MSNBC will bring Keith Olbermann back from suspension on Tuesday

MSNBC has decided to return "Countdown" host Keith Olbermann to work on Tuesday, meaning that his much-discussed suspension for making unauthorized political donations will have lasted all of two work days.

In a statement released late Sunday, MSNBC President Phil Griffin said: "After several days of deliberation and discussion, I have determined that suspending Keith through and including Monday night's program is an appropriate punishment for his violation of our policy. We look forward to having him back on the air Tuesday night."

Since Olbermann's indefinite suspension was announced Friday, many critics have questioned the decision, including Rachel Maddow, Olbermann's colleague on the prime-time lineup.

-Scott Collins (Twitter: @scottcollinsLAT)

Photo: Keith Olbermann; Credit: Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press

 

Comments

[JohnRJ08]

At least MSNBC doesn't try to pass itself off as "fair and balanced" news. Even with their overt liberal bias, Olbermann, Maddow and Matthews are still better with the facts than their counterparts at FOX News.

[Matt]

David Carr and Rachel Sklar were on CNN Sunday talking about Olbermann:
http://bit.ly/cdSE5p

[nag]

Once Comcast completes their purchase of NBC Universal at the end of this year. I believe the unholy trio of Olbermann, Matthews and Maddow will be shown the door. Comcast is in this to make money, and the viewership of these 3 shows is so low that they are big-time money losers.

[Verbalocity]

Who cares? PMSNBC only gets a few viewers every night. As a media outlet, it's not relevant.

[OBAMA: BEST THING TO HAPPEN TO THE GOP SINCE JIMMY CARTER]

Keith who?

WITH THE LOWEST RATINGS IN CABLE NEWS, WHO THE HECK CARES WHAT MSNBC DOES?

[DAK4Blizzard]

This is the right decision. If the Supreme Court can allow corporations to contribute unlimited campaign money, what's to stop Keith Olbermann from contributing?

[buz]

MSNBC is not a news network. Richard Maddow and fat head Olberman are communists and their goal is for the destruction of the US and conversion to a Venezuelan, Hugo Chavez like dictatorship.

[JP]

Great to hear he will be back on air. Keith is a intelligent, motivated, honest and liable journo. Someone who can breakthrough all of the BS that the other networks portray to us and calls it as he sees it. Anyone calling the BS on the Tea Party and the GOP needs to stay on air!

[Onboard Skeptic]

Great that the Edward R. Morrow of our times has come back once again to enchant us! As I noted in my last post about this, his condemnations of Bush in his commentaries were spot on.

[Richard]

Keith was suspended from his spot on MSNBC for violating a rule that pertained to NBC news. MSNBC is not the same as NBC. MSNBC is not news. It's commentary about news. The rule should never have been applied to Keith. He is not a journalist who needs to maintain neutrality. Even so, he never promoted on air any of the candidates to whom he contributed. What a huge waste of time.

[J. Moody]

It will be great to have Keith KOing Fox again. While MSNBC and FOX are both heavily biased, MSNBC at least has some journalistic integrity. FOX straight out lies with no shame.

[Zoo]

Keith Oooooooooooooooolbermann - the worst person in the world!

Roll bumper.

[Paul Levinson]

MSNBC's suspension of Olbermann was based on a rule that has no basis in reality - that commentators are supposed to be impartial, and that making a monetary contribution to a political campaign you support somehow undermines your commentary about this campaign. http://paullev.libsyn.com/msnbc-wrong-to-suspend-keith-olbermann

[stever999]

Olbermann is one of their money makers. Would a NFL team bench their best Quarerback for long?

[David Warheit]

No matter how one may feel about Keith Olbermann, NO ONE has the right to forbid anyone else the right to contribute to whatever candidate(s) he likes. If MSNBC would like to be informed in advance of a contribution so it could avoid anything unseemly, fine, but they cannot invade his constitutional rights. Everyone should rejoice that he will soon be back on the air.

[Michael Patrick]

western democracies can rest more easily tonight............keith be on watch............ hallelujah................ truth and justice.........................

[Mike]

He's a sportscaster , trying to act intelligent. Just like his counterpart, Rachael Maddow, theres a landscaper turned journalist. No wonder, MSNBC has horrible ratings.

Their experience equals our President, NONE!!!!!!

[Charlie]

Bottom line is both companies have two very different sets of rules with it comes to political donations and if the roles were reversed, this discussion would go in a very different direction. There would be outcries of journalistic integrity because one has a policy that says “NO” and the other has a policy that says “policy? what’s that?”.
Why anyone here bothers to try and discuss this kind of stuff is beyond comprehension. Less that 5% of the regular posters here have an objective viewpoint, while the rest are so far in one direction or another, if it were boat it would be rocking port to starboard to port to starboard to port to starboard, etc.

[Celia]

I am not surprised......MSNBC is like some of our politicians. and states...so corrupt...and they serve a corrupt people. My state fired it's House and Senate ....136 years they were Democrats....after Tuesdays election....it is no more...

MSNBC needs a good house cleaning.

[DCannon]

Wow, talk about a misnomer! "thetruth" states that Olbermann's latest book ranks 1800th on Amazon. This would be a good example of "truthiness" and how much difficulty some of these people have with facts. Olbermann's book is not even close to the ratings stated in this post (in fact, they are quite good), but I invite you to take a look yourself. It's a shame that people feel they must resort to such tactics to attack those they do not agree with.