Normally, for more years than I can remember, at this time of a New Year I write a column about the shortcomings of cable news’ political programs because they mostly condense important happenings to a few minutes, slant news coverage in order to attract viewers and rehash news first published in print publications while describing it as “Breaking News.”
A good portion of previous columns was devoted to Media Buzz, the Sunday hour-long news media criticism program on Fox News, anchored by Howard Kurtz, which, despite his assertion that it was an impartial look at the week’s news, was mostly another right of center conservative Fox program.
But without a public announcement early in 2025, the program was taken off the air for two weeks, so without the input I gleaned from the Kurtz show, this column would be much shorter, I assumed, because the examples I cite with rare exceptions are only from political news programs. Comments from opinion shows and from extreme right or left pundits are excluded because I do not consider them news.
But even without examples from the Kurtz program during his absence, there were enough examples that justify my saying that cable news political reporting doesn’t measure up to the reporting in respected major print pubs, both liberal and conservative.
An example was when CNN Congressional reporter Lauren Fox was asked to provide key take-a-ways from hearings by the Senate Finance Committee regarding Robert F. Kennedy Jr‘s nomination to head the Department of Health and Human Services.
During her wrap-up, Ms. Fox said, without explaining why she can state as a fact, as if she is an expert on the subject, that it’s “obviously scientifically not true” that there is a link between vaccines and autism.” A blatant example of incomplete reporting. What was missing from her comment happens too frequently by cable political reporters – reporting as if they are experts on a subject, even if they’re not. Several minutes later, commenting on the same subject, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN’s Chief Medical Correspondent, said, as Ms. Fox should have, that there are thousands of studies that show there is no link between vaccines and autism. Perhaps Ms, Fox needs a refresher course in Journalism 101.
But I was much relieved that after the two week hiatus Media Buzz was back, because the Howard Kurtz program is a font of material for this column.
As I wrote this paragraph on Feb 23, it was too early in the New Year to conclude that Kurtz would no longer let right wing guests make outlandish statements without correcting them or pushing back.
Nevertheless, his program of Feb. 23 was a revolution: Kurtz pushed back and corrected statements made by Tomi Lahren, the conservative political commentator, and the uber Trump supporter Jason Miller, who when it comes to President Trump behaves as the three monkeys who, “see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil,” do, even when there is evil. Miller consistently said the American people enthusiastically support what Trump was doing, causing Kurtz to say, not all do, including some GOP elected officials. Kurtz has pushed back against extreme conservative guests occasionally in the past, but much more gently than on this program. Too early to determine if it’s a trend. Unfortunately it wasn’t, as two programs in March showed.
The March 16 Media Buzz program provided a prime example of the shortcomings of cable TV. Caroline Downey, a staff writer at the National Review, said during a discussion about the declining stock market that, “I
studied macro monetary economics in college,” as if that made her an expert on the subject and the stock market. When I was in college, I studied courses in many subjects, but that doesn’t make me an expert in them, and while in the Army I learned about military techniques, but that doesn’t qualify me to agree or disagree with the strategies of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. (Warning to readers: During a bull market, there are many “experts.” But in reality, there is no such thing as an “expert” in the stock market. If there was, Elon Musk, in comparison to the “experts,” would be a pauper.)
But it was the March 23rd Media Buzz program that convinced me that Mr. Kurtz’s program was still primarily a right wing show that allowed far right propaganda to be disseminated by guests without pushback by Mr. Kurtz, ranging from none to mild.
A prime example were the comments by “über” Trump supporter Jason Miller, who spent a few minutes defending everything the president did without any pushback by Mr. Kurtz. Mr. Miller was President Trump’s chief spokesman for the president’s 2016 campaign. a senior advisor to the president’s 2020 campaign and a transition advisor to the 2024 campaign. He is a frequent guest on Media Buzz, where his extreme, no—very extreme, right wing viewpoints make Mr. Trump’s pronouncements look as if the president has joined the far left elements of the Democratic Party. Yet Mr. Kurtz keeps inviting him back, letting Mr. Miller’s comments go virtually unchallenged.
The problem with political talk shows is that much of the “expert opinions” expressed on them are not “expert opinions.”
They are only opinions, most of which are biased, according to the opinionator’s political philosophy.
