Attention MSNBC: "Journalists dole out cash to politicians (quietly)

[sabrina 1]

In a lengthy article on MSNBC's website in 2007, they reported on the political contributions made by jouralists to politicians, among them their own Joe Scarborough.

If Keith's suspension is meant to show 'fairness' then according to MSNBC's own investigative work on this issue, an awful lot of journalists from all news agencies will have to be suspended also, starting with 'Morning Joe'.

Journalists dole out cash to politicians (quietly)

BOSTON — A CNN reporter gave $500 to John Kerry's campaign the same month he was embedded with the U.S. Army in Iraq. An assistant managing editor at Forbes magazine not only sent $2,000 to Republicans, but also volunteers as a director of an ExxonMobil-funded group that questions global warming. A junior editor at Dow Jones Newswires gave $1,036 to the liberal group MoveOn.org and keeps a blog listing "people I don't like," starting with George Bush, Pat Robertson, the Christian Coalition, the NRA and corporate America ("these are the people who are really in charge").

Whether you sample your news feed from ABC or CBS (or, yes, even NBC and MSNBC), whether you prefer Fox News Channel or National Public Radio, The Wall Street Journal or The New Yorker, some of the journalists feeding you are also feeding cash to politicians, parties or political action committees.

The article goes on to note that most of those journalists identified contribute to Democrats and Democratic organizations. But Repubicans get their fair share also from jouranlists.

As the policy at the Times puts it: "Given the ease of Internet access to public records of campaign contributors, any political giving by a Times staff member would carry a great risk of feeding a false impression that the paper is taking sides."

But news organizations don't agree on where to draw the ethical line.

Giving to candidates is allowed at Fox, Forbes, Time, The New Yorker, Reuters — and at Bloomberg News, whose editor in chief, Matthew Winkler, set the tone by giving to Al Gore in 2000. Bloomberg has nine campaign donors on the list; they're allowed to donate unless they cover politics directly.

Donations and other political activity are strictly forbidden at The Washington Post, ABC, CBS, CNN and NPR.
Politicking is discouraged, but there is some wiggle room, at Dow Jones, Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report. (Compare policies here.)

(MSNBC.com is a joint venture of NBC Universal and Microsoft; its employees are required to adhere to NBC News policies regarding political contributions.)

And here's a record of Joe Scarborough's contributions to politicians:



Two donations to one Republican candidate in 2006.

Keith never made a secret of his political positions. So where's the 'conflict of interest'?

Did anyone here ever think that KO was an 'impartial' journalist? Didn't MSNBC hire him knowing his political views, and helped build his show around those views?

I hope they clarify their policies soon. Because as long as Joe Scarborough remains unsuspended, the suspension of a self-confessed Progressive Democratic host, makes them look a bit biased. Towards the Right!



So, MSNBC, either suspend Joe, or BRING BACK KEITH!

[sabrina 1]

1. There are no grounds to suspend Keith. Just in case

that wasn't clear in the OP, here are MSNBC's own rules regarding reporting political contributions. It needs to be highlighted so that their policy is clear:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19178161

"If a contribution, monetary or otherwise, to a candidate or group with a political or social agenda could create the appearance of a conflict of interest due to the employee’s responsibilities at MSNBC.com, the contribution must receive the prior approval of the section Executive Producer or Editor in Chief.

If anyone can point out where there was any conflict of interest in Keith's support of democratic candidates, then MSNBC might have a point. There was none, this was a knee-jerk reaction to the rightwing, as usual.

I hope he's back as soon as possible.

[Turborama]

2. Even far reich teahadist, & colleague of Brietbart, Dana Loesch said as much on AC360 earlier

I just don't get it, if teahadists like her aren't even making any hay out of this, what-the-fuck were MSNBC even knee-jerking themselves off to? :shrug:

[sabrina 1]

3. I think it's the beginning of a purge again. When Republicans

were in power before, MSNBC fired Phil Donohue whose show was their top-rated show at the time. They fired Ashley Banfield, a rising star reporter who they embedded with the troops in Afghanistan. But she made the mistake of being a real journalist by telling the truth about what she was not allowed to show on TV.

On other networks, Bill Maher's show was cancelled for making a fairly truthful remark on "Politically Incorrect' about fighter pilots dropping bombs on civilians.

And Aaron Brown was let go because his show was too liberal, iow, he did some real reporting on the war and the Bush gang.

There was another very good female reporter who was also let go at the time.

And there was the setting up of Dan Rather when he too did some real reporting on the Bush gang.

The lesson learned to what is left of journalism in the U.S. is 'don't rock the boat' just 'catapult the propaganda' and if you can't do that, then talk about the exploits of Paris Hilton but, don't, ever, question the powerful.

Now the Republicans are back. And MSNBC has begun to clean house again. I guess they match their shows to the party in power. In fact we know they do, they have said so, in memos etc.

So anyone who thinks that Rachel and Ed and other liberal hosts are safe, they are wrong, UNLESS this time we don't let them do it.

Jon Stewart helped this to happen when he lumped all cable shows with Fox, actually naming Keith and Ed Schultz. I guess the CEOs at MSNBC thought if Stewart gave them the green light, starting with Keith would be easy. I hope they're getting the message that we've had enough censorship in this country and 9/11 isn't an excuse anymore.

If you don't stand up when one injustice is done, more will follow. Rachel Maddow was directing her comments tonight to Jon Stewart. She gets it, too bad so many others don't.

[Turborama]

4. Could it have been that he had begun a new call out to Boehner at the end of the show?

To paraphrase: "XX Days since the Republicans took over Congress, where are the jobs Mr Boehner?" Maybe this is what really stuck in their craw?

If so, there are scary times ahead and all the nightmarish predictions that we've previously discussed are actually starting to come true.

[sabrina 1]

5. It could be. Keith did that kind of thing when Clinton was president

He counted down the days that the Republicans were spending investigating Clinton. But he did get tired of it and I believe, quit tv for a while. I don't think he was partisan when he started out, but watching the Clinton debacle turned a lot of people off these Republicans.

I think the network is about to be taken over by Comcast, and from what I've read the new boss will be someone who is a known Republican, who has donated to Republicans himself.

I also think that now with Repubs back in power, the networks might be trying to appease them in order to have access to them. This is how our media works it seems. It's all about access. With Dems in power it was okay to have a couple of liberal voices around, not too many, but a few.

I think there are probably several reasons, none of which is the one they are giving. Keith has built up an audience and if a rightwinger takes over, he may want him gone. He also doesn't bow to authority too easily so I doubt he'd take orders about 'toning' down his show.

And yes, they would not want him to repeat that message daily, but could have asked him not to I suppose.

Let's see how much power the people have. If he comes back, that will be a good sign. But if he doesn't, that will create a lot of problems for the rest of the liberal voices and they will probably be next. In fact, if I were Rachel, I would be talking to any other network that might have made offers to her. But she will probably be asked to tone down her shows also. Repubs are back, MSNBC will fall in line, I think. I hope I'm wrong, but that's what happened before.