On Sept. 24, the Times' Alessandra Stanley described MSNBC's newest host Rachel Maddow as "A Fresh Female Face Amid Cable Schoolboys." Today, Brian Stelter carries the torch with, "Fresh Face on Cable, Sharp Rise in Ratings." Didn't you know? Rachel Maddow's face is fresh! What does that even mean exactly? For starters, she is 35, which isn't youthful to college students, but next to cable news pundits, she's a child with candy. You can barely see any signs of aging! The L'oreal spokeswoman in waiting, however, is also "fresh" because of the way she carries herself, and her show. Less shouting, more communicating. Less rage and contempt, more well-formed opinions and eloquence. Which are all good reasons behind her ratings bonanza, yes? CONTINUED »
On Larry King Live last night, after kissing Sarah Palin's ass for a couple minutes and calling her family "gutsy, spirited and real," Bill Clinton said he won't do any campaigning for Barack Obama until the Jewish High Holidays are over. Not because he's an embittered crybaby who's refusing to put his heart and soul into a cause that voted his wife second banana, mind you, but because all the Jews in Florida would be offended were he to do otherwise:
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Larry King has a well-earned reputation for launching soft balls to his interview subjects, but not so when it comes to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was in town addressing the United Nations.
While some mainstream media types avoid getting into gay speak, King grilled Ahmadinejad about his country's homophobic human rights record.
[Gay action starts at about the 1:43 mark.]
It took just one week for Rachel Maddow to beat Keith Olbermann. It tooks just two weeks for her to beat CNN's Larry King Live, as well as double the ratings for the last two weeks of Dan Abrams' Verdict. And it will take just five more minutes for MSNBC to announce a bonafide hit on their hands. And then just two more minutes for Fox News to shoot down the good news by reminding everyone Bill O'Reilly is still the ratings king. But before you let the spin get to you, realize what's going on here: A woman — a gay woman — has, right out of the gate, made a huge mark on cable news punditry. While viewers flock to Keith Olbermann for his left-wing rhetoric (which, to be sure, is pretty logical much of the time), they're flocking to Maddow not for her bitchy rants or extremism, but her sensibility about the political climate. It's pleasing to see her rewarded for it.
Thanks to Campbell Brown actually doing her job, John McCain will not be sitting down with Larry King. The Republican nominee canceled his softball interview with the network after Brown went "over the line" during a segment with McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds, trying to get him to name one redeeming quality about Sarah Palin that made her qualified to be commander-in-chief, should John McCain act his age and keel over. Bounds couldn't name a single qualification, which meant Brown asked the question again and again, showing just how backed into a corner the GOP's nominee might be. All this must've upset McCain, who supports the war in Iraq and the war with the media. Which is why his camp yesterday notified CNN that he was pulling out of his King interview. Yes, the one sit down where the only challenge would be to let the question asker fart more than you.
Larry King will write another autobiography, to be published on Father's Day in 2009. It will be called What Am I Doing Here?, and not Sometimes I Fart On Air, I Worry That Jay Leno May Take My Job, nor Softball: How to Conduct the Least Engaging Interview with Society's Most Interesting People. [Variety]
There are live on-air gaffes that news anchors wish they could erase, like the common Obama/Osama mix-up.
But when Jesse Jackson whispered that he wanted to "cut [Obama's] nuts off" before a Fox & Friends interview on Sunday was set to begin, it was a reminder that public figures often have a hard time keeping their private conversations to themselves when they've got a hot mic pack clipped to their hip.
It should be a simple life lesson: When you have a media outlet's microphone attached to you , by default you should expect other people are listening to your conversation, and very likely recording it. Herewith, some famous examples of people who should know better, but obviously didn't. CONTINUED »
CNN stick figure Larry King will have his own street named after him in Los Angeles. Where Sunset and Cahuenga boulevards meet, the name "Larry King Square" will reign supreme.
Congratulations, Larry, this is all yours: CONTINUED »
SEACREST, OUT As expected, Ryan Seacrest shoots down those rumors that he's replacing Larry King. But the pre-show buzz was almost enough to get you to tune in, wasn't it? [HP]
Ryan Seacrest on rumors he's taking over for Larry King: "I will be on Larry’s show Thursday night. We will talk more about it with Larry. Larry is going to be on CNN as long as Larry wants to be but I am going to be Larry’s guest Thursday night and Larry and I are going to talk about everything." [AH]
It's unclear if The Scoop's Courtney Hazlett knows Larry King renewed his contract with CNN through 2010 or whether she just chose to overlook it in favor of the deal's loophole, which doesn't guarantee King his 9pm timeslot, but she's pushing rumors that Ryan Seacrest is planning to take over for King, supposedly, in 2009. Which, um, would be impossible? Not according to a CNN source, who claims the American Idol host is in "serious negotiations" to assume hosting duties by year's end.
Either way, the gossip mill chum isn't good news for Katie Couric, whose camp has been putting out feelers for the King slot for months.
Update: Worth noting: This isn't the first time MSNBC gossip Hazlett has run into trouble with her reporting (but when haven't us gossips?). As the Observer notes, she had to have her story about James Frey pulled from the website on Thursday because it was based on false info.
Even though Larry King just reupped his deal with CNN to keep his game of softball on the air until at least 2011, his contract did not guarantee him the 9pm slot, effectively leaving open the possibility that they could still install ratings-loser Katie Couric there post-CBS. When word arrived that a King takeover was a possible Couric career move, the Time Warner network quickly re-signed its star; but without giving him the 9pm slot, they kept King under contract while maintaining the option of transitioning Couric into the primetime post. Sneaky sneaky!
Sorry, Katie Couric, but your best post-CBS job prospect just got taken off the table. Larry King is re-signing with CNN, keeping his farting on the air until at least 2010.
"And so it is / Just like you said it would be / Life goes easy on me / Most of the time / And so it is." Not even halfway through her five-year, $15 million/year contract with CBS News, and Katie Couric is already said to be in talks with CBS chief Les Moonves and CBS News head Sean McManus to shape her exit. It'll likely come after November's presidential election or January's inauguration, and nobody's entirely sure where Katie will end up, or who will take over the Evening News. Two plausible scenarios: Katie will wait out CNN's Capt. Fartypants, Larry King, to replace him (his deal expires in 2009), or she'll grab her own talk show on CBS, or a full-time gig on 60 Minutes, or they'd let her go free to run through the meadows in search of a better deal. Though CBS brass continue to think she's doing an excellent job with her 22 minutes a night, she hasn't been able to pull the show's ratings up to a competitive level; CBS Evening News draws an average 5.9 million viewers to NBC's 8.3m and ABC's 8m. All this, and just when Howard Kurtz started rolling out the sympathy red carpet.
Jenny McCarthy believes common medical vaccinations cause autism in children. And you know what she thinks of your opinions if you disagree? Bullshit! At least that’s what she yelled last night while berating three doctors trying to reason with her on Larry King Live.
Making his way up from Baja, former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura headed to Los Angeles to chat with baseball daemon Larry King about his new acting gig, and how skin pigmentation shouldn't frighten a certain CNN colleague. CONTINUED »
Cranky farty pants and professional background dancer Larry King couldn't keep his emotions in check at his son's Little League game — so he was thrown out. Or maybe he wasn't. Differing accounts of King's behavior during Chance Armstrong King's March baseball game confirm that he was given a "talking to" by the umpire, but whether he erupted after being told to "regroup" and calm down, and was forced off the field and behind the fences after refusing to, isn't clear.
So, um, this is awkward. When Janet Jackson visited Larry King last night to hawk her album to the septuagenarian set, she also tried to teach him a few of the dance moves from her video for "Feedback," a song with the lyrics, "Something heavy like a first day period." If anything positive can be said for King's choreography, well, he didn't fart. (As he does in the video after the jump.)
Watch as Larry King relives the most exciting thing to happen on his show since he farted on air. [CNN]
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