Why are there so many Republicans on the Sunday Morning shows? I’ve never seen a good answer for this. The most benign explanation I can think of is that the demographic for the shows is very old and older people generally vote Republican.
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Valdivia
I think it was Bennen or maybe TPM (when Sargent was there) that noted that the show bookers always want to have the Reps on. I don’t know how that changes. If on a day like today they cannot even muster more than one Dem or two, when the hell are they going to?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I never thought of that. I just chalked it up to the producers/bookers/hosts et al being terrified of the dread Liberal Bias charge. The way they’ve slid Dick Jr into pundit status as one of the worst crimes committed by the Betlway Gang
Valdivia
hmm. moderation. who knew?
Trentrunner
Because the SCLM pre-emptively self-overcorrects its nonexistent liberal bias.
cathyx
Do you really not get it? The corporate media wants you to see things in their favor. That’s one of the many ways they do that.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Valdivia: me too, I figure because I used the first name of the Cheney?
Valdivia
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I used a word that refers to the opposite of heaven. I also used a word that sounds like women who ‘work’ for a living but instead of an h it has a b at the beginning. I blamed them for the number of Reps in the Sunday parade. I haz a confused.
WereBear
Because when they have a smart, articulate Democrat or liberal (Howard Dean, Paul Krugman, and Rachel Maddow spring to mind) the floor gets mopped and shined with Republican heads.
Yevgraf (fka Michael)
I haven’t watched one of those in about 20 years. I assume that it is the cue setter for the rest of the liberal MSM for the rest of the week.
You gotta have a sporting contest so that the Village Idiots can spew out and get paid for conventional wisdom.
RSA
I never watch the Sunday morning shows, but if the advertising is for Life Alert, boner pills, and incontinence aids, I’d take that as evidence in favor.
Ann B. Nonymous
Older, and I would guess rather better off than the proles who quaff Beck and Rush, though not quite Sunday brunch at the country club levels (Boehner’s class, roughly).
And they’re obviously not at church.
maya
They have better lobbyists.
Have nothing else to do on Fridays.
Just luckier picking the short straws.
Know the right interns.
Whiter teeth.
Their appearances on Oprah got cancelled.
More willing to pick up the bar tab after the show.
Still think SM talk show means Sado Masochist.
They buy ALL the sponsor’s products.
Hosts are just die hard republican cock suckers.
fhtagn
It’s the Invisible Hand of Hruska at work:
mb
jesus doesn’t love democrats as much and this is his day, after all.
Jazz Superluminar
@DougJ
The Sunday talkshows are Serious, and they’re alsotoo Bold. Why do you hate America DougJ? Why do you hate America?
Chris Wolf
Yup, Gregory asking Hayden, Chertoff and Guiliani if torture played a key role in dispatching OBL…
Torture won, 3-0.
danimal
Occam’s razor: a shrinking audience of shrinking (both physically and intellectually) people. I’ll bet the public affairs discussion shows on Univision get more viewers and have a much more liberal-friendly tilt.
Liberals should spend more time developing and supporting interesting programming to replace the Sunday gasbag shows. Let the Foxification of Sunday morning continue; it’s not worth the struggle. If there was a lively public affairs alternative program that engages in issues, with Serious People forced to think and explain their views in more than soundbites, I would watch it.
General Stuck
Drama sells. You need conflict for good drama. Degenerate Morons create the biggest conflict. ergo Republicans on teevee defending their degenerate moron leader doing moronic degenerate things,
Didn’t Pol Pot’s Chief of Staff say the same thing? Maybe we should pardon those Japanese officers we hanged for waterboarding. Posthumous, of course. Like I keep saying, something has to give on this shit, or the next wingnut potus will have stocks and stretch boards installed on the WH lawn, to protect America, of course.
Davis X. Machina
Because the Republican party is the natural party of government.
Democratic administrations, and Democratic majorities in the Houses of Congress, are temporary aberrations.
