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Keith Olbermann Is Just Another Notch For Jon Stewart

by Tommy Christopher | 8:49 am, January 24th, 2010

» 39 comments

Give credit where credit is due: Keith Olbermann‘s Friday apology, however slight, was a rare thing, indeed, in the world of political punditry. Responding to a scorching Jon Stewart parody of Countdown‘s Special Comment segment, Keith gently needled the Daily Show host’s early work, offered to come on his show, and mildly conceded Stewart’s point.

While I don’t doubt that Keith had a true moment of self-recognition here, I’m also fairly certain that this apology was equal parts reflection and self-preservation. Will it be enough to stave off the Jon Stewart Wrath-O-Matic?

Let’s face it, this isn’t the first time someone called Olbermann out, but usually, the result is an appearance on Keith’s Worst Persons in the World. In Jon Stewart‘s case, he would have had ample grounds to point out that, like a chiropractor pestering a neurosurgeon, only one of these guys has to end up owning his mistakes. Jon Stewart does a wonderful job of calling people out, aided in large part by the “I’m just a comedian” forcefield.

Instead, Keith starts out with some good-natured ribbing about Jon’s early-90′s stint as the host of Short Attention Span Theater, and doesn’t even dig up a clip of the frozen-in-1989 Stewart. Like we did:

Short Attention Span Theater, by the way, was an awesome show. It was like MTV for stand-up comedy, the MTV that used to show videos, not this MTV.

The apology is what’s getting all the attention, but for my money, Olbermann’s self-invitation to The Daily Show is the real story here. It is precisely this kind of tete à tete that has been the demise of previous Stewart prey, and a big factor, I think, in Keith’s handling of this.

For example, who can forget the now-infamous beating Stewart gave Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala on Crossfire?

That thing was so painful to watch, I actually felt sorry for Tucker Carlson. But only a little.

More recently, CNBC’s Jim Cramer presented himself to be carved like a tower of ice to Stewart’s Edward Scissorhands.

There is little doubt that public tarrings like these had to factor into the care with which Olbermann responded.

More importantly, though, how will Jon Stewart respond? Until now, he’s largely given Olbermann a pass. This is probably due to the fact that the two travel the same territory, one in a stretch Prius, the other in a Klown Kar (I think Chrysler makes those).

But any truth-telling out-caller should be able to see Keith’s response for what it is: a deflecting self-wrist-slap. In the short interval between Jon Stewart’s takedown and Keith’s admission that he’s been “a little over-the-top lately,” Olbermann actually went so far over the top that he got a cease and desist order from Sylvester Stallone.

Will Keith get that call to appear on The Daily Show, and if so, will Stewart call him out? My guesses are yes, and probably not. They’ve each got bigger fish to fry, and they don’t need to shit where they both eat.

andrew malcolm, Countdown, Glenn Beck, Jim Cramer, Jon Stewart, keith olbermann, Olberman Apology, Olbermann Apologizes, Paul Begala, Scott Brown, Short Attention Span Theater, Special Comment, The Daily Show, Tommy Christopher, Tucker Carlson, Vidkun Quisling

m

Wow. Jon Stewart’s really been hosts of plenty of fake news shows.
Cecelia

“Wow. Jon Stewart’s really been hosts of plenty of fake news shows.”

Same with Keith Olbermann.
Cecelia

I’ve often wondered about how it is that Jon Stewart could go on Crossfire in order to tell the hosts that they are harming the fabric of the national conversation (or something like that…), end up calling the conservative host an obscene name, and the media falls out his feet impervious to the irony.
Cecelia

“While I don’t doubt that Keith had a true moment of self-recognition here, I’m also fairly certain that this apology was equal parts reflection and self-preservation.”

Are you COMPLETELY tone deaf?! Olbermann gigged Stewart throughout that entire “apology”!

It was obvious that he’d been persuaded to offer up one in hopes of defusing the situation.
JimW

“Give credit where credit is due.” What a dumb thing to say about Olbermann apologizing to John Stewart and not to Floyd Abrams for calling him a Nazi. Keith Olbermann, a graduate of Cornell Agricultural college, couldn’t argue bupkis in front of anyone, yet he calls Floyd Abrams a Nazi because he disagrees with the winning decision. Giving Olbermann a pass because Tommy Christopher isn’t Jewish can’t be the reason, can it? Maybe it’s just that anything out of MSNBC is okay because they advance Tommy Christopher’s cause.
SWWT

Okay, we get it, you like Keith Olbermann. You want everybody to think he’s okay too. That’s he’s not really a bad guy. Enough already, it just looks like some serious ass kissing at this point. … no offense…
Tommy Christopher

Jim, SWWT,

maybe you should both re-read this article. I don’t know where you’re getting your takeaways from. You both seem to have missed key parts of it, like the whole thing.

