DXM History Repeats: Television

Our look back at how the subject of television has been treated and mistreated here at DXM over the past five years reaches its conclusion with my take on CNN's decision to fire one of my oldest friends and colleagues in the TV news game: Rick Sanchez.

The DXM Fifth Birthday Jubilee

Topic: CNN

Number of Posts: 291

"I, Sanchez" (Originally Published, 10.5.10)

The last time I worked with Rick Sanchez, during a fill-in stint he did on American Morning, he stood next to my desk for a few minutes and groused about the way CNN covered news. Not so much the stories it chose to pursue as what he felt was the needlessly byzantine series of standards and regulations at the network which, in his mind, was solely the product of institutional arrogance.

"Look at some of these people," he said, scanning the newsroom. "They take this stuff so fucking seriously -- like we're doing brain surgery or something." He then grabbed his crotch through his suit pants, flashed a wide smile and said, "This is what I think of that, you know?"

That was Rick all the way: brash, cocky, impulsive, occasionally crude as hell, with almost no knack for subtlety or concern for the trivialities of decorum. The proverbial bull in the china shop. Maybe that's why when I learned on Friday that he'd been fired for a couple of admittedly ill-advised comments he'd made during a radio interview, I couldn't exactly react with surprise -- not considering all I know about Sanchez after having worked with him on and off for the better part of the last two decades.

Let me go ahead and just get something out of the way right now. Regardless of the fact that I consider Rick Sanchez a friend and I've actually developed something of a fondness and appreciation for the qualities in him that others find so polarizing, this doesn't mean I'm going to blindly rush to his defense. That's not how it works, particularly when something he does creates a minor media shit-storm and therefore deserves to be evaluated as dispassionately as possible. That being said, I do think that while Sanchez's comments were, in keeping with tradition, breathtakingly artless and impertinent, he didn't say anything that he deserved to lose his job over. And I'd be making this statement even if I didn't know full well that what was going through Sanchez's mind at the time wasn't quite as inflammatory as what was coming out of his mouth. Once again, nuance has never been one of Rick's strengths.

By now you're probably well aware of what Sanchez said on Pete Dominick's radio show last Thursday that brought down the wrath of the network suits and officially ended his career at CNN just 24 hours later. No, contrary to the headlines that screamed from every direction -- the kind of incendiary reductionism that guarantees ratings or page views -- Sanchez didn't in fact shout that the Jews control the media. He absolutely called Jon Stewart a bigot -- an admittedly silly claim, likely based on nothing more than Sanchez's own hurt feelings -- and he certainly said that the people who run the television industry are "a lot like Stewart," but when you're talking about a fireable offense it's probably a good idea to take into account the fact that one or two words, even the way in which something was said, can change the entire meaning of what was said. Sanchez sarcastically implied that Stewart isn't a minority in the way that Sanchez himself supposedly is, and that the upper echelon of CNN and the TV business in general bears more of a resemblance to the Daily Show host -- white, liberal, "elitist" and, yes, Jewish -- than it does to a guy like Rick Sanchez.

And the resentment that oozes from every word of a statement like that speaks volumes about the motivation behind Sanchez's decision to say it in the first place.

Rick Sanchez has always viewed his rise to fame in almost mythic terms. He sees himself as the classic tough immigrant kid from the streets who defied the odds, took a whole lot of knocks, suffered through plenty of triumphs and traumas -- the latter, as it turns out, often self-inflicted -- and yet still stands tall. The guy they just can't keep down. You really can picture Sanchez on a stage somewhere, a tear running down his cheek as he belts out a karaoke version of My Way. Anyone who knows Sanchez understands that his resilience -- what his many detractors would likely refer to as cockroach-like -- is a major point of pride for him. This is a guy, after all, who infamously managed to get away with hitting and killing someone back in the early 90s while driving legally drunk; if talking your way out of something like that doesn't leave you thinking you're superhumanly charmed, nothing will.

The problem, of course, is that Sanchez has always been viewed as a lot of flash and bombast with no real substance. As a local anchor, he was brilliant -- really, the best I've ever seen. That's because he understood that television on the whole was largely bullshit and that local news -- particularly the kind done so well at WSVN in Miami -- was just a lot of superficial dazzle. He figured if you could talk and talk well, what you were saying wouldn't really matter. He deserves credit for what one producer we used to work with together jokingly called his unique ability to "demystify television." Given that WSVN was one of the first stations in the country to pull back the curtain and let viewers see the inner workings of its news operation -- and it was way ahead of the curve on this, doing a form of transparent media more than a decade before the digital revolution made that sort of thing absolutely essential for an outlet's survival -- Sanchez's eventual helming of a show that revolved around Twitter seems like destiny. Social networking fed the two qualities that were most undeniable in Sanchez: his ability to interact with viewers in a personal and off-the-cuff fashion and, of course, his inarguably impressive ego. There's no denying that he loved the notion that anybody could now be a journalist and that you didn't need the erstwhile kingmakers in the editorial adminisphere to tell you what was and wasn't news anymore; considering his background and his own self-mythology, this makes perfect sense.

Unfortunately for him and his crotch-grabbing indignation, the people at CNN did take the news very seriously, and while Sanchez's charm offensive had won him quite a few friends and admirers -- say what you will about Rick, he's a disarmingly nice guy -- there were also plenty of people at the network who felt like his shtick somehow sullied CNN's hallowed reputation. My attitude was always that when it came to fucking up the good name of the brand, Rick Sanchez was really the last thing CNN should've been worrying about; in fact, I actually considered Sanchez a bit of a breath of fresh air -- when taken in relatively small doses -- given that at least he understood that what we were doing wasn't the gold standard, capital-J journalism the network's promotion department would have the audience believe anyway. Apparently Jon Klein, the man who was largely responsible for CNN's well-documented slide from serious to ridiculous, also fell under the spell of Sanchez's wide-eyed enthusiasm, inexhaustible energy and complete lack of respect for the traditional way of doing things, figuring they were just what was needed to shake things up at stodgy old CNN. The trouble was a lot of people eventually saw Rick Sanchez as the personification of every embarrassing thing Klein was doing to the once-revered network; the fact that Sanchez himself willfully thumbed his nose at the elitist ethos plastered into the walls at a place like CNN didn't help matters.

Whenever anyone asks me what Rick Sanchez is like -- and it's a testament to the man's somewhat legendary status that I've been asked this an astonishing number of times -- I always say one thing: He's the easiest guy to work with I've ever met. Unlike a lot of other television personalities who straddle that insufferable line between narcissism and insecurity -- they believe the world revolves around them but they desperately need you to believe it, too -- Rick's ego has always been bulletproof, and it's counterintuitively made him a breeze to be around because he has nothing to prove. In his mind, he's 100% sure he's the shit and therefore he doesn't need you to remind him.

At least that's the way it used to be.

I think if you're looking for the seed that eventually blossomed into Sanchez's spectacular, albeit inadvertent, meltdown, it was this: something finally got to him. After years of wielding his confidence like a weapon and wearing the ridicule of his critics like a badge of honor, because he believed that any publicity was good publicity, he Peter Principled out -- if not by actually reaching his personal level of incompetence then by reaching a level at which a lot of other people thought he was incompetent. And in the savage Thunderdome that is today's media landscape, the mockery that can be heaped on you from every direction -- from those beneath you, beside you and far above you on the professional and cultural ladder -- can wither even those with the thickest of skin. Sanchez had become the personal punching bag of the host and writers of one of the most brilliantly acerbic -- and, more stingingly, most respected -- "news" outlets on television: The Daily Show. This was a show with tremendous cultural cachet -- and it had declared that Rick Sanchez was a fucking moron. A laughingstock.

If the criticism had only been coming from outside the four walls of CNN, chances are Sanchez could have shrugged off Stewart's taunts. But all it takes is a quick examination of what may be the most revealing part of the Pete Dominick interview to see that Sanchez felt that he wasn't getting any respect from the network brass either. Whether it truly is related solely to CNN's decision to put the new Eliot Spitzer-Kathleen Parker vehicle in the eight o'clock time slot rather than give it to Sanchez -- who filled in following the demise of Campbell Brown's show -- is anyone's guess. But Sanchez's comment that the "elite, Northeast establishment liberals" look at him and see "a guy who automatically belongs in the second tier" wasn't aimed at anyone but the bosses he felt were underestimating him, and it spelled out literally where he figured they saw him in the hierarchy of CNN talent. Unfortunately, though not surprisingly, Sanchez melodramatically played the Hispanic Immigrant, Steerage-Class card as the reason he wasn't a made man instead of considering the fact that he had a bad habit of making a boob out of himself on national television.