Washington is wired for Republicans.
Another Bob
I’m imagining a Lolcat poster showing a variety of really ugly old dogs sitting around a desk, saying, “We’z on yur talk show, kontrollin our message.”
Hunter Gathers
‘Cause the MSM is almost totally white, male and upper class. The easiest way to give Dancing David Gregory a stiffie is having a middle-aged white Republican go on MTP talking about tax cuts, abortion, deficits and killing Muslims. That and the people who actually watch the garbage on the Sunday talk show tend to be people who are still pissed off about blacks and women getting the right to vote doesn’t hurt either.
Danny
Conservative politicians are better at getting booked. The movement pushes a narrative, sets the agenda and then provides the congressmen that want to discuss that agenda, all the way aided by the infrastructure they have painstakingly established over many years time. Conservative grassroots are encouraged to, and are by nature better at, getting worked up and call in when they perceive “bias” (=not toeing the republican party line).
Gregory
That’s easy — liberal media! Oh, wait…
Brachiator
Why are any of these people on? I flipped briefly from MTP to the ABC show. You had a Republican strategist (Mark Murphy) on one and Liz Cheney on the other, along with Bob Woodward who, as far as I can tell, has not done any meaningful reporting on Obama in years. All these folks were wisely intoning about foreign policy and the Arab Spring and torture.
Why no Arab foreign policy experts or anyone who knew a goddam thing about the region or who might provide something other than the Village perspective?
They are on not because they are old or Republican, but because they are the Establishment.
We would have been more informed had they included in the panel one of the college students who celebrated outside the White House after the news about bin Laden had spread.
Bonus question. How many heard about bin Laden’s demise from Twitter vs getting it from the Washington Post website?
Stephen1947
What cathyx said. There are more Publicans on Sunday morning gabfests because Publicans own the networks.
PurpleGirl
@fhtagn: Oh my, that’s a great reference. LOL
mk3872
1. Out of fear of being called “liberal” by right-wing attack dogs (O’Reilly, Limbaugh, Breitbart, et. al.)
2. Repubs will say crazy stuff that makes for more headlines, views and clicks
FoxinSocks
The thing is, I used to watch the Sunday morning shows all the time. But I haven’t watched in years, because it’s like the people on these shows live on another planet. They’re all talking about deficits and austerity while everyone I know is struggling for jobs and barely scraping by.
Like the Washington Post and other newspapers, they’re no longer relevant to me, because their concerns aren’t my concerns.
Bill H.
Liberals give lengthy (not really, but compared to conservative talking points) answers that are hard to understand unless you actually think, which nobody wants to do. They say things which the “moderator” was not expecting and doesn’t know how to respond to, which embarrasses the “moderator.” They also cut into the “moderator’s” talking time too much with explanations which actually explain things.
Conservatives, on the other hand, say the same thing over and over again, nice short meaningless talking points which the “moderator” is expecting and knows how to respond to, and which permits a smooth transition into the next prepared question.
Martin
Because who the fuck else is watching TV on a Sunday other than old Republicans? The rest of us are busy at the beach/having sex/working/doing anything better.
James E. Powell
It’s a combination of who watches the shows and who sponsors the shows.
Cat Lady
I like to think it’s because every Democrat who gets asked to come on a show tells the booker “fuck off and die you lame ass motherfucker – go call McCain, cuz the butthurt is still strong in that weaselly loser. Assholes.”
Karen
Because the CEOs of all of the companies that own the networks (GE, Disney, Viacom, etc) are all Republican, silly.
It’s the same reason why in movies and TV, ugly guys always get the hot girls (not the other way around, heavens no) and the 40 and 50 year old guys get the girl in their 20s.
Notice that in movies, 40 year old women are considered to be too old to be with a man their age.
MonkeyBoy
Also, many white males over 55 watch little TV other than news and pundit shows. Thus the Sunday shows are made attractive to that segment so that advertisers have a crack at that market which is not available elsewhere.
