Do you think Keith does the show that he wants to do?

[Syrinx]

About the first twenty minutes of each show is absolutely the best newscast on American television.

But it goes seriously (or not so seriously) downhill after that.

I am freaking sick of TomKitten and BarryBonds.

I appreciate the fact that he actually used the words "concentration camps" regarding the KBR contract that I emailed him about months ago. But he used it in a "novelty" segment near the end of the show. And somehow that story was eclipsed by (another) really stupid thing that Rush Limbaugh said.

And I'm getting really fed up with "another story my producers are forcing me to do." His producers aren't his bosses. The star of the show is the boss. He could easily fire his producers.

It's time for Keith to make a decision. Is he America's most relevant, courageous newscaster? Or is he just another corporate puppet participating in a strategy of misdirection against the American people?

Keith's history indicates that he loves to tweak and pick fights with the rich and powerful. It's time for him to confirm this and to claim his position as the foremost voice of reason in a republic spinning rapidly out of control.

Either that, or he can remain complicit in distracting Americans from life-and-death (for our very way of life) issues by trumpeting every move of our more deranged Hollywood celebrities and everyday miscreants and stupid-ass criminals.

(No offense intended toward the KOEB. I just think this needed to be said.)

[Berry Cool]

1. Sorry, but I gotta disagree with you.

I think the fluff of the newscast--the celebrity stuff and the Oddball segments--is the spoonful of sugar he puts in there to help the medicine go down. For some people, anyway. If most of the show was like that, I'd have a problem--but it's not. To me, it's just enough. And the celebrity news is covered with a good ladling of derisive snark instead of the breathless excitement used on other outlets, so it doesn't offend me either.

If you think "Worst Person in the World" is just a "novelty" segment of the show, you don't understand the show. He uses it to make some pretty serious statements about what he thinks is a good idea and what he thinks is a bad idea.

You might as well forget him letting go of any big story that has to do with his beloved baseball. It would be like asking him to let go of his right arm.

And don't believe that "stories my producers are forcing me to cover" stuff. That is mock complaint. For some reason or other, he is choosing to cover these stories...but he's doing it his way.

I see no reason why Keith is "just another corporate puppet participating in a strategy of misdirection against the American people" simply because he has segments of his show that don't have to do with how lousy the Bush Administration is. Quite the opposite. Don't you get it? You're already IN the tent. The fluff segments are to pull in people UNLIKE you to get them to watch long enough so that he can then tell them what is going on in the world, too. The stuff we already know about.

Keith tweaks and pick fights with the rich and powerful every night. The fact that he may have a story on his show about a fat cat, a stupid celebrity or a dumb criminal doesn't detract from that one bit in my mind. That only means I get some laughs along with the hard stuff--and that makes the hard stuff easier to digest.

If you want 100% hard news, you will have to go elsewhere. That is not something you are going to get from Keith. But if you reject him because he believes that hard news without something else to leaven it makes it too depressing and unpalatable, I think you are throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Telling one of the few precious voices of reason and truth in the media that you can't stand him because, dammit, he ran another story tonight on how dopey Tom Cruise is.

[tatia_s]

5. a better reply than i could have concocted!

:applause:

[Syrinx]

7. you make some good points

I do, however, think I understand the show very well. I was just offering what I considered to be constructive criticism.

I realize that the "Worst Person In The World" is not just a novelty segment. But at heart, that's what it is. And if KO truly believes that the government is contracting for concentration camps, then I don't understand how that can be eclipsed by the latest stupid thing that pig man said. And if he doesn't believe it, then why mention it in the first place?

Nowhere did I say that I can't stand KO. In fact, I said the first twenty minutes of his show are the best on TV. I'm just endorsing a position that a 40/20 split between news and fluff would be better than 20/40.

Nor did I say that Keith is a corporate puppet, though I could have worded my original post better. I was venting, I guess, and went a little overboard.

