January 13, 2025

NEWEST MARVEL SEQUEL SOUNDS TERRIBLE. ONE STAR OUT OF FOUR. CANNOT RECOMMEND: MSNBC Ups Rachel Maddow to Five Nights, Sends Alex Wagner Into Field for Trump’s First 100 Days.

A cable-news outlet’s primetime schedule has in past years largely remained inviolate, except when anchors and networks part ways. Under Rashida Jones, MSNBC’s president, the network has experimented with new concepts. Jen Psaki, who anchors a Sunday program, also holds forth on Monday nights at 8, giving host Chris Hayes a schedule like Wagner’s — Tuesdays through Fridays. MSNBC has also tested programs that air separate originals on the Peacock streaming hub and the MSNBC weekend schedule.

Some of those new ideas have made Maddow a more frequent primetime presence than many had previously envisioned. She also leads a schedule-busting concept known internally as “The Avengers” that MSNBC uses on nights of exceptional news. Maddow sits for multiple hours at a dais with a shifting lineup of MSNBC personalities that range from Joy Reid and Nicolle Wallace to Ari Melber and Stephanie Ruhle.

“I made a promise that when you need me, I’ll be there,” Maddow told Variety late last year about her appearances on MSNBC beyond her regular Monday duties.

Other hosts will weave new elements into the mix during Trump’s first weeks in the Oval Office. Jen Psaki will launch “The Blueprint with Jen Psaki,” a new podcast that examines the future for the Democratic Party after a brutal election season. Chris Hayes will debut a new recurring segment, “Here is What is True,” that will scrutinize misinformation tied to news coming out of Washington and how it affects political discourse.

Wagner’s reports may crop up across the MSNBC schedule, as well as in specials, on digital platforms and through live events. “We are building the plane on the runway,” says Wagner as her journey looms.

“Building the plane on the runway” sounds like a recipe for a spectacular crash. Will Boeing be involved in the engineering?

Related: MSNBC’s Avengers will be minus one comic book superhero: Jen Rubin “Exits” the Washington Post; Chuck Todd “Exits” NBC.

As Ace of Spades suggests, “Maybe they can do a show together. Can you imagine the sexual heat that would convect out of your TV? NBC wouldn’t agree to Chuck Todd’s terms, so his contract his ending. I assume that NBC wanted him to take a pay cut, because no one’s watched him in eight years, and he refused, as he couldn’t suffer that indignity.”

Posted at 2:35 pm by Ed Driscoll

BOTTOM STORY OF THE DAY: WaPo’s Pretend Conservative Resigns — And Rage-Quits X — Over Trump-Musk Alliance.

The Washington Post’s longtime “conservative blogger” Jennifer Rubin announced on Monday that she had resigned from the paper, effective immediately, to launch a new outlet that was “not owned by anybody.”

Rubin, who became an outspoken advocate for Democrats in her efforts to “resist” Donald Trump, lionized President Joe Biden until the very end, and then went so far as to fawn over Vice President Kamala Harris even before she was foisted on the Democratic Party as their de facto nominee.

But the media landscape has begun to change with Trump’s re-election — and even some legacy media personalities and outlets have started to show signs of coming around, resigning themselves to the fact that if they don’t at least attempt to speak to Trump and his allies in good faith, they may find themselves ousted by podcasters, citizen journalists, and other less traditional media outlets.

Rubin, according to her Monday announcement, is having none of that — in addition to launching her new outlet, she declared her intention to leave X altogether in protest of Trump’s alliance with billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk.

“BIG NEWS. I have left the Post. Corporate and billionaire media are failing to meet the moment,” she claimed in her post to X. “With @normeisen.bsky.social I’m launching @contrariannews.bsky.social. We’ll have politics but also cooking, humor, film and even pets. Please subscribe and join the fight. And because I want to be true to my values I am leaving X. I refuse to enable the Elon-Trump presidency.”

