Like David Gregory before her, Andrea Mitchell is being accused by insiders of big footing a colleague to serve her own agenda.
Mitchell is said to have lobbied NBC Nightly News executive producer Alexandra Wallace to let her cover Barack Obama's overseas trip next week to Europe, Iraq, and Afghanistan, despite the fact that Lee Cowan — yes, that Lee Cowan — has been covering Obama's campaign since he began running for president. It's a classic Mitchell "big foot," we're told by one NBC source who's provided accurate information in the past, and has angered folks at NBC's political desk, news desk, and elsewhere. CONTINUED »
Despite conventional wisdom relayed to us earlier this month, NBC News' D.C. deputy chief Wendy Wilkinson does not appear to be the top candidate to take over the head position Tim Russert left empty with his death. Rather, NBC News SVP and Newsweek veteran Mark Whitaker is fingered as a likely successor, with political director Chuck Todd in the running as well. [NYO]
Though Brian Williams filled in the moderator's chair on Meet The Press today, Mr. Tom Brokaw will take over through the election as we suspected. It might've been easy to think Williams was actually quite apt for the gig: He followed Russert's traditional line of questioning that brought up past statements and offered politicos the chance to contradict themselves or reaffirm their past; Joe Biden was today's example, asked about the vice presidency. (He had said before that under no circumstances would he want to be VP. He said that again today. Then he qualified that statement by saying he doesn't want to be VP because Barack Obama just wouldn't ask him — if if Obama did ask, he'd have no choice but to say yes.)
But that's not what Jeff Zucker and Steve Capus had in mind. The official announcement came this morning, and Williams telling viewers at the end of today's broadcast, with 30 Rock revealing Brokaw will take over MTP beginning next Sunday and last through the November election. CONTINUED »
On last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann preemptively named Page Six's Paula Froelich his "Worst Person in the World" after finding out she was working on an item, for today's column (here's the item), that accused colleague Chris Matthews of gunning for the Meet The Press gig at Tim Russert's funeral. Matthews denied the charge on the record, and said the "agent type" he was speaking to was real-estate developer Bob Monahan, and that their conversation wasn't about his plot to secure the gig, but about an upcoming speech Matthews was going to give to a group of mayors. As for Olbermann, P6 quotes a source saying he's threatened to quit if he isn't named to the MTP gig; Olbermann also denies the claim. And it better be true, because everybody we've spoke with says Olbermann and Matthews are about the last people NBC News president Steve Capus plans to install on the Sunday morning talker. Russert himself took a liking to political director Chuck Todd, though it's also unusual that Russert is said to have bandied about Todd's name as his pick of successor, since Russert, while still alive, had no plans of giving up the show anytime soon.
NBC News President Steve Capus, who says "numerous people" will be hired to replace Tim Russert, on the media's chattering classes predicting who will take over the late newsman: "I put it in the borderline-crass territory. I saw something posted that I've made a decision about this or that. Honestly, it's inappropriate. [...] It's too soon. I'm sitting in my funeral suit, coming home from honoring a man who was the glue that held us all together." [TVN] We get it, Capus: You don't want to offend Russert's family, anyone in the NBC News division, or the industry in general. But MTP is also quite a franchise, and it'd be corporate negligence to not be considering who will take over running NBC News' D.C. bureau. You've even been holding conference calls on the matter.
On a NBC News conference call this morning, NBC head Jeff Zucker, NBC News chief Steve Capus, and anchor Brian Williams joined in with a number of others to discuss the future of Meet The Press and the D.C. bureau. A source who was not on the call, but overheard a colleague's speakerphone listening session, says Tom Brokaw's name was bandied about. (It's unclear whether Brokaw was on the call.)
More on the post-Tim Russert future is here.
NBC News is doing the respectable thing and not commenting, publicly, about their plans in naming a successor to Tim Russert, whose death on Friday at the network's Washington studios has left them without a Meet The Press anchor, or a D.C. bureau chief. As a show of respect for Russert's family and his colleagues, 30 Rock is holding off on telling anyone what they plan to do come this Sunday.
While NBC News chief Steve Capus and NBC head Jeff Zucker wisely selected Tom Brokaw to moderate yesterday's MTP Russert tribute, with a line-up of the guests the late anchor would've booked himself, there's nothing firmed up for the weeks ahead, claims NBC.
