Changing times in network news
John Goodman
Not THAT John Goodman. The Boss at John Goodman PR. Survivor of ABC & CBS News. A Red Sox fan trapped behind enemy lines in Westchester County. e-mail: john@johnlgoodman.com
George Stephanopoulos went to work this past week.
And while most the headlines were about his inappropriate $75,000 donation to the Clinton Foundation, I think the other story, just as big and getting less attention, is that nobody from ABC News…or Disney…locked him out.
The Stephanopoulos story is as much about the changing landscape of network news, as it is about George’s ill-thought and conceived donation to the foundation.
Not that long ago, when I was working at both ABC News and CBS News, a Stephanopoulos type incident would have resulted in an instant suspension, and possibly a dismissal.
The network news presidents of the past – Richard Salant…Roone Arledge……Reuven Frank – would have locked George’s office door for a month, or forever.
But those times – when news standards truly existed and were not run by bean counters – are long gone.
Today, George Stephanopoulos brings in too much money to ABC News and parent Disney. Between being a ratings winner and his reported $105-million salary, ABC and Disney continue to “support” George. There’s no word of a suspension, firing or anything. The silence is deafening.
Nothing will happen because George’s is too financially valuable to ABC and Disney.
The other headline from all this….we are seeing the end result of hiring political partisans to anchor network newscast. Everyone knew George’s war room history with the Clinton’s. And as much as he and ABC News spun, it was impossible to erase his past and see him as a non-partisan journalist. (Only one former political partisan pulled off this transformation and that was the late Tim Russert. When Tim pounded away at Democrats, nobody thought back to his days working for Democrats).
So George will continue to go to work. He’ll continue to anchor Good Morning America and This Week, and will likely STILL be involved in ABC’s political coverage.
Times have indeed changed forever in the network news business….old standards have given way to the mighty dollar….and I’m so glad I’m no longer a part of it.
Strong background in Reality TV, Journalism: Exec Prod, Dir, Segment Prod, Field Prod/Dir, Creative Consultant
8yJohn, While I agree with your sentiment, i think memory wanes & we forget events that occurred at both CBS & ABC which we would prefer to forget. I can think of any number of events that took place under non-bean counter news leadership that I still find appalling. My perspective, albeit a bit cynical, is that "news" practices are SO MUDDLED these days that we look back on the old days and think they were perfect. We both know that was far from the truth.
Founder @ Steam Engine Publishing | Author, "The Influencer Machine: How to Extend your 15 Minutes of Fame into a Lifetime of Thought Leadership"
8yYeah, but he laughs at Bill Kristol's jokes on This Week, so he can't be TOO much of a partisan... ;)