Piers Morgan: Boobs! Sex tapes! No viewers!

I've been fighting off the temptation to mention the nosediving ratings of Piers Morgan's new show on CNN. But I surrendered this afternoon when the Nielsen folks revealed that Morgan dropped below half a million viewers Thursday night even with a bunch of crazed half-naked Kardashians sitting at the desk with him. Really. You can't break the half-million mark with Hollywood's most beloved trollops bragging about their boobs? (The scoop from Kim: "They're 100 percent real!" Kourtney, not so much.) And their sex tapes? (Poor Kim says she's embarrassed by hers, though not embarrassed enough to stop talking about it on national televison, though I guess you could argue that 498,000 viewers qualifies as a "national audience" only in someplace like the Togolese Republic, which may be where Piers Morgan is doing his next show.)

Talking about ratings in the first couple of weeks of a talk show is usually unfair; it takes a new one time to build an audience. But in Morgan's case, he's losing an audience. His show debuted on January 17 with 2.1 million viewers tuning in to see him chat up Oprah Winfrey. They were so impressed that almost half of them didn't return for day two.

Since then, Morgan's ratings fell every day except for a small upward blip last Tuesday when Rudy Giuliani was the guest. By the time the Kardashians had finished hyperventilating Thursday night, Morgan had lost more than three-quarters of the viewers he started with last week.

(Hey, you wanna know who's really enjoying reading this? Larry King. In its final six months, his show was averaging 613,000 viewers, was low enough to get him kicked off the air after 50 years in broadcasting. But it's about 20 percent bigger than Morgan's audience Thursday night.)

CNN, by the way, announced Friday that it has a new "managing editor," former Newsweek editor and NBC Washington bureau chief Mark Whitaker. His assignment, the network said, is "to create a more powerful and distinctive dialogue about the top news stories of the day." At the rate CNN is shedding viewers, though, the dialogue's going to have to be between cameramen and stagehands.

Comments

[Ralphie Boy]

though I guess you could argue that 498,000 viewers qualifies as a "national audience" only in someplace like the Togolese Republic, which may be where Piers Morgan is doing his next show.)

--

Well, all the articles about Olberman's exit seemed to think getting ONE-THIRD the viewers of Fox's O'Reilly (Only 1.1M viewers) was a smashing success.

[Al]

Is anyone surprised by this?

Um, *any* show on CNN will fail. Just like *any* show on MSNBC.

Neither network does better than Fox's worst, which I think is Greta van Susteren (in terms of ratings).

[Dot]

He killed me when he lied about our troops killing Iraqi citizens. He is a liar, a creep, and he made me sick when he had Oprah on and he laughed everytime she burped. He is an a_ _ kisser, and if it wasn't for Susan Boyle, Piers would just be another Brit trying to find fame in the USA. Boring Rubish!

[Orenthal]

Those trashy women are not so bad.

After all, they don't riot and steal like communists.

They don't cut off heads like moslems.

They don't extort and murder like negros.

All they do is make feminists feel stupid.

[Tyler Durden]

People still watch cnn ?

[Britscum]

Boring downy faced Brit with clear disdain for the majority of Americans. We're not impressed.

[astralweeks]

Who are the Kardashians and why are they on a 'news' show?

[Rick]

What's the difference between a B-girl and a K-girl? A B-girl actual does a job while a K-girl is a worthlesss POS that is nothing but a publicity hound with mange and fleas. I'm so sick of seeing their worthless faces plastered across the media!

[Jack Chorts]

What is wrong with some people saying the picture is disgusting? The female on the right is pretty much the ideal woman, in terms of physique, it does not get much better - amazingly beautiful.

[Greg]

Uh, Glenn...you failed to mention that when Howard Stern was a guest the ratings were as high as they were for Oprah. In fact, you seem to have omitted any mention of Howard at all. He IS kind of a big deal, you know. Jealous much?

[Jack Chorts]

as far as Piers Morgan goes -- he is definitely a step up from Larry King , in that he asks real questions not powder puff questions, don't cancel him, people will come around to viewership eventually - after they forget larry king

[john]

What's a Piers Morgan?

[cleo]

Piers Morgan is the wrong guy for the job. He is pretty much hated in his home country of Britain for being a selfish snob made famous by Simon Cowell and Cowell's British version of "American Idol. (Morgan was a judge on the British American Idol). CNN needs to just get back to its roots and start broadcasting REAL news from REAL locations around the world again. That's all we viewers ask for. Not propaganda, not fake boobs, just please give us the honest-to-God, truthful facts about what's happening around the world each day. Is that so difficult?