Prime examples are all the right wing cable political shows, especially those on Fox, and one program on centrist channel CNN. It is the Abby Philip CNNNewsNight program. She begins each program by saying, “Americans with different perspectives aren’t talking to each other. But here they are.” No they are not. They mostly scream at each other.
The program most often has opponents shouting over each other’s remarks, making it difficult to understand what points they are attempting to make. But on the nights they behave like ladies and gentlemen, without interrupting each other, by presenting different takes on happenings, it muddles the truth with untruths, giving credence to Mr. Trump and his surrogate’s lies and leaving viewers who only get their news from these types of programs not knowing what real news is and what is fake news. (Helpful Hint: Much of what President Trump and his spokespersons say is “fake news.”)
But occasionally, very occasionally, cable programming shows what panel discussions could and should be. The exception to the cable rule occurred on the April 3rd MSNBC’S The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle. The lead segment of the program was about the effects of President Trump’s tariff program on the economy, a controversial and complex subject that dominated the financial news for weeks and still does. It was not the first time that the topic was the highlight of a cable discussion. What separated this program from the numerous other discussions was the panel assembled by Ms. Ruhle. Unlike other programs which had the usual suspects, the know-it-all talking heads pretending to be experts on anything and everything, all of the guests were genuine economic experts, very rare on cable panel discussions. Also differentiating the program from others is that Ms. Ruhle also has an extensive background in economics and business reporting, unlike hosts of other programs who are the “experts of the moment.”
As much as I try to not write about the hypocrisy of Media Buzz, the Fox Howard Kurtz right wing propaganda show, he keeps providing me with examples that deserve to be exposed. On his May 18 show he provided the Republican National Committee chair with several minutes of airtime to trash everything Democratic, without Kurtz pushing back or having a Democratic representative defend the Democrats. Not only was it one-sided “journalism,” but the Republican spokesperson appearance wasn’t tied to any particular news happening. Fox News says Media Buzz is a program that “Howard Kurtz and panelists analyze media coverage.” It should add, “From an anti-Democratic Party viewpoint.”
Here’s another major problem with cable news:
When Tucker Carlson broke with President Trump over the president’s Iran policy in June, it immediately became major news on the cable outlets. It didn’t surprise me, even though who cares what Carlson says. He’s just another pundit whose opinions are not any more pertinent than yours or mine, the exception being people who can’t think for themselves and rely on others to think for them. But to the cableists, it was a major story, because they think that they are important, (as do too many people in our business).
Here’s another problem with cable news coverage, especially Howard Kurtz’s Media Buzz program on Fox. The program says it analyzes the coverage of the week’s news, but often the program needs guests who are specialists in subjects like autism, covid and other medical issues, which has frequently been the case since-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. became the secretary of health and human services in February 2025. Instead of having journalists with scientific or medical backgrounds who write for medical journals and are experts in the subjects, Mr. Kurtz has the same generalists that are a part of his regular stable of guests. Doing so provides as much expert opinions of the situation as the keyboard I am using to write this.
I don’t watch every cable TV news program. Nor do I listen to cable TV 24/7. But arguably, the crown for the sorriest decision by a cable TV network of 2025 goes to MSNBC, when on Sept. 11 it fired political analyst Matthew Dowd after he said that slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s rhetoric may have contributed to the shooting that killed him. On Sept. 13, Variety posted the following comment by Dowd: “The Right Wing media mob ginned up, went after me on a plethora of platforms, and MSNBC reacted to that mob. Even though most at MSNBC knew my words were being misconstrued, the timing of my words forgotten (remember I said this before anyone knew Kirk was a target), and that I apologized for any miscommunication on my part, I was terminated by the end of the day.
Mr. Kirk’s assassination is a stain on America’s history. Whether you agreed with him or did not, he did not deserve to be shot; he deserved to state his opinions.” But the way the cable channels reported on the assassination it was as if Mr. Kirk was a combination of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, when in reality he was a proponent of far right politics, as reported by print reporters, but not by cable outlets.
Analysts are paid to express their opinions. But not, obviously, at MSNBC, where the first amendment doesn’t exist
This, even though Mr. Dowd said nothing false or defamatory about Mr. Kirk’s rhetoric. In my opinion, MSNBC owes a paid apology to Mr. Dowd and job reinstatement. And CNN and other cable outlets should be sanctioned for incomplete reporting by not mentioning Mr. Kirk’s far right rhetoric.
