The People Receiving Instruction

MSNBC: The Place for Propaganda! But Not For Ratings!!

This chart, from TV By The Numbers, an encyclopedic blog of no known bias, and cited by David Zurawik, the gutsy TV critic/blogger for The Baltimore Sun, says it all about the decline of Keith Olbermann's ratings. As Zurawik observes:

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann took offense to a post I wrote Saturday that referred to him as "slumping." He didn't dispute any of the facts in my piece, he just went on the attack with his usual innuendo, slurs and bombast over my characterization of his performance in the ratings.

Here are two graphics from tvbythenumbers.com tracking Olbermann's ratings the last six months. Read them and judge for yourself whether the adjective "slumping" applies.

No spin, just the facts. Especially note the one that shows him down 50 percent since the last quarter of 2008 in the key news demographic of viewers 25 and 54.

Also, note that in the first quarter of 2009, Olbermann's show ranked in the Top 10 programs on all news cable TV. In the figures released this week for the second quarter of the year, he is no longer in the Top 10. All 10 spots belong to shows on Fox News.

That's the fatal flaw in Jeff Immelt's strategy of using MSNBC as a lobbying/p.r. operation for General Electric. Yes it's great for the Obama administration that GE's tools--Chris Matthews, Ed Schultz, Rachel Maddow, and, of course, Olby--are shilling for them every day, but people won't watch. It's hard to be a cheerleader for a not especially popular administration. I mean most people support Obama, and he might even win re-election, but it's not that interesting just to watch people on TV kissing up to him.

And yet MSNBC's Obama suck-up strategy continues: new host Nancy Snyderman--that's Dr. Nancy Snyderman to you-- said on her show, "The White House, their health care agenda continues to be our agenda."

Talk about being on message! But nobody read Pravda, either.

The only time that MSNBC gets any traction these days is when the channel is slamming Republicans, especially those GOPers from the Bush-Cheney administration, but that's old news, and getting even older.

So MSNBC is stuck. Maybe they should just formally become a part of the GE p.r. operation. So instead of "MSNBC: The Place For Politics," it could be "MSNBC: Imagination At Work." And then MSNBC could fight more vehemently for "cap and trade" legislation, without naysayers like Pat Buchanan getting in the way of the message.

H/T for the Snyderman quote: Mark Finkelstein.

The Green Industrial Complex, Part 2

The phrase "Green Industrial Complex," of course, is a play on "military industrial complex," which President Dwight Eisenhower warned against in his Farewell Speech of January 17, 1961.

And so for Brendan O'Neill to rework Eisenhower's phrase now, in 2009, not about the military and defense contractors, but rather about environmentalists, such as Al Gore, and environmental contractors, such as Jeff Immelt's General Electric is both provocative and evocative.

Ike's speech, of course, set in motion decades of additional scrutiny of the MIC, as critics took Ike's warning seriously. We'll have to see what happens with the GIC, of course, but here's a prediction: If the enviros keep trying to raise unemployment at a time when people are hurting, there will be a big backlash.

Of course, you won't hear about it on MSNBC.

Photo illustration credit: Jim Hubbell.

"The Green Industrial Complex": Good For Al Gore and General Electric, Bad for America--and Barack Obama & Democrats

"Green Industrial Complex." That's an evocative phrase from Brendan O'Neill, writing in The Australian,describing the well-funded effort to convert America and the world to a carbon-free economy--and make billions, even trillions in the process. Here O'Neill zeroes in on the efforts of Al Gore, who sits at the center of this "GIC":

For a snapshot of the government and business interests intertwined in the rise of green capitalism, consider Al Gore. He's getting rich from environmentalism, not just by being paid a whopping $US175,000 ($217,500) a speech but by using political pressure to force government policy in a direction that benefits his business interests.

Gore is chairman of the Alliance for Climate Protection, an outfit that seeks to "persuade people of the importance, urgency and feasibility" of going green. It recently launched a $US300 million ad campaign to coax American people and politicians to embrace the carbon-lite lifestyle.

