It’s probably a stunner (or a conspiracy) to many that only one news network saw their ratings increase during the first quarter of 2010 – The Fox News Channel. Perhaps perplexed leftists could make the argument that more KKK clubhouses are equipped with cable television these days, or that an increasing number of Young Republican clubs have gotten satellite dishes, but the fact of the matter is that only Fox’s numbers have gone up. The rest have taken a statistical dump. CNN, in fact, has lost half its viewers over the past year.
Take an “ouch” out of petty cash.
And it isn’t as if there hasn’t been enough news to keep people’s interest:
The stimulus bill, the omnibus package, TARP, Obamacare, Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, Cap and Trade, the Nobel Peace Prize, the International Olympic Committee, ClimateGate, North Korea, the takeover of banks, the takeover of automobile companies, Haiti, alienating our allies, the Henry Louis Gates fiasco, teleprompters, bowing to foreign heads of state, and those ridiculous looking WWE Championship-like belts Michelle Obama wears.
There’s been plenty to keep the lefty media complex busy.
Bill Carter of the New York Times (of all places) writes:
The trend in news ratings for the first three months of this year is all up for one network, the Fox News Channel, which enjoyed its best quarter ever in ratings, and down for both MSNBC and CNN.
CNN had a slightly worse quarter in the fourth quarter of 2009, but the last three months have included compelling news events, like the earthquake in Haiti and the battle over health care, and CNN, which emphasizes its hard news coverage, was apparently unable to benefit.
The losses at CNN continued a pattern in place for much of the last year, as the network trailed its competitors in every prime-time hour. (CNN still easily beats MSNBC in the daytime hours, but those are less lucrative in advertising money, and both networks are far behind Fox News at all hours.)
And not that they should – because, after all, I believe in the free market and everyone’s right to fail – but CNN bigwigs say they will “not change their approach to prime-time programs, which are led by hosts not aligned with any partisan point of view.”
(insert pause)
Here’s the real scoop: CNN hosts are crushingly uninteresting and their perspectives are unmistakably liberal. Has their been a more disastrous combination since the pairing of Chevy Chase and the late-night talk-show desk?
Of course, MSNBC – with the likes of Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow – don’t do much better number-wise in prime time, but at least their evening docket is a tad more interesting than the likes of the phlegm juggling Larry King and the exceedingly metrosexual Anderson Cooper. The problem with MSNBC’s lineup is that after about four minutes, the mouth-foaming and vein-splitting get to be too much. Liberalism is already impossible to peddle to thinking people based on its merits. Hysterical ideologues hurling saliva at the camera through tirades, lies and tantrums shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.
Unfortunately, Americans aren’t buying that either.
Zip, at the great Weasel Zippers blog, says, “… Proving once again, pumping out lefty propaganda is not a viable business model…”
Swish.
–
–
Roman Around 