Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Ted Turner, off the deep end

From Neal Boortz:
Ted Turner is not what you might called thrilled with the surge of Fox News Channel in the cable television ratings. After all, CNN is Ted's baby. I can remember many many moons ago sitting with Ted Turner at a private lunch at the Commerce Club in downtown Atlanta. At that time, the early 70's I think, I was hosting a television show on Turner's WTBS. Turner sat there at lunch and told me of his plans for a cable television news service. I nodded politely and tried to keep my elbows off the table. Little did I know the level of success that Turner would achieve with his dream. Now that success is sullied by the growing popularity of Fox News Channel ... and Ted is torqued, and Ted felt the need to go on the attack against Fox News. So, attack Ted did ... at the National Association for Television Programming Executives meeting in Las Vegas.

In attacking Fox News I suspect Ted is faced with the same problem that my more liberal listeners have been faced for the entirety of 2004. In January of 2004 I challenged my listeners to watch Fox News carefully and to call my show with any evidence of any right-wing bias in the presentation of news stories on any Fox News program. Obviously you will find bias on the opinion programs, that's to be expected. But my challenge dealt with the presentation of actual news stories. Well, the entire year went by with repeated goading from me, and not one listener ever made one phone call or sent one email which illustrated even one instance of right wing bias in the presentation of news stories on the Fox News Channel. Not one. Turner faces a similar dilemma. He has no examples either, so what does he do? He does exactly what our friend Steve did! He goes the "Nazi" route! Yesterday Ted Turner was out there in front of God and all those people comparing the Fox News Channel, and it's superior ratings, to Hitler! Yeah, Ted says, Hitler was popular with the people too! So, Ted Turner is comparing people who watch Fox News Channel instead of CNN to the people who put Hitler in power in Germany! I particularly like the response to Ted's tirade from the Fox News Channel spokesman: "Ted Turner is understandably bitter having lost his ratings, his network and now his mind. We wish him well."

So do I, Ted. Enjoyed the lunch.

Oh .. one more thing. "Nazi" is actually an acronym for the National Socialist German Workers' Party. Ted Turner has publicly stated that he is a socialist. Hmmmmmm. Nazis were socialists ... Ted Turner is a socialist ....... Oh well, never mind.
Last year or the year before, the former Mr. Jane Fonda said that while Fox News had great ratings, he didn't care...ratings weren't everything. Now that's a message you, as CEO or Chairman or whatever the hell he is, want to send to the advertisers, shareholders, and employees of CNN, huh? "We're second rate, but hey...who cares?" If I'm an advertiser, I'm looking at maximum exposure to my paid ads, and here's Ted Turner telling me that the exposure I seek for my product or services is not to be found on his network...and he doesn't care! Needless to say, I will advertise elsewhere.

In 1996, Turner apologized to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for comments he made comparing FOX head Rupert Murdoch to Hitler. Teddie flunks "Political Discourse 101", which says that when you invoke the name of Hitler to prove a point for or against a political position, you have automatically lost the argument. Seems that leftists lose a lot of damned arguments these days, doesn't it?