Donna:
The people you mentioned weren’t dumped into those jobs off the street!
Olbermann – For many years was a very respected and widely loved sports journalist/anchor/commentator. Yes, that’s quite different from politics but is certainly a career that demonstrates whether someone has wit, charisma, intelligence, and a unique point of view.
Matthews – (although i’m NOT a fan) – Matthews worked as a print journalist for 15 years, spending 13 years as Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief for The San Francisco Examiner (1987 – 2000), and two years as a nationally syndicated columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle. — in addition he served on several Congressional staffs and as a presidential speech writer.
Jon Stewart – Years as a professional comedian with a strong emphasis in political humor/commentary, followed by his own talk show on MTV. Again, the MTV show wasn’t directly political satire/commentary, but it demonstrated his wit, point-of-view, etc etc.
Peter Jennings – your point is slightly closer to the mark here, except that he didn’t get where he was because of connections, he had a string of TV jobs that slowly led up to the top.
What I’m amazed by is that only one person here bought up Huffington Post – they’re horrible for letting any celebrity write a column. But at least with them, they’re opinion pieces, they don’t sent these people into the field as journalists.
As for the View, I don’t know any even mildly deep thinkers on the left or right that pay any attention to that fluff. And Caroline Kennedy is not finding much support at all – from the media or the Left – so good luck on using that as your straw man.
