Media: Zohran Mamdani needs to stop playing catch up and go on the offense

The media image of Zohran Mamdani has never been about Zohran Mamdani.  Assorted YOUTUBERS took marching orders from Democratic Socialists of America.  There were other DSAers running to be the Democratic Party's candidate for NYC mayor -- the very qualified Brad Lander among them -- but the party leaders -- or big mouths -- wanted Zohran.

You'll need to ask them why?

 

 

It was cute, recently, watching an MSNBCer on air last week try to state that he didn't care one way or the other re: Zohran and was just reporting.  To his credit, he hadn't (mis)used MSNBC broadcast time to pimp Zohran but so many had, so many MSNBCers had used their posts to promote Zohran during the primary that they're all tarred and feathered as guilty in the minds of most paying actual attention.

Right after the primary, when he was the presumed winner, Jen Psaki, for example, had him on her bad program and she fluffed and made a complete idiot out of herself.  Was she trying to come off like she had a crush on him?  We thought she was happy with her husband Greg.

But what we identified even more was MSNBCers were doing what they'd done back in 2014, they were playing Norman Maine as they acted out A STAR IS BORN.  

In 2014, they did that with Wendy Davis.  For a few weeks, Wendy looked like she might be the next governor of Texas.  And then MSNBC and others got a hold of her -- or her image -- and turned into a star, a media star, someone who gets airtime and press and make overs and --  Well anything and everything that a politician doesn't need.

 

You don't vote for a star, you vote for someone who's going to work for you.  

Some people are that stupid -- that's how you get all the media work to turn Wendy Davis into a celebrity.  Some people are even more stupid.  George HW Bush, for example, would be an example of more stupid.  Dan Quayle, despite Poppy Bush's being bowled over by Quayle's alleged good looks, had no political future.  Being on the ticket with Poppy was supposed to be some form of debutante coming out ball for Quayle.  The ball ended way too soon for Dan because when Bush bowed out of elected office, that it was for Quayle as well.

So that would be the more stupid.

The 'just stupid'?  They try to create political stars without realizing what they're doing.

As a general rule, a political star is always going to fail on the Democratic Party side.  As a group, the left really doesn't get taken in for the most part.  

The exception would be 2008 with Barack Obama but, remember, a lot of that was wives-of.  A NEWSWEEK wife, for example, really put the magazine in place.  

It's really something to reflect on how bad the pre-primary coverage was; however, it is especially appalling to watch the post-primary coverage.

They do realize this is an important race, right?

Not for NYC.  NYC survived Rudy G, they can survive anything. Doubt us?  Their current mayor is a crook who cut a deal with The Convicted Felon in the Oval Office. And still NYC thrives.

But this is important because of DSA's hopes and dreams.  

They really believe that they have a shot, in 2028, at the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is who they're betting on.

It's a strange bet if you dig deep.  

AOC was first elected to Congress in 2018 when she won 78.1% of the vote.  She was re-elected (applause) in 2020 with 71.6% of the vote (huh?).  Then came 2022 and she won re-election with . . . 70.6% of the vote.  And last November, she again won re-election but her percentage of the vote fell to 68.9%.  In each election, she's won so far; however, her percentage of voters has shrunk with each election as well -- from the high of 78.1% down to 68.9%.  Does that really say: AOC On The Rise?

(For the record, if AOC is the party's presidential nominee, we'll be voting for her.  We'll be voting for whomever the nominee is.)

Far beyond AOC herself -- like some voters, the DSA has soured on her with the passing of time, especially the Kshama Sawant segment of DSA which can't stop ripping AOC apart online -- the DSA sees 2028 as their moment.  They've never had a moment before.  Never come close.  But hooking onto AOC's charisma (and AOC does have charisma, probably the most since Barack in 2008), they know, is going to deliver them a moment, deliver them power, finally allow them to take over the Democratic Party from within, and possibly even cleary up their combination skin.

Are those starry eyed dreams preventing them from grasping how important Zohran is?  

AOC's path to the nomination gets a whole lot harder if Zohran can't seal the deal.  If NYC can't elect a Socialist as mayor, many observers will see that as evidence that the country cannot either.  And as they jawbone about this over and over, it would become a self-fulfilling promise.

"We can fight that!" screams the DSA.  To which we reply: When have you ever gotten the media right?

Margaret Sullivan, for example, is now at THE GUARDIAN.  She's a columnist.  She was a public editor at THE NEW YORK TIMES.  It was not a good fit for her or the paper and they did away with the public editor a year after she left the paper.  We all need to keep that in mind when reading her latest column "Is the New York Times trying to wreck Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral bid?"

The editorial board of THE NEW YORK TIMES did not support Zohran in the primary.  That's needed information.  However, has Margaret forgotten the wall between editorial-opinion and actual reporting?  Is she saying that it's gone at THE TIMES?

That would require concrete and there's nothing concrete about her nonsense post ('column') for THE GUARDIAN that would be an embarrassment if it showed up in a high school newspaper. Sullivan typed:

 

A recent New York Times news story immediately drew fire from readers – and for very good reason.

Headlined “Mamdani Identified as Asian and African American on College Application,” the article centered on Zohran Mamdani, the candidate for New York City mayor who drew national attention recently with his stunning win in the Democratic primary election.

Its gist was that as a high school senior in New York City, Mamdani – who was born in Uganda and is of Indian descent – checked a couple of different boxes about race when applying for admission to Columbia University.

So what, you might ask. Why is this even a story, you might also ask.

 

No, Margaret, we wouldn't ask that because we're not as stupid as you are.

He is not Black.  

Yes, that matters.

Senator Elizabeth Warren wrongly claimed to be of Native American heritage.  When corrected on that, she stated her family had believed that and that is what she was told as a child.  "Pocahontas" is the main name people use to mock her -- to this day, to mock her.  They mocked her with it in 2020 when she ran in the Democratic Party's presidential primary.  

Did you miss that, Margaret? 

Rachel Dolezal -- did you miss her too?  The woman who pretended to be Black?  When she was outed as White, she lost everything.

He's not Black.

It's cute the way Margaret lies and whores -- cute and embarrassing, that column was beneath her -- to try to act as though an 18 year old isn't an adult.  "High school senior"!  It's a pity she couldn't use "intern," right, to harken back to an earlier media effort to play someone as younger than they actually were.

