Justin's Political Corner

We are proud to announce The Ed Show hosted by Ed Schultz will return to MSNBC starting Saturday, May 11 at 5 p.m. ET.

The Saturday and Sunday show will debut as a one-hour long program expanding to a two-hour format from 5-7 p.m. ET later this summer.

James Holm who is currently the Executive Producer of The Ed Schultz Radio Show will serve as acting Executive Producer of The Ed Show.

Karen Finney’s new program will also debut on May 11 from 4-5 p.m. ET. More information on that program will be announced in the coming days.

H/T: MSNBC

Conservatives are outraged by an MSNBC host who talked with her daughter in an online segment about whether it’s OK if gays and lesbians marry the people they love.

Krystal Ball is co-host of MSNBC’s The Cycle, and the conversation with her daughter stuck to the basics of who is legally allowed to marry who in their home state of New York. It could be similar to how parents in that state have explained life in New York state.

Glenn Beck’s website, The Blaze, labeled the moment “Cringe-Inducing.” The headline on conservative blog, “Liberty Unyielding,” claimed, “MSNBC’s Krystal Ball exploits own 5-year-old daughter on TV to promote gay marriage.”

Writing for conservative firebrand Michelle Malkin’s website, Doug Powers called Ball’s questions a form of child abuse. “Flip the subject being pushed on the little girl to something like pro-life values and MSNBC would be reporting it as child abuse,” Powers wrote. “I’ll say this much: At least in this example it’s her own kid instead of a room full of other people’s children.”

Exactly what’s appropriate for conversation between a parent and child came up recently for conservatives when Ronald Reagan’s daughter, Patti Davis, said her father explained to her when she was “very young” that “some men are born wanting to love another man.”

h/t: The Advocate

NEW YORK –April 2, 2013 – Karen Finney has been named host of a new MSNBC program to air on weekends from 4-5 p.m. ET. More details about the program, including the launch date, will be announced in the coming weeks.

“Karen’s rich background in both education policy and politics will add a unique point of view to our expanding live weekend programming,” said Phil Griffin, President of MSNBC.

Finney has been an MSNBC political analyst and guest host on the network since 2009.

Finney has more than 20 years of experience in national politics working on four presidential campaigns, the Clinton White House, and Hillary Clinton’s first New York Senate race. She was the first African American spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee. Finney has also worked to improve public education in the public and private sectors.

As spokeswoman and Communications Director for the Democratic National Committee, Finney helped guide the DNC’s communications and media strategy for the successful 2006 Congressional elections and the 2008 presidential campaign. During the Clinton Administration, Karen served as Deputy Press Secretary to then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and as Deputy Director of Presidential Scheduling for President Bill Clinton. She served as Communications Director to Elizabeth Edwards during the 2004 general election.

Finney currently serves on the board of NARAL pro-choice America. She has also served on the advisory board for ONE Vote 2012, the Center for Music National Service and Teach for America, NY. Finney is an alumnus of the French American Foundation’s prestigious “Young Leaders” program aimed at strengthening the transatlantic relationship among up-and-coming leaders. She is also a member of the National Association of Black Journalists. Follow her on twitter @finneyk. 

h/t: NBC Universal’s Press Centre

Chris Hayes will take over the 8 p.m. time slot on MSNBC in the next month, the channel is planning to announce on Thursday morning, hours after the current host of that hour, Ed Schultz, said he was moving from the weekdays to the weekends.

Mr. Hayes, a liberal intellectual who has hosted a well-regarded weekend morning program on MSNBC for the past 18 months, is a protege of Rachel Maddow, the highest-rated host on the channel. He will become the lead-in for her 9 p.m. program, “The Rachel Maddow Show.”

The change is predicated on the belief that MSNBC can win a wider audience with Mr. Hayes than it did with Mr. Schultz, a champion of the working class whose bluster didn’t always pair well with Ms. Maddow and the channel’s other prime time program, “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell.” Mr. Hayes, on the other hand, is just as wonky as Ms. Maddow and Mr. O’Donnell, and is a regular contributor to both of their programs.

Mr. Hayes’s promotion was described by people who spoke on the condition of anonymity because it had not been officially announced by the channel yet. Once it takes effect, Mr. Hayes, 34, will be the youngest host of a prime-time show on any of the country’s major cable news channels, all of which seek out youthful viewers but tend to have middle-aged hosts and a core audiencemade up of senior citizens. Of Mr. Schultz’s one million viewers last year, for example, only 249,000 were between the ages of 25 and 54.

Ms. Maddow had an average of 339,000 viewers in that key demographic. Usually cable news ratings work the other way — the programs earlier in the evening outperform the programs later in the evening. That’s partly why MSNBC sees an opportunity to grow at 8 p.m.

But taking over that hour is a difficult assignment for Mr. Hayes, given Bill O’Reilly’s commanding grip on the time slot. Mr. O’Reilly, the biggest star on the Fox News Channel, routinely doubled Mr. Schultz’s delivery of 25- to 54-year-old viewers last year, much to the chagrin of Mr. Schultz, who parodied his rival on a regular basis. The ratings imbalance at 8 p.m. helped to obscure the fact that MSNBC has, in prime time overall, crept closer to Fox in that age group.

Mr. Hayes is as eager as anyone at MSNBC to beat Fox, even if the two channels don’t actually fight for the same viewers. His metamorphosis from a writer at The Nation magazine to a broadcaster began several years ago when he was signed up to be a part-time paid contributor to MSNBC. He impressed executives at the channel when he filled in for Ms. Maddow in 2011, and in September of that year he was given his weekend morning show, called “Up with Chris Hayes.”

h/t: NY Times’s MediaCoder blog

Meet Scott Prouty. On any given day you might find him tending bar, saving women from crocodile-infested waters or recording videos that change the course of American history. No big deal. As he made splendidly evident on his hotly anticipated debut television appearance on Wednesday night, Prouty didn’t release the 47 Percent video for the fame or the glory or the politics of it all. He certainly didn’t release it out of loyalty to the Democrats or Republicans, as he’s a member of neither party. Prouty released it based on principle.

Eight o’clock on Wednesday night marked the event horizon for Prouty going completely public. Wearing a blue tie and pinstripe suit the Boston native appeared on The Ed Show to reveal his face for the first time and answer questions about his now famous — or infamous, depending on your leanings — video. When the program started, David Corn, the Mother Jones reporter who turned the “47 percent” video into a viral sensation and a turning point in the presidential campaigns, sang Prouty’s praises and said he was glad the world could finally “experience his thoughtfulness, sincerity and passion.” Corn also tweeted two quotes from the interview that stand out. ”I wanted Mitt Romney’s words … to be the absolute center of attention,” Prouty told MSNBC host Ed Schulz. He quickly added, “I am registered independent.”

The whole story behind the “47 Percent” video and Prouty’s multiple attempts to get the mainstream media’s attention is revelatory in a number of ways. It’s also not entirely new. Last September, BuzzFeed’s Ben Smithoffered up a terrific timeline of how the person behind the camera at that $50,000-a-plate campaign dinner tried to make the video go viral well before Mother Jones dropped its bombshell. More details emerged with Prouty’s Ed Show appearance, though — like the one about the one time Prouty saved a woman’s life by pulling her out of a sinking car after she’d skidded off the road into water. There’s also the inevitably inspirational tale of his personal battle over releasing the tape and well concerted effort to stay out of the spotlight so that the story could speak for itself.

H/T: The Atlantic