Ace of Spades posits that Rubin was likely pushed out of the newspaper:

She demanded other journalists resign in protest when their owners made decisions prioritizing profit and sales over wokeness, but didn’t resign herself.

She’s finally resigned. Except, of course, I don’t believe she “resigned.” I would bet any amount of money that the Washington Post, losing money and readers at such a pace the paper’s existence is literally in danger, looked at its staff and decided to fire the non-performers.

She literally has no constituency at all. Almost no NeverTrumper does. Almost every single NeverTrumper in the country has a high-paid media gig despite having no audience or constituency. They have been paid simply for loyal service to the Democrat/Progressive Cult, and to astroturf a propaganda front against Trump.

And the paper really does have quite the astonishing burn rate: Washington Post traffic craters, loses $100M amid identity crisis as talent, readers flee: reports.

The Washington Post’s readership reportedly cratered during Joe Biden’s presidency — and the Jeff Bezos-owned broadsheet lost $100 million last year alone — as the embattled paper continues to suffer an exodus of top talent.

The left-leaning publication drew about 2.5 million to 3 million daily users to its site last summer, a fraction of the 22.5 million daily visitors at its peak when Biden took office in January 2021, according to internal data shared with Semafor.

The plummeting site traffic led the business to lose around $100 million on weak subscription and ad revenue in 2024, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

WaPo took a hit to its bottom line after reportedly 250,000 readers canceled their subscriptions following Bezos’ decision to kill an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris just weeks before the election.

The Washington Post had 54 million digital visitors last November — down from 114 million in November 2020, according to global media analytics firm Comscore.

Leaders at the company have discussed ways to hit a goal of 200 million users, according to the Journal. Executives at the paper once vaunted for its Watergate coverage have suggested using artificial-intelligence tools and news aggregation to reach the goal, the outlet said.

AI “journalists” really would be the next logical step for the beleaguered paper:

Posted at 2:22 pm by Ed Driscoll

KURT SCHLICHTER: There Is No Bottom for Blue California.

I don’t want to be pessimistic, but I’ve lived here 50-odd years, and I know the score. I got here when California was the Golden State, and now it’s the Charred Black State. It was a middle-class state in the 70s and 80s, but today’s California is a feudal society with an affluent aristocracy – their castles and keeps were the ones burned in this fire – lording over a huge caste of serfs. The middle class is either gone or leaving. That’s OK with the Democrats because it was the middle class that made California a Republican state for so long. They were the ones who demanded good government. Most of them are now in Texas or Idaho.

That leaves a bunch of really poor people and a few really rich ones. The poor people vote Democrat because the Dems feed them scraps, and the rich people vote Democrat because it makes them feel that they’re not the complete scumbags that, in many cases, they are. Have you noticed how it’s always the worst people who seem to be the most vocally liberal? Paging Harvey Weinstein – he probably worked with half the people whose houses burned down, and he probably tried to score with the other half.

The thing you must understand about the rich Californians who vote for Democrats – and not only vote for them but actively campaign for them and donate to them – is that this kind of leftism isn’t just a belief system. It’s their religion. Well, more accurately, it’s a substitute for religion. There’s an empty space inside every human being that normal people fill up with things like faith, family, and patriotism. The rich blue voters of California fill it up with commie gobbledygook. They add some wokeness, a dash of climate change, and a heaping helping of smug self-satisfaction. The resulting dog’s breakfast is what passes for their souls.

Zev Chafets’ 1990 book Devil’s Night portrays the dwindling post-riot population of Detroit utterly enthralled to leftist identity politics, no matter how badly it’s wrecked their city. Those who remain in Los Angeles will likely also triple-down on their leftist politics, no matter how badly it literally burned much of their city to the ground:

Posted at 1:50 pm by Ed Driscoll

STRATEGERY!

Even at a net worth of $400 billion or whatever it is today, Elon Musk might be undervalued.

Posted at 12:54 pm by Stephen Green

FALLOUT: NYC congestion pricing turns upper Manhattan nabes into parking ‘war zone’ — as drivers take up spots to avoid toll.

