TCA News: Keith Olbermann will helm election coverage on Current

Sure, he’s had a few dust-ups with his new network home, but the countdown to Keith Olbermann’s election coverage is on at the Al Gore/David Bohrman-helmed Current TV.

“Keith has told us that he will do our special election coverage moving forward, which we desperately want him to do,” Bohrman told a capacity crowd at Friday’s Current TCA session. Asked why Olbermann was not there to deliver the news himself, Bohrman said he was “on vacation,” leaving reporters to speculate if that actually meant vacation from the network in the wake of his criticisms over stuff like low-tech sets and technical snafus.

Still, this past Sunday the famously mercurial but popular pundit tweeted, “I’m pleased to tell you that I’ll be running the election coverage on Current, after New Hampshire.” He had refused Current’s offer to cover the Iowa caucuses, so Gore and a team of analysts did the job themselves.

In the meantime, Current is gearing up to launch its newest weeknight program, The War Room with Jennifer Granholm, starring Granholm, the former two-term Michigan governor, and a revolving guest cast of progressive politcal commentators. Taking the timeslot following Olbermann’s Countdown beginning January 30, The War Room, says Granholm, “will be the go-to show for progressive politcal news junkies who want the day’s election news unvarnished.”

But the most vocal member of the panel was Cenk Uygur, founder of the decade-old “The Young Turks,” the world’s largest online progressive news show. Hoping to lure in a younger, super-progressive demographic, Current TV began airing an hourlong televised version of the show called The Young Turks with Cenk Uygur in December.

Uygur labeled Current rival Fox News as “full of lies” and blasted CNN — where his boss Bohrman was once the Washington Bureau Chief — for being “neutral.” Viewers who are looking for political news on CNN are “wasting your time,” Uygur said, adding that truly effective politcal shows and commentators should be “objective.”

“Reporters shouldn’t be neutral between facts and lies — objective is better standard,” he tweeted to Channel Guide. “Broncos won the game is objective. They played equally well is neutral. Saddam had no ties to 9/11  — objective.”

The Young Turks with Cenk Uygur airs weekdays at 7pm ET/PT, followed by Countdown with Keith Olberman.

Photo credits: Current TV

 

1 Comment

  1. He told Gore if he didn’t get to helm it that he would hold his breath until he turned blue and fell down. So Gore told him that he could do it…then toke him out for Ice Cream.

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About Lori Acken 1195 Articles
Lori just hasn't been the same since "thirtysomething" and "Northern Exposure" went off the air.