... to the post two down, here's a bit from James Joyner:
Amusingly, a misspelled variant of his name (”Micheal Jackson”) is the fourth most popular search right now, beating out Iran.
Link to Joyner via John Cole, who has his own related note:
Also, via Michael Calderone, we learn that Meet the Press is bleeding out, losing close to a half million viewers since MC Rove’s dance partner took over from the late Russert. Clearly the bizarre strategy of packing every show with right-wing pundits and spewing right-wing talking points immediately following an election where the country told the Republican party to go to hell is paying dividends. Clearly what Meet the Press needs is more appearances by President Gingrich.
*** Update ***
This week’s guests- Mitt Romney and Lindsey Graham. Atta’ boy, Stretch. You can lose another half million if you try.
4 comments:
I try to watch it, but the times have become difficult out here on the West Coast. We get it on MSNBC at 7 AM and 11 PM or something like that. Then it's on sometime midday on NBC, but I've never been able to figure out when or I'm always tied up doing something away from the TV. When Russert had it, it seemed like it was on all day long. I kept running into it all over the dial.
I also think that Russert had a reputation for tough questions and thoughtful cross examinations. Gregory seems to me like he's just arguing for the sake of arguing. He nit picks every response in an effort to appear confrontational until it just becomes a buzz. Matt Lauer does the same thing on the morning show. No matter who the guest is, he's the attack dog sent out to harass the guest. Not with sharp questions or deep insight but just to be an annoyance.
While I'm at it, what is this fascination with Michael Jackson anyway? MSNBC suspended all programming for two days to cover Michael Jackson's death 24/7 with live interviews of everyone who ever knew Jackson. Cheeses the only coverage that matched this was when Kennedy was shot. OK so you liked "Thriller" -- enough already.
LOL! I can imagine what the teevee must be like now.
As a possible partial antidote, here's a reprint of the comment I left over at the Doghouse:
Just in case anyone hasn't seen these two from TBogg: Jackson fans then and now.
Clicking those links might help.
Mr. Riley's post is also good, of course, but saying that is redundant. In a way, it also touches on your opening gripe about the shallowness of the punditocracy.
I've never actually watched Gregory host MTP, except an occasional short clip, but I'm sure your judgment is spot-on, since I feel as you do about Lauer.
One good thing that came out of the Jackson coverage is that I wound up watching John Boehner's speech about the energy bill in Congress. It's the first time I can remember agreeing with anything he said.
According to him the new energy bill requires that every existing home be brought up to energy standards. Each county is required to have one full time energy inspector who checks houses to make sure they have double paned windows, proper insulation, adequate outlets at the driveway to plug electric cars into and a whole list of things like that. Before you could even sell your house it would have to be brought up to energy standards. After you've brought the house up to standards you have to have a study done to certify how much energy you saved with the re-make.
Might make sense for all new construction, but to retrofit every house in America with a new bureaucracy to police it just seems a little much even to me. Some counties are small and impoverished and many of the old houses are so far from even normal modern building codes that bringing them up to new energy efficiency would be a major financial enterprise.
If MSNBC had their usual programs I probably wouldn't have been watching Cspan and there would be one fewer sympathetic ears for Boehner.
The first thing I'd say is that I'd be very dubious at taking Boehner at his word, given his recent history on this bill (e.g.) and other issues (e.g.). I think it would be wise to look for some fact-checking on this speech (I haven't seen anything bubble up yet, but it is the weekend).
Second, even if we stipulate that Boehner may have not been completely making shit up, we should remember that, yeah, it's going to cost some money to deal with a problem that threatens the entire planet. We are all going to have to share the burden. It does appear from what I've read elsewhere that one of the better bangs for the buck in the near term is increasing the energy efficiency of buildings.
Third, even if the hassles from your perspective are really as bad as Boehner seems to have suggested, I imagine this will be addressed by the Senate and in the conference committee before the bill becomes law. One thing that immediately comes to mind is the likelihood of grandfathering provisions being added and tax breaks being given to homeowners who have to pay for work on their houses.
So, maybe it's worth taking Boeher's views into account, but I wouldn't weight them overmuch.
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