Rachel’s Show

[Valin]

NRO:

Maddow is part of the new matriarchy running NBC News behind the scenes.

Eliana Johnson

1/6/14

 

*] MSNBC, the left-leaning cable-news network, has settled on one solution to its recent problems. It now has an executive reviewing scripts before they go on the air. The role, which has fallen to Rich Stockwell, a former executive producer of The Ed Show and Countdown with Keith Olbermann who now oversees special projects at the network, was created as several of the networks hosts have, to the embarrassment of network brass, conducted a master class in political incorrectness. In recent months, Alec Baldwin, Martin Bashir, and, most recently, Melissa Harris-Perry have awkwardly crashed into the trinity of sexual orientation, gender, and race, leading many to wonder if there are any adults in charge at MSNBC.

 

There is one such adult, actually, and her name is Rachel Maddow. Though she provides the networks ideological vision MSNBC president Phil Griffin has called her our quarterback shes neither an executive nor a manager. Griffin, who wears both hats, is, from all appearances, letting the inmates run the asylum. Meanwhile, the network that Griffin has labeled the place for progressives is experiencing a free fall in its ratings, which are down 29 percent from 2012. A decline was expected after a presidential-election year, but MSNBCs competitors did not suffer as acutely. Fox News was down only 5 percent in total viewers (it suffered far more in the coveted 2554 demographic, where the network has persistently struggled); CNNs numbers, under the stewardship of newly installed president Jeff Zucker, remained flat.

 

(Snip)

 

 

Maddow, by contrast, is motivated by ideology. If you debate for a living, youre going to lose sometimes. Sometimes your preconceptions are wrong that has never happened to her one time, says a former colleague. She is actually not that interested in reality; she is the most ideological person Ive ever met. That is not somebody you want in charge of your programming, because she might put on a great show, but she cannot make rational decisions her agenda is changing America. . . . She really thinks she is changing America for the better. You cant have somebody like that in charge of your programming.

 

(Snip)

 

 

* MSNBC leans left....and the Atlantic ocean is a tad moist

[Valin]

Well That was quick

Inside the Turmoil at MSNBC: The Network Responds
Eliana Johnson
January 6, 2014

The spate of impolitic statements from MSNBC’s liberal-minded hosts in recent months have led many to wonder what, exactly, is going on inside the network. Over on the homepage, I write about the dynamics at play at Rockefeller Plaza, where sources say an executive, Rich Stockwell, is now proofreading the scripts of the network’s daytime hosts before they air. They also say MSNBC president Phil Griffin, who is not an ideologue, is letting primetime star and avowed liberal Rachel Maddow exercise a lot of control.

 

MSNBC is pushing back against the piece, for which I relied heavily on anonymous sources, in particular on former colleagues of Griffin’s and Maddow’s who have insight into what’s happening at the network today. ​MSNBC has issued statements to TV Newser, to Politico’s Dylan Byers, and to me. Spokeswoman Lauren Skowronski told me the piece is “absurd and full of inaccuracies from beginning to end” and that “we’re disappointed that National Review would run a story with more anonymous, uninformed sources than you’d ever find on the gossip pages.”

 

(Snip)

 

Of course Maddow is not issuing pink slips from her office, but, as I note in my piece, Griffin has publicly called Maddow “our quarterback” — the team leader who, as The New Yorker reported in September, “sets the tone for the network.” My sources and Griffin’s own statements bear that out: The network today is very much shaped by her ideological vision, and in television, talent is key to any such effort. I note that Griffin, who is not ideological and rose through the network ranks as a producer, isn’t known for his ability to manage talent. Ed Driscoll at PJ Media points to The New Yorker’s June 2008 profile of Keith Olbermann in which the author, Peter Boyer, describes how Griffin, then a senior vice president in charge at MSNBC, tried to coax Olbermann into toning down monologues. “Phil thinks he’s my boss,” Olbermann told the magazine. At the time, Boyer writes, Griffin considered himself Olbermann’s handler. We saw how that transpired.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

“I don’t play requests”
Guy Benson
1/8/14

We linked to John Hinderaker’s ruthless take-down of Rachel Maddow as a headlines item yesterday, but it deserves additional attention. During a broadcast last week, Maddow and her team engaged in specious, shoddy journalism for the purpose of attacking the Koch Brothers (right-leaning billionaires with whom the organized Left is utterly obsessed). MSNBC’s flagship program falsely attributed a welfare-related legislative effort to the ‘Kochtopus,’ knowing full well that their report was deeply misleading. In short, the Kochs donated a paltry sum of money to a group called the State Policy Network, a single member organization of which became involved in a controversial legislative initiative in Florida. The Kochs had no affiliation with this particular group, gave them no money, and had zero involvement in the political issue in question. Click through for all the gory details. It’s caught-red-handed stuff. Hinderaker concludes by flaying the flimsy “evidence” upon which Maddow concocted the entire premise for her segment:

 

 

 

A final level of deception remains to be revealed: one of the many companies that have contributed to the State Policy Network isComcast, which owns MSNBC and is Rachel Maddow’s employer. So in her Thursday broadcast, Maddow could equally well have said that MSNBC “ha been promoting forced drug tests for people on welfare,” and that FFGA is an “MSNBC-affiliated group.” She didn’t do this for obvious reasons. She knew that she was addressing a stupid audience that would never know the difference.

 

Beyond this core (and ironic) dishonesty, the show’s producers also emailed Koch Industries for their side of the story just minutes before the show began. This perfunctory contact allowed Maddow to inform her audience that the Kochs hadn’t responded to a request for comment, which sounds incriminating. When confronted with the truth, Maddow doubled down, declining to furnish the Kochs with the on-air correction they’ve been seeking. “I don’t play requests,” she sneered......(Snip)

[Valin]

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow hunkers down on Koch Bros. claim
Erik Wemple
January 8 2014 at 4:04 pm

Mark V. Holden is general counsel at Koch Industries Inc., and he has a big file relating to MSNBC. The progressive cable network tends to make frequent references to Koch Industries and its politically active, free-market major shareholders Charles and David Koch. Following those references, Holden often swings into action.

 

Last September, for instance, he sent an e-mail to MSNBC President Phil Griffin protesting the “false and disparaging statements” allegedly made on an episode of “Disrupt with Karen Finney.” In August, he wrote Griffin about a segment on “The Ed Show” that “contained a rehash of distorted and baseless allegations and misinformation” about a certain Koch seminar. In July, he wrote Griffin about a segment of “All in with Chris Hayes” that allegedly contained “misinformation” about Koch Industries. And that’s just for starters.

 

The file has gotten a touch fatter in the past week.

 

(snip)