An ArcheStereotype of the NY-Centric Media Swamp

Ellis Henican

You may have seen him on TV. He’s been on a lot of the cable news networks as a pundit-slash-analyst. He’s a reliable, crafty voice for the left on short notice, on almost any subject. He makes his point like most lawyers do, by attacking your argument with the intent of taking it down to components easily smashed with dismissal and ridicule. Most times, your own argument doesn’t have to be made at all, however threadbare the talking points are. That’s how Anthony Weiner built his whole political career while it lasted. Ellis Henican isn’t a lawyer though. He’s not really a politician either. He’s a professional Jack-of-all-trades in the news/media establishment centered principally in New York, though excursions and field trips elsewhere are permitted, of course. His box bio at Wiki describes him as a “Columnist, author, talk radio, entertainer, voice actor, television, political analyst.” Under Notable Works he lists one book, titled “Home Team,” (a ghosted autobiography of Party flip-flopper Charlie Crist), though he’s written quite a few other books (also mostly ghost assignments) over the years as well. He is, in short, a financially successful professional “journalist.” AND a graduate of the Columbia School of Journalism TA-DA!) If not exactly a household name, he’s at least close to being a household face on cable channel TV.

So why am I interested in him? I think he first came to my attention during the massive media convulsion lumped loosely together under the label “Lewinsky Scandal.” He was one of the Murder of Crows who kept cawing, “Everyone lies about sex” and facilitated the now prolific process of pecking the rule of law to death.

I became aware of him as a presence on cable news generally, the guest analyst invited not for any subject matter expertise but a dead-reliable willingness to take the lefty position regardless of its merits or lack of them. His stock in trade was the scornful preemptive dismissal of his opponent on the broadcast and a sneer so fixed and permanent it actually seemed part of his bone structure and had managed to wrap itself around his vocal cords.

Why, I’m thinking, he also has a moonlighting career playing a snarky cartoon sci-fi character who actually resembles him, including the grin. Not necessary. I’d have recognized his voice anywhere.

At one point in time when I grew tired of seeing/hearing him on MSNBC, CNN, and Fox I tracked down his email and asked if a permanent sneer was really helpful in his attempts at persuasion, because I found it the opposite of persuasive. He replied, half apologized for the sneer and explained he just couldn’t help it.

This morning I tried to give Newsmax TV a look, since their ratings are booming in the wake of the defections from Fox caused by the Tucker Carlson firing. He was there to offer his sneering dismissal of the importance of Carlson’s removal, and ventured to add that the broadcast news business “may deprive many of us our due.” That’s the way it works, he explained, and how bad can you feel that someone who called his boss a dirty name in an email gets taken off the air? So there.

The Newsmax hosts are, and have been, respectful to Henican. Why I guess I’m moved to write this. He’s a perfect example of the kind of second-tier mediocrity that populates all the “panels” of cable news. They’re everywhere, like termites gnawing on crumbling journalistic integrity. Henican has no area of academic or professional expertise. He has never held office or any position of executive responsibility in any realm of business or government. He has never even been a real knock-on-doors beat reporter. He is a working talking head only because he knows people based on the leg up he got from his Columbia degree, and he is a success because he is mildly famous keeping that sneering head talking no matter what. In short, he is a ghost analyst-expert wheeled in when no real expertise is available.

Worse, his long string of books consists of, well, ghost writer jobs, and he is phenomenally lucky because he has avoided the fate which befalls many such phantom scribes. Why is he lucky? Because he isn’t a discreet professional writer doing an anonymous contract job for hire. Henican’s name usually appears in smaller print near the “author” name. In Henican’s mind he is a gunfighter, putting his own political words into the mouths of the saps who need someone else to make them sound smart. He wants his share of credit for authoring a fake memoir for some other second-tier mediocrity.

I created this little video in honor of whatever ghost is behind Hillary’s “It Takes a Village.” There’s a person who should know better than to blab about how little the putative author had to do with the content. 

You’ll note that no real political player of power will ever hire Henican. He’s a second-tier ghostwriter the same way he’s a second-tier ghost journalist. And it always take me a while to get over the fact that anyone on cable news TV treats him as a bona fide resource. He’s just ballast against the danger of dead air.

AND A BONUS! Live video footage of Elvis Pelican on-air at Newsmax…