Does anyone wonder why Olberman, Cafferty, etc are "allowed" to say what they say?

[Atman]

Simple...look at the Nielsen ratings. CNN was crowing last week that it finally beat Fox News in the prime time news ratings...with about 438,000 viewers. 438,000 viewers. In a country of 300,000,000.

IOW, the corporate media tosses us these bones on little-watched cable news, where only the hard-core news junkies are paying attention (and already know the real stories for the most part), while their multi-million-viewer evening news broadcasts have been turned into little more than Entertainment Tonight segments.

Fewer people watch cable news on a good night than the margin of victory of Gore over Bush. No wonder we're so fucked, and we get lied to so readily...no one is watching.

.

[cynatnite]

1. Not bad considering how many channels most folks have...

these days.

[babylonsister]

2. Check out the ratings for debates. They were big, considering.

This does make me wonder where people are getting their news. PBS, Stewart, Colbert, Maher?

And CatWoman posted this today:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=3119272

PBS' Iraq Documentary Sets Online Viewership Record


Executives at "Frontline" do not yet know how many people watched their recent four-and-a-half hour documentary, "Bush's War," because of PBS's complicated Nielsen ratings.

Online, however, "Bush's War," which was produced for the fifth anniversary of the United States' invasion of Iraq, has set a record, with more than 1.5 million views of all or part of the program, which was streamed in 26 segments.

"Frontline" has streamed most of its documentaries free since 2002 (www.pbs.org/frontline ), part of an effort to reach younger audiences than typically tune in to PBS. The online viewing to date of "Bush's War," which was broadcast in two parts on March 24 and 25, is an estimated "10 times the traffic of a normal show for us," said Sam Bailey, the program's director of new media and technology. Viewers are also sticking around much longer than they usually do on the site, typically for 7 to 10 minutes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/07/pbs-iraq-docum...

[blm]

3. But, also, they weren't ALLOWED to go this far back when Bushboy needed his 2nd term

guaranteed.

Dan Rather has admitted the corporate media NEEDED to protect the Bushboy for the favorable rulings they expected in his second term.

They got them.

Olbermann's special comments started in 2006, iirc.

[Berry Cool]

7. Keith got pushed back on when he tried to have "too many liberals" on his show.

He fought, though. It was his willingness to question the Ohio election results in 2004 that made me a fan. I don't think he has ever been guilty of "protecting the Bushboy."

[blm]

8. No - KO was probably the LONLY one at the time NOT actively protecting Bushboy

then. But he still wasn't given the leeway to be as pointed in his criticism as he has been since post Katrina 2005.

[jaysunb]

4. The tide has changed.

n/t

[Buzz Clik]

5. It's all relative. Try getting 438,000 people in a hot tub.

[Atman]

6. I have.

The first 20 or so were kinda fun. After that it just go out of hand.

.