Al Jazeera America (AJA) is set to launch on August 20 but if you have Time Warner cable you won’t have the chance to see Soledad O’Brien, David Shuster and all the other failed retreads AJA has hired.
As Michael Calderone reports, Time Warner dropped Current TV immediately when Al Jazeera purchased Al Gore’s failed cable operation in January. Time Warner said at the time they’d “keep an open mind” as AJA developed. The cable company says they are in negotiations with AJA but as of now, the Qatar-owned news agency will not appear on Time Warner when they debut next week.
Many observers believe AJA will eventually appear on Time Warner, and the current stand-off is just another negotiating tactic employed by America’s number two cable operator. Time Warner is currently in its 3rd week of a stalemate with CBS resulting in the cable company’s customers being blacked out from CBS in New York, Los Angeles and Dallas in addition to many smaller markets.