Last Call

Meet the new employee/boss relationship involving Keith Olbermann, same as the old employee/boss relationship involving Keith Olbermann.

Keith Olbermann, who came to Current TV this year to remake the channel and compete against his old home, MSNBC, is sitting out the biggest political nights of the season.

Despite being the biggest star on the fledging channel, Mr. Olbermann is not scheduled to anchor Current’s coverage of the Iowa caucus or the New Hampshire primary in January. Instead, Current’s other prime time anchors, Cenk Uygur and Jennifer Granholm, will be joined by the channel’s chairman, the former vice president Al Gore, according to the channel’s TV schedule.

Mr. Olbermann also was noticeably absent from two special reports that Current produced after Republican debates in mid-December. Those, too, were anchored by Mr. Uygur.

These absences suggest that there may be new tension between Mr. Olbermann and the managers at Current, who are trying to create a progressive-oriented cable news channel. 

I don't get Current TV on my cable provider...and I'm not too particularly broken up over it either.  But if Cenk is Al Gore's new golden boy, I can't wait for the fireworks to begin...especially when Cenk's extracurricular activities at HuffPo involves telling people not to vote for President Obama on Tuesday in Iowa in order to "teach him a lesson".

I follow politics for a living; I'm not unaware of how hideous the Republican choices are. But that doesn't mean that we should pretend that President Obama has been brilliant because we're scared of the big, bad Republicans. That would be fundamentally dishonest.

And to be honest, I'm really disappointed that he does not have a primary opponent. This country is dying for someone who is going to take on the establishment. Who is that going to be on our side -- Barack Obama? On that, I know whether to laugh or cry. Every time I think about the idea that President Obama might be against the establishment, I laugh and laugh and laugh. There is never been a guy who was this enamored with the establishment. If he had wrestling nickname it would be The Establishment.

Hey Current?  Your new host is openly advocating weakening the President, ostensibly because walking out on "establishment" Dems and handing the House to the Tea Party in 2010 worked out so very well for progressive legislation in 2011.  It'll be good for Cenk's ratings so he can continue to rail at the horrible Dems while the GOP wrecks the country, or so he thinks.

Then again, HuffPo has no problem espousing the greatness of Ron Paul and saying Dems need to insist on dumping Biden for Hillary as soon as possible, so nobody should be surprised at Cenk's antics.  Works for HuffPo, doesn't it?

Perhaps Olbermann has noticed the ratings swirling down the drain. Things are certainly...interesting over there.   On the other hand, maybe there's a reason why people are dumping Current with analysis like this:

The agenda of the president sucks and is deeply Republican.

Boy, that sure makes me want to switch over from "fake progressive" MSNBC and watch "true progressive" Current, huh.