By now it is old news that Keith Olbermann left MSNBC and caused a prime-time lineup shakeup at the network. The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell got the honor (and pressure) of moving into the 8pm timeslot where Mr. Olbermann had posted solid ratings (though, of course, still got crushed on a nightly basis by The O'Reilly Factor).
As something of a news junkie, I decided I'd stick with MSNBC in the time-slot. Mr. O'Donnell is clearly a smart guy and is informed on the inner workings of Washington. He had been a frequent guest and guest host for Mr. Olbermann and actually seemed like a reasonable moderate (particularly for their primetime lineup).
However, after almost a month in the time slot, I don't know if the ratings are slipping and the network suits want him to try to emulate Keith more but Mr. O'Donnell is going off the rails!
Last night provided a good example. His "interview" with Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) was about the most uncomfortable thing I could think of short of watching my sister give birth. It was basically 10 minutes of Mr. O'Donnell yelling at Chaffetz. I mean, I am all for trying to get a straight answer from an evasive interview subject but this was ridiculous! And it's probably even all the more hypocritical since Mr. O'Donnell did multiple segments ripping on Bill O'Reilly for his continued interruption of President Obama in their pre-Super Bowl interview (which, in itself, was arguably another pathetic attempt to emulate Keith Olbermann).
Anyway, if you can, try to get through this and let me know if I'm mistaken.
It looks like maybe I'll have to start checking out Parker Spitzer again.
Hmmm... it looks like a lot of what I said here was previously said (probably much better) by this actual working journalist.
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