NBC News dumps Ashleigh Banfield

World Net Daily ^ | 3-28-04

[truthandlife]

Less than a year after bashing her own network for its war coverage in Iraq, NBC News reporter Ashleigh Banfield has reportedly been given the axe.

The New York Daily News says the Canadian native has been working without a contract since late January, and she'll no longer be employed at MSNBC where she's been the last four years.

"Regrettably, we were unable to agree on a new assignment for her," an NBC News spokeswoman told the Daily News. "We thank her for her hard work and wish her well."

Banfield's manager, Alfred Geller, added, "Since her contract expired, we have been exploring with a variety of NBC components the possibility of future activity that would include cable and network. At the end of these explorations, we were mutually unable to come to an accommodation that was OK with everybody. It didn't work. Life marches on."

As WorldNetDaily reported last April, Banfield was officially scolded by network President Neal Shapiro for remarks she made ripping her colleagues in TV news for allegedly sugarcoating Iraq war coverage with patriotism and not showing the realities of the conflict.

Banfield, in a speech at Kansas State University, had lashed out at "cable news operators who wrap themselves in the American flag and go after a certain target demographic."

Banfield also claimed in her speech TV should have shown the gruesome results of coalition force in Iraq.

"We didn't see what happen when Marines fired M-16s," Banfield said. "We didn't see what happened after mortars landed, only the puff of smoke. There were horrors that were completely left out of this war. So was this journalism? Or was this coverage?"

Reporters embedded with troops said there was little or no opportunity to film the "blood and guts" of the war due to logistical reasons. Many did not see much combat action.

Banfield's address also suggested some cable TV networks skewed their coverage to please advertisers.

"It was a grand and glorious picture that had a lot of people watching," Banfield said, "and a lot of advertisers excited about cable TV news. But it wasn't journalism, because I'm not sure Americans are hesitant to do this again – to fight another war, because it looked to them like a courageous and terrific endeavor."

Banfield hosted "MSNBC Investigates" on the No. 3 cable news network. While MSNBC's ratings improved during the war, the network still came up short in the ratings game behind No. 1 Fox News and CNN.

Lloyd Grove of the Daily News says the 36-year-old former rock singer, "once a fashion icon for her blond tresses and her ever-present on-air glasses ... didn't try to butter up colleagues and supervisors, and instead cast herself as an enemy of the Establishment. She once showed up for anchor duties at MSNBC's Secaucus studios in New Jersey sporting a T-shirt that shouted, in garish glitter: 'Starf--r.'"

[truthandlife]

She needs to go back to Canada. She will fit in very good in that Socialist environment.

[Petronski]

Starf--r.

Huh?

[CindyDawg]

Guess she will write a book now.

[South40]

NBC News dumps Ashleigh Banfield...

...to make room for the next socialist pusbag who will take her place.

[Cicero]

She ought to be able to get a job with CBC.

I think NBC picked her primarily for her looks. I've always thought that the surplus of media posters you see around New York City and at train stations in Westchester are directed as much toward advertising executives and decision makers as they are to us common folks. For a while there, Ashleigh Banfield's face looked down at you from posters all over the city, as the face of NBC news.

It's a good sign if they canned her for being too liberal. I didn't think that was possible.

[jocon307]

I'll throw in some more letters for you:

Starf*cker

I'm not sure what the point is, unless she recently crossed paths with Mick Jagger or some such, but that's the word.

[MinuteGal]

Freepers don't give passes
To Lib-babes with glasses.

Leni

[Don Corleone]

Regrettably, we were unable to agree on a new assignment for her,"

Let her drive the "Zamboni" at the Garden. She's Canadien,Canadian eh! She'll love it.

[Petronski]

I kinda thought that's what it meant, but they really should have put "Star-----r" to indicate the proper number of letters.

[BenLurkin]

[VOA]

Banfield's address also suggested some cable TV networks skewed their coverage to please advertisers.

This ditz is at the wrong network; she needs to talk turkey with PBS, NPR and Pacifica Radio.

[Betaille]

"cable news operators who wrap themselves in the American flag and go after a certain target demographic."
That's pretty short on specifics. What demographic? What cable news operator?
All of the war coverage I saw on CNN was pretty awful and anti-american... so she doesn't seem to be talking about them.
By the way, why did they have someone so obviously anti-war doing "objective" iraq coverage?

[Betaille]

"Banfield hosted "MSNBC Investigates""
Should be called "MSNBC Editorializes". I ask again, why did they have someone so adamantly anti-war doing coverage of IRAQ???

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

So the media's coverage of GWII wasn't objective enough for this Marxist (objective = anti-American). If today's media had reported on WWII, everyone East of the Mississippi would be speaking German and everyone West would be speaking Japanese.

[litehaus]

Was it not this gal who during the Floriduh recount could not add a column of figures on msnbc?

[F16Fighter]

Banfield, in a speech at Kansas State University, had lashed out at "cable news operators who wrap themselves in the American flag and go after a certain target demographic."

If the "target demographic" Banfield was after were Leftists, anti-Americans, and corpses, she met ALL her own expectations with flying colors.

[clintonh8r]

Campbell Brown will be next, I hope. I imagine she wears a T-shirt that says Whoeverwilladvancemycareerf***er..

[Bobby777]

ditz (dit*s) - noun, though often used as an adjective

a) One who cannot tell the difference between a democratically-elected President and a terrorist-dictator; i.e., gushing about "Chairman Arafat"
b) An anti-Israeli weeping for the "oppressed" Palestinians giving tacit approval to terrorists
c) A "useful idiot" for the Middle East (reference "Rachel Corrie")

[dawn53]

I think NBC picked her primarily for her looks

A few years ago, after they sent Ashley to the Middle East and she changed her hair color and started wearing those horn rimmed glasses, Glenn Beck came up with a parody song about her changing looks that was hilarious.

The title was "Oh Why is Ashley Banfield Now A Man?"

[Endeavor]

They canned her because she shoved a finger in their faces - it had nothing to do with her liberal politics.