Ford: Overnight Update 2…
More info on what happened last night via Johnny Dollar…
MSNBC formally signed off their special coverage at 2:00 am for the Time & Again show. At 3:00 am they ran the same show again.
Jamie Colby, Jeff Goldblatt, Molly Henneberg, and James Rosen were on through the night until 5:00 am when Fox and Friends started early. Rosen was the MVP; he’s an expert on the Watergate era and had interviewed Ford several times. Guests included historian Richard Reeves, Susan Estrich, Debbie Dingell (who was a Republican back then!), Charles Krauthammer, and Ed Nixon.
Wendell Goler’s interview with Ford was parceled out over the evening in five segments; this interview had never been aired before. (Dumb question…but how long was FNC sitting on that interview for? -Spud) Jamie did pointedly remind viewers that FNC was the only network with live coverage. FNC was commercial free for most of the night. The first ad break came at 4:25 am.
Would have loved to know what they reported on all night long. I think the coverage pretty much should have been over for all of them after 2 hours. Then they could have just repeated what was aired earlier. Yacking about something for hours on end I bet was pretty much boring.
Comment by Big Dave — December 27, 2006 @ 1:49 pm
I believe that’s what CNN did. They palyed the LKL Ford episode then replayed AC360 from when the news broke.
Comment by IceMan — December 27, 2006 @ 3:26 pm
Overnight live was a bit of overkill… It’s odd, but CNN and MSNBC actually have STRENGTH in their tape libraries in this situation. The Time & Again episode was fascinating — better than the phoners and wallpaper b-roll on the other network.
Comment by Don — December 27, 2006 @ 3:30 pm
Why FNC live at 3am… No news at this hour!! Everybody in bed!!!
Comment by Rodrigo — December 27, 2006 @ 3:59 pm
Third shift hospital emergency rooms have fox on.Hope that helps Rodrigo.
Comment by mike — December 27, 2006 @ 4:14 pm
Come on… The guy is dead so.. is a non news event make a special coverage at this hour… Perhaps “millions” of viewers in Asia can whatch FNC live :P LOL… All in bed in America at this time. What may be happened? NOTHING! All news starts at six am when everybody get out the bed.
Comment by Rodrigo — December 27, 2006 @ 4:49 pm
I can’t believe you people are whining about the live coverage. If a network wants to be live at 3 a.m. or whatever time, in case further details were learned or whatever, then let them! It sounds like they just wanted to be on the air to report on additional details or in case any pundits had any info. they’d like to offer up.
Comment by Missy — December 27, 2006 @ 7:57 pm
Really? EVERYONE on the West Coast is in bed with the TV off at midnight? And not EVERYONE gets out of bed at 6 am. I, for one, get out of bed between 4:45 and 5 am every day. Hospital emergency rooms are open all night last time I checked, and they have TVs there.
Of course Rodrigo, maybe you should learn how to write in proper English before you start criticizing what a news channel did when a former President died. He’s not just “a guy.” Elected or not, he served our nation’s highest office and he is owed respect and as Missy said, if they want to run live coverage and have the staff to do it then so be it.
Comment by OverHere — December 27, 2006 @ 8:04 pm
News for emergency rooms in some hospitals… LOL!
Comment by Rodrigo — December 27, 2006 @ 8:35 pm
Rod, from your earlier post, most people may be asleep but there may still be that one person who isn’t sleeping and just decides, “what the hell, I’ll see what’s on FNC” and find out the news they didn’t find out earlier that evening. Still, think about it, you have these (in one sense) children (young correspondents) who only get air time during stories and not get to host programs, so why would they not take a change of hosting for a few hours! :)
Comment by Chris — December 27, 2006 @ 8:48 pm
Good grief Rodrigo, there are lots of other places that are open 24/7 and have TVs too. I just gave one example. But go ahead, criticize a news channel for covering actual NEWS instead of tabloid trash. I’m sure you know how to run a news network better than the professionals.
Comment by OverHere — December 27, 2006 @ 9:10 pm
Good point O.H., I actually forgot about the ‘actual news’ angle of this all, that is a nice change!
Comment by Chris — December 27, 2006 @ 9:13 pm