The U.S. Chamber of Commerce Fascism should be eliminated.

It is nothing but an extension of Fox, Clearchannel, the Heritage Foundation, and every other group of rightwing, corporate financed liars, whose only goal is to fool imbeciles (tea baggers) into fighting for their own economic destruction, while creating "percieved" disunity within the working classes.

Why are these anti american scumbags, housed within our government?

If these corporate scumbags can afford to spend billions on their propaganda outlets, then they can afford to pay billions more in taxes!

Will they embrace the right wing Aryan Brotherhood and other right wing racist crowds?

How about the right wingers that want to spray down Mexicans and other Latinos with machine gun fire- will they be given a voice in a new Nazi network?
How about the rabid gaybashers- will they be given a forum top spew their hatred?
I suspect neo-Nazis are eager to get any forum to preach hatred of others...
I doubt Comcast is driven by politics- they care only about the $$$

And it is exactly what they want, Corporate control of all you see, and hear. Permanent Majority, single party system, = AUTHORITARIAN

It is a blatant Authoritarian move, but as 65% of any population, redgardless how educated or liberal, will capitulate to any Authority figure( see Milgram experiment), we have our work cut out for us.

...a welcome place for millions and millions of Americans who’ve been looking for an entertainment network and media channel that reflects their point-of-view.

You mean to tell me we don't have enough of this kind of crap now? Ever heard of Fox? They is no way Comcast should come anywhere near MSNBC.

What's next; a name change? TB Broadcasting..........the network for 'engaged' Teabaggers.

That's why I went with FIOS. Now that I know this, I'm even more glad.

Funny how the wingnuts are always bitching about the 'liberal media' but i don't see anyone giving MoveOn.org their own freaking cable network.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2Je1CEPkUM&fe...

...potential acquisition of NBC/MSNBC? Sign me up!

What progressive/liberal news outlets will we be left with if the right-wingnuts are enabled by the FCC to take over MSNBC? CNN is a lost cause.

It's a right-wing lie that there's a "liberal media".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjvuqK9WDrE

Back during the 60's and 70's the type of whackadoo that makes up the modern teabaggers were push to the margins of society for precisely the reason that they're racist, nutjob, corporatist demagogues. These are the very people that Barry Goldwater warned about and nobody paid attention to until it was too late. Looking back at the Reagan years, these nuts finally got an icon to use, though Reagan would have been sick of these people as well.

They're not kidding when they say they surround us, though not in the way they're thinking. They surround us in that they own every avenue of public expression. Every TV network. Every print newspaper. Every radio channel. They've even branched out into satellite, cable and eventually the web. They've put people into government at all levels in every agency. They've populated the military with their sympathizers and even with their own members. They've also done their damnedest to push legislation to forcibly model America in the direction they want. They've managed to get created an 'Office of Faith Based Initiatives' which exists solely for the purpose of helping favored religion spread (and don't give me that nonsense about it 'doing good in the community'. We already know that's bullshit just by the Bush years rejection of anyone who wasn't Christian and specifically Protestant and Baptist) using tax payer money. Despite not giving them everything they wanted, they had a Friend in Dubya and the Republican congress - mostly because the wingnuts are easily manipulated by waving crosses and flags.

The simplest illustration of this was the rapid restructuring of television and FCC fines after the Janet Jackson nipple slip. These phone patriots calling for 'freedom from the government' were the very people who wrote, by the thousands to the FCC to complain because for half a second ZOMG we saw an uncovered female body part. Because of this now, networks can be slapped with ridiculous fines for not bleeping curses or having 'wardrobe malfunctions' that border on the suppression of free speech.

This doesn't mean that there are more conservatives in America or that America is a right leaning nation. What it means is that the right has maneuvered itself rather like a chess master and like an octopus has entwined itself around all means of expression. They are the mine owners. They are the corporate farmers. They are the oil drillers. They are the corporate think tanks minions...and they are systematically trying to destroy bit by bit everything this country stands for to remake it in their own image.

The problem is, though we're EASILY able to see this now because of the intertoobs it's been going on for thirty years or more. They're embedded now, like a tick they're feeding off the country. With one hand they poo poo pork barrel spending and handouts all the while getting more handouts than anyone else. But pointing out this hypocrisy isn't enough. Blogging isn't enough.

If you don't agree with these blockheads then you need to make it known in a very public way. Why are the teabaggers getting all the press? Because WE ARE LETTING IT HAPPEN. They used to be a bunch of gun and bible clutching rednecks hiding out in their houses and bunkers and militia camps but now, they're organizing and gathering. You don't beat an organized, corporate funded effort by sitting around on your duffs whining about how mean they are. The center-left of this nation need to get their asses out and counter-protest. Unless we do, our country is going back to the Bushian model starting in 2010. Why? Because our politicians are a bunch of scared sheep and their politicians are Machiavellian. The Republicans bend over backwards to prop up the right wing because they know they'll get their votes over the Democrats.... but the Democrats have been mocking those of us on the left who voted for them, over and over - to play up to the same pool of crazy rightwing voters. They've bought into the illusion that America is a center right nation....and they're betting all of our lives and futures on it.

So if this comcast thing pisses you off? Do something about it. Write to comcast. Tell them how you feel about it. Cancel your cable and get satellite or verizon fios or something. Kick them in the pocket book. It's that or consider yourself dustbinned for the next few generations.

and above all when it comes time to do it GET YOUR ASS OUT THERE AND VOTE. Because every vote not cast against people like Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin is a vote cast FOR Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin.