He was 18 years old and he knew he wasn't Black.  He lied and he lied to take advantage of race in a college admission.  He wanted into Columbia -- infamous to this day for the "Scottish African-American" professor (if you don't know her, you don't know Columbia).  

More to the point, Margaret, it wasn't that long ago.  He's only 33 today.  That was 15 years ago.

Again, he was an adult.  Again, he lied.

Elizabeth Warren probably didn't lie but she's crucified to this day.  They say she lied, they say she lied in order to get advantages in eductation and employment.

But Margaret wants you to believe that it doesn't matter that Zohran lied?

Not only does it matter but it also goes to a non-inquisitive press that this issue only came out after the primary.

Back to Jen Psaki, she wasted MSNBC's time and Zohran's time with her giddy segment that should have instead drilled down on what Zorhan stood for.

That was the moment.  

She blew it.  She blew it as a journalist and she blew it as a supporter of Zohran.

People wanted to know who he was.  This was the real roll out.  And Jen didn't do journalism and she wasn't even effective as a campaign surrogate.

When Jen should have been serious and focused and talking policy, the media narrative was already being created:  Zohran eats strangely.  Zohran is not Christian.  Zohran . . .

Day after day that pops up in the media and is amplified non-stop.

And idiots in the media and the DSA don't know what the hell to do.

We're not trying to tank Zohran, we are trying to tell the people supporting him that you need to do better.

At this point, he is different.  At this point, you're wasting time arguing that he's not different.

And you're wasting time thinking you can sell him as conventional. 

Suppose all you ever had for breakfast was onion rolls. Then one day, in walks a bagel! You'd say, 'Ugh, what's that?' Until you tried it! That's my problem == I'm a bagel on a plate full of onion rolls.

Does no one recognize that?  FUNNY GIRL was not only a Broadway success in its original run, it was also a success in its recent revival.  It was a huge film, in fact, it was the number one box office hit of 1968.  The musical regularly airs on TCM.  (We're ignoring the four albums -- all of which charted -- because the bagel monologue is not on any of them.)  

 

Suppose all you ever had for breakfast was onion rolls. Then one day, in walks a bagel! You'd say, 'Ugh, what's that?' Until you tried it! That's my problem -- I'm a bagel on a plate full of onion rolls.

 

Zohran supporters, you've waited too late to control the image created.  He can't be normalized.  

But if you'd leave your limited perceptions, you'd grasp that different it is okay, that different can stand out and that sometimes people want different more than anything else.

That might be his path to victory. 

Media shocks (Ava and C.I.)

Last week was a series of shock -- far too many to cover in full.

 

But let's start off with a good shock: IRONHEART.   Chinaka Hodge deserves a standing ovation for creating a MARVEL TV show that has a female hero and is not a joke. 

 Jac Schaeffer, Jessica Gao and Bisha K. Ali should not only hang their heads in shame, they should be issuing public apologies for the garbage that they foisted off on audiences.  We're talking WANDAVISION, SHE-HULK ATTORNEY AT LAW and MS. MARVEL.  These were not superhero shows that sported strong female characters.  Instead it was giggle and laugh at the women and, in MS. MARVEL's case, at the girl.  These garbage shows had characters praised by The Water Cooler Set.  But audiences avoided them.  Liars try to pretend otherwise and note the interest in the shows and some big streaming debut.  They move on quickly so that they don't have to talk about the drop off after seeing the first episodes.  Yes, the programs were anticipated and then people saw them.

 

That garbage created a backlash  

 

IRONHEART is a first rate superhero series.  That shouldn't be such a shock.  It's been done many times before.  Even with a female superhero.  Melissa Rosenberg, for example, created compelling television as the show runner of JESSICA JONES.  Prior to that, Maurissa Tancharoen, Joss Whedon and Jed Whedon created complex roles for men and women on MARVEL AGENTS OF S*H*I*E*L*D.  MARVEL really only faltered in this century once they became part of DISNEY+.   With Chinaka Hodge creating such a strong show and Dominique Thorne being so perfect in the lead role, maybe this is a sign that (once again) MARVEL can showcase strong women instead of making fun of them?  

That would be a good shock.  However, last week was mainly bad shocks. 

For example, the Chump administration rounded the corner last week, swaying and rolling due to the bad shock absorbers, as Convicted Felon Donald Chump made threats.  What had the senile so upset?  Possibly the fact that his lies about what a great job he'd done on Iran were being questioned.  CNN had reported the truth of the US intel assessment which made clear that, at best, Iran's efforts were set back a few months. That assessment came from the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency and that really sent Chump on a rageathon.  It's a lie, it's wrong, it's criminal, CNN should fire correspondent Natasha Bertrand, it doesn't matter -- he was frothing at the mouth -- and it will be proven to be wrong when, he insisted, Israel releases its assessment.

You read that right.  

Here are his exact words, "Israel is doing a report on it now, I understand, and I was told that they said it was total obliteration. I believe it was total obliteration, and I believe they didn’t have a chance to get anything out because we acted fast."  Those were his exact words, the nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah  was apparently left implied.

The President of the United States actually insisted -- publicly -- that the US intel was no good but that the Israeli intel would back him up. 

Yeah, that's considered normal.

But that wasn't Chump's only strange remark on Wednesday.  

The dementia appeared to be 100% in charge when Chump declared -- of Iran's strike in response on a US base in Qatar,  "You saw that, where 14 missiles were shot at us the other day. And they were very nice. They gave us warning. They said, 'We’re going to shoot them.'  'Is one o’clock okay?' They said, 'It’s fine.'  And everybody was emptied off the base, so they couldn’t get hurt, except for the gunners. They call them the gunners. And out of 14 high-end missiles that were shot at the base in Qatar, all 14, as you know, were shot down by our equipment. Amazing stuff, amazing what they can do."

Those remarks should have resulted in a lot of coverage.  Go to any search engine and you'll find out that MSNBC covered the remarks as did MILITARY.COM.  Did any other news outlet write up the remarks?  Or was everyone doing their best not to upset nutso?

Konstantin Toropin (MILITARY.COM) noted, the remarks were not only strange, they didn't fit with the official story the White House has promoted:

 

On Wednesday, as he was about to depart from a NATO summit, President Donald Trump seemed to make a stunning admission: He gave Iran the green light to attack a U.S. military base in retaliation for his own strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites.

The Iranians "were very nice. They gave us warning," Trump told reporters. "They said, 'We're going to shoot 'em. Is one o'clock OK?' I said, 'It's fine,'" he added.

The casual, nonchalant tone of Trump's acceptance that Iran would attack U.S. forces at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar -- an assault that involved more than a dozen Iranian missiles -- was a sharp contrast to the message of steely-eyed professionalism and heroism that his top military adviser, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, offered to reporters the next day for what he said was likely the largest single use of the Patriot air defense system in U.S. history.

The press may have been too scared to print what Crazy said but Chump knew he'd gone too far.  So the next day, at the Pentagon, it was time for an 8:00 am press briefing with Mama's Boy Pete Hegseth.  Hegseth was so rushed, they didn't get to smooth out his foundation the way they've been doing at his personal hair and make up salon he had installed at the Pentagon leading to his psoriasis splotches being visible yet again.  

The little mama's boy got loud but with that nasal and childish voice, it only made him come off spoiled, entitled and, frankly, unhinged.

He was screaming at the press -- the same press that he was a part of mere months ago before Chump stupidly decided to nominate a drunk who once had rape charges filed against him for Secretary of Defense and idiots like Senator Joni Ernst voted to confirm Hegseth (what does it matter -- right, Joni -- we're all going to die). 

He wanted to give the press a word -- Well, he gave them 1589 words before he took a breath.  

Then he let Gen Dan Caine speak.  We covered that two-some as they made the Congressional rounds this month.  Caine plays sane while Hegseth plays like he just pooped his own diaper -- is he playing, right?  And the press briefing was one lie after another from Hegseth and a ton of projection.

He screamed at the press -- or maybe shrieked, he does have a rather high and girlish voice,  "And again, before I pass it to the chairman, because you, and I mean specifically you, the press, specifically you the press corps, because you cheer against Trump so hard, it's like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump because you want him not to be successful so bad, you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes."

Mama's Boy said that.  After we sat through one hearing after another where he repeatedly lied about former President Joe Biden, attacked former President Joe Biden and stole credit for what Joe Biden had done (including turning around recruitment numbers which Hegseth lies happened under Chump -- and he told that lie again at the start of the Thursday press briefing.)

We loved it when Caine slipped an answer to the idiot Hegseth (Caine, "Sir, I think you could -- I'd say go out -- the IC should be able to help you answer that question." followed by Hegseth, "And so, again, I go back to the IC, whether it's Director Ratcliffe or ODNI Gabbard.") because it reminded us of the Congressional hearing this month where racist Hegseth couldn't call out the Nazis and Caine had to step in to reassure members of Congress that, yes, even this administration -- or at least some members of it -- grasped that Nazis were bad.

Mama's Boy Hegseth embarrassed himself non-stop and that included his nonsense about how three bomb drops constituted "the most complex and secretive military operations in history."

The country could not stop laughing.   Ahmad Austin Jr. (MEDIAITE) compiled some of the responses such as "Normandy? Hiroshima? Bin Laden Raid?" and "Move over D-Day!" and "So the turning point of the Civil War, the Battle of Gettysburg, with 175K soldiers fighting and 50K lives lost over 3 days, doesn't hold a candle to dropping a few dozen bombs from the air? Am I understanding this statement from the SoD?" among them. 

 

When you hear Hegseth lie and Chump lie, you wonder why?  They just keep repeating lies.  Why?

 

PBS viewers might have gotten an answer last week with the latest installment of AMERICAN MASTERS which featured a documentary entitled  HANNAH ARENDT: FACING TYRANNY.  It examined Arendt's work documenting that crimes of the Nazis and how they got support for their crimes.  Arendt noted that they lied and lied some more and knew they were lying but they were creating this lie that motivated and excused.  Did anyone really believe the lie or was just the excuse they needed, the 'noble lie' told to garner support for a genocide.

 

One part that especially stood out?  

 

This passage from Arendt:

 

Banality was a phenomenon that really couldn't be overlooked.  The more one listened to him, the more obvious it became that his inability to speak was closely connected with his inability to think    Namely  to think from the standpoint of someone else.  There's nothing deep about it, nothing demonic.  That's simply the reluctance ever to imagine what the other person is experiencing.  That is the banality of evil. 

 

 She's referring to the fact that the Nazis conducted a genocide and got away with it because of people who lacked empathy.  

 

And that's why the right-wing's been attacking empathy (see our "MEDIA: YOUR FRIENDS & NEIGHBORS and your non-friends too!" from April) because MAGA can't get it's way if people have empathy.  So they portray it as a bad thing.  They pretend to be Christians while attacking the very idea of empathy that Jesus Christ taught.  At THE ATLANTIC, Elizabeth Bruenig explained today:

 

Five years ago, Elon Musk told Joe Rogan during a podcast taping that “the fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy, the empathy exploit.” By that time, the idea that people in the West are too concerned with the pain of others to adequately advocate for their own best interests was already a well-established conservative idea. Instead of thinking and acting rationally, the theory goes, they’re moved to make emotional decisions that compromise their well-being and that of their home country. In this line of thought, empathetic approaches to politics favor liberal beliefs. An apparent opposition between thought and feeling has long vexed conservatives, leading the right-wing commentator Ben Shapiro to famously declare that “facts don’t care about your feelings.”

But the current ascendancy of this anti-empathy worldview, now a regular topic in right-wing social-media posts, articles, and books, might be less a reasonable point of argumentation and more a sort of coping mechanism for conservatives confronted with the outcomes of certain Trump-administration policies—such as the nightmarish tale of a 4-year-old American child battling cancer being deported to Honduras without any medication, or a woman in ICE custody losing her mid-term pregnancy after being denied medical treatment for days. That a conservative presented with these cases might feel betrayed by their own treacherous empathy makes sense; this degree of human suffering certainly ought to prompt an empathetic response, welcome or not. Even so, it also stands to reason that rather than shifting their opinions when confronted with the realities of their party’s positions, some conservatives might instead decide that distressing emotions provoked by such cases must be a kind of mirage or trick. This is both absurd—things that make us feel bad typically do so because they are bad—and spiritually hazardous.

