Everyone knows what I thought of the Bashir incident. I said he should be fired by MSNBC. I said that MSNBC’s “punsishment” of Bashir – I don’t think my quotation marks were ever more accurate – was a slap on the wrist and set a bad precedent and broke with MSNBC’s history of suspensions for outrageous commentary. So you all know how I feel and where I stand.
That said, this Breitbart.com article by Frances Martel is beyond lame. It’s so criminally ignorant it’s nothing more than troll bait.
Exhibit A:
It has been a week since MSNBC’s Martin Bashir took the network’s hatred of Sarah Palin one step further with a sexist rant suggesting someone defecate and urinate into the former Alaska governor’s mouth. Having apologized but received no discipline, his female colleagues on the network declined to comment to Breitbart News on the network’s inaction.
Breitbart reached out directly to hosts Chris Jansing, Rachel Maddow, Abby Huntsman, Andrea Mitchell, Savannah Guthrie, Mika Brzezinski, Alex Wagner, Krystal Ball, and Alex Witt, as well as reporter Kelly O’Donnell, through a publicist, requesting comment on the continued lack of discipline Martin Bashir has enjoyed since making his comments regarding Palin. As of press time, none of MSNBC’s talent has responded to our request, nor have they commented publicly on the matter.
The silence is deafening, especially compared to the backlash against those on the right who have outraged the network’s talent in the past–with far less obscene statements.
Is Martel deliberately being dense or is she really that ignorant of how networks work? As I’m not a mind reader, I can’t tell.
First of all, you aren’t “reach(ing) out directly” to anyone if you have to go through a publicist. Martel reached out to nobody except the publicist and no publicist is going to set up their talent for gotcha pot shot questions. It was a complete waste of time to attempt to do so. I seriously doubt any of the talents in Martel’s list ever got wind of the reach out either. I’d stake my entire life savings on it. The inquiry stopped at the publicist and got no further.
Second of all, nobody…no talent…is going to comment publicly about what their opinion of a fellow talent still gainfully employed by their network did especially if its as negative as this was. That’s called going off the reservation. Joe Scarborough may have the pull to shoot his mouth off and appear to get away with it, but Joe apparently doesn’t know any better and I’m all but certain someone has chewed him out for it. Everyone else is not going to stick their necks out and shoot inside their tent. I don’t care what shop you work for or how bad the transgression is…it’s…just…not…done.
Here’s a great example without an ideological component to it: Keith Olbermann’s exit from MSNBC. Nobody commented on it. It wasn’t like there were any red/blue entanglements to Olbermann’s departure. That was purely an in house war between Olbermann and MSNBC. Rachel Maddow still hasn’t said anything about it.
Want more examples? Ok…Octavia Nasr and Rick Sanchez. No talent at CNN commented on their dismissals.
It’s…just…not…done.
Want to know what happens when you do shoot off inside the tent? Read Zev Chaffets’ biography of Roger Ailes…
In the spring of 2008, Wallace did a spot on Fox & Friends. Barack Obama had just delivered his well-received speech on race relations in the wake of the Jeremiah Wright controversy, and the hosts, including Steve Doocy, spent a good part of the show picking it apart. They invited Wallace to join in but he declined. “I told them that two hours of Obama bashing was enough,” he recalls. Ailes was furious that Wallace had criticized his colleagues on the air. “You shot inside the tent,” he said, and informed Wallace that he was a “jerk”. Wallace sent Ailes a letter of apology, and he hasn’t forgotten the lesson.
This is why…it’s…just…not…done.
Martel’s article is a move usually seen in the political arena. You reach out to see if you can get anyone to comment, knowing full well you most likely won’t get anyone to comment (unless you’re too stupid to realize that of course), and if they don’t comment you blast them for not commenting.
This isn’t like the old days when Jimmy The Greek shot his mouth off making some blatantly ignorant comments about black athletes and Brent Mussburger commented to TV reporters about it. That was before the internet. That was before the red/blue divide, egged on by talk radio, erupted in to the toxic chasm it is today and made rational discussion impossible and circling the wagons was the only defense available.
This is the 21st century. It’s now a catch 22 for the talent: Either they do comment and catch hell from their bosses for inflaming the situation or they don’t comment and catch hell from the people wanting them to comment. They can’t win.
There is only one group that can answer for things like this – only one group where the pressure must be kept on until they do answer; the executives that run the network. They make the decisions. They are ultimately responsible.
Show them no mercy. Do not ease up. MSNBC’s executives, NBC’s executives, and Comcast’s executives must answer for Bashir and the lack of punishment he received. Keep pounding until you get a response.
Too bad Martel didn’t take that route. But, hey…she got her copy. She erected her strawman and made the talent look complicit in something they aren’t a party to in full ignorance of how networks actually function.
Filed under: MSNBC
