A reported vote of confidence from Warner Bros. Discovery CEO for CNN CEO Chris Licht has caught the ire of podcaster Keith Olbermann.
During his Countdown with Keith Olbermann podcast, the former cable news host decried the situation and continued his long crusade against CNN’s current direction of straight-down-the-middle news coverage.
“Zaslav, Licht, and CNN continue to be hell-bent on returning CNN to a kind of video stenographer’s role which it never had but which they have convinced themselves was this ‘true time of greatness’,” Olbermann said.
The podcast host then quoted a report from Puck’s Dylan Byers about Zaslav’s comments, which included admitting that Licht has “gotten a lot wrong” during his tenure as CNN’s CEO.
“Nearly one year in, it’s clear that Zaslav still believes in his vision for CNN as a nonpartisan, broadcast-style news digest, and still believes that Licht is his Captain Ahab.”
Olbermann used the imagery provided by Byers to equate CNN to the conclusion of the literary classic Moby-Dick.
“Now, I’ll admit I haven’t read Moby-Dick all the way through since 1975,” Olbermann said, “I haven’t even watched the Gregory Peck movie where he’s Captain Ahab in a year or two, but if my memory serves correct, Captain Ahab find Moby-Dick, harpoons him but gets caught in the harpoon rope, and before you know it, he’s up against Moby-Dick’s side, and the whale goes under water and drowns him and then the whale accelerates straight towards the Pequod and rams it and sinks it.
“And if this Zaslav is really out there with his Captain and this version of the story is called Moby-Licht, then sooner or later the great white whale will be literally de-platforming Zaslav, and then when he and all the other sailors fall into the sea, Moby-Dick will come back and eat all of them. Or Moby-Licht. Call me, Ishmael, my boat sank. The end.”
