This and a good portion of the attendent comments enraged me
In recent days, Jonathan Klein signed a four-year contract extension to remain as president of CNN/U.S. Accordingly, Mr. Klein was in a good mood as he addressed staffers during a quarterly Q&A session at the Time Warner Center on the afternoon of Dec. 17.
CNN Worldwide, he told the troops, was enjoying its fourth straight year of double-digit profit growth. “It hasn’t been the greatest news year,” Mr. Klein said. “There haven’t been major news events that have moved the needle. But overall, we’re up pretty significantly, which is nice.”
Klein's idea for boosting ratings was take CNN even further to the right than it already was by adding overpaid, hate belching, kkk scum like Glen Beck and Nancy Grace to the already right wing roster of the main channel and headline news.
CNN was already the station of Lou Dobbs, self righteous hate monger and bigot, spewing erroneous information about the economic system, Zionist Playboy and AIPAC operative Wolf Blitzer and the ever vacuous Anderson Cooper. There is no progressive point of view whatsoever reported on CNN. In fact, there is little news of any kind reported on CNN or Fox or MSNBC. It is entertainment, propaganda and highly filtered pablum spoon fed to those who can't think on their own.
Cable news simply isn't news. Cable news is entertainment and disinformation. And the target demographic is that dumb ass segment of the American public that thinks watching television is a reasonable way to stay informed.
Have you, for example, ever seen a gay point of view on CNN? Or a working class point of view? Have you heard union members interviewed about NAFTA on a television news program? How about working mothers interviewed about the war in Iraq?Do you grasp that the cable news roster of experts are pulled straight from government and corporate offices and other vested interests - though a wider sampling than are pulled by CNN than by FOX news, FOX News which is an absolute joke to anyone with even a modicum of intelligence.
Have you ever seen the Palestinian or even Egyptian view point represented on CNN? Of course not.
Since its inception CNN has reported on the Israeli occupation of Palestine as though it is both just and legal as well as the fault of the Arabs who are invariably portrayed as inferior to westerners and often depicted as terrorists.
Nothing left wing about that BULLSHIT.
How about the lead up to the illegal and immoral invasion and occupation of Iraq for profit? Did anyone on CNN ask a single journalistic question? Hell no. They went right along for the ride as big media has always done and will always do because it is there to serve its own financial interest, not the interest of the public.
In fact the advent of cable news seems to have triggered a decline in IQ points in the United States. People are certainly deeply, seriously, injuriously misinformed. And whether people are stupid, intellectually lazy, just distracted or overwhelmed or some other option, I'm just not sure, but many people tend to parrot whatever crap they're hawking on TV with no thought of their own and without ever seeking information from another source.
My favorite examples of this are Americans who speak of Iraq withdrawal by saying, "They've been killing each other for hundreds of years: they can just keep on." As though westerners haven't been engaged in that same violence, that same killing and the some. As though Muslims are just born bad. As though the problems in the middle east are independent of western interference in those countries.
And the other golden example I so do love was during the lead up and early days of the Iraq war when they average TV watching idiot would invariably say " I want to fight them there so we don't have to fight them here."
Real deep thought that.
How significantly, he didn’t say. But according to Nielsen data provided by CNN, through the end of November, the cable network’s total day and prime time audience had increased by 3 percent overall and 5 percent in the crucial 25-54 demographic versus the same stretch last year.
Still, the network continues to chase Fox News in across-the-board ratings, and at the same time must fend off MSNBC, which so far has enjoyed a 20 percent jump in total year-to-date viewers over last year—thanks in part to the popularity of its late-night “doc block,” which often features grisly true-crime narratives and repurposed Dateline programming.
MSNBC is actually allowing a progressive point of view on the air for a minute or 2 each day. That's why their ratings have jumped up.
“When they do that, they’re really competing with Court TV,” Mr. Klein later told NYTV in an interview in his office overlooking Columbus Circle. “They’re saying, in effect, we give up trying to cover the news in any meaningful way. It enhances our brand. We’re the last man standing in terms of covering the news. We love that.”
In his newsroom talk, Mr. Klein addressed the biggest challenge facing his channel—namely, its long underperforming 8 p.m. slot, which regularly gets trounced by FNC’s Bill O’Reilly and MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann.
Mr. Klein suggested that Campbell Brown’s new 8 p.m. show, set to debut in February, would compete by being “more talk-oriented,” by featuring fewer “formal pieces,” and by on occasion capitalizing on Ms. Brown’s sometimes-comic sensibility towards the news, à la Comedy’s Central The Daily Show. “Jon Stewart should not corner the market on innovative uses of tape,” said Mr. Klein. “He wishes he had access to the amount of material we get in every day.”
In other words LESS NEWS/MORE CRAP
He also laid out some goals for 2008, telling staffers that in the coming year he was aiming for CNN to significantly boost its morning ratings, to win the 10 p.m. prime time hour, where Anderson Cooper currently trails Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren, and to establish CNN as the go-to destination when “people think about watching politics.”
Throughout the afternoon, Mr. Klein spoke of TV viewers not in terms of the usual demographic distinctions, but rather in terms of four distinct archetypes, which, he said, a recent internal CNN study had analyzed at length. He told the staffers that they should not worry about attracting “couch potatoes” who turn on the TV and stick with whatever happens to be on, and “thrill-seekers,” who tune in looking for the ultimate car chase or building demolition. Instead, he encouraged the newsroom to do a better job of attracting “inquiring minds” (viewers looking to ruminate in depth on current events) and “social connectors” (people looking for stories to yap about with their buddies).
Why would anyone with an inquiring mind watch TV at all? TV is made to dumb you down, make you passive, unable to think for yourself so you will buy whatever product is hawked during the commercials and whatever product is hawked during the programing, including fascism.
