When journalists attack
War between Olbermann and Bill-O
In case you ever wondered how small skirmishes escalate into a World War, check out Howie Kurtz's long piece today detailing how the rivalry between MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and Fox News' Bill O'Reilly has spiraled out of control to the point where Bill-O recently aired a graphic comparing the chairman of MSNBC's ultimate parent General Electric to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:
Nobody comes off looking particularly good here. Part of the problem, it seems, is that the Olbermann-O-Reilly feud could have been fun, except that Bill-O doesn't want to give Olbermann the recognition or the publicity, so instead he only goes after Keith's higher-ups. On the other hand, General Electric has always been a company that needed more media scrutiny -- so maybe in the end the feud's not such a bad thing. The threat by Ailes to use the post against Olbermann and the MSNBC corporate food chain is a little alarming, but not surprising, It might give a little more ammo to folks worried about media consolidation, however.