The world is such a cesspool right now, the truth-tellers need to use available air time wisely. I agree with your point about "sugar to make the medicine go down." But I find Keith's snarky comments about the real news to be plenty humorous, without resorting to the silly stories they usually have Monica Novotny covering, for example. (But she is extra cute, and I'm sure she could cover real news too.)

And are people really that interested in that nut Tom Cruise? Nobody that I know is -- and I'm the farthest thing from an elitist snob.

[spooky3]

16. re: Tom Cruise--have you ever checked the # of votes

for stories about him (or similar celebrities) when Yahoo! posts one? It is AMAZING how many people care about him and his ilk. You and your friends are simply not in that mindless crowd, but it's out there.

I can't add anything else to Berry's superb answer because she expressed how I feel too--except that she suggests looking elsewhere for more of a "pure hard news" show, whereas I don't think there is one on American TV, other than maybe some dinnertime news programs--but you know their ratings concerns are that only older people are watching them. I'm afraid I believe that Americans simply don't have the stomach for more than what Keith does and most of them can't handle the amount of hard news that he covers.

We don't have to agree on everything though.

[gkhouston]

18. not American television.

Maybe the BBC International feed.

It would be interesting though, if Keith did a variation of "Take out the Trash" day. You know how the WH likes to dump stories late on Friday afternoon? Maybe once a week, KO could try doing an almost-straight-news show where he takes out the celebrity stories, etc. I suppose leaving in a quick drive-by like WPITW would be okay, but Keeping Tabs and a content-free #1 story would be off-limits. Friday might not be the best night for it, though... perhaps Monday, so they could cover all the stories that got dumped on Friday? Any takers?

[Syrinx]

20. it would be a start

I hope "my producers" see your post.

[gkhouston]

22. you have producers?

wow, I'll be sending some groupies your way, stat! :7 I wish they'd try it for a few months, especially after last night. I watched WPITW, but bailed on the Tom Cruise crap du jour and the Elvis segment.

[Syrinx]

23. great!

I was feeling kind of unwelcome in this thread, but now you are going to arrange groupies for me! Man, DU is a GREAT place. If the groupies bring M&M's, please have them discard the brown ones. :D

[gkhouston]

25. is it just my imagination, or have tan M&M's disappeared?

will have to check the next time I have some M&M's...

[CC]

26. Sorry you felt

unwelcome, maybe that is because we forgot to say, "Welcome to the group Syrinx." I think the oversight was because you started a good conversation. So a belated welcome to the group, please watch out for the bears and fuzzy pink cuffs not required but are recommended. :hi:

[Syrinx]

28. thanks!

To tell the truth, that was really just a way to set up my lame joke about the M&M's.

Almost everyone disagreed with my OP, but everyone has been kind and polite.

Thanks for it! :hi:

[gkhouston]

30. Syrinx has actually been here, and been welcomed, before

some folks just like to wander by every now and again so they can get the "Welcome" basket more than once. ;-)

[CC]

31. Never hurts to welcome

once, twice or a dozen times. With me hardly ever here good chance I missed the first one too. Its going to be a long summer with all the home improvements going on, though in the long run with new insulation, windows etc we should save some on heating and cooling.

[gkhouston]

32. so did the windows actually come this time?

If so, how do they look? And what on Earth are you doing with the critters during this commotion?

[CC]

33. Yes they finally came

and are in and the siding is all finished.:woohoo: They finished up Monday. Still have to get the stone for the walls inside the porch and that window put in but the vinyl is at least on, with tyvek, foam insulation and plywood (where needed) under it. Its air and water tight from the outside now. Now the inside of the oldest part (1888) gets ripped out, insulated, drywalled, wood floors replaced and all that. Most of which we are doing ourselves. Saves about 2/3s of the cost of having someone else do it. We will p
Here are some pictures.:bounce::bounce::bounce:

Before

After




Before

After



Of course the trees leafed out in the meantime and hide most of the front and almost all of the back. :rofl: But great for privacy and really helps on the cooling in summer.

