The Fuddrucker Proxy

MSNBC needs to fire Phil Griffin immediately.  It's clear now that his hiring decisions are motivated primarily by an effort to bring down the network, a la Hudsucker Industries.

The NYTimes reports Rosie O'Donnell "is in serious discussions to return to television atop a new soapbox: a prime-time show on the cable news channel MSNBC." Jacques Steinberg and Bill Carter write, "Under one scenario, Ms. O'Donnell would be given the 9 p.m. slot where she would go head-to-head with two heavyweights of cable talk: Larry King Live on CNN and Hannity & Colmes on Fox News.

The increasingly unfathomable failure to fire Keith Olbermann and coax him into a sanitarium was already a head-scratcher.  But putting him back-to-back with this beached Truther betrays Griffin's gambit.  He must be planning some kind of management-led buyout of the network and he's hoping to take it off GE's hands for a pittance.  But first he needs to pick off whatever lingering credibility may still be clinging to the bottom of its corporate shoe.

Shrewd, Phil.  But remember, the Hudsucker plan backfired.  In the end, the newly hired idiot's ideas take root and it's the mastermind who winds up in the sanitarium.

In fairness to Krazy Keith, he does have the highest-rated show on MSNBC, though that makes it only the 16th highest-rated show on cable news (Fox News claims 9 of the top 10 spots), narrowly edging out "Deal Or No Deal" reruns (pdf) on CNBC.