But Gore is also chairman of a greeninvestment firm called Generation Investment Management, which is a member of the Copenhagen Climate Council, an international collaboration of businesses and science bodies, and which invests in firms that produce renewable energy and low-carbon technology. So Gore uses one of his multimillion-dollar organisations, the Alliance for Climate Protection, to put pressure on government to promote the low-carbon lifestyle that will furnish one of his other multimillion-dollar organisations, General Investment Management, with booming business.

Gore's activities provide only a glimpse into the new collusion between greens, businesses and government. So speedily has this network come together that according to one critic of the politics of environmentalism, Bjorn Lomborg, it is not going too far to liken the new green-industrial complex to the military-industrial complex that president Dwight Eisenhower warned of in the 1950s.

We have seen this before, of course, with Enron, which had the same idea: use political connections to rewire the regulatory system to its own advantage. Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, and all those other crooks had a moneymaking vision, but they were simply ahead of their time.

So now, with better timing--and no doubt better lawyers--Jeff Immelt of General Electric picks up the green torch. That's "green" as in the environment, and "green" as in money. The same eco-fiscal scam, is happening today, only this time with the full faith and credit of the US government falling in behind Gore's and Immelt's rent-seeking efforts, thanks to Barack Obama.

Obama is a actually a sad case. Personally, he seems like a good enough guy, but he was always willing to be a tool for the powerful, be it Harvard Law School liberals, the Daley political machine, or the Chicago financiers who took up his presidential candidacy as their cause a few years ago. Between the TARP bailout and all the other bank bailouts, plus cap-and-trade, those billionaires are going to make more billions. But what they can't do, none of them, is create real jobs for Americans. And Obama and ordinary Democrats will get the blame in the upcoming elections.

Anderson Cooper's Swan Song? No Need For Panic In The Disco, Boys: This Opera Ain't Anywhere Near Over

Nicholas Carlson, writing for The Business Insider, a part of Henry Blodget's Silicon Alley Insider site, offers a devastating look at CNN, entitled, perhaps somewhat harshly, "The Case Against CNN, By The Numbers."

TCG doesn't have anything against CNN, other than its smugness and its liberal bias. But Carlson has done his homework; including the chart above, which demolishes Anderson Cooper. The graphic above shows both total audience and inside the demo (25-54), and both show the same distinct trendline--down.

I am not sure that anyone needs to make a case against CNN, but I do have to wonder how long La Anderson will be the apple of the Big Apple's eye. I mean, could it be that glamor and cool and attitude mean more to CNN president Jon Klein than ratings? Oops, never mind. Dumb question. After all, AC bragged recently that he partied with the late Michael Jackson at Studio 54 when he was just a 10-year-old, back in the 70s--but everyone at CNN must think that's tres chic.

But how about Klein's boss, Jeff Bewkes, CEO of Time-Warner. Surely he cares more about earnings, and shareholder value, than he does about being trendy and fashionable. Right? Well, uh, no--Bewkes just re-upped Klein.

So what's going on? TCG's theory is that the likes of Klein and Bewkes grew up as nerdy over-achievers; they were too busy studying for school, and so missed out on having the fun of being underage at a notoriously drug-drenched disco, such as Studio 54 in its Jacko-Liza-Halston heyday. And so the aura of someone such as AC--and the promise that he can introduce Klein & Bewkes to Hollywood A-listers and other Beautiful People--is enough to persuade the suits to overlook his declining ratings.

No need to fret, boys--Anderson's not going anywhere, even if nobody outside of Manhattan, West Hollywood, and Dupont Circle is watching.

Fox News, Watchdog of Freedom

That's not The Cable Gamer saying it, that's David Zurawik, of the Baltimore Sun, saying it a blog post today. As he writes:

Two weeks ago, I praised Fox News for being one of the only TV news operations seriously questioning the administration of President Barack Obama as it pushes an agenda of massive social change not seen since Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal.

Whatever the reasons for Fox's tenacity, I said, it is the one channel that seems absolutely committed to being a watchdog on the White House -- a job crucial to any notion of press responsibility. My post was inspired in part by Obama's petulant sounding complaint about Fox made in an interview with CNBC.

And he concludes:

Maybe, it's wishful thinking. But I would like to believe part of the latest surge is the result of Fox performing a socially important press function in not giving the president a free pass to change American life overnight.