So with that in mind, when Jon Klein, Rick Sanchez's personal de Medici family at CNN, finally got shown the door two weeks ago, the clock may very well have begun ticking on the career of the man Klein even took the time to laud in his goodbye message to the newsroom. Maybe Ken Jautz and the new management were just looking for an excuse to get rid of him and, never one to disappoint, Sanchez slapped a giant banana cream pie of an excuse right in their faces. When you consider recent history, there's simply no way CNN wouldn't be willing to overlook Sanchez's minor transgression if he were somebody the network felt it couldn't live without. Need I remind anyone that Richard Quest was arrested a couple of years back with crystal meth in his pocket, a dildo in his boot and a rope tied around his balls and yet you can still catch him every afternoon pulling double duty on CNN and CNNi. Obviously it takes a lot to fuck your credibility beyond repair at CNN -- although it's certainly true that the last high-profile CNN dismissal was Octavia Nasr who, coincidentally, was also let go for making a comment that some claimed was anti-Israel.

The sad thing, though, is that whatever your opinion of Rick Sanchez, the speed and ease with which he was dumped may very well prove that the resentments he wore so brazenly on his sleeve last week weren't entirely unfounded. Maybe he was right. Maybe he never really was accepted at CNN, or by the pretentious media establishment in general.

I'd say that I almost feel sorry for him, because in spite of all the occasionally cringe-inducing quirks that make Rick Rick, I can't help but really like the guy. I'd say that, but I don't need to because I already know he's going to be fine.

Trust me, if history is any indication, you haven't seen the last of Rick Sanchez.

He'll have the last laugh. He always does.

I, Sanchez

The last time I worked with Rick Sanchez, during a fill-in stint he did on American Morning, he stood next to my desk for a few minutes and groused about the way CNN covered news. Not so much the stories it chose to pursue as what he felt was the needlessly byzantine series of standards and regulations at the network which, in his mind, was solely the product of institutional arrogance.

"Look at some of these people," he said, scanning the newsroom. "They take this stuff so fucking seriously -- like we're doing brain surgery or something." He then grabbed his crotch through his suit pants, flashed a wide smile and said, "This is what I think of that, you know?"

That was Rick all the way: brash, cocky, impulsive, occasionally crude as hell, with almost no knack for subtlety or concern for the trivialities of decorum. The proverbial bull in the china shop. Maybe that's why when I learned on Friday that he'd been fired for a couple of admittedly ill-advised comments he'd made during a radio interview, I couldn't exactly react with surprise -- not considering all I know about Sanchez after having worked with him on and off for the better part of the last two decades.

Let me go ahead and just get something out of the way right now. Regardless of the fact that I consider Rick Sanchez a friend and I've actually developed something of a fondness and appreciation for the qualities in him that others find so polarizing, this doesn't mean I'm going to blindly rush to his defense. That's not how it works, particularly when something he does creates a minor media shit-storm and therefore deserves to be evaluated as dispassionately as possible. That being said, I do think that while Sanchez's comments were, in keeping with tradition, breathtakingly artless and impertinent, he didn't say anything that he deserved to lose his job over. And I'd be making this statement even if I didn't know full well that what was going through Sanchez's mind at the time wasn't quite as inflammatory as what was coming out of his mouth. Once again, nuance has never been one of Rick's strengths.

By now you're probably well aware of what Sanchez said on Pete Dominick's radio show last Thursday that brought down the wrath of the network suits and officially ended his career at CNN just 24 hours later. No, contrary to the headlines that screamed from every direction -- the kind of incendiary reductionism that guarantees ratings or page views -- Sanchez didn't in fact shout that the Jews control the media. He absolutely called Jon Stewart a bigot -- an admittedly silly claim, likely based on nothing more than Sanchez's own hurt feelings -- and he certainly said that the people who run the television industry are "a lot like Stewart," but when you're talking about a fireable offense it's probably a good idea to take into account the fact that one or two words, even the way in which something was said, can change the entire meaning of what was said. Sanchez sarcastically implied that Stewart isn't a minority in the way that Sanchez himself supposedly is, and that the upper echelon of CNN and the TV business in general bears more of a resemblance to the Daily Show host -- white, liberal, "elitist" and, yes, Jewish -- than it does to a guy like Rick Sanchez.

And the resentment that oozes from every word of a statement like that speaks volumes about the motivation behind Sanchez's decision to say it in the first place.

Rick Sanchez has always viewed his rise to fame in almost mythic terms. He sees himself as the classic tough immigrant kid from the streets who defied the odds, took a whole lot of knocks, suffered through plenty of triumphs and traumas -- the latter, as it turns out, often self-inflicted -- and yet still stands tall. The guy they just can't keep down. You really can picture Sanchez on a stage somewhere, a tear running down his cheek as he belts out a karaoke version of My Way. Anyone who knows Sanchez understands that his resilience -- what his many detractors would likely refer to as cockroach-like -- is a major point of pride for him. This is a guy, after all, who infamously managed to get away with hitting and killing someone back in the early 90s while driving legally drunk; if talking your way out of something like that doesn't leave you thinking you're superhumanly charmed, nothing will.

The problem, of course, is that Sanchez has always been viewed as a lot of flash and bombast with no real substance. As a local anchor, he was brilliant -- really, the best I've ever seen. That's because he understood that television on the whole was largely bullshit and that local news -- particularly the kind done so well at WSVN in Miami -- was just a lot of superficial dazzle. He figured if you could talk and talk well, what you were saying wouldn't really matter. He deserves credit for what one producer we used to work with together jokingly called his unique ability to "demystify television." Given that WSVN was one of the first stations in the country to pull back the curtain and let viewers see the inner workings of its news operation -- and it was way ahead of the curve on this, doing a form of transparent media more than a decade before the digital revolution made that sort of thing absolutely essential for an outlet's survival -- Sanchez's eventual helming of a show that revolved around Twitter seems like destiny. Social networking fed the two qualities that were most undeniable in Sanchez: his ability to interact with viewers in a personal and off-the-cuff fashion and, of course, his inarguably impressive ego. There's no denying that he loved the notion that anybody could now be a journalist and that you didn't need the erstwhile kingmakers in the editorial adminisphere to tell you what was and wasn't news anymore; considering his background and his own self-mythology, this makes perfect sense.

Unfortunately for him and his crotch-grabbing indignation, the people at CNN did take the news very seriously, and while Sanchez's charm offensive had won him quite a few friends and admirers -- say what you will about Rick, he's a disarmingly nice guy -- there were also plenty of people at the network who felt like his shtick somehow sullied CNN's hallowed reputation. My attitude was always that when it came to fucking up the good name of the brand, Rick Sanchez was really the last thing CNN should've been worrying about; in fact, I actually considered Sanchez a bit of a breath of fresh air -- when taken in relatively small doses -- given that at least he understood that what we were doing wasn't the gold standard, capital-J journalism the network's promotion department would have the audience believe anyway. Apparently Jon Klein, the man who was largely responsible for CNN's well-documented slide from serious to ridiculous, also fell under the spell of Sanchez's wide-eyed enthusiasm, inexhaustible energy and complete lack of respect for the traditional way of doing things, figuring they were just what was needed to shake things up at stodgy old CNN. The trouble was a lot of people eventually saw Rick Sanchez as the personification of every embarrassing thing Klein was doing to the once-revered network; the fact that Sanchez himself willfully thumbed his nose at the elitist ethos plastered into the walls at a place like CNN didn't help matters.

Whenever anyone asks me what Rick Sanchez is like -- and it's a testament to the man's somewhat legendary status that I've been asked this an astonishing number of times -- I always say one thing: He's the easiest guy to work with I've ever met. Unlike a lot of other television personalities who straddle that insufferable line between narcissism and insecurity -- they believe the world revolves around them but they desperately need you to believe it, too -- Rick's ego has always been bulletproof, and it's counterintuitively made him a breeze to be around because he has nothing to prove. In his mind, he's 100% sure he's the shit and therefore he doesn't need you to remind him.

At least that's the way it used to be.

I think if you're looking for the seed that eventually blossomed into Sanchez's spectacular, albeit inadvertent, meltdown, it was this: something finally got to him. After years of wielding his confidence like a weapon and wearing the ridicule of his critics like a badge of honor, because he believed that any publicity was good publicity, he Peter Principled out -- if not by actually reaching his personal level of incompetence then by reaching a level at which a lot of other people thought he was incompetent. And in the savage Thunderdome that is today's media landscape, the mockery that can be heaped on you from every direction -- from those beneath you, beside you and far above you on the professional and cultural ladder -- can wither even those with the thickest of skin. Sanchez had become the personal punching bag of the host and writers of one of the most brilliantly acerbic -- and, more stingingly, most respected -- "news" outlets on television: The Daily Show. This was a show with tremendous cultural cachet -- and it had declared that Rick Sanchez was a fucking moron. A laughingstock.

If the criticism had only been coming from outside the four walls of CNN, chances are Sanchez could have shrugged off Stewart's taunts. But all it takes is a quick examination of what may be the most revealing part of the Pete Dominick interview to see that Sanchez felt that he wasn't getting any respect from the network brass either. Whether it truly is related solely to CNN's decision to put the new Eliot Spitzer-Kathleen Parker vehicle in the eight o'clock time slot rather than give it to Sanchez -- who filled in following the demise of Campbell Brown's show -- is anyone's guess. But Sanchez's comment that the "elite, Northeast establishment liberals" look at him and see "a guy who automatically belongs in the second tier" wasn't aimed at anyone but the bosses he felt were underestimating him, and it spelled out literally where he figured they saw him in the hierarchy of CNN talent. Unfortunately, though not surprisingly, Sanchez melodramatically played the Hispanic Immigrant, Steerage-Class card as the reason he wasn't a made man instead of considering the fact that he had a bad habit of making a boob out of himself on national television.