One day this corporate house of t**ds will come tumbling down.

I wonder if the people will give the conservative leaders the Mussolini treatment when it does; or maybe the Reign of Terror II, for their conservative reign of error and misery inflicted on the populace?

Unfortunately, looking at large areas of the country, so many people are brainwashed and stupid, I doubt it will happen in my lifetime.

into common man, middle america.

I'm a Comcast subscriber but will be dumping it when ATT Versus arrives...but I also wonder what tier will this network occupy? Will it part of the basic package or the more expensive ones?

I bring this up because Comcast (and Direct and Dish) all offer Fox News and CNN in their basic packages, but usually not MSNBC.

Yes, there is time for action, both in helping the opposition to the acquisition, and by a subscriber boycott or threat thereof.

If the conversation begins with "what we call America" and it doesn't include all of America than the scope is too small by half. There is a trust for those who provide access to information in a country that respects free press. A trust that will be violated and proudly by those who provide information to support an ideology as opposed to providing information responsible only to the veracity of that information.
This merger is very bad idea.

Any info as to which companies/persons are bankrolling this new network?

.

Good = Right!
Bad = Wrong!
Up = right!
Down = wrong?
In = Right!
Out = Wrong?
Right = Right!
Left = Wrong?
NO = Right!
Yes = Wrong?
Bible = Right!
Science = Wrong?

... And we wonder why America is becoming even more polarized.

Wealth Care = Right!
Universal Care = Wrong?
Laissez Fare Economics= Right!
Strict Oversight/Accountability = Wrong?
Corporate Personhood = Right!
One Voice/One Vote = Wrong?

... Am I getting close to the core of the problem, yet?

.

Three sure signs idiot wind is gonna blow.

More than their fair share of taxes? I'll bet most of these guys are from red states, most of which take in more fed money than they contribute.

I say this over and over again: an educated electorate and a free press are essential to a successful democracy, and we as a nation have been too busy pursuing material goods to bother about either of them. Now our chickens have come home to roost as the material goods are gone and the education we need to prevent all these corporate takeovers is not ours. So of course Comcast will do this deal, and most people won't even notice there's yet another bias.

in the PDF, of what looks like a photo of the pro-immigration reform marches from sometime back.

It is all about ratings and they know most of the country will be watching these programs. It is supply and demand, not tax and spend. There are alot of us Tea Partiers out there.

Can't wait until November.

Karoli,
I just listened to your interview on Nicole Sandler's show from April 19 for the second time by podcast. Then I read this blog entry for the first time and looked at the lookbook pdf. Good thing you saved a copy. The image of the tv set in the rightnetwork lookbook resembles the image of the tv set in prior Comcast direct mail ads I have received to get me to subscribe to more than cable tv only. I went to archive.org and looked up the address cn8.tv (what used to be the comcast network of in-house news and talk shows with infomercials) and it now redirects me to csnphilly.com the comcastsportsnet Philadelphia site. Comcast is headquartered in Philadelphia. On the archived sites from as far back as 2004 cn8.tv wasn't directing to their sports site. One of the people in the pdf lookbook blurbing rightnetwork is Herman Cain a black conservative talk host. He may have been on the comcast network along with Larry Kane and Art Fennell who are still on it. Comcast may be trying to rebrand their in-house news/talk channel The Comcast Network as Right Network (cheaper for them to produce because they have more control of costs than paying another network for carrying fees that are negotiated).

Maybe Comcast fears other conservative channels like Faux News Channel will raise their carry fees causing money losses from keeping Faux on lower cost service tiers than MSNBC. Rupert Murdoch is going to charge for online newspaper access to all his newspapers and may raise FNC carry fees.
In the Wash DC area Comcast refused to carry Mid Atlantic Sports Network (MASN) from its start in April 2005 to August 2006 while Comcast sued in Montgomery County, MD circuit court for breach of contract because Comcast SportsNet wasn't given rights to show Orioles and Nationals baseball games. Comcast would be forced into a negotiation of per-subscriber carry fees with MASN instead of owning the baseball game content provider Comcast Sportsnet. Comcast raised their fees $2 when they lost their suit and started carrying MASN for a carry fee of $2 per subscriber. It was big news in the Wash DC area because the then-new baseball team Nationals (former Montreal Expos) wasn't viewable on cable tv in the parts of the Wash DC area where Comcast had cable franchises. People could only see MASN if they had subscribed to another cable or satellite company that served their area like DishNetwork or DirectTV, RCN, or Cox (Virginia suburbs only).
Comcast fired several employees for trying to organize a union in Montgomery County, MD and then sued two county council members who supported the workers attempts to get rehired. One former council member sued now works in the DOJ, Thomas Perez. He didn't have enough law practice experience (10 years required and Perez's past DOJ experience in the Clinton administration didn't count) in Maryland to run for attorney general in 2006. The governor Martin O'Malley, after being elected himself in 2006, appointed Thomas Perez as secretary of DLLR. O'Malley is running again this year against the former governor, Robert Ehrlich, he defeated in 2006. Thomas Perez left the state government for the DOJ civil rights division in 2009. The other council member Comcast sued, George Leventhal, is still on the county council and is running for reelection this year.

I pay for cell phone and home long distance service from another company and local phone and internet access from a 3rd company. Probably costs me more but I want to use my consumer dollars to keep what few telecom competitors there are divided against each other rather than bundling services with one company.