Cat Lady
Help help I’m being
oppressedmoderateded! I’ve been way more foul mouthed than that. FYWP!RossInDetroit
@Valdivia:
“bousewife?” Also confused…
RossInDetroit
Republicans are a better show, and on commercial media it’s all about the show, not the quality of the content.
The GOP talkers have their points lined up real simple for the mouth breathers. They don’t surprise anyone. Put a Dem on and they might start pulling out facts & stuff and confuse the audience into clicking away before the next commercial for pickup trucks or adult diapers.
gpleigh
Because the MSM is owned by big greasy Republicans.
BudP
Why are Klan rallies always emcee’d by white guys?
Valdivia
@RossInDetroit:
yeah, my euphemism wasn’t very good. See my comment on top and you’ll get it. I just didn’t know what would trigger the censor or not. I meant working girls. In the oldest profession acception.
ornery curmudgeon
Because it’s propaganda, Doug, and the reason you don’t understand is because you watch it.
danimal
@Martin: …like commenting on blogs???
gnomedad
I forget where I found this; someone here may have posted it earlier:
Conservative Media Bias: Bush Officials Outnumber Obama 6 to 1 On Sunday Shows
Valdivia
@gnomedad:
yep that was me. :)
Just found that blog and liked they were blaring this info since the early part of the weekend.
Keith
@Bill H.:
This.
JenJen
I’m really not sure, but it has succeeded in annoying me all morning. (As Atrios often points out, pissing off liberals is the GOP endgame anyway, and I can’t argue with him.)
Example: Watched Candy Crowley hype a new CNN Presidential poll for an hour, and when she finally delivered, she didn’t talk about the new approval number, hinting that it was over 50% but going for broad strokes: “The President’s latest poll numbers look like a Monet. The big picture is good, but it gets blurry close up.”
That’s a direct quote. She spent the remainder of the segment pointing out the President’s low approval numbers on the economy and more importantly to her, the deficit.
gnomedad
@Bill H.:
Heh. More like a liturgy than a search for information.
goblue72
Because liberals live in coastal cities, and us urban people got a million better things to do on a Sunday morning than watch a bunch of old white people on TV glancing about the best way to screw a rat.
bemused
So many republicans are on Sunday shows because they are the serious and courageous adults. Duh.
General Stuck
I haven’t regretted for a second, not replacing my old CRT teevee a year ago, and mothballing my Dish dish. At least with the internet, I can pick and choose my own propaganda.
fhtagn
I would also observe that the similarity between Moron and More On is not entirely coincidental.
Fred
Rethugs have always been better at talking about governing because they have no problem lying. Democrats are better at the actual governing.
RossInDetroit
The most useful way I have found to look at what gets on TV is motivation. Their goal is to maximize profit. Revenue comes from commercial advertisers in most cases, or from viewership share. They get more money for having the right people watch. The right people are the people who will reward the advertisers by patronizing them. Therefore the shows’ content is assembled to attract the people who will spend the most with the advertisers who will pay the most for airtime.
I think it’s not about ideological bias but about the viewers and advertisers. If Democrats spent lots of money on products and services that had big ad budgets there would be more Democrats on TV.
phantomist
The lack of elected fascists?
MikeJ
@Stephen1947: You think they invite bar owners on the shows because they own bars?
Observer
Almost all of your collective explanations are fantasy land.
People quote Repubs because…I don’t know.
But what I do is that ALL of you quote Repubs. If you go back to Benen’s own blog this past week, you’ll see that he does the same thing: no quotes or posts about Democrats but the first dozen or bin laden posts were quoting or talking about Republicans.
Except for BTD at TalkLeft, all the blogs were about the same. Do you own checking…you folks obsess about what Repubs say all the time. Then when TV does it, you cry foul and make up implausible stories of bias or incentives and what not.
