Keith Olbermann keeps it real; he has no problem with pulling the cover off extremists’ misinformation

 Welcome back, Keith!

 

COMMENTARY 

 

By Juanita Bratcher 

   

Whether he’s disliked by his inside colleagues or not (as reported in Chicago Sun-Times’ Bill Zwecker’s column), MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann has a big fan base out there in the universe, and I’m one of those fans. When I heard that Olbermann had been suspended indefinitely from MSNBC, I was baffled and getting ready to pull the plug on the cable network channel altogether, and sacrifice watching my two other favorites in the station’s lineup – Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow.

 In conversations with friends and professional colleagues, also fans of Keith Olbermann, they also expressed pulling the plug until Olbermann was back on the air.

 Olbermann was suspended by MSNBC chief executive Phil Griffin for making a political donation to three Democratic candidates running for elective office, a violation of NBC’s policy. Olbermann admitted donating $2400 a piece to the campaigns of U.S. Reps. Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords and Kentucky Senate candidate Jack Conway.

 In Zwecker’s November 8, 2010 column, he said several sources at MSNBC and NBC said “Olbermann is widely disliked at MSNBC, where he’s called ‘an insufferable diva’ and ‘a snob and bully – and those are just the descriptions printable in a family newspaper…’ “

 Reportedly, in an online petition, liberal groups had amassed more than 300,000 signatures calling for Olbermann’s reinstatement.     

While off the air, Olbermann stated on his Twitter page, “Greetings from exile! A quick, overwhelmed, stunned THANK YOU for support that feels like a global hug.”

In a statement Monday, Griffin said Olbermann would be back on the air Tuesday (November 9), and that MSNBC “look forward to having him back on the air…”

Welcome back, Keith!! We (fans) missed that very effective voice of yours, and that excellent investigative journalism/reporting that you give to grateful viewers on a nightly basis.