Bill Carter, writing for The New York Times, provides a first-draft-of-history overview of what will undboubtedly be an epic tale someday: The Decline and Fall of the CNN Empire. And who better to write that saga, other than the principal author of the catastrophe, Jon Klein? But for now, here's Carter's lede:
CNN, which created the all-news cable network almost 30 years ago, hit a new competitive low with its prime-time programs in October, with three of its four programs between 7 and 11 p.m. finishing fourth and last among the cable news networks.
It was the first time that the programs had ever performed that poorly against their news network competitors. October was also the third month in the last year that CNN as a network finished fourth behind the three other cable news networks in prime time with the audience that the networks rely on for advertising sales.
CNN had a strong performance in the election year of 2008, but the channel’s prime-time numbers are down 22 percent from 2007.
Apologies to Edward Gibbon, who wrote The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire back in 1776.
