Keith vs. Glenn Greenwald: Are We Headed for a Clash of the Titans Smackdown?

[Berry Cool]

I fear that's the way this is headed.

Glenn Greenwald, whom I have long respected, claims, on the basis of Brian Stelter and his New York Times article, that Keith is a mere media shill, bought and paid for by GE, who dances to their tune.

Keith just spoke his answer to that tonight, and in short, it's: "Like hell I am."

This, obviously, is not over. But I have no idea how it's going to end.

[Berry Cool]

1. I reply to my own post to say:

Just looked at Salon. I had noticed that Greenwald is saying that despite what Keith said last night, there is plenty of "evidence" that his role as a mere puppet whose strings have been pulled by GE is true.

Hmph. And his story is accompanied by 44 pages of Salon letters, most of which echo the assumption that Keith is a mere corporate shill, and not very bright at that, and that even if he were free of his corporate masters, he would be nothing but a third-rate TV blowhard and no threat to the Powers that Be anyway.

Nice.

It's very difficult, even in that bastion of mostly liberal folk (invaded by only the occasional obvious crank letter from a wingnut of the rightly persuasion), to find anyone who has any faith in the man whatsoever. Maybe it's their general disdain for television as the opiate of the masses; maybe it's their general distrust of corporations as not only the source of all evil but as magical beings capable of uttering Imperius Curses to make their employees do their bidding, lest they find themselves listening to their boss yell "Avada Kedavra!" instead. All I know is, if I were Keith and I read it, it would have been part of what fueled my anger in my Special Comment last night. "'Corporate shill,' am I? I'll show them..."

It's just like it's always been. When Keith goes on vacation, all hell breaks loose. And this time, he went on an unusually long vacation. Thank goodness he at least disclosed where he was part of the time, or things could have been much worse. (I noted that Salon readers actually seem to think Daily Kos's CityLightsLover, who blogs Countdown every night, is some sort of expert as to where he goes on vacation. Yeah, right. She claims he always goes on vacation about the time of the All-Star Game, because he goes every year. I'm sure that will come as news to him. Remember the year he actually explained to us that the only reason he'd left the show early the night before was because he had dinner reservations?)

Anyway, in the tradition of the Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times," I expect we will be in for an "interesting" time as this story goes on. And I expect Keith isn't going to be too happy that there seems to be such a vocal chunk of the leftyverse whose opinion is that he, and yes, Rachel, and Ed, etc., are toothless lions that really not of much use to the country because they are just NBC whores who say and do what they are told, and if you want the REAL story, you have to go to PBS, NPR (NPR? That's a laugh, considering how Bush demolished them) and Democracy Now!. And he's going to show it a great deal in the future.

Oh, and these letter writers on Salon? I would like to know who they all work for that no one can accuse any of THEM of being corporate whores. Do they all have their own independent businesses? Or are they like many people: ostensibly working for The Man, but not involved in The Man's less conscientious work, and neither actively nor passively helping The Man's less conscientious work to succeed? And if the latter is the case, how do THEY like it when they get tarred with the same evil brush as their employers?

And, while I fully realize that corporate personhood is one of the great evils of our country, do they propose that we simply eliminate all corporations altogether? And, if we were to do that, would they enjoy living in such a country, or such a world?

[Berry Cool]

2. And again to say...

Greenwald's own responses in the letters are interesting. This is a couple of Salon readers in italic, him in bold:

While it appears that Glenn was certainly incorrect when he stated,

>I also know with 100% certainty that Keith Olbermann isn't going to be denying that he was silenced.

http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/08/01/ge/permalink/6df9b12b1c963f286fb6e2d3ee94ab96.html

If you knew what I know - and you will - you'd have said the same thing.

as a member of the virtual "jury," I've suspended judgment for the interim. I would prefer more evidence than KO's claim to editorial freedom.

Any looking for evidence that what you heard tonight on Countdown was truthful will be waiting for a long time. Evidence that it was untruthful, however, ought to be shortly forthcoming.

So, now his story is "Keith is a liar. How do I know? 'Cuz I know something you don't know---nyaah nyaah, neener neener--but you will soon find out."

Like I said, this isn't going away anytime soon.

Depressing to see progressives eating our own while the right gets out the popcorn...but when it comes to Keith, a lot of people seem to sharpen their knives and forks, and not just on the right.

[Berry Cool]

3. Oh boy...we finally have the story from Greenwald. Or, part of it.

And the explanation is reminding me that he is, indeed, a lawyer.

Here's his explanation: Keith was right, AND he was right. No, there was no "deal" and no negotiated "truce in which Keith was "asked" to lay off Billo.

Thing is, there was no "ask" about it. The truce was negotiated between the suits, and then Keith was ORDERED to comply. Not ASKED. Not "made a deal with." ORDERED. And he obeyed.

How does Greenwald know? You're gonna love this one...it's just like KarmaBites...super-sekret EMAILS!!!!!!!!!!! From a super-sekret source within NBC!!!!!!!

He's already been asked to release them, to which he says:

It would be hard to publish them without revealing the person's identity, whose job would absolutely be at risk if his identity was disclosed, but the emails said that everything I wrote on Saturday about GE was dead-on; it documented examples of commentary about O'Reilly and Fox that was censored because of GE's edict during this time period; it provided details of who at GE was responsible and who at NBC communicated the decree; and it described proposals among MSNBC employees for protesting what had been done.

So, did Karma get a job at NBC? Your call.

Greenwald is now saying that Keith, by claiming Glenn's original reporting was not materially incorrect, and crowing about how this means that KEITH HIMSELF is admitting that Greenwald speaks the truth. But at the same time, he's accusing Keith of lying when Keith claims he was never muzzled, that Keith was NEVER told and has never been told what to do by NBC.

Am I buying this? You guessed it: not yet. Because even the way Keith phrases his statement makes it obvious that he is not saying "I didn't agree to it; they forced me." He's saying "They never asked me to agree to this, because they would never either ASK me or ORDER me to do such a thing."

No, this is not over at all. I expect Keith will have something fresh to say about it tonight. Because now he's not only being accused of being a GE shill, he's accused of being told to either do as ordered (in essence) by his bosses, or be fired. And of having lied about it. And of having started up a fresh feud with Billo last night only to cover NBC's corporate butt because they're afraid of the scandal that has ensued from it having been uncovered that they are taking their marching orders from Fox and Rupert Murdoch, lest Fixed Noise expose their supposed corporate ethical misdeeds.

Well, it's up to you.

Do you believe Keith is a corporate shill AND a liar? Or do you believe this whole thing has been cooked up by the folks at Faux News to either get him fired, ruin his reputation for integrity with the left, or both? And that Greenwald walked right into the trap?

I can tell you what I think so far. But you can probably guess on your own.