I report, you decide!

"CNN's Rating Implosion"

That's the tough but accurate headline from Glenn Garvin, writing in The Miami Herald:

When the quarterly ratings were released this week, CNN finished behind MSNBC in weekday prime viewing hours for the first time ever. MSNBC's average audience between 8 and 11 p.m. was 946,000, CNN's 939,000. The more you slice and dicethe numbers, they look even worse: CNN often finishes behind sister network HLN in weekday primetime among viewers aged 25 to 54, the top news demographic.

Boss Immelt, In the Public Eye

As the whole wide world--including media rivals, such as CBS--is starting to notice the unfairness of the federal government's mega-bailout to General Electric, here's another homage to Thomas Nast, who was the best ever at capturing a political idea and distilling it down into a picture.

The legendary crook Boss Tweed said after he had been nailed by the law, people don't always read complicated news stories, (such as Jeff Gerth's detailed takedown of GE for Pro Publica) but they do understand pictures. And so maybe, with pictures as well as text, people will come to understand the vast and costly conspiracy that General Electric has waged against the public interest. Maybe it's all legal--but if it is, it's lobbyist-legal--but it's still a horrendous abuse.

Thanks to Jim Hubbell. Or, I should say, il miglior fabbro.

Fox News Channel University Presents...

...The Little Rockers!

Meet Matt Egan

The New York Times' Cara Buckley writes a good-natured profile of Matt Egan, 24, who works at Fox Business News.

Matt, now on his way to a great career, was part of the Roger Ailes Apprenticeship Program at Fox News.

Yet the Times story portrays Matt as a good guy, and Fox a good place to work.

Quick! Call Media Matters!!

"How a Loophole Benefits GE in Bank Rescue/Industrial Giant Becomes Top Recipient in Debt-Guarantee Program"

The Washington Post has an important story on GE: front page, above the fold, detailing how the federal government has given GE hundreds of billions in subsidies.

Jeff Gerth, formerly of the NY Times, and now at Pro Publica, the muckraking outfit, teamed up with another reporter, Brady Dennis, to write a great story for the WaPo, headlined, "How a Loophole Benefits GE in Bank Rescue/Industrial Giant Becomes Top Recipient in Debt-Guarantee Program." It's quite shocking, how GE has played Uncle Sam like a fiddle, getting hundreds of billions in subsidies. Here's the heart of it:

General Electric, the world's largest industrial company, has quietly become the biggest beneficiary of one of the government's key rescue programs for banks.

At the same time, GE has avoided many of the restrictions facing other financial giants getting help from the government.

The company did not initially qualify for the program, under which the government sought to unfreeze credit markets by guaranteeing debt sold by banking firms. But regulators soon loosened the eligibility requirements, in part because of behind-the-scenes appeals from GE.

As a result, GE has joined major banks collectively saving billions of dollars by raising money for their operations at lower interest rates. Public records show that GE Capital, the company's massive financing arm, has issued nearly a quarter of the $340 billion in debt backed by the program, which is known as the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program, or TLGP. The government's actions have been "powerful and helpful" to the company, GE chief executive Jeffrey Immelt acknowledged in December.

GE's finance arm is not classified as a bank. Rather, it worked its way into the rescue program by owning two relatively small Utah banking institutions, illustrating how the loopholes in the U.S. regulatory system are manifest in the government's historic intervention in the financial crisis.

And yes, there are some in the Obama administration who want to crack down on this giveaway, albeit after the money has been given away. But we'll have to wait to see if even that puny ex post facto reform survives GE's lobbying blitz.

H/T to the great Thomas Nast, the father of modern political cartooning in America.

Victory for Obama!

And all hail to his heroic television! Especially the General Electric Collective! Long live government-owned means of the media production!

Revolution from Above

During Barack Obama's administration, the greatest wealth transfer in human history is occurring--from the poor and the middle class to the rich. How so? Yes, TARP dates back to last fall, when George W. Bush was president, but then-Senator Obama happily voted for it, urged on by the same advisers who surround him now. Meanwhile, other bank bailouts--including the notorious $139 billion bailout of GE Capital, a part of General Electric--the stimulus package, and now the "cap and trade" system which further enrich neo-Enron-ish swindlers, add up to a truly immense conspiracy against the public interest.