Almost forgot, the dogs stayed where ever the guys weren't. Zaiden scared the guys though I told them Raven was the one to watch out for. She is a very skittish little girl when it comes to strangers. The cats, two hid whenever the guys worked, one claimed the couch and the last two stayed on my bed. The ferrets are in my bedroom and got to act normal since those windows didn't need replaced. They enjoyed watching the guys when they could see them and trying to get outside. Good thing digging at glass doesn't wear holes in it cause Mysti was really trying hard to dig a whole in the sliding glass door to check things out.:rofl:

[gkhouston]

34. you know what happens, though, once

you get the house just right? Time to move. }(

Glad the ferrets were so entertained with "live TV". :rofl:

[CC]

35. Well the plan is to get the

house finished. Enjoy it for a couple years then downsize. Right now we have at least twice as much house as we need. It was a different matter when Beau and Poppy were here and I did daycare, then it seemed too small. But with just me and Terry (and the zoo crew) we could live in half the house easily. I have been searching and drawing out plans for a house built from the ground up one day. I have also been looking into solar electric for it (with net metering) and alternative heat sources. With the downsizing we should be able to sale this one for enough to build a new smaller house with little to no mort age. That and alternative power sources should help lots for retirement in a future decade. Oh and starting from the ground up I can have it the way I want.

Ferrets are so easy to entertain, just throw something new at them (or old that they haven't seen for a bit) and they go wild for days.:rofl: And they absolutely love when a bag of new books arrives to try to drag around and stuff under the bed.

[gkhouston]

37. a new house with alternative energy source would be fantastic

but do yourself a favor vis a vis moving: start weeding out your belongings now. I still remember what it was like when my parents downsized. :scared:

[Syrinx]

36. yikes! You're on to my master plan.

I was planning world domination by collecting those little packages of scented candles, peanuts, and French chocolates contained in the welcome baskets.

Drats!!!

Must recalibrate master plan... ;)

[gkhouston]

2. binary thinking at its finest

So, if he did 100% hard news (something I'd be quite happy with), he'd be the foremost voice of reason, but since he does fluff segments he's part of a conspiracy to distract us from life-and-death issues? :rofl:

There are certainly "distractors" reading the news these days, but I don't put KO in that category. The true "distractors" do a lot more than babble about celebrities and crime news. On the occasions when they do report on the topics you'd consider "hard news", the reporting is generally shallow and slanted. In their case, the goal seems to be to keep us uninformed. I don't get the same feel from KO's "hard news" segments, and neither do you apparently, or you wouldn't be so eager to see him go 100% hard news.

Don't dismiss the importance of his having mentioned the KBR contract and actually calling them "concentration camps" on national television simply because it appeared in WPITW. Most people don't turn on the TV in the evening to take a graduate-level course in World Events & Your Duties As A Citizen. Breaking messages up into digestible pieces, spiced with humor and even the (to us) unpalatable tabloid stuff could get the truth out to a wider audience. There's a great Gilbert&Sullivan song KO's reminded me of on more than one occasion called "I've Jibe and Joke". Here's a relevant snippet:

When they're offered to the world in merry guise
Unpleasant truths are swallowed with a will.
For he who'd make his fellow, fellow, fellow creatures wise
Should always gild the philosophic pill.

[Syrinx]

8. I actually see shade of grey everywhere I look

Not suffering from GWB syndrome, thank you very much. ;)

I just don't give a rat's ass about Tom Cruise, and I don't think very many other people do either. Including Keith Olbermann.

[WolverineDG]

3. I don't think Keith needs to "make" any decision

To quote my old Communications prof & put some perspective on this: "NBC doesn't air the nightly news to keep you informed. NBC airs the nightly news to sell toilet paper."

