MSNBC Vs. Fox News/White House

The feud between GE/NBC/MSNBC and the White House/Fox News has intensified. Below, five links that encapsulate Tuesday's developments in the MSNBC vs. Fox News/the White House saga:

• White House's Gillespie Takes NBC News Complaint To Fox (click to watch video):

  Appearing before Fox's Megyn Kelly, who seemed to have a palpably difficult time wrangling her own sense of skepticism, Gillespie complained of how MSNBC dared edit their interview, and how they were forcing viewers to use "streaming video" to see the unexpurgated session between Bush and Engel. He said that NBC News cut the interview "very artfully" - you know, like a White House sponsored Video News Release? - and that the news organization engaged in "deceptive" "masking" - like, say, the White House/Pentagon "message force multiplier" program did!

  
  

• NBC News President Steve Capus Responds To Ed Gillespie's Charges:

  Mr. Gillespie,

  
  I'm in receipt of your email and want to assure you we take this matter very seriously.

  
  We appreciated President Bush's decision to do the interview with NBC News, and believe Mr. Engel's reporting accurately reflects the discussion with the President.

  
  Let me assure you, there was no effort to be "deceptive," as you suggest. Furthermore, the notion this was, "deceitful editing to further a media-manufactured storyline," is a gross misrepresentation of the facts.

  
  

• Olbermann Responds To White House NBC Complaints: The President Doesn't Know What He's Talking About (click to watch video):

  Olbermann aired the full excerpt and blasted the White House saying, "The White House apparently [doesn't realize] that in full, it is clear the President never actually answered Richard Engel's first question and clear that the President either does not know what he talked about or what he is now talking about."

  
  

• Steve Doocy Blasts Keith Olbermann: "A Guy Who Picks On People's Children" (click to watch video):

  "I have a problem with Keith Olbermann," Steve Doocy said. "Keith Olbermann made my son the world's worst person. How can you make a kid the world's worst person?" Doocy asked. "Next time you see Keith Olbermann on TV, just remember: that is a guy who picks on people's children. He completely sandbagged my son, took his comments out of context, and mangled them around the way he does every night. And I am mad at Keith Olbermann."

  
  

• Is MSNBC A Political Liability To NBC?:

  Monday's letter from the White House aide Ed Gillespie to the NBC News president Steve Capus was a high-profile complaint about NBC News and MSNBC -- ­ but it was far from the first.

  
  Critics are increasingly citing MSNBC for what they say is left-leaning partisan political coverage and commentary. More and more, NBC shares staff, office space and an identity with MSNBC, exposing the news division to complaints about opinionated cable hosts like Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews.

  
  Mr. Gillespie's letter -- although focusing on an interview conducted by an NBC correspondent on Sunday -- purposefully tied the news on NBC and the opinion on MSNBC together. The letter requested reassurance that Mr. Olbermann and Mr. Matthews, who are vocal critics of the Bush administration, "don't hold editorial sway over the NBC network news division."

  
  

Comments

[unscum]

Hurray,

Keith Olbermann is doing awesome, 1244000+578000 viewer verses O'Reilly's 1673000+864000 and Anderson Cooper's 742000+546000.

Congrats Keith, you are going to beat O'Reilly this election season!

Cable News Ratings for Friday, May 23

8PM - P2+ (25-54)
The O"Reilly Factor- 1,673,000 viewers (273,000)
CNN Election Center" 715,000 viewers (208,000)
Countdown w/ Olbermann " 1,244,000 viewers (452,000)
Fast Money- a scratch with 119,000 viewers (63,000) **Ran from 8-8:30PM ET
High Net Worth- a scratch with 107,000 viewers (a scratch with 42,000) **Ran from 8:30-9PM ET
Nancy Grace " 461,000 viewers (100,000)

10 PM P2+ (25-54)
Crime Scene " 826,000 viewers (177,000)
Anderson Cooper" 742,000 viewers (264,000)
Countdown w/ Olbermann " 578,000 viewers (239,000)
Donny Deutsch- 136,000 viewers (67,000)
Nancy Grace " 265,000 viewers (98,000)

