What if, a recent piece of speculative fiction in Vanity Fair wonders aloud, Megyn Kelly isn’t a poisonous bigot and shameless cable news demagogue, but a complex, flawed icon of modern feminism? Like most science fiction, this is a pack of lies meant for babies. Megyn Kelly is just as racist—or cynically willing to play the part—as every man she works with at Fox News.
If you were hoping to watch the matchup between horrible man Floyd Mayweather and the less horrible Manny Pacquiao, it’s possible you had some trouble with your cable provider tonight. And if you were a Time Warner subscriber, customer support would get around to you sometime the morning after the fight.
The FCC is very likely to block Comcast and Time Warner Cable, the reigning Worst Company in America and Most Hated Company in America, from completing their $45.2 billion super-megamorph into The Worst, Most Hated Company in America, a source familiar with the deal told Bloomberg today. Hey Comcast, have you tried turning it off and rebooting it?
You probably fancy yourself some sort of environmentalist. You watch Bill Maher! You watch Chris Hayes! Yes, and that is the problem.
Call of the Wildman, Animal Planet's blockbuster chronicle of a wildlife trapper, is one helluva romp. It's also a drama-staging, zebra-drugging, wallaby-kidnapping, raccoon- and bat-killing crock of shit, according to a disturbing new in-depth investigation by Mother Jones.
Sky News correspondent Mark Stone was detained by Chinese police in Beijing this morning while in the middle of a live segment on the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Most of the episode—include the moment they were detained, and Stone's conversations with one officer in the midst of their detention—was captured by Sky's camera operator and broadcast live to viewers of the English cable channel. (The entire incident was also captured by another police officer, who filmed the incident on a portable camera.) Stone says that they were detained for saying an unspecified word ("protest"? "Massacre"?) during the report; the English-speaking cop with whom he talks says they were stopped from filming because they didn't have the right permits. [TV Newser]
When Comcast acquired NBC Universal, part of its deal with the FCC was that it would "launch 10 new independently owned cable channels, with most backed by African Americans and Latinos, by 2018." Well. The first two Black People Channels have been announced. Black people, prepare for a fiesta of cable mediocrity!
MTV turns 30 today. Instead of taking it out for an overpriced dinner and making jokes about how it's old, we compiled this video with some of the high and low spots of the channel's history—from Madonna's infamous "Like a Virgin" at the first Music Video Awards to Puck on The Real World, Downtown Julie Brown, and Jersey Shore.
It was supposed to have been a bittersweet and quietly contemplative week for Glenn Beck, whose final Fox News Channel show aired today. Of course, all that was derailed by that senseless incident at Bryant Park, when his entire family was swept away by a wave of Cabernet Sauvignon released from a crop duster by an insane liberal. (Or else a plastic cup of wine tipped over. Reports were conflicting.)
Do you know what is causing climate change, destroying rainforests, and drowning polar bears? Yes, it's your DVR! OK, it's not that bad, but did you know that DVRs in this great nation of ours use as much electricity as the entire state of Maryland?
MSNBC's Ed Schultz offered an extended apology to radio host Laura Ingraham on Wednesday, a day after calling her a "right-wing slut" on his own radio show. Schultz said he was beginning an "indefinite" leave, though MSNBC had earlier announced that he'd be suspended without pay for one week. In the course of his on-air statement, Schultz told his audience that he's tried to reach out to Ingraham to apologize. He also promised he'd never use the world "slut" again. [WaPo]
What will right-wing talk show host Glenn Beck do when his contract with Fox News runs out in December? Maybe he will re-sign with Fox. Maybe he will become a hairdresser! Or maybe he will start his own cable channel.
HBO recently released a new trailer for its upcoming fantasy series Game of Thrones and today announced that they're airing a fifteen minute clip of the first episode on April 3rd. So the full PR roll-out has officially kicked into high gear, and while clips and photos indicate that it's certainly grand and gorgeous looking, can it ultimately work as a series?