It's a sad state of affairs when the one newscaster presents the news in a (real) fair & balanced manner is considered "liberal." It's even sadder when he's lambasted for doing it when the coverage doesn't toe certain peoples' party line (for example, the DU DQs, some of whom flipped out because he said that Oswald killed Kennedy, acting alone). If you want the news presented without a slant left or right, that means you have to accept the good (slamming shrubbie & hard news stories) with the bad (slamming the dems & "stories my producers are forcing me to cover").

MSNBC doesn't air "Countdown" because it's the only show that doesn't slant the news. MSNBC is out to make money. In order to do that, you have to have a mix of stories to keep the audience watching so advertisers will pay to have their commericials run during the show. Hell, even "60 Minutes" has (or used to have) a fluff piece as the last segment of the broadcast. You're knocking Keith for doing the same? :eyes: If "Countdown" doesn't bring in the money, it gets canned & Keith's back to pounding the pavement looking for work.

dg

[Syrinx]

9. what's a DU DQ?

I have no problem with him slamming Democrats when they deserve it. I do that often myself.

Comparisons to 60 Minutes do nothing for me. That show is a faint shadow of its earlier incarnation.

And I have yet to meet anyone who is interested in nightly updates on the latest ramblings of some lunatic celebrity cult member -- though I'm sure they exist somewhere.

[yy4me]

4. I too start to tire of KO after the first 30 minutes but I am willing

to put up with the "Wost Person" and "Oddball" segments for the sake of a little levity in the show. I do feel he has overdone the Barry Bonds, Tom Cruise, Michael Jackson et al business. We might be interested in those personalities for a short time but the repeated airing of info about celebrities ad nauseam is my clue to go take a shower. Tomorrow is a work day. I feel KO is the best news show on the air for general news, honesty and courage. I'd just like to see a little more news. Leave the celebs with warped lifestyles. Those stories are funny for a minute but not repeatedly. Maybe there should be a "do good" celebrity segment, if the producers feel we need it. A few minutes about the fine works of someone like Bono would be more worthy than more puppet theater. Still, he is great and we need him.

[Berry Cool]

6. It's your choice what to watch and not.

But given that, yeah, this is an enterprise that is not being done out of the goodness of a network's heart, and that we are very lucky to even have someone in charge of it who cares about what happens between the commercials and that it all say something that matters, I'll take it for what it is. Which, to my mind, is damn good.

And it would not be Keith's show without baseball. So I welcome the baseball.

And if the only celebrities featured on it were "do-gooders," it would probably turn into the same kind of sanctimonious crap it currently ridicules.

[Syrinx]

10. I'm glad someone sees what I'm getting at

Though I actually like the "Worst Person In The World." At least when the "winners" could actually be considered that. When he lists people that I've never heard of, will never hear of again, and have zero influence on the world at large, I'm disappointed.

[RevCheesehead]

11. To be honest, I agree with you.

I was never a fan of Michael Jackson Puppet Theater. In fact, when they did the first bit, I think I commented "C'mon, Keith, you're better than this." I tried - I really did - but it does nothing for me. However, MJPT pales in comparison to the Tom-Kat celebrity crap. I am, quite frankly, sick of it. Keith used to keep all this stuff in a 2-minute blurb called "keeping tabs." But his producers have dragged all this crap up to the #1 story FAR too many times. I think it cheapens the overall effect of the show.

For example, I'm trying to get my Dad interested in the show. He's 87, and his mind is as sharp as anyone's here. He's really appreciated Keith's insight on the big stories. But when "Oddball" came on, he asked me "why did you change the channel?" SO - I explained it was just a break in the news for some silliness, and it would get back to more in-depth coverage of news events. But when the #2 and #1 stories were on some entertainment crap, he lost interest, and began reading the newspaper. Oh, and he looked up and asked "are you sure you didn't change the channel?"

As to your central question: how much control does Keith have? I have no idea. But the title of the show might be an indicator: it's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann." It could just as easily be called "Countdown with Rita Cosby." Armageddon, for sure - but certainly within the realm of possibility. I suspect that Keith doesn't hold the reins as tightly as we'd like him to. And when he says "stories my producers are forcing me to do," I take him at his word. Maybe there's a wink there, but on some days, he seems genuinely irritated at the story.