So with that in mind, when Jon Klein, Rick Sanchez's personal de Medici family at CNN, finally got shown the door two weeks ago, the clock may very well have begun ticking on the career of the man Klein even took the time to laud in his goodbye message to the newsroom. Maybe Ken Jautz and the new management were just looking for an excuse to get rid of him and, never one to disappoint, Sanchez slapped a giant banana cream pie of an excuse right in their faces. When you consider recent history, there's simply no way CNN wouldn't be willing to overlook Sanchez's minor transgression if he were somebody the network felt it couldn't live without. Need I remind anyone that Richard Quest was arrested a couple of years back with crystal meth in his pocket, a dildo in his boot and a rope tied around his balls and yet you can still catch him every afternoon pulling double duty on CNN and CNNi. Obviously it takes a lot to fuck your credibility beyond repair at CNN -- although it's certainly true that the last high-profile CNN dismissal was Octavia Nasr who, coincidentally, was also let go for making a comment that some claimed was anti-Israel.

The sad thing, though, is that whatever your opinion of Rick Sanchez, the speed and ease with which he was dumped may very well prove that the resentments he wore so brazenly on his sleeve last week weren't entirely unfounded. Maybe he was right. Maybe he never really was accepted at CNN, or by the pretentious media establishment in general.

I'd say that I almost feel sorry for him, because in spite of all the occasionally cringe-inducing quirks that make Rick Rick, I can't help but really like the guy. I'd say that, but I don't need to because I already know he's going to be fine.

Trust me, if history is any indication, you haven't seen the last of Rick Sanchez.

He'll have the last laugh. He always does.

Quote of the Day

"Without any hint of awareness of the unintended irony Klein asserted, 'The CNN I’m leaving today is demonstrably stronger than the one I inherited almost six years ago – both editorially and financially.' That’s at least half right.

-- Former CNN Pentagon Correspondent Jamie McIntyre, in a mildly scathing but absolutely dead-on piece about Jon Klein's "ass, meet sidewalk" exit from CNN

(via Jacki Schechner, who was once the victim of one of Klein's Tommy DeVito-style office meetings)

End of an Error

Now that Jon Klein's finally been beamed out of CNN via hologram, let's take a quick look back at just a couple of his greatest hits. Jon, we'll miss you. Journalistic integrity, on the other hand, won't.

"Miles To Go" (Originally Published, 12.4.08)

You'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who's been screwed as thoroughly and with as much sheer audacity by CNN over the past few years as Miles O'Brien.

Yesterday it was announced that after 16 years with the network, Miles is being given the chance to "pursue other opportunities" along with six producers in a move that effectively dissolves CNN's Science and Technology unit.

For Miles, it marks a somewhat anemic end to an impressive tenure at CNN -- sort of like putting down a former champion horse that you yourself are responsible for running into the ground. Miles was once the proud owner of a very nice, largely secure gig as the co-anchor of a daytime show based out of Atlanta alongside Kyra Phillips. But that was before mercurial CNN President Jon Klein decided to inexplicably pull the affable Bill Hemmer off the anchor desk on American Morning and "experiment" with the team of O'Brien (Miles) and O'Brien (Soledad).

The experiment, apparently, wasn't a success. Less than two years later, Klein had another one of his arbitrary "Eureka!" moments, spun the Wheel-of-Anchors and replaced both Miles and Soledad with the current team of John Roberts and Kiran Chetry.

Miles returned not to the anchor desk in Atlanta, but to reporting duties and the occasional fill-in host slot. (He anchored The Situation Room as recently as last Wednesday, during the Mumbai terrorist attacks.)

In other words, Jon Klein offered Miles O'Brien a major promotion -- the chance to helm a flagship show in New York -- if he'd leave behind his stable situation in Atlanta; he uprooted Miles and disrupted the lives of his family only to then turn around 22 months later and say that it just wasn't working out.

That's not "strictly business" -- the nature of the beast.

That's fucking sociopathic.

It's an unwillingness to accept or a complete disregard for the fact that you're capriciously toying with people's lives.

What makes these lay-offs particularly conspicuous, though -- maybe even reprehensible -- is that they come less than two weeks after an article in the New York Observer detailing CNN's lavish spending during its election coverage: the celeb-studded parties, the new show launches, the pricey A-list pundits and, of course, that stupid pretend "hologram." In the piece, Jon Klein boasted to writer Felix Gillette:

"We can afford more people on our air and off our air. So, goddamn it, we’re going to have more people."

Except that, obviously, they can't -- and they're not.

Which makes him entirely full of crap.

Although it's almost superhumanly ironic that Klein is willing to pay for the silly technology but not for the technology unit, it shouldn't really surprise anyone at this point. He's proven time and time again where his priorities lie -- and they're nowhere near the maintenance of true journalistic excellence. It would be amusing if it weren't so sad that Klein's pride in the ability to create a phony, "holographic" image of a human being now serves as a kind of metaphor for his entire way of thinking. He's become the George Lucas of the TV news universe: tinkering like a mad scientist to create a soulless, graphically enhanced feast for the eyes -- minus the actual people required to breathe life into it -- just because he can.

I'm not worried about Miles O'Brien; he's smart and talented and he'll likely find new work quickly -- even in this economy. After all he's been through over the past few years, he may even see this as a godsend.

What concerns me is the future of the rest of the excellent and now unemployed tech staff -- people like Peter Dykstra, who's been with CNN pretty much since the dawn of time. Or Alex Walker, who typically does most of the work while receiving none of the glory.

These are the ones who will really suffer.

Well, they, and you -- the audience.

But hey, at least you'll still have the pretty holograms.

"First Class All the Way" (Originally Published, 11.19.08)

"We can afford more people on our air and off our air. So, goddamn it, we’re going to have more people."

-- CNN US President Jon Klein

There's an article in the latest edition of the New York Observer that's really worth taking a look at.

It deals with CNN -- specifically the "Nothing Succeeds Like Excess" mentality the network adopted with respect to its election coverage and the amount of money it had to spend to make it a reality.

Observer columnist Felix Gillette (who, in the interest of full disclosure, wrote a profile on me back in February of this year) chronicles the inordinate number of sponsored debates, the celeb-graced parties, the mobile control rooms, the expensive A-list pundits, the SkyCams, the real-time focus group meters, the risky new show launches and, of course, the pretend holograms -- all of which cost CNN a small fortune.

Gillette talked to network president Jon Klein, who I have no doubt was doing his best used-car-salesman-on-crank routine at the time. Gillette writes:

"'When you have the wind at your back in the form of a very profitable streak, then you’ve got the wherewithal to try things, to embrace innovation, to not cringe,' Mr. Klein told The Observer on Monday morning.

If it had taken place, say, 20 years ago, the spectacle of CNN’s 2008 shopping spree might have blended into the cacophonous jangle of a city awash in media companies awash in cash. But these days, everywhere you turn, the once reliable bon vivant institutions of New York journalism look tired, anxious and ready for bed. ABC News recently relegated its executives to 'B-level' hotels. This year, for the first time since the dawn of the printed word, Condé Nast is forgoing its holiday party at the Four Seasons. Cash bars are in.

All of which makes CNN’s current swagger, from its battery of technology to its cornucopia of talking heads, seem that much more freakish—the aberrance of opulence in the leanest of times."

What's interesting about all this though -- about Klein's bravado in the face of harsh economic times -- is what's not in article.

Last week I got an e-mail from a close friend of mine, one of my former co-workers at CNN, informing me that he was among a group of CNN employees who'd just been laid off -- reportedly, eight people on the American Morning staff. The official word is that the layoffs are the result of restructuring and not a product of budget cuts -- but that's tough not to question when standard operating procedure at CNN is to find new positions within the company for employees to move to should their old ones become obsolete.

A new baby boy, a treacherous job market, the holiday season looming, and now this: out of a job. It's not as if my former co-worker fell into the bottom performance percentile among his peers at CNN, either. On the contrary, he was quite good at what he did. Still, he now joins the growing list of people cut loose from jobs in the media over the past couple of months. Almost a dozen personal friends of mine have been let go from one media position or another and are now looking for work.

Meanwhile Jon Klein's throwing parties and tossing around money like he's Diddy.

In this unsettling economic climate, somebody will have to either pay outright for CNN's magical regenerating checkbook or simply hedge the network's bet. Either way, it obviously won't be Klein.

As we all know by now, it's rarely the people at the top who suffer.

The New York Observer: "The Corpulent News Network" by Felix Gillette/11.18.08

(Incidentally, when you click the link to read the article, make sure to check the address bar at the top of the screen. No idea whether that was an accident, the working title of the piece, or just a really subversive little joke -- regardless it's hilarious.)

It's worth mentioning that even though Klein is out, his replacement, at least temporarily, is Ken Jautz. He's the current chief of HLN, the network which, while entertaining overall, has given us such blights on the landscape of cable television as Showbiz Tonight and -- wait for it -- Nancy Grace. In other words, who knows -- the worst may be yet to come.

Broken News

It's damn well about time.

The New York Times: Jon Klein Out at CNN/9.24.10

Birth-Brains 3: The Reckoning

Chances are a lot of you have heard by now that a couple of days ago, in response to Lou Dobbs's decision to seemingly allow his brain to implode on national television vis-a-vis the whole "birther controversy," CNN U.S. President Jon Klein issued an internal memo declaring the story dead.

Chances are you may also know that, as arrogant bullies are often wont to do, Dobbs completely ignored the edict from on-high and continues to use CNN's air to express skepticism that Barack Obama is a U.S. citizen. Klein's reaction to this insubordination? Nothing of course -- not a goddamned thing other than to spinelessly, inexplicably make excuses for the guy who just laughed in his face in front of the world. CNN's been feeling quite a bit of heat lately over the Dobbs-birther miasma; there are calls for Dobbs's big orange head by people who rightly claim that airing a rumor, a debunked myth, goes way beyond the pale for a news organization that values its reputation, as CNN purports to. Klein, taking the classic enabler stance, suggests in interviews that Dobbs really does believe that Obama is "legal" (to use Dobbs's own tired terminology) and is simply reporting on the phenomenon itself.

Needless to say, this is crap. Reporting the bullshit rumor means furthering the bullshit rumor -- and Klein knows this. The people who believe this kind of nonsense only need to see it on TV or in print, in almost any form, to continue to buy into it. Unless your intention is to 100% debunk it and thoroughly repudiate those trying to advance it without a shred of proof or new information, simply a lot of half-assed conjecture, indulging the "controversy" at this point simply makes you part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

Need proof? The moment Jon Klein issued the "Dead" memo, the right-wing clowns who still cling ruthlessly to the ridiculous birther myth immediately cried foul, screeching about how Klein's decision to declare the story over and done was, in and of itself, proof that they were onto something and that, of course, the liberal media was part of the conspiracy to silence the whole thing before the "truth" came out. As with the 9/11 Truth whack-jobs, almost anything can be taken as confirmation of their beliefs. That's the very nature of conspiracy theories and those who hold to them.

Jon Klein did the right thing declaring the story over, barring any new, honest revelations. It's a shame no one's listening -- least of all one of the anchors within his own organization.


I've linked to the story below a couple of times since the whole birther controversy began. I'm reprinting it this morning because I think it says everything that needs to be said about the media's role in the perpetuataion of the birther myth and conspiracy theories in general. It shocks me that even though this was written way back in August of last year, it's still relevant today.

"The Speed of Lies" (Originally Published, 8.28.08)

If you believe Philip Berg, Barack Obama is unfit to be President of the United States; his candidacy is nothing more than a dangerously specious house of cards that will almost surely collapse if allowed to continue.

According to Berg, Barack Obama harbors a secret which disqualifies him outright from running for the office of president -- and it's only a matter of time before the truth comes to light and the resulting embarrassing debacle leaves the entire Democratic Party in chaos.

See, If you believe Philip Berg, Barack Obama isn't a U.S. citizen.

Last Thursday, Berg -- a Philadelphia attorney who's something of a notorious presence within that city's legal community -- filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Eastern Pennsylvania demanding that an injunction be issued against the official nomination of Obama. The suit charges that the Illinois senator is constitutionally ineligible to become president on the grounds that he has yet to produce a valid U.S. birth certificate -- Berg claiming that the current one on file from Hawaii is a forgery, proven so by "three forensic experts" -- and that he maintains an unresolved dual-citizenship and owes allegiances to both Kenya and Indonesia, where his father was born and where he lived as a child, respectively. Berg says that he has access to copies of Obama's Jakartan school records which show the candidate registered under the surname of his mother's 2nd husband, Lolo Soetoro, and listed as an Indonesian citizen; as if to hedge his bet, he insists that even if Obama's Hawaiian birth certificate is indeed shown to be authentic, the school registry should be enough to keep the candidate out of the White House.

If these allegations sound familiar, they should; in one form or another, each of them has been bandied about the internet or bullhorned across conservative radio for months now in an ongoing effort to paint Barack Obama as "different."

Oh yeah, and they're all basically bullshit.

A couple of weeks back, the Annenberg Political Fact Check -- an organization whose credentials are pretty much bulletproof -- set out to settle once and for all the debate over Obama's Hawaiian birth certificate. The word "debate" deserves no small amount of qualification because, in reality, there never was a legitimate claim to be made that the document was phony -- simply a lot of fantastical conspiracy theorist innuendo, perpetuated and amplified at lightning speed by a million far-right dolts with computers and delusions of Sherlock Holmesian cleverness. Annenberg dispatched staffers to examine the birth certificate and ruled, to the surprise of no one with a modicum of common sense and two brain cells to rub together, that it's 100% legit; Barack Obama was born in Hawaii. As for the claim that Obama holds a dual citizenship or is in any other way beholden to a foreign country -- that was exposed as nonsense months ago.

And yet Philip Berg filed his lawsuit anyway. He filed it knowing full-well, one would have to imagine, that most of its claims are bogus -- that they already had been or easily could be debunked.

So why? What the hell would possess someone to willfully propagate claims that are tenuous at best and outright false at worst -- even going so far as to do it in court?

Because these days, when it comes to politics particularly, the truth is negotiable -- and there's value in the lie.

Whereas once there were a select few sources of information, and those sources were generally deemed credible by all but those on the furthest fringes of the public, now anyone can be his or her own news source. And while -- as this site, ironically, has advanced -- the rise of citizen journalism and hyper-connectivity has been good for the ethics of media as a whole, it's also created a treacherous wasteland of journalistic mini-fiefdoms, each spouting its own version of reality and together making it impossible, at times, to tell honest, well-researched fact from made-up crap conjured out of thin air to further an agenda. Whether the message comes in the form of an e-mail forwarded to your inbox by that paranoid uncle with the survival bunker in his basement who you're always hoping skips Thanksgiving, or as a bitter flamewar on every news aggregation outlet across the blogosphere, the internet has replaced television as the most effective and least regulated tool for political propaganda in America.

Which is why, ironically, it's now become the partial responsibility of television to help keep the corruption in check. It's too bad the good folks in the TV news media are usually unwilling to do it.

Mainstream media managers, as a whole, subscribe fully to the notion that bloggers and their internet realm are of an inferior journalistic stock; they see them as pests constantly circling the carrion of stories already broken by TV, radio and print; they condescend to them, dismissively painting their ilk as pasty, overweight losers, futilely raging against the machine from the comfort of a Middle-American basement, hopped up on Red Bull and basking in the post-orgasmic bliss of an afternoon spent masturbating to Asian porn. Those who adhere to the Mega-Media ethos believe that when a blogger does break a story, the quality of that piece of information can be judged by whether or not it rises to the level of inclusion in a mainstream broadcast, newspaper or magazine. In other words, only those above the radar can make the decision as to what's worth pulling up from under the radar. The problem is, the good stuff -- the powerful investigation, the sometimes penetrating insight -- gets passed over by the larger media outlets because it's, well, boring. It doesn't make for good TV or a quick, sharp read. Meanwhile, unfortunately, the garbage -- the rumor, conjecture, and misdirection -- is often picked up and elevated to the level of "real news" simply because it's so damn juicy and such a sure-fire ratings or circulation enhancer. A crap story thrown out by a few official-sounding blogs -- like the story of Obama's "phony" birth certificate -- can suddenly be granted validation simply by virtue of the fact that the "controversy" surrounding it is being discussed on national television. The lie is amplified inside the 24/7 cable news echo-chamber and, presto, it's suddenly palatable and worthy of serious consideration by 90% of the population.

It would be one thing if mainstream media outlets faced this kind of bullshit head-on and said, "No, this story isn't true, and if you believe it you're a lunatic." But it's better for ratings and revenue to instead ask, "A lot of folks are saying (insert spurious assertion here), but is it true?" (For the record, nobody does this vaguely referenced end-run on responsibility better than Fox News; see "Terrorist Fist Jab.") It goes without saying that this is how political propaganda is perpetuated; by reporting the rumor as its own story -- without sharply and decisively denouncing it -- you're validating it, giving new life to it, and ensuring that enough people will believe it that the very future of the country could wind up eventually hinging on it.

Ask yourself this: How many people still believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim?

Or this: How many people still believe that Iraq was connected to 9/11?

Very few within the mainstream media came right out and unequivocally shot down these ludicrous rumors before they could take root within the consciousness of the masses -- or at the very least, the minds of those who wanted nothing more than to have their preconceived biases confirmed.

There are thousands of Americans who will still claim that they "don't trust" Obama -- and yet they'll base this lack of trust on their willingness to trust an e-mail that got forwarded to them by a friend of a friend of a friend of some guy somewhere.

