Does this sound like "fairness" to you?

9/8/08

Does this sound like "fairness" to you? Chris Matthews, fairness doctrine, Keith Olberman, media coverage of republican convention., MSNBC, NBC

Does this sound like "fairness" to you?

I'm a little concerned that MSNBC is sending Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews underground and taking away two of my media whipping boys:

From today's Washington Post:

MSNBC is removing Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews as the anchors of live political events, bowing to growing criticism that they are too opinionated to be seen as neutral in the heat of the presidential campaign.

David Gregory, the NBC newsman and White House correspondent who also hosts a program on MSNBC, will take over during such events as this fall's presidential and vice presidential debates and election night.

The move, confirmed by spokesmen for both networks, follows increasingly loud complaints about Olbermann's anchor role at the Democratic and Republican conventions. Olbermann, who regularly assails President Bush and GOP nominee John McCain on his "Countdown" program, was effusive in praising the acceptance speech of Democratic nominee Barack Obama. He drew flak Thursday when the Republicans played a video that included a tribute to the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, saying that if the networks had done that, "we would be rightly eviscerated at all quarters, perhaps by the Republican Party itself, for exploiting the memories of the dead, and perhaps even for trying to evoke that pain again. If you reacted to that videotape the way I did, I apologize."

With these two off the convention floors who will MSNBC get to provide the comic relief? And what am I supposed to do at those times when my blood pressure is a little too low and I no longer have those two to bring it up again.

I think MSNBC is coming a little too late to the fairness game. But I suppose there are people out there in the universe who will be tuning in to the cable news version of NBC for the first time during this highly-charged political season and they're going to get the wrong impression about one of the big networks little sister station.

People are going to get the false impression that the network news teams have a 'news' agenda.