MSNBC: The Place For Politics (And Taped Programming)

I'ts 8:00 pm on the day of primaries in Nebraska, Washington State, Louisiana and Kansas, and MSNBC just started its live coverage. During the day, while CNN was covering the ongoing voting via "Ballot Bowl" and Fox News was doing the same with "You Decide 2008," MSNBC was running taped programming like "Sex Slaves in America" and "Lockup: Holman" and "Born in the Wrong Body," up until 6pm when Tim Russert's show began, followed by a taped documentary on the career of Hillary Clinton, narrated by Lester Holt. Now the coverage is in full swing, anchored by Norah O'Donnell along with Chuck Todd, Lee Cowan, Alex Witt, Eugene Robinson, Pat Buchanan and Rachel Maddow, but earlier today, when Mike Huckabee took Kansas and when Washington — a state where Obama has led in fundraising and endorsements and which has almost as many delegates as New Jersey — was caucusing (in a voting system that tends to favor Obama) and even the U.S. Virgin Islands was getting in on the act, American Samoa-style, MSNBC was off the case. Why, with so many correspondents in the field and what could be a decisive day for the Democrat side going on, was the decision made to go to tape? I asked MSNBC spokesman Jeremy Gaines, who pointed out that the network would be running three hours of live coverage tonight. "We're always live when there's breaking news to report as there is tonight when there are election results to report," said Gaines. (Though I can't help pointing out that Huckabee's win in Kansas sort of counts as news.) Gaines declined to give any other reason for the decision to go to tape; it should also be noted that MSNBC was live during the day of the South Carolina primary.

What MSNBC missed during the day: Huckabee's Kansas win; live coverage of Huckabee addressing CPAC, including this already-widely-quoted line about why he's still in the race: "I did not major in math. But I did major in miracles. And I still believe in 'em!"; Fox News being sure to mention David Shuster's suspension from MSNBC because of his comment about Chelsea Clinton — but did not, however, mention that David Shuster had formerly been at Fox News.

Related:
'Significant Saturday': Three Things to Watch [Newsweek]
Not Super, But Still Important [Forbes]

Comments

[PLUMPLUM]

I was wondering about that kind of nonsensical coverage but with someone like Dan Abrams how could you expect any better. I am still try ing to figure out how he got the job. I don't know how the ratings are going but I am just tired of turning on the TV on the weekend or at night and there are rapists, pedophiles, murderers with there skin peeking out under the multiple tattoos, lesbian and gay lovers in prison9nothing better to do) and I could go on and on. It is sick. Keith Olbermann does bring some sobriety to the station. I watch Chris Matthews spitting all over the desk and the hosts, unintentionally, I'm sure; I sacrifice because I am a political junkie.

I was disappointed that there was no coverage yesterday too. The higher ups are trying desperately to appease the Clintons and save Shusters job. Remember Connie Chung. They are between a rock and a hard place. David was itching to get some attention and it seems that even Nika B. had to try to talk over him during Morning Joe sometimes, or he would have got into trouble from a couple weeks ago.

Anyway, I settled for Huffpost,Politico, CNN and Fox(ok Keith you weren't on).

It was still a beautiful night.

[realpolitic]

Abrams is good and very quick on his feet. He rarely loses a debate because he sticks to his point and is not distracted by conservative misinformation.

[Ohg]

Perhaps by taping programs and limiting the 'good old boys' commentary on race and gender MSNBC will have less to defend.
Ohg
http://thefiresidepost.com/2008/02/09/pimpep-by-david-shuster-and-msnbc/

[Witchitalineman]

I cannot reconcile for the life of me why MSNBC has such a bunch of continuous junk programs (at least to me) with crime and death so high on their priority list, and then expect viewers to watch their political coverage and analysis with credibility. The only program I watch on a regular basis on MSNBC is Keith Olbermann, sometimes followed by Dan Abrams. I have really switched back to CNN with the exception of Lou Dobbs who is off the charts at times but not any worse than Tucker Carlson and Chris Matthews.

[Witchitalineman]

I forgot to mention that I do really like Rachel Maddow. A very smart individual and hope to see her more on Keith's program, if in fact not given a program of her own.

[realpolitic]

MSNBC should lose the junk programming. It is damaging their brand name. Hire a few more reporters if need be and broadcast the news 24 hours.

Lou Dobbs is crazy and his ego is only second to O'Reilly's in the business. Tucker sounds like an eigth grader much of the time. Nah! Nah! Nah! I like Chris a good deal, except for his hatred of the Clintons. Everything Fox is a joke.

[goldman]

BUCHANAN IS RIGHT HOW THIS COUNTRY WILL VOTE..OBAM­A WILL BE PAINTED AS A LIBERAL MUSLIM BLACK MAN BY THE GOP WATCH AND SEE..

[independentrepublicrat]

"goldman" go put on your clothes.

[Witchitalineman]

Screw the GOP. I can think for myself, thank you very much.

[johnpherson]

Do you Buchanan has a problem with that? Really?