And Jim, that’s a pretty offensive assertion you make. You assume I’m not Jewish for no discernible reason, and you accuse me of giving Olbermann a pass when the entire point of this article is that he doesn’t deserve a pass.

Before you start insulting me based on my cultural background, about which you know zero, I would ask that you try reading what’s actually in front of you.
sarainitaly

I think I’m picking up what you’re putting down. Keith may have realized (after being skewered by Stewart) that he was in fact unhinged. But, he has a bigger desire to appear on the Daily Show, and avoid ending up on the receiving end of another Stewart take down. So, while it may have been slightly genuine, it was also self serving, and “deflective”. (And also self grandizing when he mentioned/ himself, maddow and stewart as the only voices on the left (or whatever the heck he said.)

Do you think that the *stop fighting* memo had any influence? Do you think he may have been told to tone back the hysterics, or do you think they love the attention?
JimW

Tommy, Olbermann called Floyd Abrams a Nazi for no discernible reason. My conjecture was that, seeing your last name is Christopher, it might be safe to assume you’re not Jewish. I then thought that there must be some reason that it didn’t hit you exactly how vile a thing it was to call Floyd Abrams a Nazi or a Quisling. “Quisling, after Norwegian politician Vidkun Quisling, who assisted Nazi Germany to conquer his own country and ruled the collaborationist Norwegian government, is a term used to describe traitors and collaborators.” Come now, Tommy… How blind can you get.
Tommy Christopher

Jim,

why would you think I would have missed that point, when I wrote a whole article about it? And either way, what does my last name have to do with my ability to divine the vileness of anything?

Sara,

I think apart from whatever was sincere in his apology, 90% of it was fear of Stewart. In the Scarborough controversy, Keith was in the power position.
Ted

Jim W – Your comment leaves me, well, speechless…and it takes a lot to do that.
BR

Anything that Olbermann says or does is self-serving. Dont ever fool yourself.
JimW

1) Any comment that leaves “Ted” speechless must be a good one.

2) Tommy did miss the point of some megalomanic continuing to say the most hurtful and vile things just to make a point, that point being “anyone who dares to avow a dissenting opinion will get cruelly trashed on national TV” (although no one watches the program anyway). No, I don’t watch MSNBC. I get it all from the MSNBCdiaites on this site… If they can tear themselves away from honing in on Fox for five minutes to get their daily dose of “gotchas.”
liberalontogeny

Got me thinking to do a search Mediaite site provides:

MSNBC (upper/lower case) – 37k results
Fox or FOX – 1.34 million results
fox (lowercase) 1.23 million results

golden goose and/or ideology?
Cecelia

I didn’t contradict or gloss over what you had written at all, Tommy.

You said that Olbermann was EQUAL parts self-reflection and self-preservation.

If there had been an ounce of self-reflection on Olbermann’s part he would have made an apology directly to the person who Mr. Stewart thought he had wronged. You know….the guy Keith targeted in the first place… Remember, Scott Brown?…

Instead Olbermann was ENTIRELY self-preservation and he obviously had very reluctantly come to the notion that some CYA was necessary, even after Stewart’s shtick and several tv critic columns AND Gail Collins’.

It probably took quite a bit of arm twisting at MSNBC until Olbermann bit the bullet and snarked his way through a mild “sorry” …shoulder shrug…(“eeennnaaa”…)
writer

Just a theory. When ‘All in the Family’ was on TV, it was clear to many what Norman Lear was doing. Archie holds conservative views. Archie is an idiot. Therefore, anyone holding conservative views is an idiot. Maybe Jon Stewart was afraid that Olbermann was becoming the left’s Archie Bunker. Watching him come increasingly unglued every night, people may start to wonder if everyone on the left is crazy. Stewart was trying to throw some water on that fire.
Tommy Christopher

Cecelia,

I’m pretty sure that if Olbermann didn’t see the truth of what Stewart was saying, he wouldn’t have apologized at all, he would have come out swinging (gently). The precise degree to which this was a factor wasn’t really the point of the piece. I’ve found it useful to take someone at his word on tangential points like that. He says he’s sorry, it’s silly to argue that unprovable point. Much more relevant is why he’s sorry, and how sorry he is.
sarainitaly

i think the best way to interpret the sincerity of his apology will be to see how he behaves moving forward… considering his track record, i’m betting it won’t take long.
Ted

“Jim W” In this case, particularly in this case, I’ll take that as a compliment.
Cecelia

“He says he’s sorry, it’s silly to argue that unprovable point. Much more relevant is why he’s sorry, and how sorry he is.”

