Jake Tapper, filling in on “This Week” this morning, asked Fox News’s Greta Van Susteren to join the roundtable. Much of the discussion focused on the 2012 presidential race with Van Susteren arguing Pres. Obama has lost much of the voter enthusiasm he enjoyed in 2008. “He spoke to the nation from Afghanistan on Tuesday night,” said Van Susteren. “That was a big deal. And you look at the ratings on cable news, and it was just nothing. Nobody even paid any attention. No one’s even like paying attention to him. It’s extraordinary.”
A quick look at the numbers shows that’s not quite true. While Fox News did not see much of a lift during the president’s address Tuesday night, CNN doubled its regular 7pm average and MSNBC was up 1/3 drawing about 6 million on the cable networks. Nielsen estimates another 16 million also watched on the broadcast networks, with ABC special report leading the way with 6.1 million viewers.