This is certainly true for Christians, whose faith generally counsels taking others’ suffering seriously. That’s why the New York Times best seller published late last year by the conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey, Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion, is so troubling. In her treatise packaging right-wing anti-empathy ideas for Christians, Stuckey, a Fox News veteran who recently spoke at a conference hosted by the right-wing nonprofit Turning Point USA, contends that left wingers often manipulate well-meaning believers into adopting sinful argumentative and political positions by exploiting their natural religious tendency to care for others. Charlie Kirk, the Republican activist who runs Turning Point USA, said that Stuckey has demolished “the No. 1 psychological trick of the left” with her observation that liberals wield empathy against conservatives “by employing our language, our Bible verses, our concepts” and then perverting them “to morally extort us into adopting their position.” Taken at face value, the idea that Christians are sometimes persuaded into un-Christian behavior by strong emotions is fair, and nothing new: Suspicion of human passions is ancient, and a great deal of Christian preaching deals with the subject of subduing them. But Toxic Empathy is not a sermon. It is a political pamphlet advising Christians on how to argue better in political debates—a primer on being better conservatives, not better Christians. 

It's very distressing but people are standing up and speaking out.  

 

And with that in mind, last week actually contained one more shock.  Chump was threatening to sue various outlets -- one of which was THE NEW YORK TIMES.  In response to his ranting and raving, the paper's deputy general counsel David McGraw stated, "No retraction is needed.  No apology will be forthcoming.  We told the truth to the best of our ability.  We will continue to do so."

Contrast that response with the caving on the part of ABC NEWS and the expected caving on the part of Sheri Redstone on behalf of CBS NEWS and McGraw's stance is a very happy shock.

 

 

Books (Kat, Ruth, Marcia)

 

As we did in 2021 and 2023 and 2024, we're attempting to again increase book coverage in the community. This go round, we're talking with Kat, Ruth and Marcia.  Kat reviewed "Jeanine Basinger's THE MOVIE MUSICAL " while Ruth covered  "Alec Baldwin's NEVERTHELESS: A MEMOIR" and Marcia covered  "Here We Go Again My Life In Television -- Betty White." Marcia, let's start with you.  Tell us Betty and the book.

 

Marcia: Betty White was an actress who did TV in the fifties and probably became more famous in the early 70s from game shows.  Then she did THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW and really became a TV actress and star.  She started playing Eunice's sister Ellen on THE CAROL BURNETT SHOW and when MAMA'S FAMILY spun off from that show, she continued to play Ellen on that and then, of course, came THE GOLDEN GIRLS.  Betty White was sunshine and fun.  I wanted to love this book.  I didn't. In 1995, Mary Tyler Moore wrote AFTER ALL and I felt like I learned more about Betty in that book then in this one supposedly written by Betty.  Betty and Mary were great friends and they couples dated.  They knew each other very well.  I didn't get that from the book.

 

"Supposedly written by Betty."

 

Marcia: I don't think Betty wrote it or dictated it.  There are too many problems with the book.  For example?  Desi Arnaz invented the multi-cam sitcom.  Betty's telling this story of I LOVE LUCY and her regional sitcom being done for a year side-by-side.  But she talks about how they were live.  I LOVE LUCY was not live.  It was filmed.  This is a part of TV history.  Lucy didn't want to go to NYC.  That meant a whole new way of putting a show together.  Desi came up with it.  The sitcom would be filmed, it would be multi-cam, etc.  If Betty wrote the book, I would assume, if her show's set was right next to I LOVE LUCY, she'd know that I LOVE LUCY was not a live show.  That happens over and over.  She or someone also writes about how Ken Barry began playing Mama's son on THE CAROL BURNETT SHOW.  No.  Not true.  Alan Alda -- among others -- played one of Mama's son on THE CAROL BURNETT SHOW.  Ken Barry never did a skit with Mama -- they were called The Family -- until the spin-off MAMA'S FAMILY.  There are way too many errors like that which make me think that Betty didn't really write the book or dictate it.

 

Ruth, you covered Alec Baldwin's memoir.

 

Ruth: I did.  I was a fan of the actor early on.  I can remember him on THE DOCTORS -- a daytime TV program.  And, in his book, he writes about that show and I was glad but I would have honestly enjoyed more about the people on the show.  I enjoyed the book but had wanted to bring this into the discussion.  He does Broadway, A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE as Stanley, and has to -- or feels he has to -- pump up and look good and this caused health problems.  I am very sad about that.  But am I remembering wrong or was his body not used throughout his career.

 

You mean on display?

 

Ruth: Yes.

 

In MARRIED TO THE MOB, as Michelle Pfeiffer's husband, we see him in his underwear and his body is featured in WORKING GIRL.  Prior to that, you've got photo shoots with magazines like US where his bare chested and posing with Lisa Hartman Black -- his KNOTS LANDING co-star.  Alec's a good looking man to this day but, yes, his body was on display in the early years.  

 

Ruth: I thought so.  Or hoped so, I was afraid I was remembering wrongly.  

 

Kat?

 

Kat: I read the worst book in the world.  Some musicals, per the author, aren't really musicals.  Depends on the mood she's in basically.  She doesn't see GREASE as a real musical.  Sometimes dancing is enough to be a musical -- SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER -- sometimes it's not -- FOOTLOOSE. Sometimes box office is so important, other times it's not.  She excuses racism throughout the book which was very offensive.  It fails to cover movie musicals in a linear fashion and instead jumps around all over.  

 

You'd asked us to bring up Barbra Streisand.

 

Kat: I had!  Thank you.  She doesn't seem to care for Barbra.  She lavishes Julie Andrews for two movie musicals and calls her a star of the genre.  Now I love THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE -- and despite the author's lie, the film was a hit.  The author hates it.  So why are we pretending Julie's a musical star only based on two films?  Barbra's attacked for everything and the author seems to confuse FUNNY GIRL with FUNNY LADY as she blathers on about how Barbra's personality is used in one.  Yes, it was.  In FUNNY GIRL.  That's why Barbra said when it was on Broadway that it was her life -- Barbra's -- it just happened to happen to Fanny Brice first.  And, sorry, Barbra was a bigger musical star than Julie Andrews.  YENTL, FUNNY GIRL, HELLO DOLLY, FUNNY LADY and ON A CLEAR DAY YOU CAN SEE FOREVER all made money.  Lots and lots of money.  She doesn't care for Streisand and that may have to do with the support Barbra's historically had from gay men because the writer of the book is a homophobe. 

 

So you don't recommend the book you read.

 

Kat: Not at all.

 

And Marcia?

 

Marcia: No.  It's a poorly written book and I don't believe Betty wrote it or dictated it.

 

Ruth?

 

Ruth: Mr. Baldwin's book was a pleasure to read.  His childhood, his college days, his move to NYC and then to California. I found it all fascinating and very well written. 

 

------------------------------

Previous book discussions:

 

"Books (Marcia, Isaiah, Ava and C.I.)" 

