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The “P” is for Panicked!

MSNBC, the left-wing basket case cable network, is in full meltdown mode. After several weeks of on-air sniping and tantrums from the Spittle Twins, Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews, executives at NBC apparently staged an intervention.

They will no longer anchor political coverage or the debates. The fair and balanced savior?

Former White House press corps yapper David Gregory.

Savor the quotes from the NYTimes piece. Schadenfreude-licious:

In interviews, 10 current and former staff members said that long-simmering tensions between MSNBC and NBC reached a boiling point during the conventions. “MSNBC is behaving like a heroin addict,” one senior staff member observed. “They’re living from fix to fix and swearing they’ll go into rehab the next week.”

The employee, like others, spoke on condition of anonymity because the network does not permit it people to speak to the media without authorization. (The New York Times and NBC News have a content-sharing arrangement exclusively for political coverage.)

Mr. Olbermann, a 49-year-old former sportscaster, has become the face of the more aggressive MSNBC, and the lightning rod for much of the criticism. His program “Countdown,” now a liberal institution, was created by Mr. Olbermann in 2003 but it found its voice in his gnawing dissent regarding the Bush administration, often in the form of “special comment” segments.

As Mr. Olbermann raised his voice, his ratings rose as well, and he now reaches more than one million viewers a night, a higher television rating than any other show in the troubled 12-year history of the network. As a result, his identity largely defines MSNBC. “They have banked the entirety of the network on Keith Olbermann,” one employee said.

Triple-snorter:

Mr. Griffin, MSNBC’s president, denies that it has an ideology. “I think ideology means we think one way, and we don’t,” he said. Rather than label MSNBC’s prime time as left-leaning, he says it has passion and point of view.

Stay self-delusional, MSNBC.

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Reader Brian M. e-mails:

Hi Michelle,

I sent this to MSNBC tonight:

Demoting Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews, from the anchor chair is like putting a butterfly bandage on an Artery wound.

MSNBC just doesn’t get it.

”Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, said in a telephone interview Saturday. Fighting the ratings game, he added, “the bottom line is that we’re experiencing incredible success.”

Yes, journalist students for generations to come can study MSNBC’s grand experiment in trying to redefine the definition of success.

You may want to invest in a book on Complex Numbers and study the chapters on imaginary numbers, it may give you insight into your ratings.