Do MSNBC hosts ever shut up? I'm watching the replay of Chris Hayes' show and...

[TreasonousBastard]

he almost never lets his guests finish a thought before interrupting. He thinks it's "probing", but it's just his big mouth.

Worse than Tweety. An interviewer's job is to get the subject to talk, not to prove he knows more than the subject.

PBS and NPR are so refreshing-- ask a question and listen to the answer. One of my favorite interviewers is Terri Gross-- she once had O'Reilly storming out of the studio without once insulting him or arguing. Just quietly posed questions that got him tripping himself up, and once he realized what was happening, he just had to leave. Others she manages to get to open up by showing genuine interest and not being threatening.

[JI7]

1. It's mostly those two who do that.

[Angry Dragon]

2. .............

[Awsi Dooger]

3. I've seen the opposite complaint about Hayes

That he allows the right wing guests to ramble.

Regardless, there is a fix. Don't have guests. Devote the first half hour to story telling with a smirk, and then repeat.

I agree PBS and NPR are excellent. Matter of fact astute questioning. I never recognize the complaints here. When I drive cross country several times per year NPR is the only salvation. Fortunately the stations are always in the same small range of the FM band. I can find the replacement station quickly as the old signal fades.

[TreasonousBastard]

6. Tried satellite radio? Sirius/XM has several channels that have kept me sane in parts of PA where...

FM is religion, rap, or country.

[nocalflea]

4. Damn, you went and reminded me of Charlie Rose.

The question. The Pause. The Answer. The Interruption with an unneeded clarification of the question.

He stepped all over and quashed some damn interesting responses. Ego.

[DFW]

5. They probably think they are being "assertive"

Or, they just watch too much Fox Noise, and, while gathering ammunition, they unconsciously pick up some of the habits of the worst of their competition.

Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O'Donnell are by far the least offensive of them, from the little I've seen while in the States. They are also, not coincidentally, the most laid back and the most intelligent.

Maybe some fine day, Matthews will figure out that "hardbawl" is best played by asking the hardest questions, not by having the hardest head.

[True Blue American]

7. Main Reason I do not like either one.

Both just blather.

Ari Melber and Nicole Wallace are my favorites. Both allow their guests to speak.

You can include Scarborough. His rants go on for 10 or 15 minutes.. I remember his past.

[TreasonousBastard]

13. AAaargghh... Scarborough! Had to turn him off the other day when he stepped on...

everyone! Mika tried to get a word in edgewise and he even shut her up. He was really rude and you could see it in her face.

Rarely watch him, and didn't realize he could be that bad. Won't be watching any more.

[UCmeNdc]

8. I was watching a Chris Hayes clip and thought the same thing

I just made a guess that perhaps he had a list of prepared questions and felt he had a limited amount of time to ask his guest these questions. Instead of saying we will never get through all of these questions he rushes his guest answers with a Chris Hayes rapid summation to go on to another Chris Hayes question. This makes it seem like Chris Hayes is talking during most of the interview.

[erlewyne]

9. You read my mind

I get on edge because I want to hear what they say.
I catch tweety about every day but go back to my
music because he drives me crazy by not shutting up.

I like Hayes but he is getting as bad.

[Skittles]

10. I agree with this assessment

I do enjoy full answers

[BumRushDaShow]

11. Some of this tactic I think

is due to the preponderance of bullshit artists that the GOP has trotted out over the past 10 years or so. And note that many of us on DU who follow the cable news shows often yell at the TV when a host allows a RW loon to just "go on and on and on" spewing complete nonsense, fabrications, and outright bold-faced lies and CT, without being challenged.

I agree that Tweety is the biggest offender - but mostly because he all too often does it to guests from "our" side, who then get overwhelmed because the network usually brings on the weakest among them as it is. Chris Hayes is more like someone amped up on steroids trying to get producer-generated questions in to satisfy the planned scope of the interview and perhaps gain a nugget of info out of the guest when doing that.

But then someone who also does this that isn't mentioned in this thread, is Joy - who can out-talk even Tweety. But we celebrate her doing it to the "other side". To be fair, she is usually asked to handle some of the worst of the worst of the gish gallopers, and I would say that she does it with style.

[tomp]

12. i think it depends what the interviewee is saying.

presumably, the ultimate goal of an interview is to get important information to the public, not to serve anyone's particular agenda.

there are time constraints on news shows (a problem in itself) and many guests are not concise, are pushing an agenda, are professional PR people, even propagandists. The best example I can think of right now is kelly ann conway. she deflects and repeats, period. If you don't stop her, you're not doing journalism, you're acting as an enabler of propaganda. one could argue that havingher on at all is poor journalism.

this same idea applies at one level or another to most interviewee's. i have no problem with an interviewer attempting to guide the discussion toward the most important truth of any particular moment. a minority of interviewees will be completely cooperative in this endeavor. the others either shouldn't be there in the first place or need the strong guidance of a skilled journalistic interviewer, even to the point of cutting off their mikes, like copper did with miller.

we need better tv journalists as well.

[TreasonousBastard]

14. Cutting off their mikes? I've wondered why they don't do more of that with the...

gish gallopers. I suppose there are some informal rules about that, but after a while they don't get booked any more. Everyone knows who the bullshit artists are, and giving them less air time is the answer.

In this case, though, Hayes stepped on Maria Jinojosa-- a star NPR journalist who was making some good points. He also stepped on a Princeton professor making some other good points. The rest of the guests were so-so and I didn't really care what he did with them-- but it still wasn't nice. I wanted to hear more from those two.

(No, I don't really suspect racism with the Latina reporter or the black professor-- more likely he just didn't like being upstaged by people who knew what they were talking about)

[Mike Nelson]

15. I'm sure he wanted...

...a "scoop" like Ari Melber had recently - but Morning Joe's Mika got it with a well-placed question. Chris would have had a chance to get his interview overplayed by letting his guest talk more and - maybe - trip himself up. Chris did have a good give-and-take, but Felix was always on top of his game.

[Luciferous]

16. Joe does that too, it drives me nuts. He constantly interrupts Mika as well, it's so rude!

[TreasonousBastard]

17. As I sorta said above, I can't really watch him...

First, there's rarely anything important breaking on his show so why waste the time...

Then, the way he steps on everyone else is ridiculous. When I see him give the shoulder to Mika, she seems meek and abused-- bites her lip and puts her head down.