11 PM P2+ (25-54)
The O"Reilly Factor (repeat) - 864,000 viewers (247,000)
Anderson Cooper " 546,000 viewers (249,000)
MSNBC Investigates- 374,000 viewers (202,000)
Mad Money- a scratch with 67,000 viewers (a scratch with 30,000) **Ran from 11-11:30PM ET
High Net Worth- a scratch with 67,000 viewers (a scratch with 34,000) **Ran from 11:30-Midnight ET
Showbiz Tonight" 355,000 viewers (173,000)

Nielsen TV Ratings Data

[Gericault]

Billo - "The Frank Burns of Cable news" that was my favorite

[swift_goat_pet_for_truth]

I wonder if this guy was upset when the right wing went after 12 year old Graeme Frost in the S-CHIP brouhaha last year.

I bet he thought 12 year olds were fair game.
I bet he never said a word. Well, maybe he applauded.

[fitfavored]

Fox news is the lowest form of journalism - like MAD Magazine imitating TIME. How many blond women do they have on that staff?

MSNBC - Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews are sexist pigs. We get it you hate Hillary!

CNN - puts me to sleep...We are over that "Magic Board" already!!!!

[Grulg]

Olbermann's penchant for turning into Obamamann just made me wanna hurl. He's the guy who just this week while talking to another, Noted_Obama sychophant-Eugene Robinson-that 'Hillary's wins in KY and WV don't mean anything as the GOP will win those anyways in the fall-hello WV is HARDLY a red state guys-" yet a couple months ago, there was Keithey spooging all over Prince Obama's little WYOMING win....urm.....yeah Keith. Losses in PA and OH and TX and KY and etc. don't mean anything, but BOYS white people in Oregon liked Obama so THERE! it don't matter none.

I actually like Keith-but he's lost his credibility here bigtime. An Obama circle-jerk, get yers right here w/ Arianna and Keithey. GAG.

[cla62]

If only someone watched msnbc. Truly sad, ratings losers night in and night out, but they still pretend to want to play with the big boys!!

[freedomisnotfree]

Really??? I watch MSNBC every day and so do many of my friends. Where did you get the idea that no one was watching...the Whitehouse's right wing propaganda machine Fox?

[V4Vigilance]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

I watched some of the interview and it was a hoot, the intellectual equivalent of "Bambi vs Godzilla". It was all that lame interview on Politico wasn't. A true "emperor has no clothes" moment, if ever there was one.

Oh, and Ed Gillespie can go "Cheney" himself. What a bombastic toady.

[LCRover001]

Normally when Bush is interviewed he receives the questions that are going to be ask before hand. What may have happened here is that the tail end of that question was left out of what Bush received. He was unprepared and ambushed by the Obama question. Instead of thinking on his feet he replied with his rehearsed answer and grudgingly carried on.

The interviewer should have said thank you but you didn't answer my question. While I dislike shady editing what I have read was edited had little to do with the point of the question which was were your statements about appeasement directed at Obama. Bush ran all way round the question and just regurgitated what he said in Israel. The reporter should have called him out on this and pressed the issue. Instead he backed off because Bush was becoming noticeably irritated about how the interview was going.

The dust up over this is as ridiculous as Bush"s answer to the question. We know what you said and we know what you meant by it, what we want to hear is the truth because we also know who it was directed at. Why lie about it? Bush and his followers have been doing it for 6 years now, so why act like they aren"t now? Since 9/11 anyone who disagrees with how the administration wants to handle things is a terrorist appeaser or supporter. So why act like they aren"t doing it now?

[syllepsis]

The Administration is aghast that Olbermann refused to be a "message force multiplier."
To tell the truth, I'm glad to see the Admin writing the "strongly worded letters" for a change.

[syllepsis]

In the Bush Administration's collective, delusional mind, the media lost the Vietnam War.
Note that peculiar addendum to Gillepsie's letter asking about that "civil war" phrase. Sorry, but WORDS don't make reality- it's the other way around.
I suppose, too, that Bush's economists blame NBC for the state of the economy.