“The one thing [the latter two types of viewers] have in common is a desire to hear a wide range of opinions,” said Mr. Klein.
Corporate spew and political lies and right wing extremist shit bags do constitute the spectrum of view point.
Speaking to NYTV, Mr. Klein elaborated on his programming philosophy. He said his vision had been shaped, in part, years ago when he worked alongside legendary producer Don Hewitt at CBS. “He had very passionate, larger-than-life journalists,” recalled Mr. Klein, referring to the likes of Ed Bradley and Mike Wallace. “He said his main goal was to choose from the best stories and get out of the way. That was his trick.”
In recent years, Mr. Klein has applied his faith in Mr. Hewitt’s model of charismatic journalists chasing their passions both to CNN’s prime time shows (see Dobbs, Lou, and his nightly discourses on immigration) and to its documentary unit. Mr. Klein said that when he arrived at CNN in November 2004, he discovered a documentary team focused primarily on “arcane” subject matter.
Under Mr. Klein’s direction, CNN documentaries have married high-profile CNN reporters with equally high-profile subjects—Christiane Amanpour and religious fundamentalism, Campbell Brown and political attack ads, Anderson Cooper and the environment. Mr. Klein said he encourages his reporters to draw conclusions in their documentaries—an upshot of which, he acknowledged, is that CNN docs increasingly “step on some vested interests, and they do respond.”
Sure enough, over the past year, CNN documentaries have riled up everyone from media watchdog types to conservative political operatives to MSNBC’s Dan Abrams to professional wrestlers. Mr. Klein suggested that he wouldn’t shy away from the hostile attention in the years to come—and suggested it probably does the network as much good as harm.
“What I love is when our competitors then turn that into segments on their shows,” said Mr. Klein. “They have nothing else to talk about other than who has CNN pissed off today. That’s great. We’ll provide fodder for their programming, as long as they get our initials right.”
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Are you kidding me? The Clinton News Network a real news outlet – give me a break.
CNN is the propaganda branch of the liberal Democratic Party – everyone know that.
If a poll shows increased viewership in CNN its because the libs, dems, and wackos want the propaganda fresh from the horses ass.
Can anyone with an IQ over 95 actually believe anything on any cable news station is liberal? No.
The Clintons aren't liberal. They're corporatist, just not as genocidal as corporatist republicans. Almost, but not quite.
"Documentary" unit? Did these "documantary" makers go to the Michael Moore school of journalism? Does he think Lou Dobbs makes up for the left slant? So deluded. CNN is just as packaged and pimped and cheesy as any of the other cable news outlets. Nice try in an obvious and pitiful puff piece.
Apparently no one on the right has ever seen any documentary other than the quite excellent ones done by Michael Moore. I've had a lapsed republican sit in my very own office and allege things about Michael Moore films that I knew weren't true because I actually watched the films while the republican read about them on Dredge Report or heard about them from Bill O'Liely. And personally I think they hate him because he's fat. Or because they're shallow, poorly educated, emotionally disturbed people who can't get over the fact that people actually have and enjoy sex while the very thought of sex sends them into fits of self castigation so they are always in a state of fury while constantly talking about Jesus.
December 19, 2007 8:55 AM
Interesting development...CNN begins to put some conservative viewpoints on the air (ie: Glen Beck show) and people actually start to tune in.
This may be the dumbest comment of this really dumb batch. As with most right wingers he overlooks facts. The big ratings jump has been at MSNBC which has begun to put a progressive point of view on the air though piece of shit Joe Scarborough and whining piece of shit Tucker Closet Carlson among others are still there.
CNN the last man standing LOL ..
If your definition of a MAN is a queer idiot with an english degree of some campus full of more queer men with english degrees called prof's.
CNN ..LOL if you work there you should Grab a gun and go back to that campus you came from and get even LOL
last man standing LOL
man ...LOL
it s to funny ...
Typical republican clsoet case ahs to be ugly about everyue's sexuality becasu therey are so terrified of their own. Especaily loathesome when there is so much legitiamnte stuff to criticize anderson cooper for. Liek talking about hself cosntantly wheile he is itnerbvieiwg peopel and passivley supportigt eh iraq inbvasion and activley defending CNN's coverage of the lead up to the iraq invasion after Katrina when the Bush Walls beegan coming down inthe media.
FNC has significantly better hard news coverage overseas, for example. Think about the War last summer, Pakistan, Iran. Fox always seems to have a reporter on scene. He is right that MSNBC has decided to not cover the news. Even their "reporters" are now pundits, see David Schuster for example.
This comment was so stupid I had to laugh out loud. FOX is NOTHING BUT right wing propaganda. Any reporting it has done from or about Iran or Pakistan or anywhere else is a perfect reflection of that.
This dude is right...CNN covers the news, as in COVER UP! I will drag up the phrase "fair and balanced" to indicate what you don't get on CNN which is why I choose not to watch it. Anderson Cooper started out okey, I gave him a chance and he turned out to be just like the rest of the liberal media. The media all want to make their fortunes these days which is why they suck up to the clintons. It's the hope of the financial gains when they write about the Clintons that fuels them. The Clinton's mistake it for support.
Fame and fortune will follow the channel and/or reporter who does to the Clintons what Woodward & Bernstein did to Nixon. It's called the "unmasking" or, telling the truth. You decide.
The only way to have a reasonably accurate understanding of what is going on politically is to take in information from a wide variety of sources. This includes reading books, newspapers, web sites, listening to radio and TV, watching documentaries, attending lectures, talking to people and reading analysis from a broad spectrum of opinion. It takes a little time and it takes a little effort. People complain that they don't have time to do this. But the people who complain most of this are people who waste more time in a day than I spend in a week keeping up.
posted by TheFuriousGourmet | 8:32 AM
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