Upper Manhattan nabes are already devolving into glorified parking lots only days after the MTA and Gov. Hochul flipped the switch on congestion pricing — with bridge-and-tunnel commuters increasingly ditching their vehicles uptown to skirt the $9 toll, outraged residents told The Post

Across Washington Heights, locals bemoaned that their already-scarce curbside parking spaces have further vanished in recent days, with many now burning hours trying to track down a precious spot.

“’Good luck to everyone,’ that’s what I say,” nurse Thomas Hurt, 36, told The Post. “Now [these commuters] are right here along with us, trying to fight it out.”

After coming home from his shift at a Montefiore hospital in the Bronx Wednesday, Hurt circled for two hours searching for a spot — and saw at least 20 New Jersey-plated cars hogging spaces between West 174th and West 181st streets.

Over the past year, residents in the neighborhoods outside the 60th Street congestion zone have repeatedly warned that their communities would be plagued with hellish gridlock and increased pollution from meandering motorists.

“It’s gotten worse in the past week. A lot of people from Jersey, they take the bridge, park here, and take the subways down,” said Cristian Romarion, 48, a project manager, who double-parked his Jeep Wrangler while waiting for a spot to open up.

“People fight for parking here . . . like, physically fight for parking. It’s crazy,” he continued, adding that he’s witnessed scraps “almost every day” since congestion pricing took effect.

Just remember that the plan wasn’t to raise revenue or reduce congestion in Manhattan but to get people to give up their cars, and it all makes sense.

Posted at 12:42 pm by Stephen Green

VIDEO: NCLA LEGAL TITANS EXPLAIN HOW THEY STOPPED NASDAQ AND THE SEC FROM IMPOSING DEI RULES ON BOARDS. Reminder/Disclosure, I’m on the NCLA’s Board of Advisors.

Posted at 11:59 am by Glenn Reynolds

SAY NO MORE:

One of the reasons California is likely stuck with Gavin Newsom and Karen Bass — or replacements just like them or worse — is that the sensible people have already fled or soon will.

Posted at 11:52 am by Stephen Green

FAR FROM THE FONT OF MISINFORMATION CLAIMED BY LEFTISTS, X IS PROBABLY THE SINGLE GREATEST COUNTER TO MISINFORMATION EVER CREATED:

Posted at 11:50 am by Glenn Reynolds

GOOD LORD:

Real heroism is on display here — most of it unnecessary, if California would maintain its forests and scrub properly.

Posted at 11:40 am by Stephen Green

“SOCIALISM SEEKS EQUALITY IN MISERY; COMMUNISM SEEKS EQUALITY IN THE GRAVE.”

Progressivism seeks equality in absurdity.

UPDATE: Even that’s too kind. Socialism spares the ruling class the misery; communism spares them the premature grave. There’s less actual equality in societies run on leftist lines than anywhere else.

Posted at 10:50 am by Stephen Green

YOU GET MORE OF WHAT YOU INCENTIVIZE:

California voters have not yet gotten it good and hard enough yet. But they sure are working on it.

Posted at 10:38 am by Stephen Green

CRIMINAL INCOMPETENCE IN CALIFORNIA: Remember back in 2020 when California Gov. Gavin Newsom said “All these things are connected. This is a challenging time. But we’re up to this challenge.” He was referring to the impact of Climate Change on California, including the increased risk of wildfires.

Soooooo ….. according to Issues & Insights (I&I), that raises an interesting question, namely: “Four years later, Newsom is again blaming ‘climate change’ for the fires ravaging Los Angeles. But wait. If climate change really is to blame, why was California so obviously, so woefully, so inexcusably unprepared?”

There is no good ending in this one for Newsom or, for that matter, the Liberal-Left Establishment Elite that has ruled California in a one-party catastrophe for the Golden State’s 40 million residents.

 

Posted at 10:36 am by Mark Tapscott