San Diego Anchor Resurfaces Across the Street

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Back in April, FTVLive told you that staffers and viewers of KFMB in San Diego are wondering what has happened to longtime Weekend Anchor Phil Blauer

Blauer has been missing from the air since the end of March, his bio has been scrubbed from the station's website. His Twitter page has also been deleted. 

Staffers are asking what happened and management isn’t saying anything.

FTVLive can now report that there has been a Phil Blauer sighting in San Diego. This week, Blauer popped up on the air at KSWB Fox 5. The picture to prove it is posted above. 

Of course, we still haven't gotten word as to why he left KFMB. 

Dallas Reporter Leaving for the Left Coast

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Longtime KXAS Reporter Randy McIlwain is moving with in the NBC family. 

McIlwain is headed to KNBC to work with the station's I-Team, specializing in consumer reporting.

McIlwain joined NBC5 in October 2003 after a six-year stint at KOCO-TV in Oklahoma City. Besides being one of the D-FW market’s most capable street reporters, oftentimes on the night side, he has filled in as a sports anchor at NBC5. His TV career began in 1990 as a photographer for WSEE-TV in Erie, PA before McIlwain became a reporter six months later.

McIlwain tweeted the news of his new job Tuesday he said his last day at NBC5 will be on June 20th and he’ll start at KNBC on July 7th. 

H/T Ed Bark

WMAR Suspect Taken into Custody

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Police say they have taken the suspect that crashed into WMAR into custody.

The suspect, 29 years old has been taken to the hospital for treatment. He is believed to be suffering from mental problems. 

Police say the man was watching newscasts on TV's inside the station. The suspect made his way to the second floor as staff evacuated the building.

The suspect was armed with a golf club and possibly machetes. He also had a backpack when he entered the building. 

One WMAR employee was hiding in the basement and giving the police information about the station.

The suspect was arrested without incident. 

B-More News Director Ordered Everyone Out of the Building

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When a man rammed his truck into the lobby of WMAR in Baltimore, News Director Kelly Groft saw the suspect arming the truck into the building and screamed for everyone to get out. 

"As far as I know everyone is safe," Baltimore County Police Department Cpl. Brian Kelly, standing near the scene, said.

WMAR staffers said that Groft acted quickly to help get station employees out safely. 

A hole the size of several garage doors could be seen in the front of the building.

Cops are on the scene and have the WMAR studio surrounded. The suspect is believed to be armed, but no shots have been fired. 

BREAKING: Armed Suspect Believed to be in WMAR Studios

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A potentially armed suspect is inside the WMAR (Baltimore) building after ramming into the TV station with a dump truck. Police would later confirm that the dump truck the man used to ram the building three times was stolen. 

According to witnesses, a screaming man repeatedly tried to get inside the WMAR building at about 11:45 a.m. ABC2 News investigative reporter Brian Kuebler tweeted " suspect tried to get in building screaming LET ME IN and said he was God."

The man, believed to still be in the ABC2 building, then rammed the front lobby three times. Police said the man was also seen wearing a backpack, which heightened alerts that he may be armed. 

The York Road building has been evacuated, and nearby St. Pius X School is under lockdown. Locals are urged to avoid the area of the 6400 block of York Road. 

The suspect may be armed, according to witnesses. WMAR staff have taken to Twitter to deliver information. According to Reporter Brian Kuebler, the suspect used a landscape truck and broke through the station lobby.

Police Chief Explores Legal Action Against Palm Beach Station

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WPEC is located in Riviera Beach, which is located just north of West Palm Beach, the market the station serves. The station is owned by Sinclair. 

The Police Chief of Riviera Beach is not happy that the station showed up at his house in a live truck to ask him questions about an amber alert that was issued and then lifted a short time later.

Chief Clarence Williams fired off and email to city spokesperson Rose Anne Brown claiming that the station is racist and upset his 87 year old mother. He says he is now consider legal action.

