The Real Issue With MSNBC

I think this is the key part of Greenwald’s post about Gregory replacing OberMatthews:

Finally, and perhaps most notably of all, Olbermann’s role as anchor somehow destroys the journalistic brand of both MSNBC and NBC, while Fox News continues to be deemed a legitimate news outlet by our political and media establishment. Fox does this despite (more accurately: due to) its employing Brit Hume as its main anchor — someone who is every bit as partisan and ideological as Keith Olbermannn is (at least), who regularly spews the nastiest and most vicious right-wing talking points, yet because he’s not a liberal, is deemed to be a legitimate news anchor.

The Washington Post’s Howie Kurtz — while repeatedly lamenting the ascent of Olbermann (and Maddow) as a threat to objective journalism — proclaims that “Hume is no partisan brawler” while Charlie Gibson gushes: “He has a wonderful style which makes you want to hear what Brit has to say, in an age when so many people are in your face.” The Associated Press recently declared that Fox News has never gone as far as MSNBC in producing partisan news coverage, asserting that “Olbermann’s popularity and evolving image as an idealogue (sic) has led NBC News to stretch traditional notions of journalistic objectivity” and that “Fox has never done that, perhaps mindful of the immediate controversy that would result.”

I don’t, in the abstract, object to replacing them, and indeed would never have given them the job in the first place. The unprepared, trivia-obsessed Matthews has no business anchoring anything. I don’t watch Olbermann; I accept the need for a liberal O’Reilly but I’m not interested in watching it, and he’s far from an ideal choice as anchor (as opposed to pundit.) The problem is the double standard, and the circumstances of their firing.

The other thing to note is that replacing people because they’re too biased and don’t meet Brian Williams’s journalistic standards is pretty farcical.