Kelsey Grammer helps launch conservative entertainment network

[a kennedy]

NEW YORK — Actor Kelsey Grammer is an investor and public face supporting a new network that launched Wednesday with entertainment designed to appeal to political conservatives.
RightNetwork, whose first series, Running, follows the fortunes of a couple of Tea Party-backed candidates for public office, is also trying a new model to establish itself. It is initially making programming available through video-on-demand services, the Internet and through mobile phones, bypassing the route of traditional TV networks with a spot on channel lineups.

Investors hope that the support of a conservative audience that has made Fox News Channel and radio hosts such as Rush Limbaugh successful could also work for entertainment programming, said Kevin McFeeley, RightNetwork's president.

"We feel the precedent has been set," he said.

Grammer, the Emmy-winning star of Frasier, said the network represented a desire by him and some political friends "to stop allowing people who hate us to define us."

"If you have NBC, ABC, you have entire networks flooded with a very particular point of view," he said. "They won't admit it, but it's clearly the way it is. There's plenty of room for us."

Initial programming also includes Right2Laugh, with standup comedians Evan Sayet, Kivi Rogers and Adam Yenser; Politics and Poker, with card players sitting around talking politics; and Leftovers, with Yenser hosting a "lighthearted look" at current news and entertainment. New episodes are made available every couple of weeks, McFeeley said. Some of the candidates featured in Running have already lost primary bids.

In the works is a sitcom called Moving Numbers, about quirky political consultants trying to elect a candidate to the U.S. Senate. McFeeley said the RightNetwork will also offer some vintage programming, such as old episodes of William F. Buckley's Firing Line and Milton Friedman's Uncommon Knowledge.

"We're not out to vilify or accuse or identify anybody as an enemy," Grammer said. "We're out there to encourage people to open their minds and take a look at some things that we as a group of people believe is the right direction for the country."

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2010-09-08-conservative-entertainment-network_N.htm

[Champion Jack]

1. LOL! His last shows have done sooooo well.

[stuntcat]

2. "to encourage people to open their minds"

yeah.. right.
I just heard of this on the radio. It makes me so sad and ashamed, the direction people are going. I know a lot of dangerously stupid, racist, "Conservatives" who are just encouraged by this kind of thing.

It's veiled as Traditional, Moral, "American".. To me it is just as dangerous as the Quran-burners.

It makes me so sick and afraid of people.

[Cosmocat]

10. Gee, American Carol goes network!

"We're not out to vilify or accuse or identify anybody as an enemy," Grammer said. "We're out there to encourage people to open their minds and take a look at some things that we as a group of people believe is the right direction for the country."

If you have seen American Carol, which Grammer stared in BTW, you see the COMPLETE opposite of this ... It is 90 minutes of really poor shots at "liberals," one after another, just and endless string of sophmoric and completely hyperbolic mischaracterizations of the evil liberal ...

It is all they have, backslapping over their self aggrandization of how great americans they are while taking mean and untrue shots at the endless array of liberal boogeymen they create ...

LOTS of open mindedness in hand with some cigar smoking self righteous morons playing holdum while getting big guffaws, "BAH, HAH, HAH, Horseface Pelosi, GOOD ONE!" "Oh, and how about the ACLU!" "No, the UNIONS are even worse!" ... "BAH, HAW !!!"

[Erose999]

17. "An American Carol" also lost 13 million at the box office. They didn't even recover their

production costs. lol

[NYC Liberal]

3. What a joke. Conservatives are authoritarians.

And since good comedy is subversive, they resort to mocking poor people, minorities, hippies and feminists...and fart jokes. It gets old really fast.

The Daily Show proves every night that right wingers are only funny when they're being serious. And Colbert proves that they don't do satire well either...since many right-wingers think he's one of them.

[Erose999]

13. Hey its worked for Jeff Dunham and Larry the Cable Guy. Not that I "approve" of either of them but

they have been able to make a living marketing that brand of "comedy" to conservative audiences.

I wish I could just once order a pizza with jalapenos on it without someone bringing up that god-awful racist puppet. GNARRRRRR!!11!

[mtnester]

4. Before or after his current girlfrind gives birth, or he gets a divorce from

his current wife?

[Sedona]

6. or banging his 15 year old babysitter

or after paying off her parents?

http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/1995/03/17/1995-03-17__frasier__won_t_face_teen_se.html

[mtnester]

18. Even more endearing!

not

[mitchum]

36. I have always wanted to hear those phone calls with his distinctive hammy voice

He's just a creep

[WI_DEM]

23. Is he off drugs yet?

[mtnester]

29. Bonus!

[sendero]

5. It's so funny..

... the "liberal media" argument. Kelsey, there hasn't been a liberal media for 15 years, you are clearly delusional if you think the main networks are remotely liberal.

