MSNBC in Obama’s Second Term…
The Huffington Post’s Michael Calderone writes about MSNBC and its Progressive brand and what happens in a second Obama administration…
Griffin acknowledges that his hosts are more likely to agree with Obama on policy matters than with Republicans, but rejects comparisons to Fox News.
“This channel has never been the voice of Obama. Ever,” Griffin told The Huffington Post. “People want to talk about Fox. Fox is the voice of the Republican Party.”
Clearly, there are differences, such as Fox News giving significant airtime to contributors like political consultant Dick Morris, who acknowledged after the election that he had tailored his analysis to cheer up Republicans, and Karl Rove, perhaps the most powerful Republican operative. And although MSNBC hosts were upset by Obama’s initial debate debacle, they didn’t sugarcoat the performance.
“We hire smart people with a progressive sensibility,” Griffin said. “I tell them to go think for themselves. We don’t have talking points.”
Inside Cable News 
November 21, 2012 at 1:24 pm
They really need to put the pipe down. No one even takes them seriously as a “news” channel anymore. The desperate shots at Fox are just sad.
November 21, 2012 at 1:32 pm
This is just too funny, overly defensive because they KNOW they are the voice of Obama, and no one else.
November 21, 2012 at 2:31 pm
The Morris jab is still incorrect.
Morris said that while he wanted to “cheer up” Republicans, he believed what he was saying. That’s a significant distinction.
November 21, 2012 at 2:57 pm
Yes…Morris believed what he was saying…which means he needs immediate Psychiatric attention….#CheapShot
November 21, 2012 at 3:07 pm
Delusional Flack is no way to go through life.
November 21, 2012 at 3:13 pm
Besides, a few days before the election, he was backtracking because of Sandy. Some of us cynically thought that he was using it as a way to climb off his limb, the one where he was predicting a Romney landslide, which no one rational ever believed. Somewhere in those couple of days, he was magically able to “convince” himself that he’d been right all along. Uh huh. And why would you feel the need to state something about “cheering up” if you were only saying what you believe to be true? Duck, cuz the BS is flying low.
November 21, 2012 at 3:22 pm
“Sean, I hope people aren’t mad at me about it… I spoke about what I believed and I think that there was a period of time when the Romney campaign was falling apart, people were not optimistic, nobody thought there was a chance of victory and I felt that it was my duty at that point to go out and say what I said. And at the time that I said it, I believe I was right.”
Good luck sorting that out. He either believed he was right about a landslide, or believed he was right to predict one to buck up the troops. In other words, whichever version makes you happy. Also, he has a used car he’d like to sell you. She’s a beaut!
November 21, 2012 at 4:33 pm
MSNBC is still trying to fool people? Everybody knows what they are and are not (a news organization). Pathetic they have to bring up Fox all the time.
November 21, 2012 at 5:22 pm
I can’t disagree with that, Spud.
But it does change things from Morris being dishonest, to Morris being a fool.
November 21, 2012 at 7:15 pm
” And although MSNBC hosts were upset by Obama’s initial debate debacle, they didn’t sugarcoat the performance.”
–“I don’t know who won the debate tonight”. — Rachel Maddow seconds after debate #1 ended
November 21, 2012 at 7:29 pm
Nice try, Farris. Rachel was practically laughed off the set by four other people for that ridiculous comment.
November 21, 2012 at 7:37 pm
Nice hit Farris. Woman showed what a total dishonest flack she was. And this is a putz issue anyway. This unusual criticism of Obama was only to rev him up. The supplicants were suddenly terrified he might lose. Pew Reseach showed MSNBC did 100% pro Obama stories the entire week before the election. They were nothing but a extension of his campaign.
November 21, 2012 at 7:52 pm
Taking shots at FNC is MSNBC’s way to rally its core audience and that’s who these sorts of articles are aimed at. Followers tend to remain loyal when there is a common enemy to unite against. The two channels are barely more competition to each other than they are to any other cable channel, but having a manufactured enemy helps to keep loyal watchers watching loyally.
FNC hosts take shots at MSNBC all the time, too, and for the same reason even though its real cable competitor is probably CNN… but there’s nothing going on at CNN to rally FNC’s core audience.
For the first few post-Clinton years there was some logic to having Dick Morris talk about the political implications of current events. Now he wastes everyone’s time using the gig to sell his books. I’m sure the producers like him because he’ll show up on any programme at any time.
November 21, 2012 at 8:39 pm
Oh that’s right. Al is, like, grownup and logical and stuff. (Geoff the Robot’s voice on The Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson) You’re freakin’ me out, man.
November 21, 2012 at 10:01 pm
Griffin is a joke.
November 22, 2012 at 9:23 am
Here’s what makes Rachel so hateable: She goes the smug,I’m-smarter-than-you-chowderheads route making fun of people who want to limit their income to avoid hitting certain tax threshholds. She brings up Marginal rates, “math”, and then tells a joke about a guy with a car window. Laying it on pretty thick, she really goes to town showing us all how moronic they are and how brilliant she is.
… Except … there’s things like the AMT. And deduction phaseouts. And all sorts of other closed loopholes that, while not affecting your marginal rate, *DO* affect your final tax bill. So yeah Rachel: IT DOES MATTER.
Rachel ignores all that, because she’s brilliant you see. And anyone who disagrees is anti-math, anti-science, racist, bigot, homophobe, etc.
November 22, 2012 at 10:28 am
Come on Farris, nobody ripped Obama’s debate performance more than Chris Tinglelegs.
November 22, 2012 at 7:50 pm
Not right away, Andy. They were very much playing the “It’s a tie” for about 30 minutes after the debate until the producers whispered in their ears “Hey guys, everyone else is calling it a massacre for Romney”.