White Slavery at CNN

Midget Mickey Kaus attempts a defense of Tucker Faye Carlson -- Carlson's poor performance on Crossfire was his pimp's fault:

Yesterday, in the course of killing Crossfire and not renewing Crossfire co-host Tucker Carlson's contract--two decisions that may be perfectly defensible--Klein told the Associated Press, "I guess I come down more firmly in the Jon Stewart camp." ... So let me get this straight. Carlson soldiers on as Crossfire interviewer while the show gets worse and worse. It's expanded, it's contracted, it's moved around the schedule. He has CNN people yelling in his ear to "get mad" or to interrupt his guests. He does what he's told. (You think he necessarily likes doing that? Then why is his own show, Tucker Carlson: Unfiltered, a model of civil discourse?) Then Carlson has a guest on Crossfire, a popular liberal comedian who doesn't like CNN-style shoutfests and when challenged calls Carlson a "dick" on the air. Everybody talks about it for a week. Most of the chatterers favor the comedian. Carlson takes a PR hit for the team. So when Klein gets to choose between backing his organization's employee up or associating himself with the popular comedian, Klein ... tells the press he sides with the guy who called his employee a "dick"? ...

Yes, the oh-so-sensitive Carlson -- who lied about Senator Wellstone's memorial and joked about the fates of John Edwards's severely injured clients -- was forced by CNN to act belligerent and ignorant. And Hairless Hack knows this for a fact because his PBS show is teddibly civilized. (It couldn't be that PBS is forcing Carlson not to be a dick.) CNN execs chained Carlson to the set and threatened his kill his family if the decibel level dropped below acceptable levels, an idea they stole directly from Speed.

Might the fact that Crossfire got worse and worse be the result of Carlson's performance on the show?

Yes, we should all bemoan the firing of a pretend journalist who performs like a trained monkey and "does what he's told."

Let's hope Kaus's new masters from the WaPo agree with me that Kaus is a dick.