NBC

Tuesday

Paul du Quenoy

Saturday Night Live is helping Trump

“Me and Vice President Harris are the same!” concluded Saturday Night Live veteran Dana Carvey, in character as Joe Biden, when he returned to NBC’s legendary sketch comedy show for the first episode of its fiftieth anniversary season. After Carvey, who left SNL’s regular ensemble in 1993, uttered those politically unhelpful words, former cast member Maya Rudolph, playing Kamala Harris, nervously gave him the bum rush off stage, only for him to wander back on to smell her hair — one of Biden’s stranger campaign trail moves — before the two delivered the show’s signature, “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night!” line to a cheering studio audience, millions of viewers at home and millions more who (like me) caught it later via social media streaming.

saturday night live

Tuesday

Elisenne Stoller

Biden gets snappy in Lester Holt interview on NBC

On Monday, in the aftermath of Trump’s shooting, President Biden sat down in the White House with NBC’s Lester Holt for an "unedited" interview, which aired in the evening. The president successfully made it through without any major gaffes, appearing combative when questioned about his mental acuity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUSmk1SqEu8&ab_channel=NBCNews He started off a little shaky after Holt called out his incendiary language, in particular his remarks it was time to put Trump in the "bullseye." Biden suggested this was a mistake, claiming he meant “focus on him” and what he’s doing, “on his policies, the number of lies he told in the debate.” He was quick to bring up the "existential threat" Donald Trump presents.

holt

Thursday

Cockburn

Did Donald Trump say the N-word?

Just like clockwork, the allegations of racism are rolling in days after Donald Trump’s historic rally in the South Bronx. The latest hit piece in Slate, courtesy of ex-Apprentice producer Bill Pruitt, has declared that Trump bandied about the n-word with reckless abandon while shooting the hit TV show.  Pruitt, who worked as a producer on the first two seasons of The Apprentice, alleged that Trump casually dropped the slur and suggested that America wasn’t ready for a Black contestant to win the show back in 2004. Pruitt says the moment “still haunts” him to this day.  The scene was set in The Apprentice’s dim boardroom as the production team deliberated who would win the season finale — Kwame Jackson, a Black stockbroker, or Bill Rancic, a Chicago entrepreneur.

donald trump n-word

Wednesday

Ben Domenech

After Ronna, Republicans should ignore NBC

NBC News’s decision to ditch Ronna McDaniel after the hissy fit thrown collectively by Chuck Todd, Joe Scarborough, Jen Psaki, Nicolle Wallace, Rachel Maddow and more should be more than enough evidence to support a commitment from the Republican National Committee and its new leadership: there is no working with NBC. Not on debates, not on town halls, not even on campaign season interviews. There’s no point in creating content for a network that finds even the most generic Republican figure so vile and scary that they don’t even want her in the building. Obviously this is an unenforceable commitment, and someone like Chris Christie or Larry Hogan will assuredly ignore it.

ronna mcdaniel nbc

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

There are no good guys at NBC

Former Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel was invited to the cafeteria, where she was promptly told by the cool kids that she can’t sit with them. The news cycle sits on day five of what has been a week- and weekend-long struggle session over NBC’s hiring of McDaniel to provide election-year analysis. Which leads us to wonder: are there any adults still working at NBC and MSNBC? McDaniel’s hiring simply could not stand with the elite of MSNBC like Chuck Todd, Joe Scarborough and Nicolle Wallace (all former political operatives) as they issued on-air apologies over NBC management to hire someone so closely attuned to a political party they don’t belong to. Jen Psaki would like a word.

Friday

Cockburn

Biden uses human shields to avoid Pelosi

NBC anchors play with traffic Spotted: NBC News anchors Chuck Todd and Hallie Jackson furiously waving cars under a parking garage gate after the State of the Union address. Cars started to pile up at a broken pay station before an enthusiastic Jackson, who hosts Hallie Jackson NOW, yelled down the ramp for everyone to line up bumper-to-bumper so they could follow each other out before the gate closed in between cars.  “I feel bad,” Jackson lamented as one car missed the cutoff. Joe Biden uses human shields to avoid Pelosi: source Never fear, “Uncommitted” voters. It turns out Joe Biden may have more in common with Hamas than previously thought.

