Two days after he was let go by Current TV, Keith
Olbermann has signed with Fox News Channel. The former ESPN, Fox Sports, and
MSNBC anchor has agreed to a reported $4 million contract where he will take
over the weeknight prime time 9PM slot, which previously belonged to Sean
Hannity.
“Although it’s in a different venue, I’m very pleased to
come back to Fox. I hope I can be as wildly successful here as I have been in
the past. I do know that now Fox News will be truly fair and balanced,” said
Olbermann in a statement.
Hannity, however, was stunned by the news.
“Over the past fifteen years I have helped Fox News rise to
the top, and this is how Roger [Ailes] treats me? They couldn’t have even gone
with ‘Hannity and Olbermann’?” Hannity said when interviewed about the story. ‘Hannity’
was the second highest rated program in all of cable news.
Olbermann will bring his show, titled “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” to Fox News, and has said that much of the show will be devoted to his program’s preceding anchor, Bill O’Reilly.
Olbermann will bring his show, titled “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” to Fox News, and has said that much of the show will be devoted to his program’s preceding anchor, Bill O’Reilly.
“I want to make sure
everybody knows the truth about Billo, and by going on right after him, I can
better expose him for the pretentious hack that he is. I won’t rest though
until I have his time slot too.” said Olbermann.
O’Reilly seemed indifferent to the news when asked about it.
“This could be a good thing. Maybe Sean can stick to radio
now. It’ll get those Media Matters creeps to stop obsessing over us for a while.
I just hope that pinhead will have me on his dopey program from time to time,
because one hour of camera time isn’t very much. But I’m not going to try to
find his studio, I’ll tell you that much,” O’Reilly said in a phone interview
from his Long Island home.
The news comes in stark contrast to the position of the network’s
parent company, News Corporation. When asked last year in an interview with Fox News’ anchor Neil Cavuto about whether Olbermann would ever be hired to work for Fox
News Channel, News Corporation CEO Rupert Murdoch, said, “No. We fired him
once. We don’t believe in firing people twice.”
Asked whether he will continue his famous “Worst Person in
the World” segment that has traveled with him to two networks, and whether that
segment will include his new colleagues at Fox News, Olbermann simply replied, “We’ll
just have to wait and see.”
Many people around the world, both of the conservative and
progressive persuasion, are dumbfounded by the turn of events, forgetting what
today is.