Even BJ was in on the game and BJ is pretty good on convering Dems. Go back and look at the posts this past week…quotes from Limbaugh, Sullivan, torture-fans, but precious few quotes from real Democrats and (I think) no quotes from the Sec of State, Senate Leader or House Minority Leader. But other blogs like Benen’s own were way, way, way worse. NO quotes from anyone other than Repubs.
It’s not just the TV folks.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JenJen: I don’t know how much of a role Candy Crowley has in choosing guests, but I remember she had McCain and Lieberman on to discuss Libya, because they were so right about Iraq. In the circles Candy moves and thinks in, that last clause contains no irony. And she was on the panel, along with IIRC John King, Wolf Blitzer and Gloria Borger, who stared in blank confusion when some Brit (forget who) pointed out that “austerity” had not only not fixed the UK’s economy, it made things worse. These people are dumb (/shorter me).
Irving
Before we jump on the conservative bias bandwagon, let me ask a simple question: What liberal commentator is out there who has the time to essentially volunteer to be on a news show on any given Sunday afternoon and talk about something with little advance notice on the topic? McCain and Cheney are easily available and can blab on anything on a moment’s notice without derailing a show. If I was running a show like this they’d be in my Rolodex, just because they’re available as a fallback.
John Casey
Jeebus.
Republicans are disproportionately booked on Sunday talk because that’s what the people who sign the paychecks want.
We have been bought and sold, my friends, bought and sold.
birthmarker
@Danny: For the Win. Read Republican Noise Machine by David Brock for a longer explanation. The repubs provide speakers’ bureaus for any and all occasions.
Case in point: After the Giffords shooting, repubs were on CNN by telephone within what, an hour? After the OBL shooting, repubs were on (I think I was watching MSNBC) very quickly, by phone. THE REPUBS HAVE A HELLACIOUS PROPAGANDA MACHINE.
And who owns the media outlets? Who benefits from the control they possess?
Bob Loblaw
@Irving:
That’s true. It’s hard to pull libruls away from their effete, godless sodomy, degenerate drug abuse, and ostentatious Marxism to get them on tv for an hour.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@Brachiator:
You’re absolutely right, especially for the millennial generation. I teach a course on cross-media communication each semester, and on a recent final exam administered to a section of 25 students (the vast majority of them no more or less media-aware than anyone else) one question, in part, asked them to tell how they had heard about the Bin Laden news. Sixteen out of 25 said it was on FaceBook, and the remainder said either Twitter or word-of-mouth through a friend. Exactly none of them said they first learned of it from television.
The TV industry had better not be asking for whom the bell tolls WRT the newspaper industry is all I can say.
fhtagn
@Observer:
There’s a difference between covering the GOP critically (with the requisite mockery for their crazification), and having them on the Sunday shows for mutual admiration and grooming parties.
Just sayin’.
danimal
@Irving: Can I volunteer Russ Feingold?
Elie
@RSA:
I agree. Who watches the sunday shows? I sure don’t.
I think that without knowing it the networks continue to diminish their own following.
Anyway, they don’t want any real discussion or present truly different points of view. These are just on the air to provide, as you say, a reason to show commercials for the target audience: seniors.
Cacti
As others have noted, I would guess that it’s because the median age of TV News viewers is 51, and for cable news it jumps up to almost 60.
Old media caters to its older audience.
licensed to kill time
@Brachiator:
Heh. I learned about it right here on Balloon Juice in realtime.
RossInDetroit
I read years ago that McCain and Lieberman were tops in the *ookers’ rolodexes because they could respond at a moment’s notice to appear on a show. Sometimes it’s expediency.
