Progressive propaganda doesn’t seem to be doing well in the ratings since President Obama’s reelection. MSNBC dropped to fourth place behind the HLN network in May.
The Hollywood Reporter notes it was a really bad month for the progressive network. All In with Chris Hayes is down 32 percent compared to the show it replaced (Ed Schultz). And the channel’s leading primetime anchor, Rachel Maddow, had her worst ratings since her show debuted, just 717k total viewers. Even Piers Morgan beat Maddow in May.
Just two months ago MSNBC President Phil Griffin told the New Republic that Fox News–dubbed “Loserville” by MSNBC staffers–was in his sights. That was the result of higher numbers MSNBC did during the 2012 election. Even as MSNBC’s fortunes have declined, Fox has continued to grow, gaining 24 percent in daily viewership.
So poor were MSNBC’s ratings this month that they actually came in fourth place behind HLN which devoted itself to coverage of the Jodi Arias trial. The network’s decline is even more striking compared to this time last year, “MSNBC suffered double-digit drops from last May — down a respective 20 and 19 percent.”
One possible cause of the network’s problems is that MSNBC has moved too far to the left. A recent study by Pew Research found that MSNBC was 85 percent opinion and just 15 percent straight reporting. An earlier Pew report found that MSNBC did not offer a single negative story about President Obama in the final week of the campaign. Apparently, outside the context of an election, progressive opinion just is not that captivating to viewers, at least not to very many of them.