Fans And Pundits Question MSNBC's Decision To Suspend Keith Oblermann

Continuing the recent network trend of preemptively reacting to some sh*t viewers might take issue with, MSNBC decided to suspend its most popular anchor Keith Olbermann today.

Here’s the backstory:

Keith Olbermann, the top anchor on MSNBC, was suspended on Friday after the channel discovered that he made campaign contributions to three Democrats last month.

The MSNBC president, Phil Griffin, issued a statement saying: “I became aware of Keith’s political contributions late last night. Mindful of NBC News policy and standards, I have suspended him indefinitely without pay.”

Politico had reported Friday morning that Mr. Olbermann’s contributions were in apparent violation of MSNBC policy.

In a statement to Politico, Mr. Olbermann, the longtime host of “Countdown,” had acknowledged donations of $2,400 to the campaigns of Representatives Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona and Attorney General Jack Conway of Kentucky, who lost his Senate race to Rand Paul.

Several hours later, Mr. Griffin released the statement about the suspension.

No one at NBC News, MSNBC’s parent, would speculate about what this might mean for Mr. Olbermann’s future, though one NBC executive privately suggested this was not a step toward firing him.

Here’s the kicker thought: the whole violation of “NBC News policy and standards” thing is really the secondary reason Olbermann was fired.

In suspending Mr. Olbermann, NBC appeared to be trying to differentiate itself from the Fox News Channel, a unit of the News Corporation. NBC executives privately said that they saw a chance to draw a distinction between the journalistic standards of their news division and the standards of Fox, a favorite of Republicans. Media Matters, a liberal media monitoring group that opposes Fox, noted on Friday afternoon that two Fox News hosts, Neil Cavuto and Sean Hannity, had given money to Republican politicians in the past.

To add insult to injury, Olbermann’s “temporary” replacement is someone who’s been known to make campaign contributions to Dems too… but it’s okay, because he’s not an MSNBC employee.

Does this even make sense? How is Olbermann cutting a check any different or worse than the Democratic Party cheerleading he does on almost every episode of “Countdown?”

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