Elie
@Observer:
I agree. In fact, I would say that with any bad story about the Democrats or Obama that is being pushed by any republican gets repeated and amplified here and on other sites over and over. I think we like it more than quoting our own or promoting ourselves from a positive perspective. We thrive on negativity and playing that track over and over, sad to say. Maybe we think that liberals and progressives are dull? What is it? Unlike the Republicans who parrot their talking points over and over, we don’t parrot our own but mock and in effect repeat theirs over and over in the process of mocking them…
fhtagn
@RossInDetroit:
*ookers? As in the reconfigured Librarian of Unseen University?
piratedan
@Observer: granted and good call…. at an initial social meeting of the Baja Arizona Kossacks (yes, I frequent the GOS) we lamented the fact that there were so few decent candidates out there hence the continued conversation about Giffords possibly/potentially running for Senate because were not doing a good job at the ground game, yeah we can phone bank and beat the bushes (hah!) for votes, what we don’t have is a frequently open dialogue about what we want and how to get it. The Progressive Caucus budget was a great place to start, and yet, we can’t get people to really talk about it. A lot of thought went into it, it sounds extremely reasonable on the first pass, introducing cuts to certain areas of the government and tax increases to the filthy rich and the landed gentry and places more of an emphasis on education and infrastructure. We’ve seen one thread topic about it here and in the interim, how many articles about the latest poutrage or unresearched pieces of detached reality from the Atlantic or the Daily Beast. Maybe its because we’re all more or less okay with damn near ANYTHING that sounds the least bit fair or reality based that we don’t NEED to discuss it, yet the energy that we spend on damning everything else leaves our keysters in our chairs instead of getting out there and effectively making or helping better Dems win elections so we can get back to the country doing what it should and watching more baseball, football or crime dramas.
so, next week I go to my local Dem group and start getting involved. I know that I am not the brightest bulb on the string, but I feel that I am a damn sight more knowledgeable than the current fucktards in charge in AZ and I’m based in the reality regarding what the function of government actually is supposed to be.
RossInDetroit
@fhtagn:
the name for people who book got Valdivia modded early in the thread.
RossInDetroit
TPM for the data. WaPo to see how the VSP will spin it.
artem1s
I always figured it was because all of the liberal commentators had perished when their own major intestines, in a desperate attempt to end the torture of listening to conservative/randian talking points, leaped straight up through their necks and throttled their brains.
cause listening to neocons is a lot like listening to Vogon poetry. only worse.also.too.
Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel)
@Davis X. Machina: Good article! That’s kind of what I assumed. So, was DC wired for Democrats up through Nixon?
Yutsano
@RossInDetroit: Oddly enough I was out to dinner with friends and my brother texted me about it. I got home as fast as I could and came…right here! I may have peeked over at CNN.com (most of the time their Web stuff is better than their broadcast news) but I wasn’t gonna buy it unless I saw it posted here.
Dave
It’s because they’re sponsored by boeing
bryanD
“Why are there so many Republicans on the Sunday Morning shows?”
Semi-archaic word of the day: itinerary. The GOP keeps a simple itinerary and no one goes home on Thursday until the weekend slots are filled.
It’s like working at McDonald’s.
Danny
@birthmarker:
Agreed. We need to improve our game, simple as that. And someone need to do some solid research to break that assymetry (booking bias) down to numbers, and then we pull a “liberal media” attack on the networks.
Admiral_Komack
“Why are there so many Republicans on the Sunday Morning shows?”
Because the President is a nig(GONG!), who became an AMERICAN citizen when he took out Osama Bin Laden, something George W. Bush and his Gravitas Gang couldn’t do.
Brachiator
@licensed to kill time: RE: Bonus question. How many heard about bin Laden’s demise from Twitter vs getting it from the Washington Post website?
Good point.
Balloon Juice was the second place I looked. I had been out for a walk, and did not know anything about what was happening in the world. I fired up my PC and saw a yahoo news item about an impending presidential announcement. Jumped over to Balloon Juice and saw the various posts.
However, I note that I did then visit a number of other news sites for detail, including links from Balloon Juice posts.