It's the responsibility of respectable news media everywhere to bring truth to propaganda and refute the fiction proffered for the sole purpose of sowing discord and confusing the electorate. It's incumbent upon the mainstream media, particularly if they value their stature as strongly as they claim, to shine a bright light on the lies, rather than fueling the fire by debating the merits of a story that they know perfectly well has no merits.

Should you believe Philip Berg?

It's a question that doesn't need to be asked, because it's already been answered.

Whatever Ailes You

And here I thought it was trying to figure out how to ambush Anderson Cooper in the men's locker room at the gym before he has time to cover up.

The Huffington Post: CNN President Jon Klein Jokes that Fox's Roger Ailes is His "Single Most Important Problem"/3.25.09

Tuesday is Recycling Day

"The Outsider" (Originally Published, 6.9.08)

The look on Bryan Bell's face alone would've made the whole thing worth the effort.

A current senior producer on CNN's American Morning and, ironically, the man who moved me up to New York from the network's Atlanta hub -- unwittingly setting off a chain of events that would eventually lead to me being fired -- Bell was one of the first people I ran into upon faux-casually strolling into the lobby of the Time Warner Center last Wednesday morning.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked, sharply breaking his stride in my direction and contorting his face into a wide-eyed mask of appropriate surprise. He was, after all, suddenly standing face to face with a ghost -- someone who four months previously had been shown the door to the building and wasn't supposed to be allowed back in under any circumstances. Yet, there he was. There I was.

I shot Bell a smirk tinged with as much subversive attitude as I could muster -- which, given the situation and the level of insurgent impertinence required of me to bring it about, was quite a bit. "Going to the internet conference up on 10," I said as I glided past him, spinning and pushing a quick fist into his shoulder. "Good to see you, man."

He was still staring in some form of disbelief as I turned and squeezed between the closing doors of the elevator, locating the familiar button for the 10th floor almost involuntarily and punching it.

We're just about at the end of "Internet Week '08" here in New York City, the first of what organizers hope will be an annual event aimed, from what I can gather, at bringing together the powerful movers and shakers of the digital and media worlds in a concentrated effort to better understand and more fully utilize the internet to jack the American consumer. All week long, various seminars, panel discussions, cocktail parties, meet-and-greets and opportunities for hipster hook-ups have been going on throughout the city. And while Internet Week probably isn't the sort of boon to New York's prostitution industry that, say, last month's annual Fleet Week celebration was, it's admittedly allowing for an unusual confluence of ideas and cultures, as at least a few of the gaunt and scruffy Red Bull addicts of the internet underclass -- still basking in the post-orgasmic afterglow of Comic-Con -- are granted entrance to the Emerald City and afforded a rare audience with the mighty media wizards who usually prefer to remain safely behind the curtain of their office doors. For the people at the top, it means a chance to get a better handle on that whole "internet thing," while for the young upstarts on the bottom, it presents a host of opportunities to kiss a little Illuminati ass in the hope of landing the kind of job that will allow them to pay their hefty student loan tabs and fulfill their dreams of transforming themselves into that Ferrari-driving techno-smart-ass kid from the National Treasure movies.

As someone who violated the accepted protocol and did everything backwards -- slipping from the warm embrace of corporate media favor to tumble down and land in journalism's not-so-soft underbelly -- I haven't been sure of my personal place in the Internet Week festivities. Almost everyone in attendance has either already "arrived" or is looking to devour his or her way up to the top of the food chain; I've recently taken up residence near the bottom. A lot of them are nursing big aspirations of getting in; I still have a fresh shoe print on my ass from being kicked out.

In other words, I knew going into it that I'd probably spend a lot of time asking myself just what I was doing there -- regardless of where "there" happened to be at any given moment.

But the Time Warner Center wasn't like any other stop on my Internet Week itinerary: It's the building that houses CNN's New York studios, which means that it's where I worked for three years before being fired a few months ago for, of all things, blogging. Bryan Bell, my friend and former co-worker, was right in echoing and putting a finer point on my own sentiments: What the hell was I doing there?

I only had a few seconds to ponder whatever combination of brass balls and rank stupidity led me to venture back into the belly of the beast before the elevator doors separated, depositing me on the TWC's 10th floor for last Wednesday's "Conversations on the Circle" breakfast panel discussion, sponsored by Time Warner and moderated by CNN's porcine D.C. bureau chief, David Bohrman. As I stepped out of the recessed and muted lighting of the elevator, the first thing that struck me was the contrast. I'd never considered the Time Warner Center public office area from the perspective of a civilian and therefore hadn't noticed that everything a visitor sees -- from the moment he or she walks through the revolving door entrance and navigates security to the ride up in the high-speed elevator -- is covered in light-absorbing black slate and brushed steel. The whole place looks like the Death Star, only slightly more imposing. Walking in, you get the impression that somewhere in the building, there's a control room for a laser cannon mounted on the roof with enough firepower to destroy 30 Rock. But that sense of foreboding lifts the second you arrive on 10 -- the top visitor-accessible floor and the main conference area. It's almost as if the building's interior designers purposely aimed for a William Blake-style "heaven and hell" motif, with the dark and spare street-level lobby representing the heretical netherworld and the lofty heights of the 10th floor symbolizing the kind of Elysian hereafter that awaits only the most noble servants of the mega-media ethos.

Put simply, everything on the 10th floor is so damn bright. The floors gleam with the polished reflection of overhead lighting, the halls are coated with an eggshell matte; there's even a surreal Vegas-like array of white pinpoint lights that flashes uselessly along one wall leading to the conference area, which is itself an awe-inspiring separate section of the floor complete with 20-foot high ceilings and massive picture windows providing spectacular views of the city beyond. At no point during time spent in the TWC's conference area will anyone cease to be impressed by its grandeur and reminded that he or she is being given a chance to converse with the enlightened beings atop Olympus.

I edged past the seemingly life-like welcome drones, the thin attractive women dressed in smart black Nehru suits waiting outside the elevators. Their job was to direct attendees to the Hudson conference room where the morning's seminar was being held, but I figured I knew where I was going and didn't need to ask directions -- plus, the farther I kept my head down, the better. I'd already signed in downstairs, in hell, so when I arrived at my destination -- a spacious room dotted with several high, circular tables and featuring a spartan coffee and juice buffet station against one wall -- I dropped my shoulder bag and immediately made a bee-line for the food, my thinking being that if I was going to listen to Dave Bohrman for an hour-and-a-half, at least I could do it on a stomach full of high-quality freebies.

I had staked out a table and was engaged in a conversation with one of the morning's other attendees -- each of us about half-way through a cup of coffee and a blueberry muffin -- when the announcement was made that it was time to begin. Slowly, everyone around me picked up their things and began filing into a separate room, some grabbing a road bagel or final bottle of water off the food table as they passed it. I didn't say anything out loud, but the revelation that we weren't going to be forced to stand throughout the seminar drew a small sigh of relief out of me; up until that point, it had been impossible not to notice the giant screen on the wall opposite the breakfast table, upon which was the projected image of four empty chairs -- one would assume, the places where our esteemed panelists would soon be sitting. At one point, I wondered if they'd just keep us happily noshing while, somewhere far removed from the riff-raff, Bohrman and company addressed us via teleconference. Either way, the sight of those four empty chairs looming over me and my fellow guests as we snacked was more than a little unnerving. I kept waiting for the faces of the Kryptonian High Council to suddenly appear, bellow that we were all "GUILTY" and banish us to the Media Phantom Zone.

Especially me.

I was the guiltiest man in the room, after all.

But as I joined the herd pushing into the next room -- as I readied myself to come face to face with one of CNN's most powerful news managers -- I wondered if I was the only one who knew it.

I followed the crowd of a couple hundred into the conference room proper, and the first thing I noticed was the view.

In what seemed to be a deliberate effort to further impress upon the attendees of the "Time Warner Conversations on the Circle: Internet and News" seminar just who the hell they were dealing with, the guest seating for the event faced toward the giant floor-to-ceiling windows which made up one entire wall. Opposite the glass was a panorama of the West Side of Manhattan that was even more breathtaking than anything we'd seen previously. I made my way over to the far side of the room and took a comfortable seat in the third row, the raised platform and four empty panelist chairs now no longer a projected image on a screen but a three-dimensional reality just a few feet in front of me. I reached into my bag, pulled out a reporter's notebook and waited for the discussion to begin -- or at least for security to realize the mistake that had been made and forcibly escort me out of the building.

Thankfully, the former happened before the latter.

David Bohrman was introduced as an award-winning producer and the "inventor" of the CNN/YouTube debates by a grinning representative from Time Warner who then flitted away to grab a seat directly in front of the dais. Even for a company flack, the rep seemed a little too eager to be there -- particularly so early in the morning; as I watched him adjust his front-row seat, I found myself waiting to see if he'd suddenly produce a clear, watermelon-proof tarp with which to cover himself. My split-second reverie was broken by the sound of Bohrman's voice in front of me and booming from the speakers overhead, drawing my attention back to the stage.