[Christy C]

Oh, please! These bimbos think they are the real thing? Sure thing, especially when their PIMP mother is out pimping her daughters.

Just happy to see that Reggie finally moved on...

It was so painful to watch PM trying to interview Howard Stern. PM was clueless about Howard's life, though it was funny to see Howard bashing PM and CNN throughout the interview.

[Chippy55]

CNN and Headline news are bizarre to watch. One day they'll have 3 talking heads in vertical boxes, a few day later they are in horizontal boxes, and the camera zooms all over the set, and then Comcast shows up TWICE every half hour with homely Tonia Caruso to top with someone for 5 minutes about saving the whales. Then on the noon news they have viewers calling in to "tell us what you think", lol. And every other day they have a helicopter following a car chase (yawn) in Los Angeles, and there 10 police cruisers "keeping a safe distance", and they follow the guy until he runs out of gas, and it's like a real live Bait Car TV show. Wow, how urgent, another pot smoker going for a joy ride in a stolen car, only to be let out of prison by the Liberal Judges in California.

[Scootch]

Piers who?

[Harrison]

This article may have had more comments than Morgan had viewers.

[Joe]

Even on his highest night, he was beaten handily by the Fox news line up.

[Mike]

Maybe he should try having Angie Dickinson on 'for the full ou-wah!' Bahahahahahaha! Ego-maniacs get just what they earn in the end!

[Yukiko]

Who is Piers Morgan?

[Jim in Houston]

William: Ladies?

[joe.attaboy]

Here's the problem with this guy and his show. The week before it premiered, I heard these ads on the radio about how he was going to have this "cutting edge" show where he was going to "make the headlines" with his interviews, so some garbage.

So, who does he have for his first guest: Oprah Winfrey. Like the world doesn't get enough Oprah on their televisions.

[John Fiorella]

I don't see anything wrong those ladies.

[Greed Rules]

Piers who????

[Bettina Sebastapol]

Its amazing how these genius network executives could even fathom that anybody could replace Larry King. LONG LIVE THE KING!!

[Mikethe Tex]

I'm sorry, did you say the Kardashians are boobs or have boobs?

[Glenn Koons, LB, Ca.]

It is not the babes,or Piers or ...it is CNN. They have , like MSNBC lost any journalistic professionalism and objectivity. That is why Fox is kicking their butts on any time slot. The people on CNN,perhaps except for Wolfie, just do not cut it as knowledgeable on any subject even if they had the Queen of Sheba appear.

[ger]

I don't need these Brits,Aussies or actors acting like Brits and Aussies on my TV anyway.Why are we swamped by these people anyway even in our ads.Get them off our sports,gardening shows ect.It's embarrassing to see them there.Ger

[Justin]

I can't understand him. Watched it for about 10 minutes and never went back. We have too many 3rd worlders here now why would we want to deal with trying to understand their mushmouths? OBKB

[Portfolio Recovery]

Whose 15 minutes will expire first? Piers or the K girls?

[Wayne]

Does anybody still watch CNN? I programed that channel out of my channel changer about 20 years ago. They were crap then. Can't believe they have survived this long. Are they getting Federal subsidies?

[Portfolio Recovery]

Piers or k girls? who will be off TV first? Lets bring back Larry! Or least FOX can now pick him up.

http://portfoliorecoveryassoc.com/

[Garr Obo]

Where the **** are all these ***holes with the British accent coming from anyway? Do the networks really think that the American people want to hear their tripe. Get some people with a Midwestern accent, like the ****head Tom Brokaw on these programs and maybe someone would be more inclined to lesten to them.