Anya
Speaking of Sunday shows, Christiane Amanpour turned out to be an utter disappointment and a classic villager. Her guests are uninspiring, her interview with Billy Graham’s son was such a disgrace. The whole time I kept thinking, ask a fucking follow up question. But my biggest beef with her is her tenancy to never challenge republicans on their lies. I don’t know, maybe she’s not very informed about domestic affairs but her poor performance at This Week, managed to put Jake Taper in a good light.
cbear
Judging from her appearance the only circle Candy moves in is an endless one between the snack table in the Green Room and the buffet in the network cafeteria—and I doubt her thinking extends much beyond where she’s going to get her next ham sandwich.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
Catering to the intended audience, which is NOT the hoi polloi like you and me. Look at the sponsors and the ads for which they buy time: They ain’t sellin’ Stouffers Red Box entrees, they’re selling ADM. They ain’t selling GEICO, but pool insurance policies.
These shows are little more than the villagers telling the emperor that his new clothes are splendid.
Danny
@Davis X. Machina
@Observer
@Elie:
I think all of those are related. Being in a state of perpetual opposition as dems were 1968-1992 (wrt the presidency) breeds a lot of bad habits, such as obsessing about the guys in power, being passive and reacting to what the other guy does, anger and contempt at the majority of the population that keeps electing idiots and so on.
licensed to kill time
@Brachiator:
I’d like to state for the record that I am not now, nor have I ever been, a member of the Twitterist Party. I may know Twitterists but I shall refuse to name them.
I also renounce Stalin and the broccoli mandate.
BobS
@cathyx: Thank you. Fortunately I didn’t have to read too far into the comments for someone to answer the question correctly.
Brachiator
@Admiral_Komack:
Sadly, one of the blonde talking heads on Meet The Press made this point, that until he orchestrated bin Laden’s takedown, Obama’s character as a Real American was suspect, at least to Republicans.
Just amazing.
MonkeyBoy
@Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again):
I think ADM as an advertiser is not really selling anything. They are more like a sponsor and what they are selling is their name as proud to promote “serious discussions” as a public service. But their name promotion really boils down to “don’t screw with or regulate agribusiness.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@fhtagn:
No shit. I like the mention of BTD/Armando/Daffy Duck as the exception.
As if that makes for exceptional commentary…lol!
There is a narrative that the Sunday shows have to put out and it won’t get there unless
the Republicanstheir bought and paid for lackeys are on the air to give it. The rich dudes didn’t buy the Republican party and news agencies just to let Democrats on to mess things up for them.That wouldn’t be a wise use of their investments, would it?
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Karen: It’s a straight white Christian man’s world we just live in it. And they’re pissed off about it post CRA and women’s suffrage.
Brachiator
@Evolved Deep Southerner:
Wow. A small sample, but still an indicator of a seismic shift in how a new generation gets its news. Thanks for this.
I also think about how news stations scrambled to get pictures out of the celebration in front of the White House. Even more impressive and more immediate were the tweets and retweets from the people who were actually there celebrating.
Stephen1947
@MikeJ: I started using Publicans to refer to that collection of numbskulls that used to be a respectable political party when they started fetishizing the use of ‘Democrat Party’ – I’m doing unto others… Probably the most common use of ‘publicans’ that modern people are aware of is the New Testament conflation of ‘publicans and sinners.’
MikeJ
@Stephen1947: Yes, but barkeepers are generally nice people. There’s no reason to use a perfectly cromulent word to describe awful people.
ProgressiveATL
Because the real audience is other villagers. By the villagers, for the villagers.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@MonkeyBoy:
Point taken.
Davis X. Machina
@MonkeyBoy: Exactly. The people — Northrop, General Dynamics, Raytheon — who put ads in the DC subway for weapons systems so far as I know don’t have retail branches.
Davis X. Machina
@Parallel 5ths (Jewish Steel): “Normal’ was different, but not that different then: think Senator Stennis — the Dixiecrat/National Security axis. The ancestor of the modern Republican party.