[KQuarksSuperKollider]

It was simply not fair to have one network in the tank for the Republican party and the other networks actually tried to be fair to both parties. Something obviously had to be done. I am proud that for the most part MSNBC has taken up that mantle for the Democratic party and progressive causes. If the media was not going to be fair intranetwork at least they are more fair now internetwork, especially when right wing radio dominates that part of the media.

[the964kid]

NBC/MSNBC 1
white house/fox news - 0

You're always going to be on the losing side if you're making the same argument that the worst president in american history, George Bush, is also making.

[cla62]

Yes, it's Bushs' fault nobody watches msnbc. How could they be up one when nobody even seen what happened. LOL. Ratings losers. You have to have viewers to make a difference!

[proudloudlib]

O. M. G. !!!

"... complaints about opinionated cable hosts like Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews."

Because none of the other stations have opinionated hosts, do they?
Lou Dobbs
Glen Beck
everyone on FOX

They have to begrudge us the one reasonable opinion out there. I think they are afraid someone will listen.

[swift_goat_pet_for_truth]

Right wing toadies are OK.
Never forget that.

[mahalosili]

1.
Bush is back tracking and twisting the meaning his speech in Knesset, and asked for Faux Noise's help to do just that. WHY? Is it because Bush angered (not just) Americans - both on the republican and the democratic side - but also the people around the world? Does the group of angry people include Egyptians who described Bush as "a failed president who delivers nothing but a lousy speech?" Or maybe a state-owned newspaper also from Egypt that said "Bush aims to do nothing but appeasing Israel?" Hmm. Did the current administration finally realized that McDumdum Sr. made a grave error when he delivered that speech in Israel and now in desperate need of cover-up stories?

[mahalosili]

2.
Bush and fixed noise's strategy right now is to attack MSNBC for covering the story of McShame Sr.'s dumbness in which the purpose is to divert attention and portray MSNBC as a less than trustworthy newscast.

From what I've seen MSNBC especially Keith and Chris are eye openers to millions of viewers, and that's what's f***ing alarming to the BUsh administration and his personally managed station - foul news. People are waking up from the lies and the hex they cast over us. They're losing their control over the 'American robots' and are witnessing an ever shrinking right-wing-robot-base. Heck! I would be alarmed my self if I was a right-winger! But I'm not and actually glad all this is happening. The More curious audience for MSNBC the better!

This is an on going war. Which side are you on?

Knowledge is power. GO Keith! GO Chris! Go MSNBC!

OBAMA '08!
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/05/17/africa/ME-GEN-Egypt-Bush-Press.php

[psmarc93]

God bless Keith O. -- his very first Special Comment about Rumsfeld calling critics of the war "traitors" was like someone opened all the windows in a house filled with gas. Fresh air. I wept. Keith was the first to stand up to the White House propaganda and say the Emperor has no clothes. I've watched him loyally ever since.
BUT... that having been said, every since Rush Limbaugh made ad hominem acceptable and O'Reilly made screaming fashionable, the entire tenor and quality of debate in America has been debased and it even extends to Keith. I find his sports-caster announcer's voice grating and his frequent stoops to name-calling beneath him. I am not impressed by taunts at O'Reilly as "Fallafel Boy" or "Loofa Boy." O'Reilly is an ignorant bully and a tool, the facts daily prove his worthlessness and danger to the American forum of information. "Loofa Boy" doesn't make him seem worse to me. It takes Keith down a peg.
Call me old-fashioned, or even out of touch, but reasoned debate MUST be polite, respectful and based on facts. As soon as fallacies such as ad hominem enter into the fray, the user should be banned for the duration of the argument. Think of how that would kill Fox News.

[Gericault]

I agree that the name calling takes the debate down a peg.... but it is entertaining. I admit I do love it.

[fignozzle]

i wept too.

