GOODBYE TO CNN?

It’s a sign of how bad things are at CNN that management there thought David Shuster might help.

Mr. Shuster is the MSNBC "reporter" notorious for his rants about what he perceives to be the intellectual and moral shortcomings of conservatives.  Mr. Shuster was suspended Friday (4/02) after MSNBC’s management learned he had taped a pilot for a show with CNN.

It is, of course, bad form to do such a thing for a rival without first getting permission from your own bosses.  But it is more Mr. Shuster’s judgment than Mr. Shuster’s morals that has me ROTFLMAO.

Mr. Shuster is in the final year of his contract, and MSNBC’s ratings have been nothing to write home about.  They were down 15 percent in prime time in the first quarter of 2010 from the first quarter of 2009; down 22 percent in all day programming.

But looking for a job at CNN these days is like signing on to the crew of the Titanic after it struck the iceberg. 

CNN is a distant last among the cable news networks.  On March 31, the last day of the quarter, the Fox News Channel had 2,534,000 viewers in prime time.  MSNBC had 1,100,000.  CNN had just 704,000.

And the hole CNN is in is getting deeper.  Between the first quarter of last year and the first quarter of this year, the pioneer among cable networks lost nearly half of its prime time viewers.  CNN’s top rated show (Larry King Live) draws far fewer viewers than the late night reruns of Bill O’Reilly’s show on the Fox News Channel.

The hemorrhage of viewers, and consequently of ad revenues in what was already a tough business climate has CNN on life support.  Things are so bad that print journalists have been offering unsolicited survival tips.

Russ Douthat of the New York Times thinks more opinion is needed.  CNN should bring back "Crossfire," the liberal/conservative debate show it cancelled in 2004, he said.

Andrew Cohen of Vanity Fair disagrees:

"CNN should instead go back to being what it once was — an un-slick, un-stylish venue for serious people who want breaking news done well," he said.

CNN’s management contends they’re already doing what Mr. Cohen wants, and that that may be the heart of their problem.  Viewers today — the ignorant, bigoted morons — prefer the blatant left wing bias of MSNBC and the blatant right-wing bias of Fox to CNN’s "straight news" approach.

CNN’s courtship of Mr. Shuster — the antithesis of the unbiased journalist — suggests management thinks CNN’s prospects will be improved by becoming more like MSNBC.

There might be, as Mr. Cohen thinks, a market for a cable news network that just presents the facts, unspun.  But that isn’t the choice cable viewers have today.  That choice is among a liberal network that flaunts its liberalism; a liberal network that pretends it isn’t, and a conservative network.

CNN’s misfortune is that those liberals who prefer liberal bias masquerading as objective journalism can watch the newscasts on the broadcast networks, where things also aren’t so great.  In the first quarter this year, ABC and CBS scored their lowest ratings since Nielsen introduced the People Meter in 1987.

While MSNBC was slumping and CNN was plummeting, the Fox News Channel enjoyed its greatest quarter ever.  Ratings for all of its shows were up.

In a poll released in January by PPP, a Democrat firm, Fox was the only news organization to be trusted by more respondents (49 percent) than distrusted (37 percent).  CNN was at 39/41; NBC at 35/44; CBS at 32/46, and ABC at 31/46.

Fox’s viewers, according to a Pew poll in 2008, are 39 percent Republican, 33 percent Democratic and 22 percent Independent, far more balanced than CNN at 18 percent Republican, 51 percent Democratic, and 23 percent Independent, or MSNBC at 18 percent Republican, 45 percent Democratic, and 27 percent Independent.

The number of Democrats who watch Fox is greater than the number of Democrats who watch CNN or MSNBC.

Fox attracts so many Democrats and Independents because it reports news CNN and MSNBC ignore, and because it has more liberals among its commentators than CNN and MSNBC combined have conservatives. 

No news organization is completely "fair and balanced," but Fox is far more nearly so than are its competitors.  As CNN chases MSNBC down the rathole of explicit liberal bias, Fox’s competitive advantage will grow.

Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret and a former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.