Just to get biases out of the way, I'm not a huge fan of Spitzer's. Plus his actions have led to our current governor, who's even worse. So in other words Spitzer not only screwed six-diamond hookers, he also screwed New York.
As far as Kathleen Parker goes, I know little about her. I know she's spoken out against Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck in the past, so she could be one of those rare conservatives who approaches the realm of politics cerebrally more than vocally.
So without further ado...
8:00pm: I'm already annoyed by the back and forth banter. If I wanted to see this I would have Tivo'd Live! With Regis and Kelly.
8:02pm: An "opening argument" section. I agree with Spitzer on this, but the allusion to a Wall Street cop, harking back to Spitzer's glory days, wasn't 100% necessary.
8:04pm: This show better get more organic. Why didn't these two just write an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal instead of reading it off of the teleprompter? Wow, Sarah Palin on the fence: what a novel argument.
8:05pm: Spitzer's clearly scripted rebuttal is correct: every politician waits to help build suspense. You have to keep the main stream media narrative going.
8:06pm: Spitzer's second allusion to his job as attorney general.
8:07pm: Andrew Brietbart? Are you serious? You have your choice of who to pack this Manahttan diner-sized overcrowded table with and you choose this hack? He just tried to say that the Tea Party isn't angry, then calls the One Nation rally full of Communists and Socialists. Give me a break.
8:10pm: Spitzer says the Tea Party has no answers and no solutions to fix government. Bingo.
8:11pm: Poor Thomas Frank. He expects to be on an intelligent political round table and ends up having to define "socialism" for a crank like Breitbart.
8:17pm: And we're back. If you have any doubts that almost every aspect of this show is scripted, Parker just offered Spitzer a rebuttal looking into the teleprompter the entire time.
8:20pm: Could Spitzer kiss Warren's ass anymore? He's treating her like the second coming.
8:21pm: Did Parker just say that making credit card forms simpler will lead to people not being responsible? Does she really think that the credit card fine print sheets make sense?
8:23pm: Spitzer had to end that interview with final praise of Warren, because he did not make his utter worship of her clear for the last eight minutes.
8:26pm: Is it bad that I don't care about "Coming up: Fmr. Spitzer target confronts Eliot."? Plus, there's plenty of room to write "former" down there.
8:27pm: Eliot Spitzer used to be a prosecutor, in case you didn't know.
8:28pm: "But... Sarah Palin's an idiot." Nailed it. Though Parker seems to have an obsession with Palin, for whatever reason.
8:30pm: Sorkin need not worry about people not seeing "The Social Network" based on his politics; I think I'm the only one watching the show at this point.
8:36pm: And now there's a whole section on Spitzer's time as AG? I want a section where Spitzer sits down with one of his hookers and they discuss global socioeconomic issues.
8:38pm: And now Spitzer is blaming Blodgets's actions on the system? Where is the personal responsibility that Parker was complaining about earlier (and, for that matter, where's Parker?) And he gets a plug for his website? This case is eight years old. Why do we have two people bloviating about this crap?
8:39pm: The editors could not get rid of Blodget's assertion that Spitzer has big balls? Again, information that could have been obtained if this show went with my idea of the hooker section.
8:41pm: I learned nothing from that conversation.
8:46pm: Henry Blodget's back? And this is not Jeopardy!, I don't care what people did in 3rd grade or that they were hackers since 12 years old.
8:47pm And the obsession with Sarah Palin continues. Spitzer opened this "political party" with a plug for Parker Spitzer being a show with strong opinions and we devolve to talking about Palin's fashion and the fact that she is "smokin'."
8:48pm: As if a round table discussion about what celebrity you want to in the Oval Office could not get worse, the picks are the Dude from Big Lebowski, Jared from Subway (which led to a Spitzer family story that no one cared about), and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Two of these three cannot be president because they either do not exist or are not jus soli citizens.
8:50pm: We'll be right back with another "great question." I'm not holding my breath.
8:53pm: "I could stay all night." Sorry, Mr. Spitzer, I've only paid for an hour.
8:54pm: Story time! Spitzer and Parker didn't have novacaine when they got their fillings for their cavities!
8:55pm: Wait, they came back from break to ask the "political party" what their guilty pleasure was, only to go back to break right after? This show is so disjointed.
8:58pm: Anderson Cooper! Save me! Please don't go back to Parker Spitzer. Nooooooo.
8:59pm: And we end the show with a phrase harking back to keeping "uppity" Native Americans in their place. "See you tomorrow night." No, no you won't.
If CNN is betting on this show to bring their network back to relevance then, to put it bluntly, they're screwed. Going beyond my snarky criticisms of the doldrum topics and the obsession with Sarah Palin, the show had absolutely no flow. I would say at least 30% of the show was people talking over each other. When there was a clear voice, no point was really being made. Additionally, before a point could possibly be made, the show went to a break. It felt very rushed despite the fact that the whole thing seemed to be scripted. In other words, I will not be watching this show willingly again. Plus, I think my girlfriend's mad at me for making her watch it with me.
Photo - Two people you don't want hosting a prime-time cable news talk show (Time)
This article is very hard to read. Unless you watched the new show and remembered every single line in the show, this article made no sense whatever.
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