Evans Liberal Politics
January 22, 2011
Keith Olbermann out at MSNBC
Keith Olbermann out at MSNBC, The Raw Story, January 21, 2011, by Nathan Diebenow, used with permission, quoted verbatim: Evans Liberal Politics is happy to partner with The Raw Story to bring you cutting edge news.
Final update 11:09 p.m. EST
The liberal host of MSNBC’s “Countdown” has completed his last broadcast for the cable news network he called home for the past eight years.
Keith Olbermann: |
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“Good night, and good luck,” Keith Olbermann said as he threw his script behind him for the last time at the end of his show.
The phrase is one he borrowed from the late veteran radio and television journalist Edward R. Murrow.
MSNBC released a short statement, saying that the two parties had not apparently reached agreement on Olbermann’s contact.
“MSNBC and Keith Olbermann have ended their contract,” the statement said.
It continued, “The last broadcast of ‘Countdown with Keith Olbermann’ will be this evening. MSNBC thanks Keith for his integral role in MSNBC’s success and we wish him well in his future endeavors.”
No further explanation was given.
Olbermann thanked a number of people in his sign-off, but failed to mention any MSNBC executives.
An MSNBC spokesperson told The Washington Post Friday night that the NBC Universal-Comcast merger this week played no role in Olbermann’s departure. MSNBC’s president would not comment.
A second statement from MSNBC concerning line-up changes gave no mention of Olbermann either.
On Monday, Lawrence O’Donnell is on at 8 p.m., Rachel Maddow remains at 9 p.m. followed by Ed Schultz at 10 p.m. Cenk Uygur will host temporarily at 6 p.m.
Following Olbermann Friday night, Maddow did not cover her co-worker’s departure.
Oddly enough, halfway through her show, MSNBC featured an ad promoting Olbermann’s show, according to The Guardian.
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Maddow, appearing as a guest on RealTime with Bill Maher (see embedded video below) live after her show, addressed Olbermann’s departure. Details, though, were sparse.
“Yeah, it’s been a big day at MSNBC. At least it’s been in 15 minutes,” she said.
Maher did not buy Maddow’s explanation that Olbermann and the new company had cuts ties by “mutual decision.”
“That’s always bullsh*t,” Maher said.
“I know very little,” Maddow replied, immediately describing Olbermann’s exit as “very gracious and nice.”
In an early report, CNN’s Anderson Cooper said on his Twitter feed that Olbermann was fired. Raw Story initially reported that Olbermann had quit. However, MSNBC used neither phrase.
Olbermann and management have had a rocky relationship over the years; recently, the host was suspended for two days last November for contributing to Democratic election campaigns against company policy.
In 2008, Olbermann and MSNBC agreed to a four-year contract extension worth $30 million. This past week, the FCC and the Justice Department approved the merger of Comcast and NBC-Universal.
Sam Stein, Huffington Post’s political reporter, said via Twitter that Comcast’s merger had less to do with Olbermann’s exit than with Jeff Zucker leaving his post as president and CEO of NBC Universal.
“Zucker was Olbermann’s protector there,” Stein said.
Mediaite also cast the Olbermann/MSNBC split in terms of office politics.
“Countdown,” the network’s top-rated program, attracted 1.1 million viewers, according to Nielsen. However, Olbermann failed to match the ratings of FoxNews’ most popular anchor Bill O’Reilly.
Media mogul Russell Simmons reacted on his blog to Olbermann’s November suspension by stating that the network would end up suffering.
“Without Olbermann, MSNBC can’t survive – and the voice of progress will fall to the dark ages, when one unholy church dictated a fictional version of the truth,” he said.
Simmons concluded, “Re-instate Keith Olbermann now. I will personally pay his campaign contributions.”
Word is that CNN would not hire Olbermann because of the network’s strict non-partisan editorial perspective.
Olbermann has yet to reveal his plans.
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Here is the transcript of Olbermann’s Final Thought from his final show (see video, above):
I think the same fantasy popped into the head of everybody in my business who has ever been told what I have been told — “this will be the last edition of your show.” You go to the scene from the movie Network, complete with the pajamas and the raincoat, and go off on a verbal journey of unutterable vision, and you insist upon Peter Finch’s guttural resonance, and you will the viewer to go to the window, open it, stick out his head and yell. You know the rest. In the mundane world of television goodbyes, reality is laughably uncooperative. When I resigned from ESPN 13 1/2 years ago, I was given 30 seconds to say goodbye at the end of my last edition of SportsCenter. With God as my witness, in the commercial break before the moment, the producer got into my earpiece and said, ‘Can you cut it down to 15 seconds so we can get in the tennis result?’ I’m grateful that I have more time to sign off here.
Regardless, this is the last edition of Countdown. It is just under 8 years since I returned to MSNBC. I was supposed to fill in for exactly three days. 49 days later, there was a year’s contract for me to return to this 8:00 time slot that I fled years earlier. The show established its position as anti-establishment with the stage craft of mission accomplished to the exaggerated rescue of Jessica Lynch in Iraq to the death of Pat Tillman to Hurricane Katrina to the nexus of politics and terror to the first Special Comment. The program grew entirely due to your support and great commentary. I hope for you too. There were many occasions where all that surrounded the show, and never the show itself, was too much for me. With your support and loyalty — if I may use the word insistence — required that I keep going. My gratitude to you is boundless and you think I have done good here, imagine how it looked as you donated $2 million to the National Association of Free Clinics and my dying father watched from his hospital bed and comforted that his struggles were inspiring such good for people, he and I and you would never meet, but would always know. This may be the only television program where in the host the much more in awe of the audience than vice-versa. We will also be in my heart for that and the donations to the family in Tennessee and these victims of governmental heartlessness in Arizona to say nothing of every letter and tweet and wave and handshake and online petition. Time ebbs here and top the close with more story. It is still Friday. Let me thank my gifted staff and a few of the many people who fought with me and for me: Eric Sorenson, Neal Shapiro, Michael Weiss, David Bloom, John Palmer, Alana Russo. Rachel Maddow and Bob Costas and my greatest protector, the late Tim Russert.
QUEEN
Another One Bites the Dust
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Comcast Merger – Keith Olbermann: Comcast would make MSNBC ‘more liberal’
Evans Liberal Politics
July 24, 2010
Comcast Merger – Keith Olbermann:
Comcast would make MSNBC ‘more liberal’
Keith Olbermann: Comcast would make MSNBC ‘more liberal’, The Hill’s “Hillcon Valley Technology Blog, July 23, 2010, by Sara Jerome and assorted neoconservatives, quoted verbatim:
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Evans Liberal Politics has been in a bit of a ratings slump so we thought we would take this interesting story that should be (in the first place) of a lot of interest to every true liberal, and add to it the responses (comments) of ten of the more (neo)-conservative respondents to this story. It really boggles the mind what some of these meatheads are saying about the merger. With the current pro-corporate mindset that the courts are taking these days, it’s likely that this merger will go through. But at any rate, here’s what ten of the nuthatches have to say about it. Who says politics isn’t entertaining?
"DCMOYNIHAN" says: Give Castro his own show. Or maybe regular remote broadcasts from Venezuala…
CommieCast!
"AL" declares: Only Satan deserves Olberman.
"SUNSHINE CONNIE" elaborates: The only way I can think of to make MSNBC more Liberal would be to fire Scarborough and the few less dogmatic Leftists on his show. He’s a small ‘c’ conservative or “slow-pace Progressive” and the closest thing to the other side they have on air. It could become the Donny Deutsch Show or the Eugene O’Donnel Show. Or maybe they could hire that “Randy (something)” from Air America! Or what about that New Black Panther guy who wants to kill “Cracker-Babies?”
"JEFF" reveals: I’m a one man, man and I’m already secretly married to Barney. Hey, wait just a damn minute…. (slipped something subversive in there, right???)
Now "DWAYNE" is just downright mean: Olbermann’s viewers keep wanting to tax us all for their freeloading, maybe he can be added to the PPV channel for left nuts and D-baggers.
"THE CHEESE" takes a rather mean but humorous approach to trashing MSNBC: Olberman and Maddows are the same person. When “Rachel” comes out it’s really Obermann with his tie off and some mousse in his hair. They also kick him in his teabag prior to the show to raise his voice a bit.
(LOL)
"CHUCKH" thinks he is making a serious comment when he states: Good morning caracas, I just love watchin’ msnbc and cnbc as most of us in our 50′s I remember the cartoons in the 60′s Yogi Bear (bwanny fwank), Yosemite Sam (henry waxman) and many more so who needs news we all know how things turned out for italy in the 30′s and 40′s there is nothing we can do but buy Gold, Silver,Water, Food, Laughter and ridicule. God bless AMERICA. Michael G. McDonald
(Jesus, the guy thinks CNBC is very liberal. Oh, well, there’s room in certain hospital wards for these guys, right?)
"FROM WHERE I SIT" doesn’t think the whole arrangement will go very well for Olbermann: Can’t wait till Olbermann meets Comcast chairman Ed Snider. That should be a barrel of laughs. Mr. Snider doesn’t suffer fools lightly, and he’ll fire an @sshat like Olbermann with a snap of his fingers. (And I’m sure a guy using a moniker like that is really in the know. Right.)
"RSSMITH", apparently making an inside comment on our friend Keith, let’s it be known: This is great…First the screamer moans because there is no ketchup for him, then he gets caught with a woman in New York that he thought was a guy and now this…there is a God!!!
(Now that is just a little mean… Interesting, but mean.)
Finally "DORIS," speaking for all true liberals, lets it be known: Wow…from the hard-right (and reality-deficient) tone of the majority of these posts, Keith-O is doing something RIG…er, CORRECT to get under their skins! …bless him…
He brings comfort to the afflicted, and afflicts the self-aggrandizing Wrong-Wingers. Long may he rage!
That last comment would be just about the opinion of this left-winger, anyway. — Evans Liberal Politics owner Paul Evans.
Eight Years of the Bush Presidency, Summarized: Watch Keith Olbermann – 8 years in 8 minutes, YouTube video – actually this is 9:27. Really kind of says it all.
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