[blastocyst]

Will they do it in a timely fashion so as to invalidate his candidacy in the Democratic Primaries ya think?

[realpolitic]

Painted as a "liberal" and as a "Muslim" all in the same breath?

[dbw53022]

I don't find live coverage very helpful. It's reporters interviewing reports until news actually happens. If networks were really interested in reporting, they'd begin coverage when polls closed (or caucuses ended) report the results, interpret the exit polls and help frame the context of the results within the primary process.

All live coverage prior to this is simply like pre-Super Bowl programming. A filler before the main event.

[endymian]

hey what do you expect from msnbc, has anyone looked at nbc? has anyone noted as huffington has for years now, how biased tim russert is and how he stacks his shows with republican and right wing operatives. leaving the nbc co-anchors of the nightly news out of it --brokaw--just wont go away---msnbc offers up a cheap thrill a minute in its funny house/horror show of punditry which include the unfortunate likes of matthews and tucker, both left over from the lets bash bill clinton impeachment era. tucker, only lately seems to be trying to understand why his frathouse style quipping ain't so funny, now that the party is over for the right. and as for matthews, it often seems its part arrogance and part stupidity on his part when he so obviously slants the news---he has been the great unpaid mccain campaign counsultant for the last year--he just keeps singing 'luvin that man of mine"! the reported love affair with julie annie that famous x mayor x dresser never really heated up. even though mccain waffled like crazy when he decided to go middle of the road in 2000 and then realized he had to go far right--to hell in a handbasket--to court the conservative republican base--you know the basest repulicans­---matthew­s still calls him the straight talk express--well with this lover affair there don't seem nohtin straight goin on at all.

but come on folks what do you expect from a punch and judy show that rakes in the dollars by enticing viewers in the off time--which i guess is really the on time on msnbc--by showing us how they daringly capture would be sex offfenders and how our nations prison population makes a ready made cast for nbc's and ge's profit margin. what values, what pillars of journalism this group of hooligans are!

[realpolitic]

NBC and MSNBC are the same outfit.

[okeydokey]

I caught that documentary about Hillary last night and wondered when we are going to see an hour long program about Sen Obama's lifestory. I am quite curious as to what events it would include. What news footage exists from his community organizing days. Are there any clips from his 8 years in the Illinois State House? Is there film of the anti-war candidate speaking out at any of the large rallies that have been held across the country. Maybe someone video taped him typing those manuscripts of his life story?

[hank48188]

They probably don't have any of the footage of him doing any blow or smoking weed, but they might have something when he was involved in the FAITH BASED stuff in Chicago, helping Tony Rezko get those gov't loans to rehab building that ended up abandoned and boarded up. He gave speeches against the war, but when he got to Washington he always voted for funding. I'd love to see those clips in the State House where he claimed to hit the wrong button on tough votes and trys to explain his error to the rest of his peers.

[blastocyst]

or singing 'purple haze' in the shower

[grannysharp]

Their is a OFF button on TV sets so maybe if we used them more or flipped channels the net works would get the idea that their programs need to be changed.

[degjack]

No...just get the crap OFF the airways.
That's a better solution.

[VOTER]

MSNBC has only one hour of airtime, 5 days per week, worthy of viewers and that is when Keith Olbermann is on the air.

Morning Joe is an abomination filled with giggles, back talk, over talking, overblown egos and little else.

The network's Prison Tales/ Crime Penchant is probably successful among America's prison population. LOL
I believe MSNBC advertised a full evening of these shows for Christmas Eve or New Year's Eve. How nice.

With the economy spiraling downward, corporations know the first place to save advertising bucks is MSNBC.

[realpolitic]

Well said! Morning Joe is juvenile, as is Tucker. Scarborough is all ego and little else. He has some feel for what works politically among his conservative crowd.

[independentrepublicrat]

It seems to me that since the Shuster incidence, MSNBC is catering to Hillary demands of NO POSITIVE OBAMA coverage in order to appease Billary. MSNBC has covered all of the primaries live this year but only after the manufactured outrage of the "pimped" turn of phrase, does MSNBC do taped shows with a pro-Hillary documentary on automatic replay (that thing was shown AT LEAST four times in the last 24 hours). Note that had they done their standard live coverage, it would have necessarily been pro-Obama because he swept all four primaries yesterday and the Clinton campaign knew he would as a result of their exhaustive polling.

Looks like MSNBC will no longer strive for neutrality and will become anti-Obama­/pro-Hilla­ry (like all of the other networks except CBS, which has remained professional and netural in their coverage of all campaigns) as the Clintons demand as retribution for the use of colloquial slang by an MSNBC report. The Clintons will score points any way they can and now they are holding a cable network hostage (coincidently, the only cable network that was not definitively pro-Hillary but instead tried to exercise some news integrity with consistent bouts of objectivity).

[SUNRAI]

And for the love of God, he helped me miss all four airings of that Hillster doc block. LOL!