Alright then, let me argue what must be to you ‘provable’ poinst…

WHY HE’S SORRY:

He’s sorry that someone of Stewart’s influence, with whom he shares an audience, has criticized him.

HOW MUCH HE’S SORRY:

Not sorry enough to apologize to the target of his over-the-top accusations.

All of which I started originally.

So then…I can deduce from the answers to the questions (that you say are the relevant questions), that Olbermann apologized:

Because Phil Griffin twisted his arm and slowly convinced Olbermann that it might defuse the heat he’s taken from columnist jerks and from a popular comedian who magnifies what he perceives as Olbermann’s errors, by lumping them in with his perceived Maddow errors.
Cecelia

Let add that olbermann is not sorry enough to give more than a ten second apology, punctuated by a shrug.
Tommy Christopher

Cecelia,

that’s pretty much what I said.
Cecelia

I may be similar to what you said about Olbermann’s self-preservation motive.

If you had left it at that, rather than to venture that he was equally reflective about his hateful shtick, THEN it would have been “pretty much” what you said.
http://www.sailrabbits.com Magister

I think that if Keith were to appear on The Daily Show, he’d probably get some gentle jabs because it’d be expected, but there’s no real reason for Stewart to take him off at the knees. As for Olbermann, I don’t have the ratings before me, but I have to assume that including all platforms and all showings, Stewart gets a much larger audience and as you say, he’s the “power” of the relationship.

All in all, I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s not an Olbermann appearance until he has a book to sell or maybe during some pre-taped holiday lull. There’s actually nothing for Stewart to gain from such an appearance; He’s not like Letterman who needs a sympathetic ear or a last minute guest. Barring a complete takedown, no headlines would come out of the exchange and you could argue that everyone who watches Olbermann is already predisposed to watch TDS.

Though of course, I’m sure Bill O’Reilly is welcome at any time.
SWWT

My earlier comment was based on the recent string of articles you have published about the Olbermann incident. And while you do not condone he stated, you condemn him in such a soft and friendly manner that it’s hard for me not to think you’re trying to soften the criticism against him by people who generally don’t agree with him.

But yeah, as for THIS article, I dunno. Kinda soft, but then again, maybe it’s just very much entirely reasonable and I was expecting more of a harsher tone. But that’s just my opinion.
Tommy Christopher

I think that expectation is shared by a lot of commenters here who don’t see Olbermann’s value.
MSNBCFAN

I think they both respect each-other–through the half-spat between them, they complimented each-other. Please follow:

http://twitter.com/msnbc_fan
ImNotBlue

…Keith gently needled the Daily Show host’s early work, offered to come on his show, and mildly conceded Stewart’s point.

Gawker… hardly a right-wing friendly source… disagrees:

He then makes the not-at-all-subtle suggestion in a frivolous-but-not-really manner suggesting that Stewart’s being assy over Olbermann because Olbermann turned down an invite to The Daily Show once.

http://gawker.com/5455458/keith-olbermanns-patronizing-disingenuous-response-to-jon-stewarts-olbermann-takedown
Cecelia

SWWT says:
January 24, 2010 at 4:51 pm
But yeah, as for THIS article, I dunno. Kinda soft, but then again, maybe it’s just very much entirely reasonable and I was expecting more of a harsher tone. But that’s just my opinion.

Tommy Christopher says:
January 24, 2010 at 5:27 pm
I think that expectation is shared by a lot of commenters here who don’t see Olbermann’s value.

