It's likely CNN can't wait for 2010 to come to a close.

When Campbell Brown departed earlier this year, the cable network announced with much fanfare that the new Parker Spitzer, a kind of right vs. left on-air debate of current issues, would fill the vacant 8 PM slot. Journalist Kathleen Parker didn't cause a flurry, but eyebrows were raised over the hiring of Eliot Spitzer, the debauched former governor of New York, as co-host.

Now, only two months later, it seems Parker Spitzer has been something of a bust.Continue reading...

After 25 years in the role, Larry King announced this evening that he will be leaving his show later this year.

In a statement posted on his CNN.com blog, King wrote that "I would like to end Larry King Live, the nightly show, this fall and CNN has graciously accepted, giving me more time for my wife and I to get to the kids’ little league games."

King added, "I’m incredibly proud that we recently made the Guinness Book of World Records for having the longest running show with the same host in the same time slot."Continue reading...

Piers Morgan in Burger King's perfume poster. Photograph: Crispin Porter & Bogusky; The Guardian

This story could just as easily have been an April Fool's joke —except it's not April, and it appears to be no joke. The New York Post reports today that former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, who was publicly disgraced for his affair with a call girl, will join CNN as co-host of a look-alike show to CNN's Crossfire, which ended its run on the network in 2005.

Crossfire followed a popular point-counterpoint format in which two hosts of opposite political persuasion debated a news topic. CNN is reportedly looking for a conservative to be Spitzer's foil on the new show, which will replace Campbell Brown in the 8PM Eastern time spot.

In an equally head-shaking move, CNN is reportedly considering Piers Morgan as a replacement to Larry King, whose contract expires a year from now. That's Morgan, by the way, in the BK UK ad above.Continue reading...

Maybe it's time for straight news on cable to throw in the towel. In an increasingly noisy environment, cable television has become a place for loud, opinionated voices rather than reasoned, objective reporting. Think of it as talk radio with video.

As we've reported, that trend leaves CNN uncomfortably in the middle, leaning neither toward MSNBC's left nor Fox News Channel's right on the US media spectrum. The result is a squeeze play that has seen CNN losing viewers—and talent, with high-profile departures indicating a venerable TV brand in danger of losing its identity and audience.

Last November, acerbic anchor Lou Dobbs left the network, followed by veteran global correspondent Christiane Amanpour's departure in March (although she doesn't pop up on ABC News until August).

Now anchor Campbell Brown is out, of her own accord, and she has made it very clear why: "she was unable to compete with the opinion-mongers that dominate cable news in prime time," reports the New York Times.

Campbell feels she doesn't have the heart for the posturing and vitriol that's dominating cable news these days—or as the above clip during the Haiti earthquake aftermath shows, perhaps it's a case of having too much heart.Continue reading...