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Fox Business Network: NY Times' Joe Nocera Can’t Take It Anymore
October 22, 2007

“It’s was Thursday around 4:40 and I couldn’t take it anymore” said NY Times' Joe Nocera of the nascent Fox Business Network.  Nocera finally muted his television after watching Liz Claman’s much-touted live interview with Warren Buffet.

“When he declined to answer about which currency he was interested in, he barely had to explain his rationale for not answering.  She did it for him!  She was so ingratiating, it was painful to watch,” reported Nocera.

I’d heard that FBN was going to be “friendlier,”  “breezy,” “accessible, ”  “jargon free.”  (Subtext: dumbed down)

But it’s still jaw dropping to watch FBN’s on-air personalities slobbering like basset hounds all over their guests.

Conor Knighton, host of Current TV’s Infomania, sized-up some especially cringe-worthy clips from FBN’s first day on air.

“Groundbreaking” interviews included skateboarder Tony Hawk (who sat expressionless), a Naked Cowboy (from the sidewalks of Manhattan; he was bleeped out),  and Oscar de la Hoya.

One of the comely on-airs chirps that she just luuuuuves boxing, she really does:

“I’m a HUGE boxing fan…and I’m an HBO after box,  after uh,  nuhhhh, after, after huhhhh,  [then finally,  probably after some prodding over the earpiece]…Boxing After Dark, I’m a big fan.”

Current’s Knighton rightly observed that the on-air personalities were way out of their comfort zone, aching to be cool and hip but instead coming across as awkward and phony.  He then needled hedge fund manager Jonathan Hoenig for carrying on about “random personal crap.”

Hoenig ("managing member at Capitalistpig Hedge Fund LLC ") is an FBN host.  Surrounded by a bank of computers, he pokes his finger at a webcam and says he’s going to “let us into his world.”  He speaks earnestly into the cam.

“I like coffee.  I like the occasional cigarette.  I like politics.  I like television.  I like the occasional pretty girl.  At night, I’m the one snuggled up, but not always with a loved one.  Usually with a lap top and Wi-Fi.  Maybe you think that’s cool.  Maybe you think that’s pathetic.  But that’s my life.”

Ohhhh, compelling stuff.  Two years in the making!

No, cool would be Hoenig unshaven and disheveled, a cigarette dangling from mouth, flailing at his computer while his hedge fund tanks, maybe during the approaching mortgage security bondholder meltdown.  Yeah, that would be entertaining.

In another segment, an anchor brags:  “This is the kind of detail you won’t see anywhere else except the Fox Business Network.  Whatta we lookin’ at here, Bob!?”

“Bob,” the Chairman of CME, holds his arm up as the camera moves in for an extreme close-up of his shirtsleeve - and his cufflink stamped with the CME logo.

Yep, that’s just the kind of detailed business intelligence I need to optimize my portfolio.  

Knighton was ewwwww! as he watched the antics of a couple of middle-aged, on-air personalities as they feigned a strip tease.  Knighton then cheerfully clicked off the names of the FBN on-air eye candy:  “Alexis! Nicole!  Jenna!  Shibani!!

(CLICK HERE FOR PART TWO)

Posted by Mary McNamara on October 22, 2007 | Comments (0)