And when the history of this time is recorded, Jeff Immelt will be remembered as one of these new-style American Revolutionaries--a leading recipient of bailout money, and a leading propagandist for the new financial order, thanks to groups such as US Climate Action Partnership, which is guaranteed to make billions through politicized rent-seeking.

In other words, this American revolution has nothing to do with the freedom-loving values of the original American Revolution. This revolution is infinitely cynical, and, frankly, it is evil. It is not a revolution for freedom, it is a revolution against freedom. And as such, it is more likely what we saw in Russia nine decades ago.

So let's make sure Comrade Immelt is remembered properly, in the context of others like him. You remember VI Lenin? He was a revolutionary, too, although he was no champion of ordinary people. The Bolshevik revolution was not a popular rebellion against the Tsar. That revolution had already happened eight months before, in February 1917, led by a democrat, Alexander Kerensky. No, the Bolshevik takeover, in October 1917, led by Lenin, was a coup d'etat. A takeover by Lenin and his fellow conspirators, who were anything but democrats and populists.

Obey MSNBC

Obey GE

Obey Olby

What happens when a spontaneous protest movement congeals into rigid and stern orthodoxy? Obviously a lot of hearts get broken. Obviously a lot of skulls get crushed.

The street artist Shepard Fairey has made a big splash in recent years, not only with his iconic Obama "Hope" poster, but because of his "Obey Giant" series of posters, tee shirts and other graphics. For a while there, it seemed as if Fairey had captured the anti-Bush/Cheney mood. And one result was the 2006 and 2008 elections, which went badly for the Republican Party.

OK, fine.

But who's the giant now? And who's stomping on hope? The Democrats are in charge now, and they can pass whatever they want--a stimulus package, an idiotic cap & trade legislation. Although, of course, not everyone inside the Obama movement is still happy. Newsbusters' Mitchell Blatt posted a great item on Friday, detailing how the far left has turned against their onetime hero, Keith Olbermann. Why? Because the far left has soured on Obama, mostly over his continuation of Bush-era policies on detention and surveillance, but also over rising unemployment and general fatigue over bailouts and boondoggles for billionaires.

And so now the left is turning against Obama's tax-funded ideological enforcers, such as Olbermann.

So what will Olby do, if he is not obeyed? Stay tuned!

Bringing in Conan O'Brien Was Jeff Zucker's "D'oh!" Moment (One of Many, Come To Think Of It)

Is it just me, or was NBC chief Jeff Zucker separated at birth from Homer Simpson?

Nikki Finke has the details on one of the great boneheaded plays of network history--how, in a Homer-like misjudgment, NBC threw away its super-valuable "Tonight Show" franchise:

It's clear right now that Dave's Late Show is topping Conan's Tonight Show in audience size. This is the first time Dave has done this to The Tonight Show in a full week of original broadcasts since 2005, and that has to worry NBC Universal Jeff Zucker, whose decision it was to rotate out Leno and rotate in Conan.

Definitely a "D'oh!" moment for NBC and the long-suffering shareholders of GE. The next shoe to drop, of course, will be the exit of Ben Silverman, and then perhaps a shuffle at NBC News.

(Thanks again, Bob Wright, for getting GE into the media biz!)

General Electric? Try General Entitlement!

So General Electric gets billions from Uncle Sam, and then seeks to wiggle out of contracts. Here are the details from Paul Glader, writing in The Wall Street Journal:

Congress's involvement in the dispute highlights a consequence of the government's growing role in the economy. GE has said it hopes to generate up to $100 billion in revenue from the economic-stimulus package, and it has issued U.S.-backed bonds with lower interest rates than other GE debt. Now, Greenbrier is trying to use that against GE.

And so there go 3000 jobs, according to the WSJ, in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.

And it's part of a larger phenomenon: GE, being so favored by the government, is now in a position to do everything cheaper than its competitors. That's not fair, it's just politics. And the reason why MSNBC, along with NBC and CNBC, are the most valuable rent-seeking rainmakers that GE has in its corporate arsenal.