The Refs Begin To Tremble

by digby

Looks like GOP caterwauling has had its effect:

MSNBC Takes Incendiary Hosts From Anchor Seat

By BRIAN STELTER

MSNBC tried a bold experiment this year by putting two politically incendiary hosts, Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews, in the anchor chair to lead the cable news channel’s coverage of the election.

That experiment appears to be over.

After months of accusations of political bias and simmering animosity between MSNBC and its parent network NBC, the channel decided over the weekend that the NBC News correspondent and MSNBC host David Gregory would anchor news coverage of the coming debates and election night. Mr. Olbermann and Mr. Matthews will remain as analysts during the coverage.

The change — which comes in the home stretch of the long election cycle — is a direct result of tensions associated with the channel’s perceived shift to the political left.

It was obviously also a result of the spitting and hissing between the two anchors during the coverage, but it’s pretty clear that NBC is taking some serious heat from the GOP and this is, after all, the house that Jack built. They’ll keep Matthews and Olberman on, of course, and they’ve added Maddow. But the word has gone forth and there will be adjustments, many of them small and nearly subconscious. They will hardly even know they’re doing it.

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