None of that means media's chattering classes aren't placing over-unders on who's going to fill Russert's slot, at MTP or leading the network's Washington unit. There's a list of usual suspects, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. So who's the most likely to take the very big reins?
Let's take a look. CONTINUED »
PEACOCK SHAKE-UP TVNewser is reporting that NBC is going to close its Dallas and Chicago bureaus. Some staff members will move to the local owned and operated stations; Chicago will fall into the New York hub, Dallas will go to the Los Angeles hub. [TVNewser]
Last week, David Shuster was indefinitely suspended for suggesting that the Hillary Clinton campaign was “pimping out” first daughter Chelsea, the most likable member of the Clinton entourage.
Chelsea Clinton has always been a bizarre public figure. In 1992, she was her dad’s biggest supporter. But since becoming first daughter, she has understandably struggled with her lack of privacy as an adult. Until Iowa, Chelsea mostly hid in the background of her mom’s campaign.
In Maine, where Barack Obama won one of four primary elections over the weekend, Hillary Clinton wrote NBC News president Steve Capus, “Nothing justifies the kind of debasing language that David Shuster used and no temporary suspension or half-hearted apology is sufficient.”
No one denies that Shuster’s verb choice leaves something to be desired, but indefinite suspension seems sufficient to say the least, especially considering that that Chelsea has been "pimped out" before. After all, how many teenagers do you know who held the hands of both parents on leisurely walks to a presidential helicopter following an investigation into their father's infidelity?
"Absolute bullshit" is what some MSNBC staffers are calling the notion that NBC News brass doesn't care about daytime programming. The reaction comes from our item this morning, where a former network staffer with close ties to MSNBC insisted "Zucker does not give a shit about the ratings of the daytime news block on MSNBC. [...] All they care about is MSNBC 'sales prime, because that’s where they think the money is." From what we're hearing from the calls that are coming from inside the house, MSNBC chief Phil Griffin is insisting dayside remains a priority.
If you're working in daytime at MSNBC, start counting your days. Or your hours — because you're the least respected part of NBC News, at least when it comes to Jeff Zucker's interests, and GE's shareholders. You're not making your parent company very much money, or enough to satisfy them when it comes to deciding who's gotta go to save some $40 million. And no matter how hard you try, your ratings and revenue mean little.
"Zucker does not give a shit about the ratings of the daytime news block on MSNBC," says a well-placed network insider. "The sales people are always telling this to the NBC News management. All they care about is MSNBC 'sales prime,' because that's where they think the money is. This in my view is so fucking stupid as to be unimaginable, but that's NBC U."
So what about MSNBC primetime? Peter Lauria called it "sacrosanct" in the Post this morning, but that's not entirely true, either, claims our source. Dan Abrams would've lost his on-air gig had they been able to sign Rosie O'Donnell. Tucker Carlson took a pay cut just to keep his job when his contract was renegotiated. And while MSNBC chief Phil Griffin has always liked Chris Matthews, he is "not happy about Hardball," says a source, and "finds it 'boring.'" Keith Olbermann, with his fat new $4 million contract and respectable ratings, it the only one who should be 100 percent comfortable. Not that folks like Matthews are going anywhere – let's not start that rumor – but it's possible they could lose some authority of their shows in an effort to reinvigorate them.
As MSNBC staffers have their walking papers prepared, the hunt is on for who's leaking info from the inside about all those job cuts coming. Peter Lauria's item in today's Post inadvertently points the finger at now-former Washington D.C. chief and Hardball EP Tammy Haddad, since Lauria wrote that she "left MSNBC of their own volition" when, as even mid-level staffers know, is a complete farce. (She left after a spat with Chris Matthews, where he blamed her for his low ratings.) Lauria also describes axed daytime programming VP Susan Sullivan in the same light, but Sullivan was forcibly removed and relocated to to NBC's San Francisco affiliate, where she is news director. If either were providing info, of course, they get to write her own happy ending.
MSNBC chief Phil Griffin and NBC News SVP Mark Whitaker (the former Newsweek who came aboard in the spring) are trying to keep tempers cool as the message travels up the ladder to NBC News chief Steve Capus. So it's Griffin's new hire – Shannon High-Bassalik, the Miami news director he plucked from the outside, and who took over Dan Abrams' job as general manager in October when MSNBC moved to 30 Rock – who's responsible for mediating. She'll also be your point person for addressing those building rumors that everyone from operations to the news desk is at risk. CONTINUED »
The Post's Peter Lauria today updates the story we already told you about on Monday: that Jeff Zucker-ordered savings in NBC's news division is going to amount to massive job cuts.
