Yesterday Hispanic blogosphere was buzzing with the news of Lou Dobbs exiting CNN. Some claimed victory from their efforts to force CNN to muzzle Mr. Dobbs on his anti immigrant anti Hispanic vitriol.
Personally, having worked in media for so many years I understood his strategy of content branding. With the explosion of cable leading to the fragmentation of audiences it’s a free for all to get any meaningful traction with ratings. I periodically tuned in to his program and what I saw was an old man who only saw what he believed. As the managing editor he exercised great power to turn opinion into psudeo journalism. See for yourself from this 60 Minutes interview a sampling of misreported facts.
Today we find out from The New York Times that CNN/US president Jonathan Klein had ordered Mr. Dobbs to vent his opinions on his radio show or else. This second option seems to have been the prefered choice.
What are people saying about this incident? It’s all over the place from two extremes. Here is a sampling of words.
“ Gee, CNN, Lou Dobbs was the only show you had left that I watched. I admire a man who stands up for what he believes. I didn’t agree with everything he said, but he was bringing up important issues that our government seem not to want to fix or answer. If you never have taken a stand in your life, maybe you don’t stand for anything. Good luck, Lou Dobbs.”
”Sorry to say this but Dobbs is an idiot! . Day after day we are introduced to new and inventive ways that the illegals are taking over the US, and undermining the very fabric of our society!
Outsourcing is the work of the devil, Mr Dobbs would have us believe! But is it really? When asked, the big players explain that outsourcing is cost effective. When you translate that, you get ‘We can actually get workers that can understand the customer’s requirements and be nice to them.”
Source of quotes Yahoo News