"Books (Trina, Stan, Ava and C.I.)"

"Books (Isaiah, Ava and C.I.)"

 

"Books (Jess, Ava and C.I.)"

"Books (Stan, Ava and C.I.)"

"Books (Trina, Ava and C.I.)"

"Books (Rebecca, Marcia, Ava and C.I.)"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You might be a Home Schooled idiot . . .

 . . . if you called your third grade teacher "Mommy."    

Best action films of the 2020s

 

25) SAYEN 

 

24) RED NOTICE 

 

23) CLASSIFIED

 

22) THE TAKEOVER

 

21) KIMI  

 

20)  THE PROSECUTOR 

 

19) CANARY BLACK 

 

18)  SHADOW FORCE  

 

17) LOU

 

16) ATLAS  

 

15) DIABLO

 

14) FREAKY TALES 

 

13) THE AMATEUR  

 

12) WOLFS  

 

11) FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

 

10)  THE ACCOUNTANT 2

 

 

9)  THE MOTHER 

 

 

8)  THE UNION 

 

7)  CLEANER

 

6) HEART OF STONE

 

5) THE BEEKEEPER 

 

 

4) THOSE WHO WISH ME DEAD 

 

3) SINNERS  

 

2)  THE GRAY MAN 

 

1) THE OLD GUARD

 

Book List

 

Book coverage continues in this community.  For earlier lists of books covered see 2021's  "Books," 2023's "Books" and 2024 "Book List"

Books reviewed in the community this year.

1) "bob hope should be a lesson" -- Rebecca reviews Richard Zoglin.  

2) "Shattered Love: A Memoir" -- Marcia reviews Richard Chamberlain's insipid autobiography. 

3) "Help! My Apartment Has A Dining Room Cookbook: How to Have People Over Without Stressing Out" -- Trina reviews a cookbook.

4)  "Media: OWNED finds Eoin Higgins owned by bad journalism" -- Ava and C.I. take on Eoin Higgins bad book.

5) "Sly's awful books proves Questlove a liar" -- Stan reviews Sly Stone's memoir. 

6) "THE LIFE AND HARD TIMES OF HEIDI ABROMOWITZ (Jess)" -- Jess reviews a humor book by Joan Rivers.

7) "STAN LEE LIED: YOUR HANDY GUIDE TO EVERY LIE IN THE ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS" -- Isaiah reviews a book documenting truths. 

 

8) "Rachel Ray's Garbage in the Kitchen" -- Trina reviews Rachel Ray's RACHEL RAY'S 365: NO REPEATS.

 

9) "BLACK BAG (great film) and Spielberg book" -- Stan reviews Richard Schickel's  STEVEN SPIELBERG: A RETROSPECTIVE

 

10)   "Matteo Lane's Your Pasta Sucks: A 'Cookbook'" -- Trina reviews Matteo Lane's new book.

 

11) "Books, Shatner and more" -- Marcia reviews William Shatner's BOLDLY GO.

 

12) "BATMAN'S VILLAINS" -- Isaiah reviews a comic book collection.

 

13) "Jeanine Basinger's THE MOVIE MUSICAL " -- Kat reviews a book on movie musicals.

 

14)  "Alec Baldwin's NEVERTHELESS: A MEMOIR" -- Ruth covers Alec Baldwin's memoir. 

 

15)  "Here We Go Again My Life In Television -- Betty White" -- Marcia covers a memoir.

 

 

 

 

Media: Truth Molested Versus Truth Told

It was Sunday morning in Iran but Saturday night in the US when the Convicted Felon  Donald Chump's order to bomb Iran took place.  This was an act of war and he executed it without the Constitutionally required Congressional authorization and he also failed to inform them ahead of the bombing.  Three sites bombed in Iran with twelve 30,000 pound bunker buster bombs.

 

He says that the B-2 bomber planes were targeting nuclear sites.  He says that.  Others say Iran moved things from those sites long ago.  His intel is faulty, some say.  

 

It's Chump so we're talking about someone who's been booked repeatedly and charged with battering and abusing the truth.

 

Does truth matter?

 

Two documentaries gave answers last week.

 

AMERICAN MASTERS is a PBS program that we really wish they'd discontinue or at least rethink.

 

We've taken issue with the series many, many times before.  A friend -- who's read all of our criticism of the series -- argues that when people get thins wrong and we say they're lying, they're just mis-remembering. 

 

Janis Ian was the focus last week -- JANIS IAN: BREAKING SILENCES.  Singer-songwriter.  Responsible for classics like "At Seventeen" and "Stars."  We've covered Janis before which is why  we felt it was the best test for what our friend was saying.

 
Janis' memory is shot.  We covered that.  We covered how her autobiography didn't match reality.  We're not going to link to it, you know how to find the past pieces.  There's one where we especially documented where her timeline was off by over three years. 

 

Janis' big problem in the documentary was that she confessed to not being an artist.

We honestly like Janis.  We think she's written many classic songs and that includes "All Those Promises."  We think she's talented and smart.  We agree with her eearly lesson that you don't whore because if you whore, that's all you are.  

 

One thing, before this documentary, we did believe in was Janis was an artist

 

That's not the case.  Art is at least secondary to Janis.

 

She speaks of how, early on, she just wanted to be famous.  But despite her self-presentation and her insisting that stopped being the case early on, her comments make clear that she's confused stardom with art.

 

There are two struggles in her career per the documentary -- post-"Society's Child" and post-BETWEEN THE LINES. There's the third one that finds her in Nashville but that's not really addressed or presented as such.  The two presented really aren't about art  They're about commerce.

 

She seems to think that she would and could have been a star with "Society's Child" if it had been followed up correctly.  She was, according to her, the next Bob Dylan.  

 

And that's where we go sideways.  "Society's Child" is not a great song.  It's a White song, we'll give it that.  And we get that the NYC White crowd thought it was everything back in the sixties.  

 

We also get that all the little White girl in the song does is whine to her mother and tell the young Black male that she can't see him anymore.

 

It's as though people heard the song -- White people -- in 1965 and applauded her for it and have continued to just keep applauding without ever re-examining the song's lyrics:

 

One of these days I'm gonna stop my listening, gonna raise my head up high
One of these days I'm gonna raise my glistening wings and fly
But that day will have to wait for a while 

 

Sad. 

