Liberal world right now is just topsy-turvy and one place they’re topsy-turvy is that the journalists who have been known as liberal commentators, liberal writers, exclusive ideology liberal, they’re being fired. They’re being fired. They’re being let go.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: So Farron, liberal world right now is just topsy-turvy and one place they’re topsy-turvy is that the journalists who have been known as liberal commentators, liberal writers, exclusive ideology liberal, they’re being fired. They’re being fired, they’re being let go. Their job isn’t there anymore and some of it has to do with the market is looking for advertisers. Right? And if you have consumers that are off at some liberal commentator because that’s all you hear, is liberal, liberal, liberal, nothing on the other side. They say the American public’s tired of it. They’re leaving the networks. The number, only 31%, 31% of the American public trusts the corporate media.
Farron Cousins: That seems pretty high. I would think it would be lower.
Mike Papantonio: But it is, it’s 31%. In 1970 it was 70%. So these people that they say, oh, I’m such a victim. No, hell no, you’re not a victim. You’re not a journalist. You’re not a journalist. You’re not Ed Murrow, you’re not Walter Cronkite. You’re not somebody who we go to for the news. You’re a colors person. What is your opinion? People are tired of it and these people are being fired. Where do they go?
Farron Cousins: Well, I disagree with the entire, people are tired of it because if they were tired of it, they’d be tired of it on the right as well because obviously that’s all Fox News does. That’s all Daily Caller, Breitbart and all these other sites.
Mike Papantonio: But maybe they’re different. Maybe they’re different. You see, maybe different in the way, maybe the right wing looks at it different from the left wing, I guess is what I’m trying to say.
Farron Cousins: Well, we’ve always known this because we’ve been talking about stories like this for 20 years. The people on the right are far more reliant on right wing media than people on the left rely on left wing media. A lot of the people out there make their own opinions. Like, I don’t need to watch these people on TV tell me what to think or feel. I can do this on my own and we’ve talked about that so many times over the years. But what also happens here though, is this weird phenomenon that happened after the election where you had this mass depression that I think is still going on, on the left. Like, I can’t believe we lost and so a lot of these people in polls have actually backed this up, is they just said, I’m done. I’m done with news. I’m not watching. I’m done with MSNBC, I’m done with CNN, I’m done with Huffington Post, all these groups. I’m not doing it anymore. So the numbers across the board, and we saw this on YouTube, everybody else did too, they immediately, literally overnight after election day, rock bottom. Now we’ve recovered, a lot of other folks have recovered, but I think some of these outlets did not and the reason for that is because some of these groups got so, they believed their own hype to a degree. Now with Vox, I think Vox is more of the victim of, we will talk about corporate stuff and we will go after corporations. So it’s harder for them to get advertisers. HuffPost, obviously, they’ve got an ad every two paragraphs.
Mike Papantonio: But you remember where we had Air America? That was an issue. Okay. All we were was, it was a great lineup. It was wonderful lineup. We had just everybody in our group was a liberal commentator. But the problem is we couldn’t get advertisers because I would do a show about Ford where there’s some defect in Ford or a pharmacy. So we couldn’t get advertisers. But look at the lineup. Rachel Maddow, Janeane Garofalo, Sam Seder, Cenk Uygur.
Farron Cousins: Thom Hartmann, Chuck D, Lizz Winstead.
Mike Papantonio: It was an incredible lineup. But we kind of boxed ourselves in and I think that’s kind of what’s happened here. These people, where are they going to go? We’re talking about big numbers. We’re talking about 30, 40 kinds of people being canned.
Farron Cousins: And in the case of the Washington Post, we’re talking about big name people with the Post. Like Jennifer Rubin, who is a conservative columnist, but she doesn’t like Trump. She’s like the Liz Cheney, I guess, of journalists you would call her. Still very conservative. Just don’t like Trump. So that is the question. Where do these people go? And my answer to that is, do we need them to go anywhere? Do we need ’em back in the media at all?
Mike Papantonio: I don’t know.
Farron Cousins: I think we’re going to be just fine.
Mike Papantonio: But this victim thing that I’m hearing, oh, we’re a victim. We’re a victim. No, you’re not a victim. You chose to take that path of myopic ideology. You said, I’m not going to even think of the other side. You chose to do that as an opinion writer. You chose to do that as a reporter when you would see a story. It’s very evident what’s happened here. It’s chickens come home to roost. I don’t know where they go. Hell, maybe they get different, a whole new job. I don’t know what to say. I know the impact is MSNBC is a fire sale right now. Who’s going to buy MSNBC or CNN right now? How long is it even going to take them to pull out of the drabble, the myopic single-minded ideology that we hear all day and all night on MSNBC or CNN?
Farron Cousins: But it works for Fox.
Mike Papantonio: It does.
Farron Cousins: So you have to look at the difference in the way the public sees it.
Mike Papantonio: You’re right.
Farron Cousins: So it is weird. But I think also at the same time, all of these groups, whether it’s the papers, the websites, or the cable news, they’re all parts of dying mediums. That’s not where news comes from anymore for good or bad. It comes from YouTube, it comes from TikTok, it comes from podcasts.
Mike Papantonio: Yeah. I think the best way I’ve heard that presented is people look at that vast variety and then they come to what they feel is maybe the middle of all that. But you can’t do that when you turn on CNN or MSNBC or Fox, there’s no middle. You either are there or not and I think liberals have been in this big blue bubble for so long.
Farron Cousins: Oh yeah. Absolutely.
Mike Papantonio: And that bubble has just not only burst, it has exploded and I don’t think I would hire for us, I wouldn’t hire any of these people. I really wouldn’t because I look at what you do on your show. I’ve always said it. I believe you’re one of the best progressive commentators in the business. And you know why? Because you’re not a one trick pony other than the fact you hate Trump. Other than the fact, if you talk about Trump, it’s going to be ugly. I get that. I’m fine with that.
Farron Cousins: I’ve praised him twice. He did two good things when he was actually president. The banning of the bump stocks, which got overturned by the courts and he had put the rule in place, pharmaceutical companies have to put the price in the commercial.
Mike Papantonio: That’s right.
Farron Cousins: So I gave him credit when he deserved it.
Mike Papantonio: Okay. But my point is there. I don’t see you as this myopic ideologue. This show proves that. We’re about as middle as you can get on this show. And I just think these people, God bless ’em, I wouldn’t hire one of ’em because they’ve become such ideologues that are unable to analyze. They’re not journalists anymore and so, like I say, MSNBC, CNN, both fire sale.