[Berry Cool]

12. This is definitely something we see differently.

I would be really depressed if all I had to watch was an hour of hard news. And Michael Jackson Puppet Theater makes me laugh at the very audacity.

If I had my druthers, they could let go of TomKat now that the baby has been born. I love hearing them snark on these people, but how much is there left to snark on now?

As for how much control Keith has? He said on the C-SPAN "Q&A" show that he is in COMPLETE control. So, do we believe his story about how "my producers are forcing me to do this," or do we take him at his word and assume he is telling us the truth and that his producers have no power to force him to do anything and that if he is covering a story, it is because, for some reason or other, he wants to?

Yes, I've seen him look irritated--but when he says elsewhere that he's in complete control of the show, are we supposed to believe he's not?

[Syrinx]

19. Thank You!

I was beginning to feel that I was the only fan of Keith that feels that his show could go from being "very good" to being "great."

Great is something this country desperately needs right now.

[RevCheesehead]

21. It certainly does.

Truth be told, there are lots and lots of people who are looking for good, thoughtful commentary on news events. Supposedly, in MSNBC thought, that is covered by Tweety. But Tweety's a shill, and his Hardball has become, shall we say, in need of a visit from Enzyte Bob.

The Sunday morning talk shows provide some of that. But face it, many of us (especially the Seniors) are in church, and don't see them. We need "great." Amen to that!

[Berry Cool]

24. Then again, if you think it already IS "great,"

you see no reason for it to change according to the whims of various individual viewers.

[RevCheesehead]

27. Berry -

what is with you? People are going to have differing opinions here. Can't you just accept that, without countering every comment made? :shrug:

[Berry Cool]

29. What do you mean, "what is it with me"?

You have your opinion, I have mine. I don't see how countering what someone said negates their opinion. :shrug:

Honestly, this is all I have to say on the subject.

[AlCzervik]

13. personally the 1st 20 minutes are worth sitting through the other stuff

maybe thats the compromise he has to make you know--cover infotainment and the we let you have creative control over the part of the show.

[Wetzelbill]

14. this reminds me of The Simpsons episode when Jon Lovitz's

character from The Critic guest starred and had the audacity to badmouth Macqyver in front of Patty and Selma. :)

I can't say I disagree with you though. I'm not as wary as you are, but when I see shit like the "Puppet theater" stuff, I think KO is going a little lower than he should be going. Not a big fan of the celebrity news either. However Keith is just money for that first 20 minutes or so. :)

[truthseeker1]

15. Grateful to have KO

I'm grateful to have KO and while I do agree somewhat with your comments, I'm fine with his mixing in the novelty stuff if it means it will attract more viewers. I'm just glad it's segmented towards the end so I can skip the sports and celebrity news. (Personally, I'll take the quick bites of celeb news over the long drawn-out segments on Bonds and other sports stories. But if that's what hooks a certain segment of the audience, so be it.) For the straight stuff, I catch Amy Goodman on Democracy Now. But honestly, her dry delivery gets a bit, well, dry after awhile and KO is the perfect balance between Amy and Jon Stewart.

My formula for a well balanced news intake: Amy Goodman, KO and Jon Stewart. I tape all of them on my Tivo. If I'm short for time, I watch the first 10 minutes of Amy, the first 20 minutes of KO and the first 10 of Jon. :)

[Berry Cool]

17. What it all comes down to is, it's his show, and it is what he makes it.

It is never going to be what someone else thinks it should be. It's going to be what he thinks it should be.

If that's not enough for you, you can watch/listen to other people's shows in addition. If you don't like some parts, you can skip 'em.

Just don't expect that now that his show is finally finding its audience, that it is going to change to become a perfect reflection of what its various viewers think it should be. It's attracting people for what it is, and I expect that is what it will stay unless and until the ratings start to drop instead of build.