Besides maybe salesman-of-the-month at a Hummer dealership, David Bohrman looks like he could only be one of a few things: the unhealthily stressed-out head of a newsroom, a noticeably overindulgent corporate shill, or the manager of a political campaign. The fact that he is, in reality, all three should come as no surprise to anyone. Bohrman's a large man, with a hairline that's receded to just about the very top of his head and a well-groomed salt-and-pepper beard. He wears thin-framed eyeglasses that all but vanish against his prodigiously round face, as well as the kind of suspenders and J.C. Penney tie combo that make it seem as if he's purposely attempting to be a walking promotion for Larry King Live. Bohrman would be intimidating if he weren't such a damn news cliché in the Jerry Nachman vein, only infinitely more acquiescent to the hatchet men in the adminisphere. His claim to fame when it comes to supposedly bringing CNN into the 21st century is twofold: He was the chief architect of The Situation Room -- that daily sonic onslaught and tribute to the short-attention span -- and of course, he was, as was previously touted and would be throughout the length of the event, the "inventor" of the CNN/YouTube debates. (For the record, to hear CNN refer to these debates and their place in history, you'd have thought the things had cured cancer and aligned the planets.)

Bohrman quickly took a seat, leaning back to allow everyone an inescapable glimpse at the desperate effort the buttons down the belly of his shirt were undertaking to avoid popping off one-by-one into the crowd. I started to wonder if I should've brought my own tarp. He introduced the rest of the panel, the members of which were all conspicuously younger than him: There was Nadira Hira of Fortune magazine, and, as we'd find out, the group's designated "Gen-Y" expert; Steve Grove, head of news and politics for YouTube (also, "the cute one"); and Michael Scherer, a Washington bureau correspondent for Time magazine who appeared, at least from where I was sitting, to be wearing a clip-on tie.

Bohrman started in almost immediately, posing the burning question "what is the internet?" to no one in particular. His own answer was hilariously ironic in its anachronism, given the subject matter.

"It reminds me of that old Saturday Night Live skit that asks, 'Is it a dessert topping or a floor wax? It's both!' Well that's kind of like the internet."

In my notes, I jotted down:

INTERNET = DESSERT TOPPING, FLOOR WAX

What I didn't bother writing down -- because I knew I'd remember it -- was that Bohrman started things off by referencing a gag that had been on TV at least three years before anyone on the panel was even born. It was readily apparent that this kind of just-not-getting-it would be standard operating procedure throughout the discussion -- at least as far as the CNN end of things was concerned.

For the next 20 minutes or so, the panel pontificated on the role of the internet not simply in politics in general, but in this particular presidential race. Hira, once again possessing a virtuosic grasp of "kids these days," brought up Obama's popularity on Facebook and compared the Obama campaign's use of the web and the McCain camp's to the Yankees taking on a little league team. Upon realizing that someone had broached the Facebook phenomenon, Bohrman interjected and reacted with surprise that people could actually forge any sort of meaningful bond with someone who's nothing more than a flat presence on a computer screen, then drew the only analogy he could, saying that a lot of people feel the same kind of connection to Wolf Blitzer.

"He's like a Facebook friend," he said.

I found myself wondering how Wolf would respond if I Superpoked him.

Bohrman then once again brought up the CNN/YouTube debates, just in case anyone had forgotten about them within the last two minutes.

What seemed to outright shock David Bohrman the most, however, was the notion that the panelists -- this new breed of journalists -- actually interacted with their audience, and did so free of many of the constraints that had previously been carefully put in place to shield both the members of the media and the organizations for which they worked. Bohrman may be a trailblazer when it comes to updating the philosophical mindset of the mainstream media, but both the technology and its true impact on what journalists do and what's expected of them is still well beyond his grasp. As I sat listening to him, I realized that likely without meaning to be, he was almost comically arrogant in his apparent belief that the multifarious corporate media giants could embrace the technology needed to thrive in the new world, yet still preserve the single most important necessity to their bottom line: control. Over and over again, the young panelists hammered home the fact that the internet has brought with it an unprecedented level of transparency in our society and culture, particularly when it comes to media organizations, and that the upcoming generation can smell marketed bullshit a thousand miles away, even through a broadband line. Bohrman, meanwhile, seemed to cling to the idea that the heavily-controlled CNN "brand" could translate perfectly to all forms of new media -- that those who are relying more than ever on the internet for their information will trust a big-profit-driven news organization without question the same way they did when they, quite frankly, had no other choice.

As the discussion went on, Bohrman seemed to sink deeper and deeper into the quicksand of an outdated way of thinking. He dismissed The Daily Show and defended the top-down model of information dissemination, which basically dictates that the organizations at the supposed pinnacle of the media carry the most authority. By the same token, he belittled -- probably inadvertently -- the news gatherers and aggregators at the forefront of the new media revolution, saying that the stories they break can be judged by whether or not they "percolate up" to the major networks -- whether the king-makers on TV and in print deem them worthy of a place within their hallowed ranks.

At one point, Bohrman even mentioned his excitement at reading a column on The Huffington Post which linked back to, of course, CNN.com -- ostensibly proving his point.

It was right about then that my hand shot up.

For the next 45 minutes, I sat quietly as Bohrman looked directly at me -- meeting my gaze several times -- but never called on me. This, despite the fact that there were rarely more than a half-dozen hands raised at any given moment as the forum morphed into a question and answer session.

I continued to take notes and continued to keep my hand up, but was strangely by-passed over and over again. Whether Bohrman was aware of just who I was personally and/or my status as an ex-CNN employee and current troublemaking blogger I couldn't tell (although I'd bet that if he reads HuffPost, he's familiar with me in name if nothing else). One thing's for sure though: The conference wrapped up without me being able to ask my question.

Which is why, as the event ended and invited guests began making their way toward the doors, I stood up and headed in the direction of David Bohrman.

"Hi Dave, my name's Chez Pazienza," I said, smiling and extending my hand. "I don't know if you know who I am -- I used to be a producer here at CNN."

He returned my smile and handshake, but seemed distracted. Later, while leaving the building, I'd call my friend and fellow ex-CNNer Jacki Schechner, who used to work closely with Bohrman, and ask her if he was always so nervous and twitchy; she'd say no.

"I'm just curious," I asked, my eyes glued to the face atop his towering frame, "you mentioned reading The Huffington Post and said you were thrilled to see links there leading back to CNN's website. Do you ever read the comments from HuffPost readers whenever someone writes about CNN or, I hate to use this term, 'corporate media' in general?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, they're not usually very complimentary. A lot of people who get their news from the internet are doing it because they don't trust you guys anymore."

He shifted on his feet, his eyes darting well above my head before finding their way back to me. "I don't know -- I mean, I don't think that's true."

"My question I guess is, do you feel at all like CNN as a television organization -- your 'brand' -- is in competition with new media? How do you fight the perception that there's something very wrong with the mainstream media in this country?"

He paused for a moment, then gave me a relaxed smile. "I think organizations like CNN complement new media. There's a symbiotic relationship between the two. We don't see new media as some kind threat."

And with that final word, he took a step back, giving me the international symbol for polite dismissal.

"Alright, thanks for talking to me, Dave -- I appreciate it," I said, then, just for the hell of it, threw him a curveball: "By the way," I smiled, "Jacki Schechner says hi."

See, Bohrman was Jacki's immediate supervisor during her time as a CNN internet reporter, and despite having hired her, he was either unwilling or unable to take a stand in the face of network president Jon Klein's decision to fire her last August -- which might prove better than anything I witnessed at the "Conversations on the Circle" forum that both he and CNN have no idea what matters to those who subscribe to the internet ethos, as Jacki Schechner knows the blogosphere inside and out and was an incalculable asset to an organization attempting to assert its new media dominance.

Either way, I knew she'd be a sore subject, and watching Bohrman suddenly falter and fidget restlessly at the mention of her was even more satisfying than the look on Bryan Bell's face when I first walked in the door.

"Oh, well," he sputtered. "Yeah, I really miss her." He adjusted his shirt and ran his palms down the front of his pants.

"I'll tell her you said that," I said with a smile, turning and walking away.

Less than 60 seconds later, I was back where I'd been for the four months since being fired: outside the Time Warner Center and beyond the purview of CNN and mainstream media in general.

As I silently wandered the massive shopping area directly under the Time Warner Center's glacial blackened glass towers, I did my best to figuratively pat myself on the back for being willing to go back into the belly of the beast and face whatever I found there -- to stick to the ideals that might've gotten me fired in the first place.

I'd made it inside and back out again. I was safe.

So, to celebrate, I took the escalator up to the Bouchon Bakery and rewarded myself with a sandwich and a bowl of soup -- which I paid for with the unemployment debit card issued to me by the state of New York.

(Photo Credit: Time Warner Center, from southwestern corner of Central Park, by Braesikalla. More of his photographs can be found at Light Infusion. They're all fantastic. Please, you buy.)

Another Two Bite the Dust

TVNewser is reporting that two more high-profile members of the CNN staff have been handed their walking papers -- and to be honest, I have mixed emotions about this one.