BattleCat
If I were a rich politician who didn’t actually have to do the job I was elected for, you know, I’d go on Sunday shows too.
Some of those show hostesses are pretty hot young things, you know?
I know.
Kathy in St. Louis
I have wondered about this for years. When the Republicans are the party out of power, they are on the Sunday shows all the time for “balance”. When they are the in party, they are on to explain all their programs.
I think the real reason is that these news organizations are owned by very conservative entities who are constantly trying to cook the process. If all you hear is the Republican, or at best the most conservative Dems on the Sunday shows, that’s what the public will perceive is the general consensus on an issue.
And this is all done is a fawning manner toward the neocons who show up, and with never a follow up when their points are patently false.
Brachiator
@ProgressiveATL:
Yep. The Sunday shows are about Democrats or Republicans. It’s just a gaggle of Beltway insiders droning on about their narrow, self-absorbed vision of the world.
ornery curmudgeon
@Kathy in St. Louis: Exactly how I see it. Propaganda.
James E. Powell
@Danny:
The problem is, we are not even in the game. We may vote, volunteer, and contribute a little money. But to the elites of the political system, including the Democratic Party, we just do not matter.
Elizabelle
@Kathy in St. Louis:
Agree with Kathy’s comment 100.
Despite what Republicans say about their ability to “create their own reality”, some know they cannot do that reliably.
Ergo the Sunday talk shows, owned by massive corporate entities.
Which provide conventional wisdom and frame the issues to benefit the corporate owners interests as much as possible.
Amazingly, the Republicans deliver for those massive corporations, quite well. Cloaked in talk about small business and individual liberty and choice.
Oh. And ownership too.
Elizabelle
I would love to start my own Sunday morning gabfest.
It would be called “Cue the Guillotines” and we’d serve fabulously strong coffee and just let smart — actually smart, not just glib — people rip.
Arundel
As Davis X above said and linked, “Washington is wired for Republicans”. Why this is, I can only suppose it’s because they best represent the moneyed interests whose patronage allows these coporate shows to run.
It’s not just the Sunday shows. CNN, with Cooper or Blitzer, regularly will have four Republican heavy-hitters, and “on the left”, Donna Shalala. Who will make genteel protestations before agreeing with them. Such a farce.
Gergen must live in the Green Room there. ANyway, it’s all good news for John McCain. (Exclusive!)
cleek
nobody watches these shows. who cares.
fhtagn
@cleek:
Easy there, Cleek. Mrs von Ribbentrop in Oklahoma is a devoted viewer. Let’s not go too far.
Kewalo
I haven’t read all the comments but wanted to get my 2 cents in. I watched the shows today for the first time in months and I probably won’t go back.
This Week had Liz Cheney? Liz freaken Cheney. And idiot Gregory asked Guiliani for his opinion on Pakistan…Pakistan??? Because Guiliani has so much foreign policy experience I guess.
They were just train wrecks, without one decent liberal unless you consider Doris Kerns Goodwin a liberal. They probably do since she deals with facts.
These are how I see those shows and I am old. Closer to 70 then 60 now and my brain, although much slower, hasn’t stopped entirely. I’d be willing to guess that it is old RWers. Or RWers of any age. I think they are setting up for the election and I think we need to find a way to counter them. I don’t have any bright idea, I’ll leave that to you younger folks. But if you come up with something half way decent, I’ll be there to help you out.
boss bitch
I’m not buying that demographic bullsh*t. They are supposed to report the news.
Neldob
We need to write the media masters lots of letters letting them know we noticed they have no liberal stars, or just very few, and don’t like it and find it trivializing or something. I don’t have a tv, just taking your word for it.
MikeMc
‘Cause they say crazier shit. Democrats are so fucking even-handed it’s boring to watch them. I can’t watch those shows. I can’t watch them because of the things Republicans say. I can’t watch them because of the things Democrats don’t say.
ribletsonthepan
@JenJen: I think you are being too hard on Candy Crowly. If she really meant to cast aspersions on the new approval numbers she would have said Obama’s poll numbers read like a “Seurat”.