[Timmy]

I prefer to call the "K's" soiled doves

[g-ma]

I like Piers and will continue to watch

[Lucien Privee]

CNN should have replaced King with Mike Savage. At least the show would have some semblance of intellegence. He has over 4 million listeners and climbing. Sometimes it is best to report the truth and not some liberal agenda.I remember when CNN first aired. The news was now close to real-time.If you wanted anything news-wise during the day you had to wait for the network to cut into the show you were watching. This resulted in the news-seeking viewers to watch CNN and abandoning tyhe netork news,When CNN came in that all changed and so did the viewers expectations. It is evident that the owners of CNN have simply become liberally complacent and they are now in the same position as the network people were back then. To catchup now would mean the management of CNN needs to really report the news and provide earth shattering reporting that would attract the viewers back. Fox had it right "fair and balanced" but is it really? I think FOX is very conservative leaning. When the national media whos job it is to report the news starts contolling the government like they try to do by sensationalizing news events for ratings, they then fall on their faces and then scratch thier heads wondering why they have less than a half million viewers a night. To top it all off, why did CNN off-shore the King show? We do not have people in this country capable of replacing him? Look what we got, a person so rude he doesn't care to even listen to the answers of his own questions. Sorry Piers but this is not American Idol. Maybe this is the Communist News Network.

[David Smith]

The guy used to be the editor of a hard-left British tabloid, anti-American rag called The Mirror...

Till he was a sacked for running a fake story denigrating British troops in Iraq. So I guess he was too scuzzy even for a scuzzy rag.

Yet, it's still hard to see what could possibly go wrong on CNN.

[Sparky2]

CNN, like MSNBC, will never be any bigger than they are because they have so many enemies that won't watch them because they are so hugely liberal and anti-conservative in their overall agenda and they do not have viewership other than New York and California. They lost all of middle America when FOX News came on the scene and there was an alternative for viewers. All one has to do is notice how they can't get themselves to stop attacking Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann who are well liked by middle America. CNN/MSNBC liberal agenda is more important to them than gaining viewers.

[Kevin]

Between CNN and MSNBC, both networks have more alphabets then viewers pull the plug already guys life support is not helping you.

[ByteRider]

Here's the facts as I see them-- MTV is a dying network. They no longer adhere to their formula of MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC! Everyone recognizes this.

CNN is basically doing the same thing. They no longer adhere to their formula of news news news, instead they show biased, moronic opinionators or have tabloidal shows like Morgan's.

Good riddance.

[david]

piers morgan always was a self conceited little prick and guess what America? Youse guys are so welcome to keep the odious little turd!

This is the same guy when editor of the UK Daily Mirror newspaper which published faked pix of fake British soldiers urinating on Iraqi prisoners. Even after a thorough investigation which proved the fakery, morgan never accepted/conceded his mistake and never apologized. Keep the SOB until he slides from view.

[Joe]

"That picture of those ladies is disgusting :("

William, you know how I know you're gay?

[Nate]

Let me get this straight. CNN is sheding viewers by the thousands so they decide they need a new managing editor. The best talent they can come up with was hired away from NEWSWEEK, the magazine that is so adept at meeting the needs of its readers and advertisers that it was recently sold for a mere $1?

Will these leftists never learn?

[Whatthe?]

The Kardashian gals are so fine. And Piers is a he-man.

[tom]

if some men have their brain between their legs. same can be said for some women have their brainS on their chest. cnn has lost it's touch for meaningful news

[Believer]

Piers is TOO pushy when he asks questions. Did you listen to the way he pressed the Olsteens? It was antagonistic, it was awful, unengaging, pompous, immature, and unkind. I was cringing inside as I listened.

If you need any tips, Piers, I say, slow down when you talk. Enunciate more. And ask questions as if you're a counseler talking to someone...essentially, make the GUEST talk more, and you just keep your questions to a minimum. Laugh more with your facial expressions including your eyes!

BE GENTLE! This is not "America's Got Talent" - these guests are not competing for a spot to win the prize money. They're here to share with the world, and you're there to help facilitate them.

[Rob Cooper]

Lunows- CNN has to pay each airport a fee to show their lib garbage, then sells the commercial time.

[Dreamon]

Nobody wants to tune in to hear some dude with an brittish accent. FoxNews is crushing the competition. Everyone is sick of the liberal slanted news from the other cable news channels. Everyone thinks FoxNews is all GOP but it is a bit of both GOP and LIBS. People are just don't hear that on the other channels. Now Hannity is all GOP but he does invite guests to give their opposing views. FoxNews always gives both sides an opportunity to make their case. Glad to see Keith get the boot on MSNBC. Got to drudgereport some time and look at the nightly viewers for the cable news channels. Fox has the top 7 or so shows.

[Turd Ferguson]

If Piers Morgan wants his show to survive, he needs to ask himself, "Who would Tom Snyder interview?"

[mg]

At least he has ratings. Spitzer has no ratings at all which why they are not posted.