 

Her heroes were Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Joan Baez and Odetta but she never wrote like Dylan or Ochs.  She was the personal, not the political. "Society's Child" couldn't be followed up despite what she thinks.  Her writing was copycat.  She gets that on her vocals, noting she had to stop trying to sing like Joan or Odetta but she doesn't grasp that when it comes to her song writing.  Or if she does, she won't cop to it.

 

Her first crisis?  She had exhausted her creative juices.  The well had to be refilled and she had to stretch and grow. She did five albums that were basically a child make believing.  That's what they sounded like because that's what they were.  That's why VERVE dropped her after album four.  And VERVE rarely dropped anyone.  CAPITOL signed her for one album, her fifth album, and then dumped her.  She took a hiatus and came back three years later with STARS.  It was art and it was seen as such.  Then came AT SEVENTEEN her monster album.  Huge seller but, again, we'd grade it as actual art.

 

Would she?  Listen to her talk about AFTERTONES.  Her, not the producer Brooks Arthur, listen to her.  She should have worked on it more and not let it be released so soon.  Over and over, we hear that.  And why is that?

 

According to Janis, if she had worked on it more that would have made it sell more.

This is Janis' second best selling album. 

Art or commerce?

 

She's talking about commerce.

She's also deeply stupid.

A best selling album is about luck.  

 

It's about timing.

 

That's something Janis doesn't understand still.  It's something Michael Jackson never understood.  Joni Mitchell gets it.  Your kids are going to get beat up in the playground and that's beyond your control.  Immediate reaction to THE HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS -- both sales figures and contemporary reviews -- are not the final word on the artistic merits of an album.

 

It was shocking to us to find that Janis didn't grasp this. Again, we applaud Janis' art -- "In The Winter" -- we're just surprised she's more about the commerce.

 

But then came the lie as Janis was discussing taping an episode of THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR (CBS) in November of 1967. 

Fortunately, not from Janis' mouth but, sadly, from Lily Tomlin's mouth, "Bill Cosby spoke out against her.  He said that she was probably a lesbian.  He said that to the press." 

 

We love Lily.

 

We don't like racism.

 

And that's what Lily's lie is: Racism.  

 

For the record, Lily wasn't at the taping of THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR.  She wasn't even in the state of California at the time (she was in NYC).  

 

She didn't even know Janis at the time.

 

Now Bill Cosby's never been our favorite person.  We've been here 20 years covering the media and long before the scandals and charges of rape broke, we were very clear that we were not fans of Bill Cosby.  

 

The scandals have broken.

 

Apparently that means anyone can lie about Cosby now.  That he deserves no better because of the assaults against women.  

 

But the truth is the truth.  And it does matter.

 

And when two White women get together to lie about a Black man, then there's a problem.  And they should know that not only are their remarks racist but so is the context in which they make the remarks.

 

Again, Lily didn't witness a damn thing so for her to lie -- are we really going to say, "Oh, well her memory!!"?

 

We're not.  You can be pathetic and make excuses for racism, but we're not going to do that.

 

Bill Cosby is a pioneer and a criminal.  It's complex.  And lying about him doesn't make it any better.

 

How is it a lie?

 

When Janis included the story in her autobiography (page 68), she didn't name Bill Cosby.  

 

And she didn't get around to naming him until his name was complete dirt because of all the women coming forward saying he'd assaulted them.

 

So first off, there's that.

 

Second, read the book (not CRAPAPEDIA which gets it wrong and thinks this happened at a Smothers Brothers club performance):

 

Unfortunately, not everyone saw it that way.  My business advisors landed on me with both feet after I taped THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR.  According to them, a very well-known television star had spied me asleep in Merka's lap during a break, and had proceeded to tell several industry people that I was obviously a lesbian and shouldn't be allowed on national television.

 

After women came forward to accuse Bill of assault in 2014 -- six years after her autobiography was published, Janis came forward with the name in the blind item -- the person she'd hinted about ("well-known television star had spied me" -- Bill was starring in the TV series I SPY at the time she taped her variety show appearance).  

 

Grasp that Janis didn't hear Bill's comments.  Her management -- which was bothered by rumors developing about Janis -- is who told her the story and who attached Bill's name to it.

 

So even Janis doesn't know that Bill's guilty of what she alleges happened.

 

But Lily, in her zeal to take down a Black man, does Janis one better.  He's no loner talking to "several industry people."  According to Lily, who wasn't there, wasn't even in the state when it happened, Bill went around, she now lies, "He said that to the press!"

 

Show us the report, Lily, show us any reporting in 1967 or 1968 where Bill Cosby was quoted about Janis possibly being a lesbian.  

 

There is none. 

 

If there had been, Janis wouldn't have run the tale as a blind item in her 2008 autobiography.  She would have instead named Bill Cosby and cited the outlet (or outlets) that published the stories.

 

Janis has always told this story, since 2008, as to mean that whomever the man was, he was trying to end her TV career and was telling TV execs.  

 

We love Lily, we do.  But when two White women tear into a Black man with lies, we're not going to be silent.

 

Bill may very well have done what Janis thinks he did -- thinks he did.  But not even Janis knows for sure.  And Lily outright lies to back up her friend Janis Ian.

 

What they're doing -- what PBS and AMERICAN MASTERS are letting them do -- is not that far from lynching a Black male because someone said he whistled at a White woman.

 

It's enough to make you lose all hope in documentaries.  

Fortunately, HBO started airing a strong, new documentary last week SURVIVING OHIO STATE. The documentary about the assault and abuse of male athletes at Ohio State for several decades is produced by  Eva Orner (who also directed), David Glasser, George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Joshua Rofe and Steven J. Berger.

 

Survivors talk on camera about how they were abused and assaulted by Dr Richard Strauss.  They talk about it and they talk about how wrestling coach Russ Hellickson and assistant coach Jim Jordan knew about the abuse and laughed at it and looked the other way.  Multiple players discuss how they went to Hellickson and asked him to stand with them as they went public and he said he would.  But Jim wouldn't.  Jim was now US House Rep Jim Jordan.  Suddenly, Russ wanted nothing to do with the men that he had hailed as his sons and Jim was too busy doing things like calling one of the accusers brothers up on the phone and begging him -- in tears -- to come forward and accuse his brother of lying in order to save Jim's reputation.  

 

Watching, we were reminded of a man who was the envy of a huge number of straight men at one point because of whom he was married to. The man who is still alive was a college athlete in another state in an earlier time and he was pimped out to men.  He even managed to turn it into a career starter.  And he was happy to do it because he says he's bi (he's gay).  He'll be dead soon and he'll die a disgrace (he's already disgraced himself once this year).  