On the one hand, it would seem to once again prove what I've been saying for the past few weeks -- what came to a head last Wednesday with the layoffs that sent Miles O'Brien and the entire CNN Science and Technology Unit packing: Contrary to the horseshit being shoveled by Jon "Diddy" Klein, the economy is having a serious effect on CNN. Add to that the fact that one of the two staffers who's been let go is the talented and gorgeous Jennifer Eccleston -- CNN's international correspondent based in Rome -- and you'd think it would be tough to find a silver lining in all of this.

Except that there sort of is one -- in the form of an object lesson.

That's because the second CNN staffer being laid-off is American Morning's living-doll internet correspondent, Veronica De La Cruz. To put a very fine point on it, De La Cruz never should've been hired in the first place; she's little more than a pretty face (unlike Eccleston who has brains to go with her looks) and represents the furthest thing from what CNN purports to be about. Klein probably knew almost right off that bat that he'd made a mistake by hiring her so he bounced her around from place to place and buttressed her with smart producers -- Alex Walker, who was let go last week, being one of them -- likely hoping that she would catch up and become more than just a walking head shot. She never did, apparently -- so Klein finally gave up and pulled the plug.

The thing is, he could've had someone better all along.

Guess who he let go of just a year-and-a-half ago to make room for brand new internet correspondent Veronica De La Cruz?

Jacki Schechner.

(Yes, you can read Jacki's quick, hilarious and self-confessed "immature" take on the whole thing here.)

Miles to Go

You'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who's been screwed as thoroughly and with as much sheer audacity by CNN over the past few years as Miles O'Brien.

Yesterday it was announced that after 16 years with the network, Miles is being given the chance to "pursue other opportunities" along with six producers in a move that effectively dissolves CNN's Science and Technology unit.

For Miles, it marks a somewhat anemic end to an impressive tenure at CNN -- sort of like putting down a former champion horse that you yourself are responsible for running into the ground. Miles was once the proud owner of a very nice, largely secure gig as the co-anchor of a daytime show based out of Atlanta alongside Kyra Phillips. But that was before mercurial CNN President Jon Klein decided to inexplicably pull the affable Bill Hemmer off the anchor desk on American Morning and "experiment" with the team of O'Brien (Miles) and O'Brien (Soledad).

The experiment, apparently, wasn't a success. Less than two years later, Klein had another one of his arbitrary "Eureka!" moments, spun the Wheel-of-Anchors and replaced both Miles and Soledad with the current team of John Roberts and Kiran Chetry.

Miles returned not to the anchor desk in Atlanta, but to reporting duties and the occasional fill-in host slot. (He anchored The Situation Room as recently as last Wednesday, during the Mumbai terrorist attacks.)

In other words, Jon Klein offered Miles O'Brien a major promotion -- the chance to helm a flagship show in New York -- if he'd leave behind his stable situation in Atlanta; he uprooted Miles and disrupted the lives of his family only to then turn around 22 months later and say that it just wasn't working out.

That's not "strictly business" -- the nature of the beast.

That's fucking sociopathic.

It's an unwillingness to accept or a complete disregard for the fact that you're capriciously toying with people's lives.

What makes these lay-offs particularly conspicuous, though -- maybe even reprehensible -- is that they come less than two weeks after an article in the New York Observer detailing CNN's lavish spending during its election coverage: the celeb-studded parties, the new show launches, the pricey A-list pundits and, of course, that stupid pretend "hologram." In the piece, Jon Klein boasted to writer Felix Gillette:

"We can afford more people on our air and off our air. So, goddamn it, we’re going to have more people."

Except that, obviously, they can't -- and they're not.

Which makes him entirely full of crap.

Although it's almost superhumanly ironic that Klein is willing to pay for the silly technology but not for the technology unit, it shouldn't really surprise anyone at this point. He's proven time and time again where his priorities lie -- and they're nowhere near the maintenance of true journalistic excellence. It would be amusing if it weren't so sad that Klein's pride in the ability to create a phony, "holographic" image of a human being now serves as a kind of metaphor for his entire way of thinking. He's become the George Lucas of the TV news universe: tinkering like a mad scientist to create a soulless, graphically enhanced feast for the eyes -- minus the actual people required to breathe life into it -- just because he can.

I'm not worried about Miles O'Brien; he's smart and talented and he'll likely find new work quickly -- even in this economy. After all he's been through over the past few years, he may even see this as a godsend.

What concerns me is the future of the rest of the excellent and now unemployed tech staff -- people like Peter Dykstra, who's been with CNN pretty much since the dawn of time. Or Alex Walker, who typically does most of the work while receiving none of the glory.

These are the ones who will really suffer.

Well, they, and you -- the audience.

But hey, at least you'll still have the pretty holograms.

Related:

DXM: First Class All the Way/11.19.08

(Also make sure to check out Jacki Schechner's take on this here.)

First Class All the Way

"We can afford more people on our air and off our air. So, goddamn it, we’re going to have more people."

-- CNN US President Jon Klein

At the risk of once again incurring the wrath of my new BFF, the amusingly unhinged "CNNfan," there's an article in the latest edition of the New York Observer that's really worth taking a look at.

It deals with CNN -- specifically the "Nothing Succeeds Like Excess" mentality the network adopted with respect to its election coverage and the amount of money it had to spend to make it a reality.

Observer columnist Felix Gillette (who, in the interest of full disclosure, wrote a profile on me back in February of this year) chronicles the inordinate number of sponsored debates, the celeb-graced parties, the mobile control rooms, the expensive A-list pundits, the SkyCams, the real-time focus group meters, the risky new show launches and, of course, the pretend holograms -- all of which cost CNN a small fortune.

Gillette talked to network president Jon Klein, who I have no doubt was doing his best used-car-salesman-on-crank routine at the time. Gillette writes:

"'When you have the wind at your back in the form of a very profitable streak, then you’ve got the wherewithal to try things, to embrace innovation, to not cringe,' Mr. Klein told The Observer on Monday morning.

If it had taken place, say, 20 years ago, the spectacle of CNN’s 2008 shopping spree might have blended into the cacophonous jangle of a city awash in media companies awash in cash. But these days, everywhere you turn, the once reliable bon vivant institutions of New York journalism look tired, anxious and ready for bed. ABC News recently relegated its executives to 'B-level' hotels. This year, for the first time since the dawn of the printed word, Condé Nast is forgoing its holiday party at the Four Seasons. Cash bars are in.

All of which makes CNN’s current swagger, from its battery of technology to its cornucopia of talking heads, seem that much more freakish—the aberrance of opulence in the leanest of times."

What's interesting about all this though -- about Klein's bravado in the face of harsh economic times -- is what's not in article.

Last week I got an e-mail from a close friend of mine, one of my former co-workers at CNN, informing me that he was among a group of CNN employees who'd just been laid off -- reportedly, eight people on the American Morning staff. The official word is that the layoffs are the result of restructuring and not a product of budget cuts -- but that's tough not to question when standard operating procedure at CNN is to find new positions within the company for employees to move to should their old ones become obsolete.

A new baby boy, a treacherous job market, the holiday season looming, and now this: out of a job. It's not as if my former co-worker fell into the bottom performance percentile among his peers at CNN, either. On the contrary, he was quite good at what he did. Still, he now joins the growing list of people cut loose from jobs in the media over the past couple of months. Almost a dozen personal friends of mine have been let go from one media position or another and are now looking for work.

Meanwhile Jon Klein's throwing parties and tossing around money like he's Diddy.

In this unsettling economic climate, somebody will have to either pay outright for CNN's magical regenerating checkbook or simply hedge the network's bet. Either way, it obviously won't be Klein.

As we all know by now, it's rarely the people at the top who suffer.

The New York Observer: "The Corpulent News Network" by Felix Gillette/11.18.08

(Incidentally, when you click the link to read the article, make sure to check the address bar at the top of the screen. No idea whether that was an accident, the working title of the piece, or just a really subversive little joke -- regardless it's hilarious.)

Holo Man

We all know that even though CNN's eye-catching live "hologram" reports during its election night coverage were a really cute trick, they weren't actually holograms -- right?

Well, at least one person says they were. And if you holo-haters argue with him and question the network's decision to ignore the actual definition of what a hologram is in favor of making up its own, he'll -- well -- he'll post a stern and somewhat transparent comment on your website.

Such is the case with Mediabistro.com -- a popular site that follows the inner workings of television news.

It ran a story yesterday morning on a report put together by the Canadian Broadcasting Company that poked holes in CNN's nifty new TV technology. The CBC talked to a scientist who basically explained that what CNN had created by "beaming" its reporters and guests into its studio wasn't in fact a hologram -- as it claimed -- but a "tomogram." The difference is that a hologram is an image projected into physical space while a tomogram is simply an image captured from all sides then reassembled by computer and displayed on screen. From a journalistic credibility standpoint this is a hell of a distinction, given that Wolf Blitzer -- an ostensibly serious newsman -- spent several minutes talking to empty space on live television the other night.