[radiojunkie]

^^^^post of the day^^^^

[delphillips]

Of course a lot of MSNBC is entertainment, but so is FOX. Come on, Hannity yelling down someone or Bill-O calling someone a pinhead isn't entertainment? As far as I'm concerned, MSNBC has found a great mix between entertainment, fact and opinion in their programming, especially election coverage. How can you get anymore extreme opinions from the likes of (the AWESOME) Rachel Maddow and Pat Buchanan? So what if they lean a little left; Fox doesn't lean right? And who wants to watch the monotone Wolf Blitzer anymore on CNN? Talk about appeaser! All I can remember is the tail-between-his-legs Blitzer when Cheney scolded him for the lebian questions. Wolf is a hack and most (not all) of those on CNN lack a lot of the passion for politics that I'd prefer.

Go MSNBC!

[nyckingpin]

I watch Keith almost every night, I'm a big fan, but I DO get the impression from him that he has somewhat of a favorable bias towards Obama. However, I won't go as far as to say he or MSNBC at large is "in the tank for Obama". Are they a little left leaning? Yes. So what? They're closer to the journalistic center than Fixed News can ever dream of being.

[Susani]

Oh my God, what are you drinking? The Koolaid again? Anyone who agrees with KO must have the hateful mentality that he has. He is a pompass ass, and a liar. And those that agree with him don't know their facts.
And if you don't think that MSNBC is not in the "tank for Obama", you don't know good journalism, which is very rare anymore.
If Fox is "fixed news" then MSNBC is "fake news"

[Grulg]

Keith Obamamann is SEVERELY in the tank for Lord Prince Obama. Das News is SEVERELY in the tank for the GOP. Deal with it.

[JamesEB]

Sorry, Douchey, but a 20 year-old is not a child, buy any standard. If you're going to put your son out there to ask idiotic questions and generally behave like the typical FNC apparatchik, then he's fair game. Douchey, Sr.'s outburst was truly embarrassing.

[fignozzle]

if his son is old enough to kill iraqis for bush, well then...........

[tlcutter]

You people are all a joke. You actually enjoy watching adults bicker like 4 year olds. And you morons pick sides defending one from the other.Children it is time to grow up.
When was the last time you learned anything useful watching any of these guys. GROWUP. LOL

[Johnbo]

Oops, that comment was directed to MutualDistain.

[IslandGyal]

Keith Olbermann has the neo-cons for lunch; I LOVE it!

[Kari422]

I guess the White House forgot. This is America and one of our rights is freedom of speech. I know Bush thinks he is a dictator. This country is founded on the principle of the rights of the people. To all like minded liberals "Power to the people"! 2009 a change is coming. Big hugs.

[IslandGyal]

Steve Douchie put his son up to discredit the Dems, what he got from his attempt in the BIG boy world of politics and the media, he should take, without daddy coming to his rescue.

[toby25]

Keith Olbermann is a complete hack and irritating as hell. Him and his "special comments" what a tool.

[ENK727]

I think he's hysterical. I actually enjoy watching the news again. I love when he does the various voices for O'reilly, Beck and a few others.

[Johnbo]

I eagerly await your detailed critique of his comments on the fabricated outrage created by the White House over the editing of Bush's remarks. Please tell us how NBC was biased.

Thanks in advance for your prompt reply.

(chirp . . . chirp . . . chirp)

[frappe]

Keith's "Special Comments" are special. Yes, indeed. :))

[NHGranite]

Can't stop watching, though, can ya?

[ProfEvil]

The truth must really hurt.

[wellinformed08]

So all I got from this is that it's ok for the White House and the Right Wing to have their opinions and truth twisters and spin scientists sponsored by FOX and led by Sean Hannity (who is one of the only people alive still talking about Rev. Wright because he can't find anything on Obama), Joe Scarbrough and Bill "talk dirty to me" O'Reilly (who has no idea what he is talking about so he SHOUTS all the time) but Keith Olberman (who I fell in live with after he called Hillary Clinton out and vowed to reproduce with after he told Bush to SHUT THE HELL UP) and Chris Matthews (who doesn't hold back on the left or right wings) need to be kept under control. Are you kidding me? I try very hard to listen to both sides and I flip between MSNBC and FOX every night between 6pm and 11pm. It's just getting so hard to listen to ANYONE (except Colmes) on FOX now because they give me such headaches. They will interview people and then completely flip their words in front of them and NOT let them clarify. I always wonder if they got college degrees in journalism or psychology.