GE to KO: STFU

[A version of this post previously ran as my regular Friday night column on Firedoglake.]

Hey, waddya say tonight we go after some big game? Yeah, I know what you’re thinkin’: elephants by definition are big game. Or, maybe you’ve watched the video clip here, and you’re thinking, Bill O’Reilly is a big target, but kind of an easy one. Well, if that’s what you’re thinking, think bigger:

For years Keith Olbermann of MSNBC had savaged his prime-time nemesis Bill O’Reilly of the Fox News Channel and accused Fox of journalistic malpractice almost nightly. Mr. O’Reilly in turn criticized Mr. Olbermann’s bosses and led an exceptional campaign against General Electric, the parent company of MSNBC.

It was perhaps the fiercest media feud of the decade and by this year, their bosses had had enough. But it took a fellow television personality with a neutral perspective to bring it to an end.

At an off-the-record summit meeting for chief executives sponsored by Microsoft in May, the PBS interviewer Charlie Rose asked Jeffrey Immelt, chairman of G.E., and his counterpart at the News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch, about the feud.

Both moguls expressed regret over the venomous culture between the two networks. Then — even though the feud had increased the viewing audience of both programs — they instructed lieutenants to arrange a cease-fire, according to three people who work at the companies and have direct knowledge of the deal.

In early June, the combat stopped, and the anchors for the most part found other targets for their verbal missiles (Hello, CNN).

“It was time to grow up,” a senior employee of one of the companies said.

Instructed lieutenants??? Oh, wait, I should add this:

The rapprochement — not acknowledged by the parties until now — showcased how a personal and commercial battle between two men could create real consequences for their parent corporations. A G.E. shareholders’ meeting, for instance, was overrun by critics of MSNBC (and one of Mr. O’Reilly’s producers) last April.

And there we have it, don’t we? It wasn’t that it was personal, it’s that it was business—and not the news business, G.E.’s business.

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The wages of sin: your wages, their sin

Now that our great and glorious leader Michael Bloomberg and Council Speaker Christine Quinn Quisling have succeeded in their power play, here’s a little question to consider this fine fall weekend: at what cost?

I am not asking about the political cost, which is, in many ways, immeasurable—at least as yet—I am talking about the real cost in New York City tax dollars that have already gone or will have to go quite literally to pay homage to our new born king. For along with the millions upon millions that have already been spent out of the mayor’s publicly financed slush fund to buy the votes he needed on the City Council (an impeachable offense, as best I can tell), NYC will now have to spend more taxpayer dollars to defend itself against the lawsuits that naturally had to arise from this extralegal end run around the city charter (two have already been filed, with the promise of more on the way).

It will certainly be in the millions of dollars—how many millions, I can’t say. I doubt anyone in the city government would dare give an estimate.

But, millions and millions of city dollars have been spent, and millions and millions of city dollars will be spent. . . all so that we can keep Mike Bloomberg and his supposedly irreplaceable expertise in place to guide the city through the dire fiscal crisis to come.

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By the way, Mike and Chris caught the eye and ire of the national media on Thursday, making Keith Olbermann’s list of Worst Persons in the World.




(cross-posted on Daily Kos, guy2k and The Seminal)