| To: Bill who wrote (1499) | 3/16/2009 10:46:47 AM | | From: Peter Dierks | | | | Newsweek and Air America Join Forces -- Both Reputations Tarnished
by Seton Motley
03/16/2009
It’s official -- what we the sentient public, doctor and dentist patients in waiting rooms across America and the eight diehards still subscribing have long known: Newsweek is a horrendously biased left-wing rag.
Newsweek announced on Tuesday that they are partnering with liberal radio uber-failure Air America to syndicate their show Newsweek On Air. They are the first outside “talent” to join with the newly rechristened Air America Media (AAM).
Longtime Newsweek On Air producer and host and Newsweek Contributing Editor David Alpern said of the conjoining, "AAM Syndication is a great partner for Newsweek On Air. We look forward to maintaining the same high-quality content, balance, and listener interest that has won our program various awards and a place on so many station schedules, some for nearly all of its 27 years on the air."
After more than a quarter century of their “balanced” programming, I would venture to guess that most of you have never heard of Newsweek On Air. This state of anonymity will likely continue with their Air America Media partnership. It seems they sought to collaborate with an entity whose listenership mirrors their readership – minimal and declining rapidly.
What is it that has Newsweek thinking that Air America Media is such a “great partner?” Is it that they are they looking forward to sharing the same airwaves that gave us the likes of Mike Malloy, who on February 3, 2009 said “the Republican Party needs to be executed, preferably at dawn, preferably without a last cigarette” and the next day proffered “the Republican Party needs to be murdered”?
Or perhaps it’s someone more like Thom Hartmann, who on January 23rd of this year alleged that the 2001 anthrax mailings to then Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy were an inside job designed to scare these two into allowing a vote on the Patriot Act? “Now you tell me that that's a coincidence and I'll tell you, and if you really believe that's a coincidence, I got a bridge to sell ya in Brooklyn.”
Neither of these integrity-riddled broadcasters is still with AAM, which must be a disappointment to the folks at Newsweek. But it is into this cesspool that they are now enthusiastically diving. They must be so proud.
And is the timing of this partnership announcement coincidental, or just really stupid?
The same week Newsweek announces that they now have new skin in the radio game, they use their cover and the accompanying story to bash Rush Limbaugh, the undisputed king of syndicated talk and someone who is ideologically opposed to the magazine's new syndication partner. Thereby hiding their new business interests -- and their old ideological ones -- behind the battered veneer of their journalistic integrity.
It’s Pepsi assaulting Coca-Cola under the guise of objective reporting.
And as if they were priming the partnership pumps, when Air America Radio launched in 2004 Newsweek did a fawning, glowing three-page announcement story featuring host Al Franken -- including a President Bush-mocking “photo illustration” of Franken standing on an aircraft carrier in a flight suit beneath a “Mission Accomplished” banner.
After what we witnessed from the media during their coverage of the 2008 Presidential campaign, these sorts of things are less and less surprising. And we will be seeing more and more of them.
Last year, the press sold out in a whole new way to now-President Barack Obama. They’ve always been this biased; never before have they been this blatant. In 2000, they wanted Al Gore to win; in 2004, they wanted John Kerry to win. But in 2008, they took an active, participatory role in ensuring Obama won. And over the course of their coverage, they became decreasingly concerned about hiding it or who knew it.
So it should not surprise us when things like Newsweek partnering with Air America occur. This is just the official inking of the deal. The agreement had long ago been reached. Newsweek themselves brought on Daily Kos mega-liberal Markos Moulitsas as a contributor in 2007, but claimed to have “balanced” it out by also adding Karl Rove.
It speaks volumes that Newsweek views as equals a man who managed two successful campaigns for the White House and someone who wrote in April 2004 of the Blackwater contractors slaughtered in Fallujah, Iraq “I feel nothing over the death of merceneries. [sic] … Screw them,”
Were we at the Media Research Center to write any of this into our intentionally (and extraordinarily) humorous DisHonors Awards Gala script for next week, at which we make much fun of the unintentionally (and painfully) humorous media, I’m not sure it would play.
For all good humor must be rooted in truth, and this would seem just too… fanciful to be true.
Sadly, it is indeed another frightening reality in the Brave New Post-Obama Media World.
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Mr. Motley is the Director of Communications for the Media Research Center. If you like, or dislike, he may be reached electronically at SMotley@MediaResearch.org.
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| To: American Spirit who wrote (1465) | 3/28/2009 10:50:29 AM | | From: Glenn Petersen | | | | Are you still waiting for Fox News to shrivel up and die?
CNN in third place in prime time for first time
By DAVID BAUDER
March 28, 2009
NEW YORK (AP) — CNN is poised to finish March third in the prime-time weeknight ratings behind Fox News Channel and MSNBC, the first time this has ever happened for the channel that pioneered the cable news genre nearly three decades ago.
CNN says its overall business is healthy and it is not straying from its straight news path. But it is suffering more audience erosion than its rivals since the peak days of the presidential election, further proof that the opinionated prime-time shows on Fox and MSNBC have greater audience loyalty.
