it was first reported by? I mean, is John Edwards' affair less true b/c the Enquirer broke the story?

 

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sho...tt-continues-glenn-becks-audience-swells.html

UPDATED: As boycott continues, Glenn Beck's audience swells

An advertising boycott against Fox News host Glenn Beck has succeeded in keeping most major sponsors from running commercials on his show even as the controversial commentator's viewership has grown.

Beck attracted 2.81 million viewers Monday, his third-largest audience since his show launched on Fox News in January, according to Nielsen Media Research data provided by the network. On Tuesday, nearly 2.7 million viewers tuned in, his fifth-largest viewership to date. And the conservative host got a plug from former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, who urged people to watch his program in a post on her Facebook page.

“FOX News' Glenn Beck is doing an extraordinary job this week walking America behind the scenes of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and outlining who is actually running the White House,” she wrote Wednesday to her 800,000-plus supporters.

Color of Change, an African American political advocacy group, organized the boycott last month to protest Beck’s comment that he believes President Obama is a racist. The group succeeded in securing commitments from at least 36 companies that have pledged not to advertise on his show, including Wal-Mart and Sprint. Some, such as AT&T and Procter & Gamble, were not Beck advertisers to begin with, but their ads had mistakenly appeared on the program. Representatives from those companies reiterated their request not to have spots during his show. Later today, Color of Change plans to announce six more companies that also are declining to be Beck advertisers.

As a result, few major businesses remain as sponsors of Beck’s eponymous 2 p.m. PDT program. On Wednesday, the only big companies with a presence during his show were Bank of America and the Wall Street Journal, whose parent company News Corp. also owns Fox News. The rest of the commercials included spots for gold seller Rosland Capital; Ashley Furniture Home Store; Empire Carpet; Liberty Medical, a diabetes medical supplier; Johnson Law Group, an asbestos litigation firm; “Shadow Government,” a new book critical of Obama published by the National Republican Trust; and the anti-tax group TeaPartyExpress.org.

Fox News insists that the boycott has not affected its revenue, because advertisers have just moved their commercials to different time periods. And for his part, Beck appears invigorated by the challenge. “Even if the powers to be right now succeed in making me poor, drum me out … I will only be stronger for it,” he said on the air Wednesday. “And I will use American ingenuity and my ingenuity to pull myself up, and I will find another way to get this message out, on a platform that will be a thousand times more powerful. Because of my faith, I know how this story ends. The truth will set you free.”

 

^^^ That was about the same time the boycotts started. This is more recent:

http://www.businessinsider.com/fox-news-glenn-beck-ratings-down-by-30-this-year-2010-4

Michael Calderone at Yahoo! News has a similar assessment: "Even with smaller ratings numbers, he's still the second-highest-rated cable news host, behind only his Fox colleague Bill O'Reilly. And Beck's year-to-year drop since April 2009 was more modest than others — 7 percent among total viewers and 6 percent in the age 25-54 demographic (the viewership advertisers most covet)."

Here's how the other cable news personalities are doing, year over year, in April:

April 09- April 2010 in the 25-54 demo:
Fox News' Bill O’Reilly– down 3%
MSNCB's Rachel Maddow – down 8%
Fox News' Greta Van Sustren – down 13%
Fox News' Sean Hannity – down 17%
MSNBC's Chris Matthews – down 23%
MSNBC's Headline News – down 26%
MSNBC's Keith Olbermann – down 28%
CNN's Wolf Blitzer – down 37%
CNN's Campbell Brown – down 39%
CNN's Anderson Cooper – down 41%
CNN's Larry King – down 46%

 

I'm kind of waiting for one of the critics to help me out. I know there are people who don't like Beck, I'm jsut wondering what it is about him. I didn't see the "Obama is a racist" show, but I did see a clip of Van Jones talking about things I would not like my President's advisor talking baout.