This is John Klein, the president of 4th place cable news channel CNN, trying to explain why their abysmal ratings are somehow irrelevant. Technically the guy has a point — his competitors are putting out a product that people want to watch (zing).
After last year’s election, CNN’s plan to retain the viewership they had accumulated and counter their not competition’s opinionated news was to “concentrate on really being the best news network in the world.” Plummeting viewership aside, anybody who has watched CNN lately can attest to one basic fact: they have not achieved this goal. It is a horrible, horrible news network.
Jon Stewart recently took them to task for their ridiculous habit of ‘leaving it there’, wherein they invite a political guest on, allow him/her to say essentially whatever they want, and then don’t question them on a single fact, number or statistic they pulled out of thin air. That’s called being the laziest news network in the world, not the best. (The Daily Show, btw, regularly destroys CNN’s prime time ratings).
CNN is in nothing to lose mode. They have three options:
- Continue down their same boring path, and eventually fade into obscurity if they haven’t already.
- Try to emulate their opponents — become more opinionated — and contribute to the poisonous/worthless shouting match that is cable news.
- Grow some balls and actually become the best news network in America (fuck the world).
#3 is obviously the most preferable option, and I don’t think it would be a very hard goal to achieve. Not only does their not competition basically suck as well, but it’s pretty easy to pinpoint what is severely lacking in the cable news world and what might draw significant interest from those like me who have all but tuned out entirely: STOP TREATING YOUR VIEWERS LIKE THEY ARE IDIOTS AND STOP TREATING YOUR GUESTS LIKE THEY AREN’T LIARS.
Honestly, I think it would be that easy, and I also believe there is a portion of the population that is yearning for it. Stop trying to be enternewsment, stop pretending that right and left are created equal, stop glossing over large issues with insanely simple segments, call out your not competition for their blatant distortions, call out your guests for their blatant distortions… maybe even break a fucking story. In short, become actual, real, no bias no bullshit news.
