Karma has come calling at CNN and MSNBC, the avid broadcast-promoters of the Russia hoax. Viewers who deserted the conspiracy theorists after it turned out that Mueller reported no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia are staying away and — even worse! — migrating to Fox News.

BC primetime host Rachel Maddow brought in her worst weekly ratings of the year last week, following the conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. News broke of Robert Mueller submitting his conclusion to Attorney General William Barr shortly before the close of business on Friday, March 22. Last week's television ratings were the first full week of coverage since the conclusion of the investigation into whether or not the Trump campaign colluded with Russian officials. Throughout the week, Maddow averaged 2,458,000 viewers with 392,000 people in the key age demographic 25-54, both of which mark yearly lows for the liberal television host, according to Nielsen Media Research. The week before she averaged 2,716,000 viewers with 479,000 in the demo.

What makes this especially painful for Maddow, who rode the hoax to become the top-rated host in all of cable news at times, is that the ratings decline actually got worse after the exposure of the hoax first broke:

Further, Maddow lost half a million viewers from the Monday before the report was concluded to the Monday after (last Monday). Her ratings proceeded to drop another 200,000 viewers the next day

Meanwhile, things are, if anything, even worse at CNN. Ryan Saavedra reports the abject humiliation of the cable news pioneer at the Daily Wire:

Fox News' Tucker Carlson absolutely dominated CNN last week, beating their entire prime time line up combined in total viewers by over 1,000,000 viewers — and CNN is not handling the news well. CNN's entire prime time line up garnered 2,474,000 total viewers compared to Carlson's 3,475,000 total viewers. Ratings from Nielsen Media Research for 03/25-03/29: · FOX News Tucker Carlson: 3,475,000 total viewers; 625,000 viewers in the 25-54 age demographic · CNN Cooper: 810,000 total viewers; 203,000 viewers in the 25-54 age demographic · CNN Cuomo: 875,000 total viewers; 217,000 viewers in the 25-54 age demographic · CNN Lemon: 789,000 total viewers; 228,000 viewers in the 25-54 age demographic

There is nobody, other than President Trump, whom CNN and MSNBC hate more than Tucker. He relentlessly mocks them, and last week, he exposed CNN's slavish obedience to the DNC.

The culpability of these two cable news networks in promoting a hoax, employing former intelligence officials — John Brennan at CNN and James Clapper at MSNBC — to pretend to offer inside intelligence data convicting President Trump of treason, is serious. Lee Smith, in a long and thoughtful article at Tablet Magazine, calls it "an extinction level event." If they were independent businesses, it might be, but both are owned by huge, wealthy conglomerates that have many other business lines to generate cash and can use the influence ownership of a cable news network provides to protect and enhance those other businesses. Neither is likely to go the way of the dinosaurs, much though they deserve that fate.