He's looking to save some $20 to $40 million, with pink slips coming this week or next at MSNBC and NBC News; CNBC will be saved, supposedly, because they need all the horsepower against Fox Business Network they can muster. Two big names are known to be out the door: primetime programming chief and Bill Wolf (holdover from Rick Kaplan's era) and editorial director Davidson Goldin (who came over when Dan Abrams was general manager). But those helping build the competitive primetime slate at MSNBC shouldn't have much to fear; Zucker wants to keep that spirit alive. Happy holidays!
This morning, we woke up thinking it had been a while since we heard about that perennial news story, evening news ratings. Sure, the Internet, CNN and pharmaceutical ads have made evening news irrelevant and impossible to sit through, but millions of Americans still get their news through basic cable. And that demands coverage. CONTINUED »
"There are going to be firings very soon — everybody is terrified."
That's the promise being made to us by a former NBC News network insider who maintains close ties with Mama Peacock's news division. The axings, to be sure, will be part of a larger cost cutting move; "tens of millions is the figure being thrown around."
"There's even one rumor that the Nightly News could be shot on one 'flash cam'. Which i can't imagine." Heh. Us either.
Things got a little awk for NBC golden boy Brian Williams on Monday night when he described marriage as being “under attack.” For those who missed the 2004 election, the wording was uncomfortable similar to Christian right’s rhetoric against gay marriage.
We thought bad writing, not a large scale anti-gay conspiracy at NBC was to blame for the news script. Brian Williams, at least in his NBC approved blog post, agrees:
I was the recipient today of several emails from well-intentioned people, telling me I was being attacked in parts of the blogosphere for something I wrote and said on the air in last night’s broadcast … My meaning? Our national divorce rate, which is currently somewhere between 40 and 50 percent. Others took it upon themselves to decide that I was somehow attacking gay marriage.
With that scandal settled, some have taken issue with Williams’s use of “being attacked in parts of the blogosphere,” claiming they were simply stating a problem with Williams choice of words. We, on the other hand, take issue with Williams’s use of blogosphere. That expression is so 2004.
Check out this totally scandalous screencap, courtesy of the eagle-eyed folks at TVNewser.
Looks like a certain newsroom fact-checker won't be voting for "Barak" anytime soon!
Oh, relax people. It's not like they really screwed up and called him "Osama" or something.
Now that would just be embarrassing.
Have you heard the news? "NBC News and The New York Times are teaming up to cover the 2008 Presidential Election," reports brand-new TVNewser Chris Ariens.
"As part of the collaboration," continues Ariens (who's doing a fine job thus far!) "NBC News will 'have first access to breaking news' reported by the Times, and vice versa. In a release, NBC says the deal is 'drawing on both news organizations' strengths in political journalism.'"
Or, in other words, Bill Keller will have unfettered access to Brian Williams' blog entries before they go live, and Williams will now be required to sign the "Get Well Soon!" card circulating the Times' headquarters in regards to injured/litigation-happy journo Jill Abramson.
Earlier today, we told you that TMZ was written up in the NY Times, in a mostly laudatory piece praising Harvey Levin, it's anchor and managing editor, and calling the website "the celebrity handler's worst nightmare."
Memorable quotes from the article included Levin (a former lawyer and investigative reporter) defending site's journalistic integrity, explaining, "We work as hard at breaking a Britney Spears story as NBC would work on breaking a President Bush piece."
And, as a testament to that aforementioned "hard work," here are a couple of screengrabs taken from TMZ's website earlier this morning.
Brian Williams isn't used to being second best. After taking over for Tom Brokaw in December 2004, he's never had to fight for ratings (like Katie Couric) never had to fight for his anchor seat (like Charlie Gibson) and never had to worry about much besides picking out a tie for that evening's broadcast.
But now, the tables have turned, the viewers have shifted, and Williams has been relegated to second place in the ratings for the last two months.
How does Williams cope? By not paying any attention to the ratings slide whatsoever.
Editorial Director