 

He was able to get away with his act because of attitudes about gay people.  He didn't seem gay, right?  And athletes are big and strong.

 

Male.

 

Male athletes are meat.  That's the attitude.  They can endure anything. They can take being ripped off by universities that basically own their bodies for four years.  They can take this and that.  And nobody better ever complain because you're not supposed to think, you're supposed to be an animal -- on the field and off. 

"Our coaches knew," one survivor explains in the new documentary.   Another explains, "We had guys complaining about Dr. Strauss to Jim Jordan."

A female coach did take it seriously and did lodge complaints and concerns about what Strauss was doing with the young men.

 

What was he doing?

 

"One of the wrestlers said, 'Dude, why does this guy have to constantly check our nuts, check our dicks."

 Another explains how Jim Jordan at one point says, "If he ever did that to me, I'd snap his neck like a stick of dry balsa wood." 

  

At other times, the future member of Congress downplayed it.  He told one wrestler, "It's Strauss.  You know what he does."

And this came in reply to the wrestler complaining that the team doctor was now in the locker room with the team, taking showers with the team, masturbating in the showers.  

He was allowed a locker in every male team's locker room.  He took several showers a day.  When he would shower, he wouldn't turn to the wall where the nozzle was, he'd put his back to the wall so he could study the young males.  As one survivor explains, "He's showering three times a day.  He's sporting erections.  He's masturbating."

And Jim Jordan and Russ Hellickson looked the other way.  They were supposed to protect the students.  They were legally obligated to protect them -- in loco parentis.  They failed.  And, years later, they won't grow the hell up and admit that they failed these men.

 

They always knew and they looked the other way.

 

A survivor explains he goes to Strauss and tells the doctor, "'My foot is sore.  My foot is sore.'  And the first thing he says to me is 'Drop your trousers'."  Another explains, "I got in there and showed him my bleeding ear and the first thing Dr Strauss said was, 'Drop your shorts'."

 

Documentaries, when they're truthful, can make a difference.  The Ohio State athletes never really had their day in the court of public opinion because this was the first case that really addressed how colleges and universities prey on young men.  They make millions off them but will dump them in a minute due to a sports' injury.  The survivors of Strauss talk about being on scholarships and how Strauss and his 'physicals' decided whether or not they played.  We're not used to seeing the college 'beasts' as potential victims.  They had that wall to break through with this scandal.  

 

Their stories are consistent and address what they witnessed and what they experienced.  

 

That's the great thing about truth -- it usually comes out.  Sometimes it comes out too late.  Sometimes, it's dismissed initially.  But it does usually come out and it slowly leaks into our national consciousness and national conversation.   

 

And some day -- maybe this week, maybe months or even years from now, we firmly believe that Saturday's unprovoked assault will be seen as the crime it truly was.  

 

Media: If MSNBC could just clone Rachel Maddow . . .

 . . . they could do away with their ratings problems.  But, sadly for the network, though Barbra Streisand may have cloned her dog Samantha twice in the last eight years, cloning humans is something that currently still just takes place on screen in films like MICKEY 17.

 

 

 

MSNBC, for those who don't know, is talk TV.  Every hour is pretty much a talk show hour.  Like CNN and FOX "NEWS," it bills itself as a "news network" but barring a huge disaster -- natural or human made -- they're not breaking from their talk show format.  

 

And then the thing about talk shows is that you've got to want to spend an hour with the host.  Oh sure, you hear a certain singer or comedian's going to be on a talk show, you tune in for that episode, but to watch a regular talk show, especially five days a week, you need a host people want to spend time with.

 

And spending time is MSNBC's biggest problem.  The left doesn't need marching orders and they're not hungry for that.  MSNBC regularly forgets that which is how Saturday they got Jen Pskai doing yet another MSNBC segment with  Zohran Kwame Mamdani.

 

Who? is the cry around the country since MSNBC is a national channel and not some over the air broadcast little station that reaches Queens and, on a good day, Brooklyn

Exactly.  

 

These are the candidates in the Democratic Party primary for NYC mayor:  Adrienne Adams, Michael Blake, Andrew Cuomo, Brad Lander,  Zohran Mamdani,  Zellnor Myrie,  Jessica Ramos,  Scott Stringer and Whitney Tilson.  Cuomo is also running as an Independent.  The Working Families Party does not plan to endorse at this time.  Their plan is to go with whomever wins the Democratic Party primary unless it's former New York Governor Cuomo -- in which case they will declare a candidate. The current mayor is Eric Adams and he is a Democrat but he's running as an independent due to numerous scandals and his recent save-your-own-ass relationship with Donald Chump who saw to it that criminal charges against Adam were dropped.  

 

Now there are other candidates but we're focusing on Democrats the primary will be June 24th (early voting has already started and, good news, this will be a ranked choice election).  The story of the Democratic Party primary is also a story of fools and whores -- you decide which -- like  Bill McKibben, Jane Fonda, Rashida I-Love-Donald-Trump Tlaib, Kai Penn, etc.  Why do we say that?  This is an election for the mayor of New York City.  The people listed -- and many others who have endorsed -- do not live in NYC and are not currently working in NYC  It really is none of their business.

 

And it's not MSNBC's business to endorse either. 

 

Kat observed Saturday: 

 

So anyway, we sat down on the couch and turned on the TV.  I'm not interested in MSNBC pimping a candidate for NYC, by the way.  I find that offensive and disgusting when they pull that s**t and pick whomever they want to favorite of the Democratic Party candidates running.  

Jen Psaki, you make it so easy for me not to watch you when you pull that s**t.  

 

To which Mike added:

 

Exactly.  That's why I've never been big on MSNBC.  Since the 2024 election, I've really grown to appreciate Rachel Maddow.  I've always loved Lawrence O'Donnell and Katie Phang.  I've started watching Stephanie Ruhle since the election and enjoy her.  

But I can't take this bulls**t of you're going to use a corporate network to try to influence a political primary by picking your personal favorite Democrat -- a Socialist, by the way, not a Democrat.

 

 Zohran Mamdan got yet another MSNBC segment last week on Monday  

 

 Yet another.  There may be nine candidates in the primary but only one gets invited on MSNBC repeatedly.  

 

This is what former US President Bill Clinton meant when he observed MSNBC was just another side of the coin to FOX "NEWS."