[hank48188]

Well that might be fair if they gave Obama negative coverage for the next three months, I know they have been negative on Hillary for the last three months. On the night of their coverage of the Florida primary for at least the first hour they didn't show any of the results on the DEMOCRATIC side, it was only thr REPUBLICANS. Even though almost 2,000,000 DEMS turned out to have their voices heard the results were not to their liking beacause Hillary was crushing Obama and that didn't fit with their spin. Hillary got the most votes that night, more than ant Republican as well.

[independentrepublicrat]

Actually, they have been solidly pro-Hillary but I don't expect the campaign of perpetual victimization meme to admit to fair treatment.

[viewfromiowa]

We noticed the same thing. It also happened for a while after the forced apology by Mathews. MSNBC allowed themselves to be bullied. Sad. From what I hear from people close to the DNC, many of the DNC and superdelagates are sick and tired of being bullied by Billary. Hopefully, they will have more of a backbone.

Just as an aside, how desperate is it of Hillary that she is constantly plagiarizing Obama?

[lovethesinner]

Someone should write MSNBC and tell them to put a sock in Buchanan's mouth. He spent ALL NIGHT, every chance he got, trying to make the case that WHITE PEOPLE WON'T VOTE FOR BARACK OBAMA.

It was so "Hillarious" (yes, I'm implying that Pat is shilling for Hillary so the GOP can knock her down in the general) that Rachel Maddow, Eugene Robinson, and even Nora O'Donnel would burst out laughing every time he tried it.

Finally, I thought Rachael had delivered the "coup de gras" when she pointed out that Obama TROUNCED Hillary in the WHITEST STATES in America, (Iowa, Idaho, Nebraska) but, Pat (the xenophobe without a cause) Buchanan tried it one last time.

The whole crew just sat in silence.

And some camera man had the balls to cut to all of them looking down, shaking their heads and when Nora O'Donnel noticed, she said, "well, we'll be right back..." and they cut to commercial.

They need to put him down. The foam around his mouth is proof enough. He's in the tank for GE. They want Hillary, and the only thing they can think of is the RACE card.

It's just sad.

[Independent007]

I also noted the continuous race baiting by Buchannan. Yes, the only reason is because they are hoping for a Clinton victory. Common sense tells you that white men are voting for Obama in large numbers. I think Rachael hit the nail on the head, strange that even their African American commentator seemed out to lunch.
Weak coverage unexpectedly so from MSNBC.

[sneezeguard]

You left out one thing.

There's a WORLD of difference between white dems and white republicans, or any other type of Republicans for that matter. They will NOT vote for Obama. I've spoken to normally sane white republicans who swear they would stay home. It's the indy's that are going to decide who's going to take the white house this year. Will the indy's vote for Obama? Probably some will and some won't. This will be a nail biter to be sure.

[Witchitalineman]

Well here's a white person who will vote for Obama.

[SUNRAI]

He's been doing that since Iowa....Bu­chanan does it on Morning Joe...he does it on Hardball..­.he then turns around and does it on Countdown.­..and then they give another chance to do again on Dan Abrams....­it's crazy...an­d NO ONE listens to him.

He's the ONLY one with this nonfactual view. It's crazy. Yet, I've seen Rachel cut Buchanan down and Joe Scarborough has also got a dig on him a couple of times...

[Paulitik]

I love their political coverage. Olbermann's the best, Chuck Todd might be the best political analyst in the game, and I love seeing Rachel Maddow and Pat Buchanan chum around, they have an unexpectedly charming chemistry. But for the love of god, those taped shows SUCK!

[Independent007]

Agreed totally.
And very very disappointed at MSNBC tonight. I hate FOX but I have to admit that even their coverage was better than MSNBC tonight, when they decided to cover the elections after Lockup(man don't they have other stuff to air?).

When all hands are on deck MSNBC is the best hands down. Unfortunately, they all must be 7 Day Adventists, because on Saturday they are sleeping at the wheel when we most need them

[bikerdude]

That might have been true 6 months ago, but now it has slipped badly. Matthews often doesn't make sense, Tucker should just shut up. Keith is great. Rachel is great. Pat wears me out with his obtuse approach to the conservative line. Abrams can show some insight into the news, but then he tries to finalize the presentation in a way to prove his superiority. His ego is a problem. The need new management badly. Their pet pups are out of control and they are not attracting the bright, new commentators we would all like to hear/see.

[loisteagulp]

Perhaps Tweety was still spitting from Shuesters suspension and they didn't trust him to report. Then they were down enough people to go longer no than 3 hrs. I wish I would have known tweety wasnt going to be there. I DO love Rachel Maddow and Pat!

[Rendon76]

Amen, it makes me sick how much they repeat the same shows over and over. Admittedly I like to watch MSNBC the most but when they have "To catch a predator and" and "Lockup" playing on a loop for months and months I have to turn to CNN for live campaign coverage. They really have to try harder to give us more live campaign coverage.

[newamericanrobot]

it's all repuke propaganda anyway.