Sad, sad news: America's gov Eliot Spitzer—who was not so bad on TV, once they got rid of his dead-weight co-host—is not returning to CNN's prime time lineup. His show is being canceled to make way for new CNNer Erin Burnett. We never watched your show, Eliot—but we never watched just as much as we never watched your competitors. Our condolences. Internal email from CNN boss Ken Jautz below.
Reps. Ron Paul and Barney Frank introduced a bill yesterday that, for the first time, would end the federal ban on marijuana, leaving it to the states. CNN covered the news appropriately, by having a erudite debate between an old stoner actor and some asshole former g-man.
In your musty Monday media column: paywalls infest the iPad, The Onion wants a Pulitzer, Ed Henry goes to Fox News, Spin magazine fires its editor, mommy bloggers get their own talent agency, and reporters are harassed in Egypt.
Last night, CNN's John King moderated the first Republican primary debate of the 2012 election season. High on theatrics, like King's stupid "This or That" questions for each candidate, the debate had many critics. And as you'll see in the above clip from tonight's Daily Show, Jon Stewart wasn't all that impressed either.
Tonight in New Hampshire, seven Republican candidates for president in 2012—including Michele Bachmann who just announced her candidacy—shared the stage for the primary season's first debate. The showdown was moderated by CNN's John King, who asked tough questions like "American Idol or Dancing with the Stars?"
Watching Ann Coulter antagonize black people and 9/11 widows is, at this point, pretty boring. Watching Ann Coulter answer questions about her age, though? Strangely thrilling. Here's Piers Morgan quizzing the razor-boned pipe cleaner about the time she dropped two years from her age.
Following Anthony Weiner's admission this afternoon that he posted a crotch shot to Twitter and was involved in "inappropriate" online relationships with several women, many wondered how Eliot Spitzer—no stranger to political sex scandals himself—would cover the topic on his CNN talk show, In The Arena.
CNN is really going for it with this whole "Osama took little kids' balls" thing. As it turns out, thanks to an investigation, we now know that the people who lived in the terrorist mastermind's compound not only kept neighborhood kids' soccer balls, but they kept cricket balls that came over the walls, too. And, by speaking with a 12-year-old neighbor, CNN learned that a "fat guy with a goatee and moustache" lived there. Does this mean Osama bin Laden liked to play cricket? Perhaps he was behind the match fixing scandal that rocked the cricket world last year? Hopefully CNN will get to the bottom of this. We need to know.
Snooki, the figurehead from Jersey Shore, is getting a lot of heat from the media these days. But it's about time everyone shut up and stop harshing on how much money our dearly beloved Snooki rakes in.
In your wet Wednesday media column: Newsweek's suddenly cloudy future, CNN would like some black viewers, Univision eyes cable news, the AP's union negotiations drag on, and a sad NPR Twitter addict.
Click to viewFormer Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty is trying too hard again: The Republican, who hasn't officially announced his presidential candidacy, told CNN's Piers Morgan "I'm running for president" only to have his spokesman Alex Conant quickly downplayed the statement, saying "He will have a formal announcement about running for president later this spring." Tim! Chill out! You're going to ruin this for everyone! [CNN]
On his show tonight, Conan O'Brien announced that he really missed Larry King. His solution? Allow King to host a show from, as the CNN legend put it, the "creepy rafters" above O'Brien's studio. Alas, it didn't take long for both men to get annoyed by the other's presence.
Steve Harrigan, the Fox News correspondent currently engaged in a war of words with CNN's Nic Robertson while they both cover a war of bombs in Libya, is as lazy as Robertson says, according to someone who's worked with him.
