RNC's Hillary Protest - Don't Call It A Boycott.

This past Friday the Republican National Committee, under the leadership of Reince Preibus, voted to "boycott" NBC and CNN because of their respective plans to air programs featuring Hillary Clinton.  Their plan is to not air any of the 2016 GOP Primary debates on those networks.  Looking at this, a few things come to mind right off.  First, a "boycott" is actually supposed to cause some level of monetary damage to the person or entity being boycotted.  It's pretty hard to see how this hurts these two networks, since advertisers don't really pay much for ad space on debates.  NBC, being an entertainment network, stands to make more money on reruns of The Voice than from political debates.  Second, there really is supposed to be a goal involved in a boycott.  The idea is to force the target of your boycott into some kind of concession.  Does the RNC really think they're going to force NBC and CNN to drop their respective Hillary plans?  No.  They don't.  That's because this isn't really a boycott.  This is an attempt to hide the crazy.

MSNBC’s Ratings Problem? THEY'RE BORING!

As you may have heard by now (or at least can tell by the multiple squirting orgasms over at FOX News) MSNBC’s prime time ratings have done a cliff-dive over the past two months.  Now of course the right-wing is crowing that it means the demise of liberalism (despite majority approval of same-sex marriage, immigration reform, and gun control), that the country is turning away from Obama (never mind his high approval numbers), or that the White House “scandals” are taking their toll (only so far as people just aren’t paying attention to them).  This is because the right-wing believes the rest of the country hates Obama as much as they do.  They also believe everyone needs an echo chamber of talking points fed directly into their synapses in order to feel good about themselves.  Liberals have also weighed in with theories that are equally ridiculous, citing some imagined rightward shift by the network because of comments from some of it’s more high-profile pundits like Chris Matthews.  I tend to dismiss this idea as well since to date I have yet to hear Matthews (or anyone else on the network) call Obama a Socialist, Communist, Kenyan, Nazi who’s hell-bent on destroying America.  Besides which, I’ve always felt that constructive criticism of this president, and legitimate questions about his policies, are a good thing.

When you put aside all of the hand-wringing analysis, blame-gaming, finger-pointing, and general over thinking, the reason for MSNBC’s recent ratings slide can be summed up in just two words.  CHRIS HAYES.  Now before you all click off the page and un-follow me on Twitter, I’m not bashing poor Lambchop.  I happen to like him.  He’s smart, delivers intelligent dialogue, and is not prone to hyperbole or histrionics (although he does posses a kind of wide-eyed idealism that I find annoying).  The problem is not Hayes specifically, but his show “All In”.  Quite frankly…IT’S FECKING BORING!