On Sept. 14, Howie Kurtz announced that Media Buzz was being canceled. Mr. Kurtz often said that the premise of the show was an examination of the week’s news. However, as a person who regularly watched the show, it was often just another vehicle for far right guests to express their opinions. Often the show had guests who never once mentioned the week’s news. A major fault with Mr. Kurtz’s hosting was that he often would let right wing guests ramble on without correcting their misstatements, while cutting off liberal guests from fully stating their positions.
But during the Trump2 administration there was a significant change in Mr. Kurtz’s defense of the president’s policies. It went from being nearly 100% of defending the president during Trump1 to a noticeably lukewarm defense of Mr. Trump’s actions in his second term. Mr. Trump was upset about the change in tone of the program and said so. Could that have been the reason the show was cancelled?
On Sept. 10, Yahoo! News posted the following: “But the axing also follows a furious Truth Social tirade from the president in May, where he stated that the longtime MediaBuzz host did not defend him with enough conviction.
“It is time for Howie Kurtz to retire!” Trump wrote, following a MediaBuzz panel where commentators clashed over the ousting of his then-national security adviser Mike Waltz.
“Every Woke Anchor in the Business, people that no one watched from CNN, MSNBC, and others, are plastered all over his show, with all really negative and fake statements, and then I am weakly ‘defended’ by Howie and his group (although Ben Domenech has been strong!),” Trump added: “The case Howie makes for me is so pathetic that it would be a lot better if he didn’t say anything. Anyway, that’s the way it is!” Is it a coincidence that Fox axed Media Buzz because of the President’s displeasure?
Also on Sept 10, news broke about a remark that Fox’s Brian Kilmeade made about homeless people. His remarks were the most disgusting comment I have ever heard on cable or any broadcast channel (even more disgusting than some of Mr. Trump’s comments about American soldiers who gave their lives for the country. On an episode of Fox & Friends, during a discussion about mentally ill and homeless people, after a co-host suggested that homeless individuals who refused aid should be jailed, Mr. Kilmeade added, “Or involuntary lethal injection or something—just kill ’em.” The obligatory apology came. But a comment from Fox News did not.
Because a significant amount of material in this essay over the years came from the 12 years of Media Buzz, this probably will be the final installment of this yearly essay.
But maybe not if enough occurrences like this happens: On Oct. 4, Jake Tapper of CNN conducted a so-called exclusive interview he had with President Thump. So called, in my opinion, because the interview was conducted via texting between Mr. Tapper and the president, giving the president, if it was him who answered the questions, time to think about his answers. As Lawrence O’Donnell pointed out on his Oct. 6 MSNBC show how does Mr. Tapper know that his questions were actually answered by the president? I know the answer. He doesn’t.
Mr. Tapper’s program is also an example of what’s wrong with cable news political reporting. Instead of acting as an anchor and letting beat reporters explain what is happening, Mr. Tapper often asks questions to office holders on hot button happenings of the day. Sounds good? Not to me. By having a Democrat give an opinion and immediately having a Republican reply, it muddies the subject because it’s a given that they’ll take opposite sides of an issue as a politically savvy person like Mr. Tapper knows. Mr. Tapper also hardly ever questions what the politicians are saying and, in affect, provides an open mic platform for them to spread their propaganda. In my opinion, that’s not reporting. That’s providing a mic for politicians to politicize a situation. At least on Fox News and the old and new MSNBC (now NBC Now) the talkers don’t pretend to be unbiased, as CNN anchors do.
I have long believed that cable political shows are a poor cousin to respected print outlets when reporting the news
But I’d be remiss in not mentioning Lawrence O’Donnell of NBC Now, who has done something that no other cable commentator in my memory has done. On more than one occasion, Mr. O’Donnell has given credit to his staff for booking guests that made his show become the one that helped the Jeffrey Epstein files to become public.
Mr. O’Donnell’s giving credit where credit is due should be the rule in our business, where good work by individuals is often camouflaged “in team effort” reports, resulting in disgruntled employees. That’s why in my reports I always emphasized individual good work. Doing so didn’t hurt me and resulted in having people who reported to me trust that I had their best interests in mind. It paid off years later, when I opened my own consultancy, when those young practitioners reached management level and were able to provide me with accounts.
There’s a valuable lesson that PR supervisors should remember: Be nice to people when you are on the top, because you might need their help on your way down.
