THIS IS CNN: Don Lemon goes berserker on Kaitlan Collins

CNN was doing pretty badly before Chris Licht. Chris Licht was hired to change that, and even outsiders are seeing that what he has been doing is not working out well. Ratings were pretty bad. ... and they are down from there.

CNN was a cash cow for a very long time. Before Licht took over, yearly profits had dropped below $1 billion for the first time in years (according to reports) on the back of what had already been a steep decline in viewership. It is a sinking ship.

It's easy for people to say he's unqualified. Who is qualified, though? What might satisfy people on here as their idea of qualified, is likely not going to drive the viewership and financial goals of the people who own CNN. They are flailing right now. What you have seen from Licht could be that he's hopelessly unqualified, but it can also be that all the "qualifications" in the world don't have much chance of fixing CNN quickly (what they are desperately trying to do). ... or it can be a combination of both of those things.

 

He runs a giant multimedia conglomerate with hundreds of properties that run a gamut from DC Entertainment (comic books) to HBO (and its streaming) to TNT / Turner sports to CNN and a lot of other things. Of course it's all his responsibility. ... but people who are successful in positions like his can't (and don't try to) manage everything that falls under their purview. To be successful, they need to find others to take on operations of specific things and entrust them to do a good job. Of course with a personality and ego such as Zaslav's, it's safe to guess that Licht hasn't been operating without a heavy hand interfering. And of course when things don't go well, all eyes turn to the boss. But no, Zaslav's job isn't to have all the answers for everything Warner Brothers Discovery does, any more than anyone would think that Jamie Dimon is directing the trading floor at JP Morgan or Satya Nadella at Microsoft is planning strategy for LinkedIn.