These days working at CNN isn’t something to brag about: Gutfeld
Gutfeld and guests discuss how CNN is doing on ‘Gutfeld!’
It's time for …
NARRATOR: CNN Death Clock Countdown
So, where to start? How's CNN+ doing?
Yeah, not good.
What do you expect? It was based on a premise that people who like CNN would spend money on CNN+. Problem is: There are no people who like CNN.
CNN sign. REUTERS/Chris Aluka Berry (Reuters)
It's on at airports for the same reason there are uncomfortable chairs — to get you to leave.
Everyone hates CNN, including people who work there, their relatives, their pets. One day, Brian Stelter came home to find his two cats, Krispy and Kreme, had taken their own lives by OD'ing on catnip. On the TV? "Reliable Sources."
These days, working at CNN isn't something you brag about. It'd be like someone gloating that they're the executive chef at Bennigan's. Who would want anyone to know you work at CNN?
Well, unless you're trying to pick up Bette Midler — that's how I got a hernia.
Inside, the place has the vibe of a prison yard on lockdown after a three-day race riot. Who knows who will shiv you next?
My money is on [Jeanne Moos]. Remember her? She was great.
So how could you expect diehards to come to CNN+ when they don't even have any die-softs?
Then … CNN execs figured viewers already had a lot of time for CNN+ since they weren't watching CNN. That's pretty smart.
CNN's Brian Stelter. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for Vanity Fair) (Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for Vanity Fair)
Former media editor Jon Nicosia reports that tensions between some talent and producers are higher than Snoop eating a bag of Doritos on the roof of a dispensary.
Some are having daily breakdowns and threatening to walk — we won't name names. And it's because no one's watching. CNN paid out millions in return for getting under 10,000 viewers.
I did the math and it depressed me. If I got paid what CNN talent got paid per view, I'd be living in a mansion made of smaller mansions and inside each one, a Barbie dream house.
So it's a media platform with under 10,000 people. For perspective, do you know what gets more than 10,000 people?
YouTube channels on knitting get 100 times what CNN+ is getting. YouTube channels on proper flossing — same thing, and it's just videos of people flossing.
I can't get enough of it.
But "Dog took a crap and posted it on YouTube" — it would do better and not get paid $1 grand per turd unless Germans bought the network.
So sadly, CNN staffers are bracing for layoffs and budget cuts. Which, to me, sounds like a pretty big opportunity for Elon.
While he's waiting on Twitter, he should scoop up CNN like the dog turd that it is and turn it into something useful, like a Jiffy Lube or a Buffalo Wild Wings, or maybe a channel that covers news instead of creating it.
CNN's Brian Stelter. (REUTERS/Andrew Kelly)
Think about that. What if CNN was a news channel? Oh, but then what do they do with other recent hires like Jamal Hill or Rex Chapman? One is a breathless race-baiter, and the other tricks CNN into thinking he doesn't just steal videos on Twitter.
I guess they go to headline news where the rest of their talent goes to die. They should call it headstone news.
Then there's Stelter. I can't bear to lose him because he's giving me nonstop content. He's been my moose — I mean, muse.
His latest F-up? Sunday on "Reliable Sources" he invited some professors to discuss a study where Fox viewers were paid — paid cash — to watch CNN for seven hours a week.
Here's a picture of a Fox viewer from that experiment. It's funny. CNN now has to pay people to watch their crappy TV.
CNN is your only choice — if you lost the remote. But a funny thing happened in this segment, and it wasn't Stelter sneaking a bite of a calzone that he was hiding under his coat.
Joshua Kalla, a Yale professor, was invited on to discuss the study, and Stelter assumed he would bash Fox. Didn't go that way.
BRIAN STELTER: So, Josh, you all call this partisan coverage filtering. And basically, you're proving what we've sensed for a while, which is, Fox viewers are in the dark about bad news for the GOP.
JOSHUA KALLA: That's right, Fox and CNN cover different issues, and Fox News predominantly covers issues that make the GOP look good and make Democrats look bad. And on the flip side, CNN engages in this partisan coverage filtering as well that we find, for example, during this time, the Abraham Accords were signed. And these were the agreements where Israel, the UAE and Bahrain signed a major peace agreement, and we see that Fox News covered this really major accomplishment about 15 times more than CNN did. So we established both networks are really engaging in this partisan coverage filtering. It's not about one side, it's about the media at large.
STELTER: I think you're engaging on both sides–ism there, Josh.
You're engaging in both sides–ism Josh.
Look, Pillsbury, the data, the research, showed both sides. That's why he used it. It's called context, something CNN's deathly allergic to. And that's why CNN is sinking.
They don't believe there's more than one side to their fabricated tales. And if you show them one, well, then it's both sides–ism or they'll call you racist.
The reason why they fear Elon Musk is the same reason they obsessed over Fox. It's because we threaten their fake news bubble.
Now it's being destroyed. And I got to admit, it's kind of fun to watch that feeling you got as a kid watching the Wicked Witch melting.
It's an amazing time to see the gatekeepers of false narratives collapsing. Remember this golden moment?
CHRISTOPHER PHILLIPS: All the mistakes of the mainstream media and CNN in particular seem to magically all go in one direction. Are we expected to believe that this is all just some sort of random coincidence, or is there something else behind it?
STELTER: Too bad — time for lunch.
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Stelter wanting to go to lunch was the most honest thing he's ever said.
But at a certain point, you can't rely on food as your escape, unless you bake a saw into a cake.
This article is adapted from Greg Gutfeld's opening commentary on the April 15, 2022, edition of "Gutfeld!"