 

They're not informing you because they can never resist the temptation to order you, to propagandize you.  It's something the corporation should have put an end to long, long ago.

 

It's why so many of us on the left reject MSNBC.  

 

On the left, we value education, we value facts.  We're not watching to learn talking points or hear half the story.  

 

Unlike the fright-wing, we're actually educated people.  Many of us went to college, but all of us spent considerable time on our own educating ourselves and continue to spend that time doing so.  

 

MSNBC thinks we're zombies like FOX "NEWS" viewers and that we need our daily marching orders.  That's not only why so many of us don't tune in, it's also why it's so hard for most of us to consume more than one hour a day of MSNBC.  

 

The network provides conditioning and socialization and marching orders and talking points, but it's not real big on actual facts and information.

 

Rachel Maddow is the MSNBC star and when she returned to nightly shows Monday through Friday during Chump's first 100 days of his second term, ratings soared.

 

She's now back on Mondays only (her choice, not the network's) and ratings are, in many ways, worse than they were before the election.

 

That has to do with the nature of the network, yes.  For every Rachel and Lawrence O'Donnell who can make a strong arguments, there are so many lazy whores.  

 

Worse than lazy, they're just unappealing.

 

We've bit our tongue on Jen Psaki who was wrongly given Rachel's time slot.  

 

We've done that because she became very hesitant (and useless) once she assumed Rachel's time slot on every night but Monday.  We know Jen's getting notes constantly to be this or be that or do this or do that.  We know that's happening because of what we hear.  But we also know it because of what we see on screen.  Since taking over those nights, Jen has shrunk, not expanded.  

 

Last week was her worst week ever on MSNBC.  And that started long before Saturday night when she was back to pimping MSNBC's clubhouse candidate for NYC mayor.

 

She's trying to stand out -- good for her -- but failing in skits like let-me-pretend-I'm-still-White-House-spokesperson.  She pretends to answer the questions Propaganda Pig Karoline Leavitt ignores at press briefings.  

 

Are we supposed to be laughing?  Because we're not.

 

It should be funny or at least sharp.

 

But there she is getting meeker and meeker each time she does it.  Her low energy is like a sad barista at Starbucks greeting you with, "We're all out of oat milk."

 

Either up the energy and get an actual POV (point of view) for the segment or drop it.  Currently, it goes nowhere. It makes for the worst segment of far too many of Jen's shows currently.

 

We don't have time or space to outline all the things Jen needs to be doing -- and, again, we're aware that she's hearing feedback from countless consultants already.  

 

But one thing she needs to do is book better guests.

 

Last week, our mouths dropped in horror as she did a segment on artificial information and digital data and blah blah.

 

Our mouths dropped because of the freak show guest.

 

One of us (C.I.) has known Ronan Farrow his whole life.  

WHAT THE F**K HAS HE DONE TO HIS FACE?

 

That's all caps because the whole world should be yelling it.  His face looks like an overstuffed pillow and his addiction to altering his looks now surpasses that of Michael Jackson -- and don't get us started on those eyebrows.  Not since serial plagiarist Gerald Posner have we seen someone associated with the news industry work so hard to destroy their face with so much bad plastic surgery. 

 

TV is a visual medium.  That alone should prevent Ronan Farrow from ever being brought on as a guest again.  

 

But there are other reasons as well including that Ronan already bombed with MSNBC viewers a long, long time ago.

 

Did no one learn from 2014?  That's when Ronan bombed on MSNBC -- when more people were watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS repeats on HALLMARK than watching RONAN FARROW DAILY -- and awful, awful show -- see our  "TV: Another idiot for the idiot box" from March 2014.  A ton of money was spent promoting that show and no one could stand to watch it.  That was due to Ronan and we explained that and his personal habits/problems/ticks that resulted from his childhood (and his mother) and rendered him too odd for TV.  

 

Maybe if he'd stayed with Jon Lovett, he could have addressed those problems.  But Ronan didn't want to deal and screwed up the only real thing he ever had in his personal life just like he screwed up his chance at TV fame.

 

Keep the weirdo away.  People don't need to look at that face before bedtime -- no one wants nightmares.

 

They want facts.

 

Rachel turned a talk show monologue into just that with her own show.  Lawrence was doing that before she got her own show.  Talk shows need openings and need monologues.  But they need to be delivered with confidence.  

 

Confidence is where MSNBC continues to struggle.

 

Joy Reid had it.  And she had ratings and praise.  Coming off an award, MSNBC cancels her.  They have three strange people now filling her slot.  It's not working and it never will.  MORNING JOE (a problem all its own) could recreate early in the evening.  But when Joe Scarborough is on the set, he is the star of the show.  His opinion's the one everyone goes to.  With Joy's replacement show, you have three hosts that aren't that attractive or charismatic and the show's all over the place because the hosts are all over the place.  A show has to have a POV.  Joy provided one.  The ratings have crashed in the weeks since she was fired.

 

A smart network would have snapped her back up within a month, would've called her on the phone and said, "We made a huge mistake and we're adult enough to say that.  Let's negotiate your return."

Along with getting rid of Joy, they got rid of Alex Wagner and Katie Phang.  They also delivered audiences.  People could watch them and feel they were being informed.  

 

That's not happening with most of the line up currently.

 

Why in the world, looking at the ratings, does Chris Hayes still have his time slot?

 

We're not saying fire Chris, we're saying his rating are bad.  Move him to an earlier time slot and put Ari Melber in Chris' current slot and you've got building blocks for a winning prime time line up. 

 

Ari is delivering and those ratings are because he's strong on air.  Do the execs not see that?  An hour of Ari delivers a POV and a strong on camera presence.  Ari -- Rachel substitute -- Lawrence O'Donnell -- Stephanie Ruhle could be a strong evening of programming that won over viewers.

 

Chris is too laid back.  Comfortable?  Snooze worthy.  He's not aggressive enough for prime time and should be moved to an afternoon slot.  

 

Another who should be moved?  Nicole Wallace.  She's got a POV, she wins viewers yet, in terms of time slots, she's stuck in Siberia. 

 

How do the MSNBC suits watch their own network -- they do watch, right? -- and not see that Ari, Nicole and Jonathan Capehart are TV talk show stars.  They have the presence, they have the command.   

 

Building the network around strong hosts and grasping that viewers want facts and information not marching orders would allow MSNBC to finally become a network the country needs.  Such a development would qualify as civic duty and actual journalism.