Tuesday

Jack Holmes

Why America’s top TV networks are banking on English soccer

America’s soccer supernova is always just around the next corner, but Rebecca Lowe, who anchors NBC’s coverage of the Premier League in the United States, recalls a few corners already turned. “When I stood in LA in the rain at four in the morning and there were 5,000 people lining up to come in and join us,” she said, referencing one of NBC’s “FanFest” watch parties in 2021, “I was like, ‘Oh yeah, this has not only made it, but this is not going anywhere. This is only getting bigger.’ And there are not many things in this country that can get bigger.” It sure seems like there are more red-blooded Americans patrolling our streets in Arsenal and Liverpool shirts these days.

premier league

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

Media begins shoring up Biden’s network flank

Members of presidential administrations taking roles with news networks isn’t a particularly new phenomenon. Former Bush administration press secretary Dana Perino has fostered a successful career on Fox News. Former Clinton advisor and White House communications direction George Stephanopoulos took on a prominent role as the face of ABC News. When it comes to the Biden presidency, however, several lines have been blurred between official presidential messaging coming from the briefing room and networks who are hiring former Biden officials for prominent roles as he gears up for a re-election campaign. Networks are staffing up their ranks of former Biden communications officials at a furious pace.

Thursday

Michael Bachmann

Disgraced former MSNBC host Mark Halperin charges thousands for news service

Former MSNBC host Mark Halperin is charging high-prices for his news service that launches Thursday.  Wide World of News Concierge Coverage, which starts at $400 a month, is set to replace the Substack Halperin has operated since 2020. The new service will include the Wide World of News newsletter that Halperin currently publishes on his Substack, as well as several other features designed to give subscribers greater access to Halperin’s reporting.  “This new service will give you – and your company or organization — actionable insights beyond dumbed-down cable news chatter or social doom scrolling,” Halperin’s new website says. “Instead, you’ll get the inside track on what will happen next and why, from Halperin’s unbiased, curated reporting.

mark halperin

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

Chuck Todd’s send-off from Meet the Press was a mercy killing

Chuck Todd’s departure from Meet the Press this weekend was not a victorious send-off as much as it was a mercy killing. When Kristen Welker was handed a debate in 2020, it felt like only a matter of time before NBC escorted Chuck into the car and drove him out the woods. The most striking thing about Todd’s time as Meet the Press host, following the ouster of David Gregory, is just how un-striking it was. The most significant thing to happen on the show came courtesy of a guest, with Kellyanne Conway coining the phrase "alternative facts" during an appearance. Yet Meet the Press was almost Sunday morning appointment viewing under Tim Russert, who died suddenly in 2008, and it had steadily declined since then.

Thursday

Amber Duke

The twisted love affair with Eileen Gu

The Chinese Communist Party has a brilliant new propagandist in Olympic gold medalist Eileen Gu, the American-born freestyler skier who is competing for China in this year's Winter Games. Gu is a talented athlete, gifted academically, and, well, gorgeous — she has done modeling campaigns for Louis Vuitton, Fendi and Gucci and has appeared on the covers of Elle and Vogue China. She's also a traitor. Gu, who is 18, was born and raised in San Francisco by her American father and Chinese mother. She plans to attend college at Stanford University. Yet she announced in 2019 that she would represent China in the 2022 Beijing Olympics.

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

What Chris Wallace does next

Chris Wallace stunned the world of news media this weekend by announcing his resignation from Fox News and its staple show, Fox News Sunday. What he did next shocked some further and didn’t surprise others at all: he joined CNN+, a new streaming service coming next year from Jeff Zucker’s dramatic infotainment network. The move is hardly a bombshell given Wallace’s recent run-ins with the MAGA faithful, both on and off the network. It comes on the heels of a contentious election where Wallace lost control in the first presidential debate. Some see Wallace’s departure as an indictment of the direction in which Fox News is heading editorially.

chris wallace

Friday

Grace Curley

When they smear you as a conspiracy theorist, you’re onto something

Here’s how to tell when Republican politicians or journalists or activists are making headway: left-liberal media networks start accusing them of being — wait for it — conspiracy theorists. In recent days, for instance, NBC’s Ben Collins and Joy Reid claimed that the grassroots parent uprising over critical race theory in schools was being driven by QAnon. Or remember last February when Sen. Tom Cotton raised questions about the origins of the coronavirus? The New York Times headline read, ‘Senator Tom Cotton Repeats Fringe Theory of Coronavirus Origins’. In May, when Sen.