Kathy in St. Louis
I go on lots of website, and this one has some of the most thoughtful comments anywhere.
That said, Candy Crowley is the worst ever. She was the laziest campaign correspondent I’ve ever seen. She must have taken the McCain press handout each morning, done a standup in front of the bus, then gone shoe shopping. I mean, there was never a piece of news analyzed by this woman, or any further fact-finding on anything he said. She was, of course, a natural for Sunday morning talking head political shows. That’s exactly how they operate, too.
JAHILL10
@Elizabelle: I’d watch!
Kane
Several years ago on C-SPAN there was a media forum with Tim Russert, Bob Schieffer, Dan Rather and others. Someone in the audience asked why the Sunday morning shows invite far more Republicans than Democrats. Russert explained that because Republican are in power, that is naturally who they would invite. He added, if Democrats ever regain power, then they will be invited more.
But it never worked out that way.
Last month I saw Eric Alterman speaking at a book signing on C-SPAN. During the discussion, he pointed out that in the year 2009, the guest who appeared on Meet the Press most often was former Speaker Newt Gingrich. In the same year, according to Alterman, Speaker Nancy Pelosi never made an appearance on MTP.
Danny
@James E. Powell:
Nah, the more progressives agree to that sentiment, the less clout progressives get. You got to play to win, and you got to believe you can win to play. Rent Rocky I and watch it 5 times, you’ll catch on.
Even the crony capitalists that run the republican party have to buy off their base with guns, abortion laws and the odd war every now and then. Votes matter, elections have consequences, thats how democracy works. If the 60% that stayed home last november had gotten their sorry asses to the polling booth we’d be hearing more about jobs and less about small gubmint.
Danny
Eh, and more to the point, 10 phone calls a day to the networks would be an annoyance. Every progressive blogger writing once a week about how the partisan breakdown 60%-40% on the networks guests would be an embaressment. If that factoid is out there 10 years it becomes common knowledge. Maybe “it can’t be done” – i don’t know – but did we try?
The “Liberal media” accusation works wonders for conservatives and it isn’t even true (any more).
dww44
@Neldob: Actually, this is as good a place as any to start. I’ve been out of town most of the day so am late to this discussion. Before I left, though, had TV on and saw a blurb for Gregory’s MTP and when those 3 Repub names were mentioned, I thought, “Oh, my God, NBC is paying them back for daring to “lean forward” on weeknights on MSNBC. Or else, Gregory is either a closeted Republican or is owned by one and he actually thought this was a good idea.
Where is the pushback from our side? Where are the national Democrats and the LIBERAL thinktanks? We need to push back now, often, and repeatedly.
I am starting by emailing David Gregory and asking him why this lineup today. All of us, each of us, needs to not consign the TV/Cable newsshows to the older demographic, of which I am one ( I do not watch the Sunday morning shows). And, most especially, we need to confront and challenge Republican dominance of the airwaves. I don’t give a whit that they are owned by right leaning corporations. Giving up on that front means we are also giving up on our vision of where this country should go.
P.S. on the drive back was listening to ATC Sunday show on public radio. Tuned in when the host was interviewing someone from the American Enterprise Institute about our relationship with Pakistan. Say what? At least they cuda countered with the Brookings Institute( a bit of he said/she said is better than just one said). The host didn’t even mention that AEI was a conservative think tank. Of course we all know that public radio is scared witless these days. Just the way the GOP wants it.
Triassic Sands
I think the MSM is afraid of Republicans, while they neither respect nor fear Democrats (with good reason).
AxelFoley
@BudP:
ROFL
bob h
I think that is right. Many of the advertisers are financial asset managers, so they must be looking at an older, more affluent viewership, and they do not want to disturb them with inconvenient truths.
Howlin Wolfe
@maya: Maya, I vote for all of the above.