Former NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams has been demoted down to breaking news anchor at MSNBC. However, on top of the humiliation of such a demotion, Williams shouldn't be too surprised to find a somewhat less than welcoming reception from the sanity challenged network of Big Ed and Reverend Al.
According to a New York Post report, the rank and file staffers at MSNBC absolutely hate Brian Williams for a less than complimentary report on the state of cable news on his former Rock Center program:
Brian Williams’ welcome to MSNBC might be frigid because staffers there haven’t forgotten a scathing report he arrogantly aired on his short-lived “Rock Center” about “corrosive” cable news blowhards at MSNBC, Fox News and CNN.
The two-part September 2012 report was so unpopular at MSNBC that, at a network holiday party shortly after, some over-served staffers even chanted “F - - k Brian Williams.”
Yeesh! Perhaps Williams better make his own coffee after his MSNBC arrival to avoid being served coffee with a strange salty taste. Here are more Post details of what inspired the Brian hate at MSNBC:
Williams is now a cable staffer after his demotion from NBC’s “Nightly News” anchor chair. But in 2012, as anchor and managing editor of his own show, “Rock Center,” he aired a two-parter on cable news’ “partisan ranting” from correspondent Ted Koppel. Williams introduced one segment by describing cable as, per Koppel, “corrosive and does nothing to help compromise in this country.”
Williams stuffily wondered, “Has any of this splashed up against what we do?” Koppel responded: “What works about cable television is it’s cheap and it makes a ton of money. There is nothing cheaper than a bunch of talking heads. The people who hire those talking heads have discovered the more irascible, the more partisan, the nastier they are, the bigger an audience.”
“The rank and file at MSNBC were furious at Brian,” a source told Page Six. “They hated it so much, they were still mad about it months later at the office Christmas party.” That’s where some cheered “F - - k Brian Williams” — “It was like a rallying cry,” our source said.
Here is a clip of the broadcast so hated by the MSNBC staffers that they profanely slammed Brian Williams:
Exit question: Will Brian Williams try to make nice with the MSNBC staffers by giving them tickets to sit next to him while he leers at his daughter taping the intense scenes on set of Girls?
