We admit that we probably spent more time this past weekend than we should have, consuming all of the coverage about the CBS television network’s surprise decision ending its production of “The Late Show” and its relationship with Stephen Colbert, after a decade of his hosting what has typically been the #1 network show in the 11:35pm time period.

As we suggested last Thursday night, there would be a lot of questions about the decision. And given the optics of it, studying how the story has been playing out has been a fascinating exercise in watching the intersection of journalism, the media industry itself, and America’s political landscape in 2025.

Before the story fully succumbs to the demands of the ever-spinning news cycle and is likely overtaken by whatever the hell the next major development in “The Epstein Files” will be, wewanted to examine a few more thoughts out there-as they apply to both the situation on the network level, as well as the one in the local markets across the country.

If the CBS executives believed that their Thursday night explanation would be satisfactory enough to address the instant and obvious speculation about the political forces that might be behind the decision, well, in the classic words of Vice Principal Ed Rooney in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” they were “sorely mistaken.”

Especially after details emerged that Skydance head David Ellison had visited the Washington, DC offices of the Federal Communications Commission just two days prior, trying to push for the approval needed to finally get Skydance’s long-suffering bid to takeover CBS corporate parent Paramount Global finally “off the schneid.”

Then the President of the United States-and frequent target of Colbert’s monologues- popped up on his Truth Social platform and bitcoin holding company on Friday with this opportunistic message: “I absolutely love that Colbert got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings. I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next.” Mr. Trump went on to praise the only late-night host he finds amusing, Fox News host Greg Gutfield, but that was before sister News Corp-owned outlet The Wall Street Journal published a blockbuster story about an apparent letter that Trump sent to Jeffrey Epstein back in 2003. We’d link to it for you, but it’s behind a paywall.

Well, at least somebody is making money on their digital property!

(FTR: Trump denies he wrote the letter, says the newspaper’s report is false, and promptly filed another $20 Billion lawsuit against what he called another part of “the Fake News Media.” The WSJ says it will “vigorously defend any lawsuit.”)

CBS says that the decision to take Colbert off the air is positively, absolutely a financial one, and it has nothing to do with anything else that its parent, Paramount Global, may or may not be involved with.

As the story continued to reverberate, the would-be supporting financial numbers began appearing in much of the follow-up coverage. The production cost of “The Late Show” was reportedly around $100 million per year, including a $10-15 million annual salary for Colbert himself. Poor CBS was losing some $40 million annually on the program. The precipitous slide of late-night ratings and advertising revenues to streaming just made it impossible for the network to keep the show on the air.

Impossible, until at least, airing ten more months of it.

This is one of the biggest problems we have in looking at this whole storyline of being “purely a financial decision.” Puck’s Matthew Belloni did a great job of explaining the current economics of producing a network late-night talk show in 2025, in the latest episode of his excellent podcast, “The Town.” His interview with veteran late-night TV executive Nick Bernstein was very illuminating in breaking down the numbers in play, as well as the forces that may be at work. Keep the show going, lose tens of millions of dollars more, rather than pay off Colbert’s contract, give the staff two weeks’ notice—or maybe 30 days if they were feeling really generous, and pull the plug on the show sooner, rather than later?

Plus, CBS leaves Colbert on the air to continue to annoy, on a nightly basis, the occupant of the White House and his administration for nearly another whole year? What is up with that kind of timetable? Keith Olbermann, former ESPN, Fox Sports, MSNBC/NBC News anchor, has been vocal  both on X and his own podcast “Countdown” about his skepticism that the Colbert decision was made for political reasons, given the long exit ramp that CBS is providing.

Olbermann, who made it clear on his podcast that he is no fan of Colbert and considers him to be something far less than a gentleman, based on their interactions over the past few decades, believes this is evidence that the decision was not politically driven.

Fox News jumped on that take from the liberal leaning Olbermann with the improbable headline on its website: “Keith Olbermann pours cold water on claims Colbert was fired for political reasons.” When Olbermann is quoted on Fox News (at least on its website) then we may need to question if truly, the apocalypse is imminent.

Crack wise all we might, the underlying worry here is that the decline happening in the television business is much more terrifying than anyone is talking about out loud. The New York Times weighed in with a piece on Sunday from its “Critic-at large” Jason Zinoman that proclaimed that “Getting cancelled may end being the best thing that ever happened to Stephen Colbert. The same cannot be said for its impact on late night television.”

The article goes on to suggest that Colbert will be just fine in his post-CBS years, hosting a podcast and maybe writing a Substack, just like Bari Weiss, Terry Moran, and everyone else in the media who has lost their high-flying and higher-paying job in recent months.

Notably, some with more success than others. (We say that as we look in the mirror.)

That is of little comfort to our friends in the local television business who are trying to figure out just what the decision to cancel Colbert at some point in the future or at least by next May means in their world.

Is “network late-night TV dead as The New York Post, the Los Angeles Times, The Hollywood Reporter, and so many others had in their headlines? If so, what happens after the late local news ends at 11:35pm?

Here’s one thought we haven’t seen anywhere else. Why not expand those late local newscasts to an hour?

It’s been done before. KSTP-TV in Minneapolis-St. Paul took its 10pm newscast out to a full hour in 2013, delaying the start of the ABC network’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” to 11pm when the network moved the talk show up to replace “Nightline”.

Much earlier in its storied history, KSTP was the first in the nation to expand its late news to a full half-hour, when most stations still carried only a fifteen-minute late news update. That may well have started the long expansion of local news to seemingly every hour of the day.

Depending on what programming the networks offer to replace the now deemed “much-too-expensive” late-night talk shows they currently air (at the possible risk of incurring the wrath of upsetting those in power in Washington, DC) some local affiliates will certainly give serious thought to calling their network reps and using that favorite phrase heard in Congressional hearings, advising that they will be “reclaiming my time!”

Braver local stations may go all in on following the trend of WJXT, WISH-TV, WHDH-TV, etc. (and soon WPLG and WANF) in reclaiming all their broadcast day and placing their bet on even more local news than just an hour at 11/10pm.

After all, any local station can see what Byron Allen has in the Entertainment Studios program library just as easily as the broadcast networks.

Or whatever will be left of those would-be dinosaurs nearing extinction.

Buckle up, friends. This wild ride in “Jurassic Park” is far from over. -30-