Candy Crowley made a clunker of a claim in her profile of Sarah Palin on the April 11 edition of CNN's State of the Union. After noting that, as part of her “safe and lucrative” role as a Fox News commentator, Palin has “put her brand” on the show Real American Stories, Crowley said of the show: “The normal Fox News audience is reported to have doubled in the time slot.”
We don't know who “reported” that to Crowley, but as we've previously noted, actual ratings reports say quite the opposite. From TV Newser:
While coming in first in its time period -- beating the Total Viewer average of the 10pm programs on MSNBC, CNN and HLN combined -- FNC's “Real American Stories with Sarah Palin” was down substantially versus the performance of “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren” last Thursday as well as that program's Thursday average for the month of March. “Real American Stories” delivered 2.073 million Total Viewers and 472k A25-54 viewers, down 10% versus last Thursday among Total Viewers and down 28% in A25-54. For all Thursdays in March 2010, the “Stories” premiere was down 10% among Total Viewers and down 19% in A25-54.
Looking at quarter hour data, “Real American Stories” shed viewers from start to finish -- down 18% among Total Viewers (2.319mm vs. 1.895mm) and down 22% in A25-54 (533k vs. 418k) from the program's first to its final quarter hour.
Losing audience in the time slot is not the same as “doubling” it.
Previously: