Why Olbermann is failing

I think I understand exactly what was going through Olbermann's mind when he first conceived his show. He thought to himself, you know, I see Hannity and O'Reilly going on TV every night and screaming their Right-Wing message for an hour, and lo and behold, the 40% of Americans who describe themselves as "Conservative" tune in hoping to hear their views reflected back at them, and thereby feel comforted. He probably then went on to convince himself that if he were to just do the same thing, but from a Leftist perspective, then the 40% of Americans who describe themselves as "Liberal" would provide him with the exact same kind of bulletproof ratings that Hannity and O'Reilly enjoy.

Here's the problem with what Olbermann actually did... he forgot to actually watch Hannity or O'Reilly's show before he launched his own. When you watch Keith's show, you get the impression that he was trying to duplicate what his Liberal friends TOLD him Hannity and O'Reilly were doing, rather than what they ACTUALLY do.

Because the reality is that whatever else Hannity and O'Reilly do, they respect their audience, and more importantly, they respect those who disagree.

Olbermann never has and never will.. which is why he called Scott Brown, a man who probably agrees with Olbermann on more issues than he disagrees, "an irresponsible, homophobic, racist, reactionary, ex-nude model, teabagging supporter of violence against women and against politicians with whom he disagrees."

Let's contrast that with Hannity's show. I haven't watched him in years, but back when O'Reilly was his lead-in and he shared his stage with Alan Colmes, I watched both shows almost every day. And since Hannity is the biggest idealogue of the two most popular personalities on Fox News (I have never watched Glenn Beck so I can't comment on him), let's focus on Sean for a minute.

Here's what I saw on Hannity's show. He and Alan would bring on guests from ALL SIDES of the political spectrum, and then they would take turns interviewing that guest from their own point of view without interrupting each other. So if Hannity spent his portion of the interview asking the guest "aren't you just a communist who wants to take away all our freedoms?", Alan would redirect the questioning and ask "isn't everything Sean just said bullshit?".

In this way, both points of view were aired IN THEIR ENTIRETY, in the end Sean and Alan respectfully agreed to disagree, and viewers were left to make their own judgement about what they just heard.

Keith never does this. He's a cowardly bomb thrower who hides in his studio and would never EVER show the kind of courage it takes to come out from behind his desk and debate a personality like Scott Brown, or Michelle Bachman, or Sarah Palin. I don't know Keith personally, but he doesn't seem that difficult to psychoanalyze... he's used to being the smartest guy in the room, he's used to dominating a conversation, and he's terribly insecure. Having a smart, two-way, give-and-take debate just isn't something his psychology allows him to handle.

And so he's created some weird, bastardized, Frankenstein's monster version of what his diseased mind has convinced him Hannity and O'Reilly have been doing every night for years.

And it's no surprise he's failing.

He has completely, and irretrievably, missed the entire point.