It turns out that electing a dumpster fire to be president can be good for television ratings—at least, if you are anti-dumpster fire.
MSNBC finished as the most-watched network in all of basic cable in primetime on Monday, for the first time in its 21-year history, according to Nielsen Research.
The Comcast-owned network averaged 2.34 million viewers, edging Fox News and its average of 2.25 million.
Rachel Maddow's show has been the big winner, putting yet another awkward kink in the network heads' ongoing efforts to deliberalize the network and put a stop to all this "highest ratings ever" nonsense.
Maddow again had the No. 1 program of the week in cable news, averaging 2.94 million total viewers and 711,000 in the key 25-54 demographic advertisers covet most.
That said, the nation is still going to hell in a handbasket, and there's little to nothing most of us can do about it.
In all of basic cable, WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) on USA Network was the most-watched, with Maddow coming in second.
A fake sport featuring over-the-top caricatures pretending to beat the snot out of each other? Finally, it becomes clear just what CNN has been going for this year. Congratulations to Maddow, though.