conspiracy

Sunday

Ben Sixsmith

Even Elon Musk couldn’t make SNL funny

When my editor asked me to watch Elon Musk on Saturday Night Live, I desperately wondered how to refuse. 'Actually, I’m busy on Saturday night.' Useless. There are a million ways to watch live television after the event. 'I’m a bit sick right now.' Too sick to watch TV and write about it? 'I can’t hear Pete Davidson’s voice without wanting to punch a hole in wall.' True, but not the sort of thing you want to admit in public. Damn it, I agreed. Journalists are asked to visit Syria and Afghanistan, after all, so I can hardly complain about having to watch Saturday Night Live. As The Spectator’s unofficial comedy critic, moreover, I have had to experience everything from Sarah Cooper’s mirthless Netflix special to Charlie Kirk’s bewildering satire on right-wing punditry.

musk

Thursday

Stephen L. Miller

Why do journalists keep repeating the same mistake?

A single mistake in journalism can be forgiven. Perhaps the story was based on faulty information from a bad source and rushed through without a thorough vetting — probably due to a desire to be first to report — and then transparently corrected for the audience. But if the same mistake is repeated, over and over again, by the same news outlets who have taken leave of their basic journalistic duties, then alternative motives have to be explored. Something nefarious on behalf of these organizations and their sources may be afoot. Since Joe Biden’s election, there have been three major instances of journalists publishing a story, watching it trend for days on social media and be discussed on cable news, only for it to be partially or completely retracted later. Damage done.

giuliani mistake

Friday

Charles Lipson

Distorting the news to inflame the mob

NBC's flagship news program completely garbled one of the week’s top stories: a deadly fight among teenage girls in Columbus, Ohio, which ended with a policeman shooting and killing a knife-wielding attacker, 16-year-old Ma'Khia Bryant. The network’s coverage was an abomination. NBC omitted vital information and distorted what actually happened. The Biden White House immediately piled on, insisting that the Columbus shooting was the product of racism. They did so at an incredibly sensitive moment — minutes after a Minneapolis jury convicted policeman Derek Chauvin of murdering George Floyd. Since NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt and other media programs did not report the Columbus story fairly or accurately, let’s do so here.

Tuesday

Caroline McCarthy

Another fine media mess

When I spoke with NBC News earlier this week to talk about the media industry’s role in combating misinformation, I worried that the story might gain undue traction if any footage happened to get posted from my Zoom interview. In it, I was sitting in front of a bookcase full of chainsaw operation manuals and guides to dealing with invasive plant species. (Hello from COVID exile in rural Maine, where every day is Groundhog Day. Literally. A family of groundhogs has taken up residence outside the living room window.)Instead, the story turned out to be the fruits of a partnership between NBC News and a nonprofit called the Center for Countering Digital Hate.

nbc news

Monday

Stephen L. Miller

The American media is in a Chinese finger-trap

Imagine if during the height of the Cold War, a media already combative against President Reagan was also heavily invested in the Soviet Union financially. Pretend the Soviet Union could leverage vast amounts of propaganda using our entertainment, news and print media as Reagan told them to tear down the Berlin Wall. Due to either a complicit corporate media in America, China is presently engaged in a highly organized propaganda war against the United States, not dissimilar from that analogy. As COVID-19 spreads across the United States, mainstream outlets are publishing Chinese state apologia across the web, and China is leveraging their clear influence over these markets, using the Hong Kong protest blackouts as a blueprint.

media

Tuesday

Cockburn

Mark Halperin and the art of the #MeToo U-turn

So, you’ve been accused of sexual misconduct. You’re officially hashtag canceled, laying low, plotting your return to glory. How do you pull off the comeback? Do you try and slip back in unnoticed like The New York Times‘s Glenn Thrush? Do you go on a literal apology tour around the country like comedian Aziz Ansari, performing a routine about how much you’ve learned from your experience? Neither of those approaches was good enough for Mark Halperin. For the former NBC News correspondent, who was accused of, among other things, rubbing his clothed erect penis on some young female staffers and propositioning others, the smartest way back has a few stages. First, issue a general apology, while denying a couple of the allegations, and don’t direct one at the women involved.

mark halperin