OJ’s Tunku Varadarajan doesn’t like the idea of NBC naming a successor – any successor – to Tom Brokaw.
Where NBC erred was in failing to use an impending Brokaw departure to "downsize" the concept of the anchor to something akin to the self-effacing newsreader in the BBC mold--or, to use an older comparison from closer to home, to the way news used to be delivered on American networks before our seemingly incurable "anchoritis" set in.
During a bout of insomnia Sunday night, I caught Fox News’ weekly Media Mutual Masturbation Show. Er, Fox NewsWatch. I don’t remember which panelist reported this, and I can’t find a transcript for the program. But if memory serves, Brian Williams’ contract stipulates that if he doesn’t get the Nightly News when Brokaw leaves, then no one does.
A clever ploy by Williams’ agent, or a clever escape clause for a downsize-thinking NBC?
NOTE: NewsWatch features Cal Thomas, a man who needs to learn the value of coloring one’s hair with something other than the wax one uses to polish one’s shoes. One would think, wouldn’t one?
Having had the misfortune to read a number of his columns, I think Cal's most pressing problem is the quality of the stuff inside his head rather than the stuff on top of it.
Now to be fair to Cal, he fits right in among the rest of his fellow NewsWatch panel. A bigger bunch of irritating wankers I have seldom seen.
Back to the original topic, with Brokaw not leaving until the '04 Presidential election (i.e. more than two years from now) I don't understand what the rush is to name the successor.
That said, I will be sorry to see Tom go, of the current three stooges reading cue cards for Network News shows, he's the one least in the tank for the DLC. Tom out and Bryan in tilts Network News even further left, not that it matters to me because I long ago gave up the networks for FoxNews.