————————————————————————————————————————

Oh, please, Tommy. Your reply to SWWT is just another way of your saying this again:

“So, to review, Keith didn’t actually prove that Brown is a racist or a misogynist, but the problem here is that in order to defend Brown, you still kinda have to trash him. Much easier to call Keith a liar, accuse him of playing some kind of “card,” and high-five your buddies for calling him “Keith Olberdouche” or something.”

http:www.mediaite.com/tv/keith-olbermann-proves-his-case-against-scott-brown/
The Real Royal King

I see Cecelia has spent a good part of her weekend raving about Olbermann. Why should this be different than any other weekend for her? I can honestly say we have here a clear example of someone whose mission in life is to destroy someone else. Fortunately, she is in the company of merely a handful of similarly simple-minded and singularly focused people in the world who think the greatest dangers to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are Keith Olbermann and Newshounds. These people confer on both a seriousness and value they would not otherwise have, so I am sure Olbermann and Newshounds are most appreciative to them. Tommy, you have done yeoman’s work, but you are assuming you are dealing with someone open to sound reasoning. You most decidedly are not.

I will add, too, JimW, you are about to cross the line into some anti-Semitism I am sure you don’t hold. A bit of circumspection might be in order. I won’t quibble with your content, but your tone and composition are nearing a very dangerous edge.
The Real Royal King

Tommy Christopher says:
January 24, 2010 at 3:51 pm

Cecelia,

that’s pretty much what I said.

—

Indeed, it is, Tommy, but it’s best not to argue with Cecelia. You’ll always be wrong and you’ll just get her all riled up. By the way, don’t eat any cookies from a strange address.
Cecelia

The Real Fake Royal King,

I know the mental gymnastic of projection is a coping skill for a lot of people, but in your case it’s your singular talent.

What do you do, look at yourself in the mirror and think “I’ve stalked both Olbermann Watch and Johnny Dollar’s Place for years, under a plethora of sockpuppets, strawman sockpuppet aliases and name-jacked names, so as a defense against the obvious, I’ll accuse other people of being obsessed”?

Yeah, you do that and in a medium where people can enjoy discussion and vying with other people who have similar interests, you work very hard at dumbing everything down to the least common denominator of your operator’s heart.

You pretend, you lie, you attempt to seduce, you strive to misrepresent, and finally you do your all to destroy anything genuine there can be in this medium..

Go back under your bridge, “Mark”. You’re the kiss of death to honest discussion and you’re poison to honest feeling. Go back under your bridge, you’re the worst of all internet trolls.
The Real Royal King

I am correct in assuming the referenced sites are the small gathering places for the Koldys coven? If so, the point is … pointless.
ImNotBlue

The Real Royal King says:
January 25, 2010 at 8:00 am

I can honestly say we have here a clear example of someone whose mission in life is to destroy someone else.

Are you really so mired in your own ego, that you can’t see the blatent irony, nay hypocrisy in this statement? You, M, and a whole host of others (including Glynnis), make it your mission to destroy anything Palin, Brown, Bush, Cheney, Beck, O’Reilly, FOX News, and so on?! There are whole websites dedicated to daily attacks… and now you criticize Cecelia for attacking Keith Olbermann… in a thread about Keith Olbermann?!

Really?! You’re that out of touch with reality? Wow! Buy a mirror.
The Real Royal King

If I had a mirror, INB, I would be inclined to look at myself all day long, such is the power of my appearance. And, you are in error. I have no interest in destroying O’Reilly. He is a wonderful source of sexcapades in our nation.
ImNotBlue

The Real Royal King says:
January 25, 2010 at 1:06 pm

If I had a mirror, INB, I would be inclined to look at myself all day long, such is the power of my appearance.

Ah, you’d get one of those “hypocrisy” blocking mirrors. I hear they’re expensive.

And, you are in error. I have no interest in destroying O’Reilly. He is a wonderful source of sexcapades in our nation.

I thought that was Clinton… or Edwards… or Tiger Woods… or Olbermann… or… oh, that’s right. Again, you only “see” what you “want” to see. I forgot.
The Real Royal King

Now, INB, I know you feel compelled to defend your rightist “stars” at all costs, and regardless of the injury to your own integrity, but you have to admit that the O’Reilly accessories and accoutrements were far more interesting than anything to emerge from the gentlemen you named.
Cecelia

The Real Royal King says:
January 25, 2010 at 11:48 am

I am correct in assuming the referenced sites are the small gathering places for the Koldys coven? If so, the point is … pointless.

———————————————————————————————————————————-

Yes, Pat Pomeroy, the place you got bounced from.

You’re frightening.
alex020588

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