Business news with an attitude

Brian Stelter and Tim Arango of The New York Times writes Monday about business news network CNBC and how its reporters and anchors have become more aggressive in expressing their opinions on the air.

Stelter and Arango write, “But in a change from previous downturns, CNBC is now a place for politics, to borrow a phrase from its sister channel MSNBC. The network’s journalists have been encouraged to speak their minds, making the line between reporter and commentator almost indistinguishable at times.

“’When they are all sitting around the table it’s hard to tell a business pundit versus a reporter,’ said Tom Rosenstiel, the director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

“For instance, Larry Kudlow, a conservative economist who is considering a run for the United States Senate, is the co-host of an 11 a.m. news hour. Three CNBC employees, who insisted on anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said that the role of opinion on the channel had been a subject of frequent discussion.”

Read more here.