PBS announced today that it plans to overhaul The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer for the 21st century, by instituting some changes to better coordinate the show’s TV and online presence. It’ll also overhaul the newscast for the 20th century, by again pairing Lehrer with a co-anchor—though this time it’ll be rotating co-anchors, rather than a …
News Media
Sean Hannity's Smear of Mustard
On the drive down, we stopped at a TGI Friday’s and I ordered a cheeseburger. When the waitress brought the food I asked her if she had any Dijon mustard. Dan [legislative aide Dan Shomon] shook his head.
“He doesn’t want Dijon,” he insisted, waving the waitress off. “Here”—he shoved a yellow bottle of French’s mustard in my …
Cable News' First 100 Days
Today, of course, news organizations like this one are in overkill mode dissecting President Obama’s first 100 days in office. The broadcast and news networks will all be covering tonight’s Presidential press conference (except Fox network, which will mark Tim Roth’s first 100 days in Lie to Me). While we’re at it, though, we might ask: …
Dead Tree Alert: The Fears of a Clown
My Tuned In column this week peers into the hour of extra-strength apocalyptic demagogue-a-tainment that is Fox News’ Glenn Beck show:
On March 23, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner unveiled the Obama Administration’s toxic-bank-assets plan. The stock markets cheered the news, sending the Dow up 497 points.
This meant one thing:
…
Don't Stop the Presses Over Bogus LA Times Ad Controversy
The buzz of newspaper-critic circles this morning—and, oooh, what exciting buzz that field generates!—is a front page ad in the LA Times for the new NBC cop drama Southland. (You can see it here, in a PDF that I assume will change with tomorrow’s edition of the paper.)
I wrote a column for Salon almost a decade ago when there was a …
MSNBC Picks Ed Schultz, Still Looking for Primetime Host
Fresh off of overtaking CNN for second place in the primetime ratings, MSNBC has struck a deal with progressive radio host Ed Schultz—though it’s to fill the 6 p.m. E.T. timeslot, not the talked-about 10 p.m. vacancy, currently occupied by a Keith Olbermann rerun. David Schuster, who had briefly hosted MSNBC’s 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue …
CNN: The Third Name in News
The ratings results are in for the first quarter of 2009, and they’re not pretty for CNN, which, after riding high for much of the election year, has fallen to third place in the primetime ratings for the first time. Fox News’ primetime is up 24% on the year, MSNBC up 22% and CNN is down 10%. (The one bright spot for the larger CNN …
CNBC: Through the Looking Glass?
Having recently written a column on the anti-Obamism of CNBC in the past couple of months, it’s worth noting that the network seems to be having something of a love-in for the President, his administration and their just-announced toxic-assets plan today.
Mind you, I’m not an expert on the markets or bank policy; I’m not going to judge …
An Hourlong Nightly News. Probably Won't Happen. Should It?
Prominent media insiders–by which I mean “my editors”–are excited this morning over a brief passage in a New York Times article about the success of the NBC news division:
NBC’s surge in the evening has been strong enough for the news division president, Steve Capus, to suggest that NBC is positioned to be the first network to
…
David Simon Goes Back on the Cops Beat
This is what happens when a pugnacious old police reporter finishes his TV show and has some time on his hands. David Simon, frustrated with the reporting follow-up to a police shooting in Baltimore, followed up with the cops on his own. He says he found—true to The Wire—”half-truths, obfuscations and apparent deceit,” and a local …
Report: U.S. Lifting Coffin-Photo Ban
The Defense Department will reportedly announce today that it is lifting the ban on news photographs of the returning of war dead to the U.S. Rather than hash the issue over again, here’s a column I wrote in 2006 about why this is a good idea.
As the HBO movie Taking Chance (based on a true story) demonstrated this month, chronicling …
Someone to Host Meet the Press
It’s official, or at least officially a rumor: David Gregory will be the next host of NBC’s Meet the Press, unless he isn’t. (Other media organizations have been unable to confirm the Huffington Post’s original report, so count it a scoop for HuffPo if it turns out to be true. Update: Politico’s Mike Allen now also reports the same, …
Armed Conflicts (of Interest)
If you have more time on your hands than I do this morning, I recommend David Barstow’s New York Times opus about retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey and how, as an omnipresent military analyst for NBC News, he has advocated military policies that serve the interests of defense contractors—one of whom pays him to do just that, though his …