Here is the email as he sent it:

From: “Williams, Clarence D, lll” <cwilliams@rivierabch.com<mailto:cwilliams@rivierabch.com>>
Date: May 10, 2014 at 12:32:33 PM EDT
To: “Brown, Rose Anne” <rabrown@rivierabch.com<mailto:RABrown@Rivierabch.com>>
Cc: “Ryan, Pamala Hanna” <pryan@rivierabch.com<mailto:pryan@rivierabch.com>>
Subject: Re: Amber Alert Downgraded

Rose Anne, please let c-12 news director know I am not happy about their new crew coming to my home…disturbing my 87 year old Mother and neighbors.  I consider their actions a violation of public trust and RACIST!! No other public safety official in this media market has ever been treated this way. I will be meeting with the City Attorney on Monday as well as my  personal Attorney to seek an injunction preventing future displays of this nature on news issues not related to me in my capacity. I want a letter from my PIO expressing outrage at this practice and expressed again at your next association PIO meeting!

Clarence

WPEC has not commented on the chief's complaint and his calling the station racist. 

H/T Gossip Extra

You did NOT Do that?!

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Violent storms swept through Nebraska on Sunday night and stations were covering the storms that left over 20,000 people without power in Omaha alone.

Like all stations do now-a-days, WOWT turned to social media and invited viewers to submit storm photos to its Facebook page.

 One viewer submitted this photo that was obviously a joke (then again we are talking about Nebraska here) and the station actually aired the photo in their newscast.

Does not anyone look at this shit before it hits air?

Just saying....


Jeff Zucker Admits that CNN has given up on Real News Coverage

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If you want confirmation that CNN boss Jeff Zucker has given up on covering real news, then you just have to look at what he said in a recent interview about CNN's missing plane coverage.

In an interview with Mashable last week, Zucker  said this:

“I think that if people want to be critical of CNN for over-covering a story, that’s totally fine with us,” CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker told Mashable. “Clearly, the audience has spoken and said that what CNN did was correct.”

So the spike in ratings proves that Zucker and CNN's choice to abandon all other news was the right choice?

I bet if Anderson Cooper and Wolf Blitzer oil wrestled naked during the 9PM hour on CNN, ratings would also spike. In fact, we're willing to bet they would be higher than CNN's plane coverage ratings.

Does that make it the right choice?

Why not have Kim Kardashian and Honey Boo Boo anchor the newscast. Ratings will go up....does that make it right choice Jeff?

Clearly Zucker has shown that CNN is all about getting ratings and not covering news. 

We feel sorry for the real Journalists that are still stuck working at CNN. 

Your leader is failing you all in the name of eyeballs. 

CNN Ratings Fall to Lowest in 15 Years

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Somewhere Piers Morgan is smiling.

Morgan was dropped from CNN's prime time after his ratings had fallen to historic lows. But, with Bill Weir hosting CNN Tonight in Morgan's old spot, the ratings are still sucking. 

CNN Tonight averaged its second-lowest ratings during the 9 p.m. hour on Friday in both the 25-54 demo and total viewers in nearly 15 years. The CNN show had 48K viewers in the demo and 226K total, according to Nielsen.

The only other time the 9 p.m. hour rated lower than that in total viewers dating back to 2000 came on October 11, 2010 when Larry King Live had 196K. In the demo, it occurred on May 15, 2012 when Piers Morgan Tonight had just 39K viewers.

So while Wier's ratings were very low, they still didn't scrape the bottom like Piers did.

Maybe he's not smiling after all. 

H/T Mediaite

Magic Time at CNN

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Following up on Anderson Cooper's interview with Donald Sterling, Coop sits down with Magic Johnson. 

The interview will air tonight at  8 p.m. on "AC360."

In Cooper's interview with Los Angeles Clippers owner Sterling called Johnson a "good man," but also said, "I don't think he's a good example for the children of Los Angeles."

Sterling also said: "Well, what kind of a guy goes to every city, he has sex with every girl, then he catches HIV and -- is that someone we want to respect and tell our kids about?"

An interesting comment since Sterling admitted that he made the racist rants in an effort to try and have sex with V. Stiviano.

This guy really that big of an idiot.