CNN's weekday prime-time ratings are relatively flat compared to last year during the primary campaign, up 1 percent from March 2008, according to Nielsen Media Research. Fox's ratings have jumped 30 percent and MSNBC, the new No. 2, is up 24 percent. The biggest growth in cable news is for CNN's partner, Headline News, which is up 62 percent.
Fox remains on a mountain above its two closest competitors, with its prime-time audience in March more than that of MSNBC and CNN combined. "The O'Reilly Factor" has done particularly well, keeping more of its postelection audience than anything else on CNN and MSNBC.
Through Wednesday, Fox was averaging 2.73 million prime-time viewers in March. MSNBC had 1.16 million and CNN had 1.14 million. The March ratings period ends Friday, and it's doubtful CNN will be able to overcome MSNBC.
"The fact that one network may have eked out a slight edge in one small slice of the overall business really doesn't say much of anything," Jon Klein, CNN U.S. president, said on Friday. "It's more clear than ever, given the way that our competitors have positioned themselves, that CNN has positioned itself as the real news network."
Relying on news, rather than opinion, leaves CNN more susceptible to higher ratings peaks during big stories and lower valleys in routine times. Yet it's hard to consider the present — new president, economic turmoil and two wars — a slow news period.
CNN's ratings news "is very significant," said Frank Sesno, a former CNN Washington bureau chief and now a professor at George Washington University. "This is a big problem."
More significant is what CNN's ratings problems mean coupled with the daily drumbeat of layoffs in the newspaper industry, he said. With people more interested in hearing things through an ideological prism as a form of entertainment, it diminishes the value of independent voices giving straight news.
"It's getting harder to do real journalism on television," Sesno said. "This is `man the ideological barricades.'"
Fox is ready to start a new venture Monday, "The Fox Nation," which it bills as an online community that believes in "your right to express your views, your values, your voice." Fox representatives would not immediately return a call for comment.
The most problematic part of CNN's prime-time schedule is Campbell Brown's 8 p.m. show, up against O'Reilly and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann. Brown's audience is smaller than any prime-time show on the three networks, and beneath Nancy Grace's crime hour on Headline News.
Brown leaves for a six-to-eight week maternity leave following Friday's show, and will be replaced temporarily by Roland Martin. Klein said Brown's show isn't in any danger, noting that it took years for Olbermann and O'Reilly to build their audiences and Brown has been in her job for a year.
There's been no talk of moving Grace to CNN, he said. Having Grace's crime-oriented show on Headline News allows CNN to keep its focus on being a news network, he said.
MSNBC's Rachel Maddow is a close third to Larry King, and both are beaten handily by Sean Hannity's new Fox solo show. At the 10 p.m. hour, a rerun of the show Olbermann did two hours earlier has been doing surprisingly well against CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360," leading MSNBC to at least temporarily put on hold any development of a new live show then.
MSNBC chief executive Phil Griffin said the prime-time ratings are an affirmation of the network's decision to go liberal with Olbermann and Maddow. But he also said it pointed to problems at his rival.
"They've got the best brand in news," he said. "CNN, that's better than anybody. But you've got to deliver on that — and they're not. It's a hollow promise."
He compared CNN to ESPN, which started at the same time, saying that, while ESPN has evolved aggressively and remained the leader in sports, CNN hasn't. Their evening lineup of Lou Dobbs, Brown, King and Cooper lacks any consistency or flow, he said.
"What do they stand for?" he said. "That's their biggest challenge. CNN ain't what it used to be, and that has given us an opening because we stand for something and they don't."
Klein dismissed Griffin, noting CNN is beating MSNBC handily when the full day — not just prime-time — is taken into account. He said that for March and the year's first three months, it was CNN's best showing since 2003, when the Iraq War started.
CNN continues to have a greater reach and reputation than its rivals across all platforms, he said.
"When you have other so-called news networks ceding the field of journalism, we are happy to fill that void," Klein said. "It's working for us."
Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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| To: Glenn Petersen who wrote (1507) | 1/21/2010 5:24:11 PM | | From: Sully- | | | | Air America Shuts Down
Air America, the progressive radio network that had only this year debuted in Washington and moved into facilities on Idaho Ave., announced today that it will cease all broadcast operations as of this afternoon, in anticipation of a forthcoming Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing. In a memorandum to Air America staff this afternoon, Chairman Charlie Kireker blamed the "very difficult economic environment" for the demise of Air America, noting that a "painstaking search for new investors has come close several times right up into this week, but ultimately fell short of success." Starting at 6 p.m. EST today, Air America will provide its affiliates a selection of encore programming until 9 p.m. EST on Monday, Jan. 25, at which time "Air America programming will end."
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| To: Sully- who wrote (1508) | 1/21/2010 6:39:17 PM | | From: Bill | | | | What a waste of money and air.
If they had asked about their prospects before funding it, we would have told them that hate radio doesn't sell. And once the screaming stops, what do their leftist hosts have to talk about for the remaining three hours a day? Boring. |
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