In this age of CGI post-production technology, actors are often forced to perform with and react to plenty of things they can't see; journalists, however, are expected to deal in the factual rather than the fantastic, and I'm not sure pretending to have a conversation with someone who in reality isn't there in any physical form whatsoever does much to bolster CNN's claim of being "The Most Trusted Name in News."

But once again, there's at least one person who'd strongly disagree with this assessment.

He calls himself "CNNfan" -- which is laughably suspicious right off the bat, since it's hard to imagine CNN having "fans" in the traditional sense, and anyone who really wants to be known as one is probably somebody well-adjusted people would be wise to avoid.

He left this suspiciously pedantic comment on Mediabistro in response to the story about the story debunking CNN's Star Wars-universe technology:

"It is proprietary technology which CBC has no access to. So they can only infer from incomplete information. I say in general, based on the basic definition, 'Yes, it is at the very least, a type of hologram' A hologram is a flat optical image which looks three dimensional when viewed with the naked eye.

Besides that, all I know is that I like it, and I applaud CNN for being cutting edge! It does not matter if the CNN anchor is speaking to a traditional flat screen off camera. Only what the audience sees matters, and they see a really cool hologram.

The CBC needs to realize that as TV goes all digital, new technologies will emerge. Hologram experts need to see this as a wake up call before they are made obsolete by new CNN TV technologies that do a better job of telling the news story."

If this sounds overtly defensive and priggish as hell to you, that's because there's there's always the possibility that it was written by CNN's president, Jon Klein. Although nothing can be proven, and I admit that I'm reticent to dabble in too much conjecture, Klein has reportedly been known to troll the internet, searching for stories about himself and CNN to, I suppose, give him ideas -- as he's the most knee-jerk reactive man in television news -- while simultaneously fueling his mammoth ego. Word has it that he's not above leaving an acerbic comment or two (under an assumed but conspicuous name of course, like, say "CNNfan") when he comes across a story he takes issue with (like, say, a Mediabistro blurb about how the hologram that Klein was so giddy over he would've stuck his penis in it if he could've wasn't a hologram at all). Many readers of this little experiment of mine insist that Klein has even left comments on this site in an attempt to furiously strike back at the negative press I've given the network both here and at the Huffington Post.

Is he really that petty and vindictive?

Actually, yeah.

Once again, nothing can be proven in regard to the Mediabistro piece -- but go back and read the comment from "CNNfan" again.

Who the hell talks like that?

Then again, there's always the possibility that Jon Klein himself is a computer generated special effect.

It would explain a lot of things about CNN.

And Now, a Word from "Jon Klein"

I'm filing this one under "For Entertainment Purposes Only," simply because there's no way to verify the authenticity of what you're about to read -- and I tend to doubt that the real Jon Klein, even when you consider his purported level of arrogance, would be balls-out stupid enough to publicly comment on this site.

That said though, I received a response to yesterday's short post on personal blogging by members of larger media outlets that reads as follows:

From: Your Former Boss

Chez, I've had enough of it. When you came to work for us, you implicitly made a pact to give your time and your skills to us. We paid you a salary, you give us your skills. We didn't need skills in the bedroom or skills in the kitchen or any of that; that's the stuff for your off time. Your production skills were what we paid for, and that includes your thoughts on media, your writing talent and all the rest.

Frankly, while working for us I don't believe you should be writing anything without permission. Not a novel about space aliens infesting a Mormon commune or a book of your favorite family recipes.

We, and many other business besides, pay good money for our workers and provide benefits and for that we expect...no, demand...loyalty.

You broke that trust, and that is why you are currently surviving on the benefits of unemployment insurance. Be glad we let you get that without challenging your right to it. After all, you broke trust. You broke your implied word that came with being our employee. In short, your termination was well deserved and if I had my way, you'd be paying us back for every hour you spent work on this blog while working at CNN.

Sincerely,
Jon Klein

For those lucky enough to have no idea who this person claims to be, Jon Klein is the president of CNN/U.S. and was, in fact, my "boss" during a substantial portion of my time at CNN. I've been told by several people since being fired from the network that Klein -- the real Klein -- actually is strangely Queegian enough to troll the internet looking for negative press about him and the little ethically-challenged fiefdom that he's built on the once-hallowed ground on which CNN sits. But once again, I just can't believe that he'd let his ego get the best of him and make the entirely ill-advised decision to engage in a public war of words with, well, a blogger (although, we've witnessed a lot of very bad, ego-driven ideas involving television types played out in public lately; take, for instance, the nightly fusillade between Keith Olbermann and Bill O'Reilly, bringing the vast resources of NBC and News Corp., respectively, to bear against each other in what's essentially a playground brawl). For what it's worth, even my own sense of self-importance isn't weighty enough to make me willing to believe that I'm important enough of an issue for CNN to have drawn its president out of his office and into a pissing match.

However, the comment does sound quite a bit like Klein: it's highly articulate, avoids going completely off the rails at any point, and is full to the brim with hubris. And the only thing I can say for sure is that it was written by neither myself nor someone I know.

So, just for the hell of it, I'll respond to this mystery person:

From: Your Former Employee

Mr. Klein,

I'm going to operate as if the comment recently made on my site, Deus Ex Malcontent, really is from you. I admit that I do this more for myself than for the benefit of you or even my readers, as I'd love nothing more than to finally address you "face to face."

The truth, sir, is that since your appointment to the position of president of CNN/U.S. in late 2004, you have consistently betrayed the principles and ethics upon which the network was originally founded -- the standards the public relies on from an organization such as CNN. You've done this by abandoning your background in real journalism, conveniently turning up your nose at it in favor of assuming the role of a highly-paid corporate hack whose sole interest is a twofold goal: assuring the mightiest stream of revenue possible for the Time Warner shareholders through the garnering of ratings by any means necessary and, in turn, ensuring that his own job is never in danger. This kind of end may certainly be a practical one in this age of news-for-profit, but unfortunately the tactics required to meet it -- the lengths you must be willing to go to in order to grab the ratings which pull in the money -- often run wholly anathema to the canons of honest, respectable journalism. Put simply, creating political conflict where this is none and inflating the conflict that already exists for the sake of generating viewer interest is reprehensible; allowing demagogic blowhards like Lou Dobbs and Nancy Grace, and Vaudevillian buffoons like Glenn Beck, to even walk the halls of CNN is a startling forfeiture of credibility; fostering an environment in which managers find it acceptable to make inexplicable comments like, "What can we do to not lead with Iraq?" is almost beyond belief; ruining what should, by all accounts, be the gold standard of U.S. televisions news, CNN, is absolutely unforgivable, sir. Unforgivable.

I refuse to once again list the failings of you and your organization as of late -- failings which are, in no uncertain terms, so absolute from a journalistic perspective as to be mind-boggling. I refuse because I've spent the past four months spelling them out ad nauseam for anyone and everyone to see. CNN/U.S. may indeed be making money hand-over-fist for its keepers at Time Warner, and this fact may indeed be all that really matters in your eyes -- but this in no way justifies the depths to which you've allowed the network to sink in pursuit of these vast profits.

It's about more than money -- more than the razzle-dazzle, and the shock value, and the over-the-top celebrity-fellating-and-generating ethos. It's about journalism. It's about bringing truth to power and, dare I say it, responsibility. And it's these principles that you've sacrificed time and time again, Mr. Klein. And though I have no doubt that you'll dismiss this criticism, as you tend to do to any and all outrage aimed in the direction of you and the institution you've created/destroyed, ask yourself this some time: "If the person currently castigating me through Deus Ex Malcontent and The Huffington Post is so wrong, so completely off-base in his reasoning, why are not one or two, but three of my senior managers in constant e-mail contact with him, agreeing with his arguments and feeding him inside information?" For the record, I'm not referring to a few disgruntled "bottom-feeders" within your organization; I'm talking about managers whom you think highly enough of to enlist them to represent CNN/U.S. as panelists at this year's National Association of Broadcasters convention in Las Vegas.

Think about that, sir.

As for myself -- my admittedly insignificant little drama in the much larger and more important picture, and your supposed irritation with it -- I can only say this: You may have paid me, but you didn't own me. I worked for CNN, not the CIA. I gave my job 100% and have the sterling employee reviews to prove it, but what I did on my own time, and not as a representative of the views and opinions of you or anyone else at CNN, was mine and mine alone. I regret nothing, and if you honestly do believe that you and the entity you lord over should be afforded absolute control of those who draw a CNN paycheck, you really are as laughably megalomaniacal, not to mention paranoid, as your many detractors claim you to be. I'm not sure if even the real Jon Klein, at his most delirious, would be short-sighted enough to actually threaten me with the revocation of my unemployment benefits or insinuate that I could at some point be taken to court for my personal actions during my time under the employ of CNN, but if by the slightest chance it really is you spouting such draconian invective, all I can say is, in the words of the very president the media in general failed to take to task for so long: bring it on.

Go ahead, make me a martyr. Make me truly famous.

Make my voice deafening.

Sincerely,

Chez