[mikeytherat]

7. It is not an act - Kelsey Grammer really IS Sideshow Bob!

And about as successful, too.

mikey_the_rat

[tanyev]

8. I wish him as much success as he had on his sit-com with Patricia Heaton.

[Erose999]

9. Hopefully this will go over as well as Lush Rimjob's foray into television in the early '90's.

[Brewman_Jax]

11. What? FOX isn't enough?

they're acting like a buncha greedy repubs! Launching a network for...a buncha greedy repubs. You can't make this up. :P

[mikeytherat]

12. Entertainment like "An American Carol?"

In one scene, the Michael Moore character (named Michael Malone - real stretch there, guys) and one of the ghosts open a huge door, and lots of smoke pours in. As Michael is choking, he comments about all the smoke, and the ghost tells him, "That's not smoke - it's the pulverized remains of 9/11 victims!"

In the movie, the scene mentioned above was supposed to be funny - so why aren't you laughing? Probably because conservatives and humor go together like dog shit and ice cream.

mikey_the_rat

[The Wizard]

16. "conservatives and humor go together like dog shit and ice cream"

I'm sorry, but I'm stealing that one. As the snot bubbles come out of my nose.
Didn't Pox News try emulating the Daily Show for about three days before someone realized "conservatives and humor go together like dog shit and ice cream" Ahhhhh.

[mikeytherat]

20. Yes. The "Fox Half Hour News Hour."

It had a shorter shelf life than an open bottle of unpasteurized milk.

mikey_the_rat

[rurallib]

21. one of the most appropriate similes I have ever heard.

Wish I was in school, I would try to work it into a term paper.

[Botany]

14. Kelsey please

ABC a liberal network?

ABC / ESPN / Disney sell the right wing line big time.

The path to 9/11 & dancing w/ the stars (Tom Delay, Bristol Palin, & Tucker Carlson).

[Bitwit1234]

15. Since they have so many conservative entainers

you know like Rove, Beck, Rush and the whole damn fox crew it should be filled up. But gee you can't have a network that shows nothing but CLOWNS. Or can you. Cause that's all republicans are. A bunch of clowns. And not the funny kind. They are creepy as hell.

[spanone]

19. more reason not to watch mr grammer

[WI_DEM]

22. he can't get a job unless it's playing Fraiser

[tanyev]

26. I loved that show.

But thinking back on it, I liked it because of the great supporting cast. My favorite shows are all ones that focus on their storylines. Frasier could have gone off on vacation for an entire season and I wouldn't have cared.

[ThatsMyBarack]

24. Chuck Todd can be its official statistician!

;)

[smokey nj]

25. Alternate headline: Kelsey Grammer helps launch lead balloon.

[LynneSin]

27. Kelsey Grammer is showing is Right-Wing Family values....

He's not even divorced and already his girlfriend of TWO months is pregnant.

I mean he pretty much probably boinked her as a one-night stand and forgot to cover his ding-dong.

Now he's claiming she's his new girlfriend.

Does he think we're that stupid?

[hatrack]

28. And what'll he be doing next week?

:rofl:

[qb]

30. The new conservative entertainment network... listed in TV Guide as OXY-MORON

[TheKentuckian]

31. Perhaps the most pitiful thing ever

Even the pukes will crap it out after the novelty wears off and pop in Bedtime for Bonzo on VHS, crack open a can of Beast Light, bust into the Cheetos, and call it a night.

[arbusto_baboso]

32. Guess he's tired of driving into trees.

He needs a new way to make an ass of himself.

[EFerrari]

33. LOL.

[KamaAina]

34. "bypassing the route of traditional TV networks with a spot on channel lineups."

Or, as we say in the reality-based world, "unable to secure a spot on channel lineups even from right-leaning cable operators like Comcast." :eyes:

[Brickbat]

35. LMAO -- Firing Line as entertainment!

:rofl:

[earth mom]

37. Ugh. Wasn't one bat shit crazy nutcase channel enough?!

:puke:

[SoCalDem]

38. First Show? "How to Impregnate Young Women For Fun & Profit" n/t

[mikeytherat]

39. "...a new network that launched Wednesday..." ***EXCLUSIVE PHOTO MONTAGE OF THE LAUNCH***

mikey_the_rat