During a speech on Monday, Cable News Network president Jeff Zucker admitted: “No news organization is perfect, and CNN is not always perfect.”
As if to verify his statement, network reporters that same day covered an appearance by former secretary of state Hillary Clinton with a poorly edited video that made it appear she was laughing about the death of four Americans in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012. On Tuesday, CNN's Ashleigh Banfield apologized profusely for what she called “a mistake.”
Jeff Zucker
By Randy Hall | January 28, 2014 | 7:55 PM EST
By Randy Hall | January 27, 2014 | 8:32 PM EST
Cable News Network president Jeff Zucker used his keynote address at the RealScreen Summit in Washington, D.C., on Monday to promote his “new vision” for CNN that he said has expanded beyond reporting breaking news while including documentaries and films in its programming, which he described as “more shows, less newscasts.”
“We’re never going to stray from breaking news,” Zucker stated before noting that CNN “provides more news coverage on a daily basis than any other TV network in America” while broadening out “our offerings to the public, and we have moved into the nonfiction world with some success thus far.”
By Randy Hall | January 16, 2014 | 7:47 PM EST
Phil Griffin, head of the MSNBC cable television channel, told Marisa Guthrie of the Hollywood Reporter that he accepts responsibility for recent embarrassments that led Alec Baldwin and Martin Bashir to leave the network and Melissa Harris-Perry to offer a tearful on-air apology.
"These were judgment calls made by some of our people. We handled them. We were transparent. That is our philosophy: Be factual, and step up when you make a mistake,” Griffin asserted. “We took responsibility for them and took action. They were unfortunate,” but “I don't think it hurt us in any way.”
By Noel Sheppard | January 11, 2014 | 8:14 AM EST
CNN President Jeff Zucker on Friday took a shot at Fox News saying, "[T]he Republican Party is being run out of News Corp. headquarters, masquerading as a cable channel.”
This led RNC chairman Reince Priebus to strike back on Twitter writing hours later, "Hey Jeff Zucker, we're the Republican Party and we speak for ourselves, pal. Have a great weekend":
By Noel Sheppard | January 2, 2014 | 3:20 PM EST
After his first full year running CNN, Jeff Zucker has little to be proud of.
The primetime ratings of the self-proclaimed "Most trusted name in news" reached 20-year lows in 2013.
By Randy Hall | December 19, 2013 | 5:30 AM EST
As 2013 draws to a close, Fox News Channel continues to dominate cable television news programming, according to Nielsen data through Dec. 8.
In an article for Variety, Rick Kissell stated that Fox has averaged 1.774 million viewers in prime time -- down 13 percent from last year's presidential election-driven numbers -- while the Cable News Channel fell 15 percent, and MSNBC lost 29 percent.
By Noel Sheppard | December 18, 2013 | 11:10 AM EST
One of the biggest questions swirling around Hollywood is where will Jay Leno land when Jimmy Fallon replaces him as the host of NBC's Tonight Show in February.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, it could be CNN.
By Noel Sheppard | December 3, 2013 | 11:27 AM EST
In an era when newspapers are dying, broadcast evening news programs are shedding viewers, and there's less and less real news being disseminated that isn't just opinion, CNN president Jeff Zucker thinks his network "need(s) more shows and less newscasts."
Zucker also told Capital New York Tuesday that he wants more of “an attitude and a take”:
By Noel Sheppard | November 27, 2013 | 10:43 AM EST
By Randy Hall | November 8, 2013 | 5:33 PM EST
After many years of being the channel people turned to for breaking news, the Cable News Network announced on Wednesday that while reporting news is still CNN’s “bread and butter,” the liberal channel will add a heavy emphasis on acquiring unscripted shows by outside producers in the vein of documentaries like Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown and films like Blackfish.
Years of left-wing bias have apparently cost the network its “Most Trusted Name in News” status, along with a series of factual bungles during big news events. But will the new films follow in the liberal footsteps of Morgan Spurlock's Inside Man project or air some films by conservatives as part of its new strategy?
Gruesome Opportunist Piers Morgan Promotes New Gun Control Book Just Two Days After Navy Yard Shooting
By Randy Hall | September 20, 2013 | 12:57 PM EDT The announcement for Piers Morgan's new book, Shooting Straight: Guns, Gays, God, and George Clooney, states that the liberal host of a Cable News Network weeknight program “is one of the most talked-about, controversial figures in the media today.”
Even though Morgan has been engaged in a years-long crusade to implement extreme gun-control laws, neither he nor his publisher, Simon & Schuster, apparently had any qualms about pushing the book on Wednesday, only two days after the Navy Yard shooting that left 13 people dead.
By Randy Hall | August 22, 2013 | 9:20 PM EDT
The all-liberal all-the-time cable “news” channel continues to lose its audience as MSNBC's ratings were down by nearly one-fourth during the past three months from the same period in 2012, according to preliminary data from the Nielsen Company that was compiled from the start of summer through last Sunday.
Making things even worse for the “Lean Forward” channel is the resurgence of the Cable News Network, which had a 21 percent rise in ratings that almost caught up with or surpassed the numbers for MSNBC in several key categories.