TVSquad

Everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when they learned about "Balloon Boy." Rather, they remember what they were thinking: "Has the news media completely run out of things to cover today or was Chester the Squirrel That Can Water-Ski taking a day off?"

Every section of your TV had been preempted and saturated with coverage of what sheriff's deputies believed to be a runaway balloon that was carrying the life of an innocent boy with it. It even preempted the so-called cable "news" networks that interrupted coverage of the pending health care reform bill. That move only would have made sense if insurance companies refused to cover victims of hot air balloon accidents because they considered "gravity" to be a pre-existing condition.

And the really funny part is now it starts getting weird. The Larimer County Sheriff's Office said the family faked the whole thing just so they could get on TV.

I've never noticed how often the hosts at CNN - almost all of them - say the phrase "we'll have to leave it there" when they run out of time when interviewing a guest. But The Daily Show noticed it, and last night they were all over CNN about it.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
CNN Leaves It There
www.thedailyshow.com

[Watch episodes and clips of The Daily Show and other shows at SlashControl.]

This season, Jeopardy is doing a Million Dollar Celebrity Tournament. One episode a month will have three celebrities battling to see who gets to play for one million dollars for their charity later in the season. A lot of fans don't like the celebrity editions. It breaks up the flow of the regular champion coming back, the questions are easier than the regular game, etc. But last night's episode was fun.

The three celebrities who played the first game of this season's tournament were Wolf Blitzer, Dana Delany, and Andy Richer...and Richter won! Actually, it's not even fair to say he "won," he crushed Blizter and Delany. The game was over way before they even got to the Final Jeopardy round. Blitzer didn't even make it to that round (I cringed when he added an "S" to Julia Child's last name because I knew the money would be taken away), but they let him play anyway.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer must be running on Energizer batteries. Between his duties on his weekly The Situation Room program and Sunday's two-hour Late Edition talkfest, Wolf is on the air 17 hours a week. While this makes him the leader in face time over any other television anchor it probably doesn't bode well for his social and family life. Not to mention that he's probably missing the new season of According to Jim. So, the cable news network is doing something to free his schedule up.

Sometime in the new year, Wolf will step down from his Late Edition duties and will be replaced by chief political and magic map correspondent John King. The revamped Sunday schedule will begin at 9 a.m., with the first hour dedicated to politics and opinions on the new Obama administration. Later hours will touch on national and world affairs with commentary on current events. And, most likely, John will use the powers of the magic map to make some of the less likable pundits disappear.

I think one of the weirdest things that happened on election night were the hologram thingies that CNN used. It was OK when they showed an image of a building, but it got really strange when Anderson Cooper interviewed will.i.am (almost as weird as me having to write someone's name as will.i.am). Cooper was standing there in the studio, looking off to the side, waiting for am (is that his last name? Or is he one name, like Twiggy?) to pop up in front of him like on Star Trek. The whole thing looked kinda cool but also kinda cheesy, and it was funny when Cooper introduced the interview by saying "we're joined now via hologram..."

Now comes the scandal: they weren't even holograms!

12:23: Wolf Blitzer just reminded us that this is, in fact, an historic occasion. He also assures us that the coverage will continue. I, however, will not. All in all, CNN's coverage was adequate, but pretty boring. The reason I choose CNN over the other news channels is because of the personalities. Campbell Brown, Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper usually find ways to engage and amuse me, but not tonight. Everyone was pretty straightforward and dry. What do they think this is, network news? If I wanted straightforward and dry, I'd watch Charlie Gibson.

But hey. At least this election is over. See you in four years!

12:19: Obama finished speaking a good five minutes ago, yet nobody has broken in with commentary. That's either an admirable show of restraint or a sign that the CNN anchors are all busy getting drunk.

I thought I'd get this in before we get too far away from the Republican National Convention.

Conan O'Brien sent Triumph The Insult Comic Dog to St. Paul last week to cover the convention, and as usual the results are hilarious. He manages to get an interview with CNN anchor Anderson Cooper. Well, at first Cooper just sends him a note from across the convention hall (I won't spoil for you what the note says) but Triumph finally gets a face-to-face interview with Cooper, where he lays down an awesome dig at MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews that Cooper laughs at (Cooper should be looking at Triumph during the interview but keeps looking at Robert Smigel instead).

Triumph also gets Wolf Blitzer. Actually, Wolf doesn't talk to Triumph, but that doesn't stop the dog from thanking Blitzer for keeping his porn name even after he got into journalism. There's also a mention of Law and Order, thanks to Fred Thompson, and he screams to Greta van Susteren and other pundits and hosts.

After the jump is the video (in two parts).

I'd just like to say that there are a lot of TV sites on the web, but TV Squad is "The Best TV Site That Has Ever Existed Or Will Ever Exist On This Planet Or Any Other." And that's official, by the way.

Now that I've announced that, there seems to be a little battle going on with the cable news channels and even the regular networks when it comes to coverage of this year's Presidential election. CNN reminds us every three and a half minutes that they are "The Best Political Team On Television," almost as much as they remind us that "we're in The Situation Room"), and now CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric has jokingly named her team of Jeff Greenfield and Bob Schieffer "The Best Political Team In The Galaxy." They liked that, especially Greenfield, who used to be the political expert over on CNN.

I wouldn't call myself a political junkie, though I guess I do get that way every four years. The massive coverage the election gets from the news channels is both way overdone and endlessly fascinating.

Last night I watched the coverage of Super Tuesday. My plan was to try to stick to one station, since they'd have the results eventually, but my remote trigger finger got itchy and I was surfing all night. Here are a few random thoughts I jotted down.

1. I couldn't watch CNN, at least not all night.. Those giant screens and all those graphics. At one point Wolf Blitzer was standing next to a massive lineup of 24 different pie charts, and I think he wanted to just throw his notes down and walk down the street to the nearest bar. John King was doing all these fancy things with his fingers on a screen, and it was hard to follow and kind of glitchy. It was the world's most insane PowerPoint presentation.

First off, I'd just like to point out that Chris Matthews is the most annoying political analyst on television.

Now that that's out of the way, did anyone watch the New Hampshire primary coverage on CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News? If Chandler Bing was covering the primary, he'd say "could the networks be more wrong?" (If Chandler Bing really existed and commented on political coverage).

Um...I'm really not sure what to make of this video from CNN. It's not Dancing with the Stars exactly, but there is dancing and there are stars.

It shows the new Fab Four - Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, Lou Dobbs, and Larry King, with Cooper definitely the "Paul" of the group - dressed as Christmas elves (complete with funny hats, green suits, red and white stockings) and doing a bizarre dance to the tune of "Jingle Bells." OK, obviously, it's just their heads pasted on top of elf bodies. I wonder if they had to get the permission of the four anchors to do this or if it's just something CNN decided to do on their own. I can't imagine Dobbs being thrilled with it but I can see the other three laughing at it. Oh, I'd pay money to see Dobbs or Blitzer do their shows in those outfits.

You can "Elf yourself" at Office Max's elfyourself.com.

A while back I called Anderson Cooper "The Four Million Dollar Man." Looks like we're going to have to call him something else.

CNN has just given the anchor of Anderson Cooper 360 a big increase in pay. Cooper will be paid $50 million over the next five years. Yes, that's 5-0. That comes out to be $10 million a year, but it's up to you whether you want to call Coop "The 50 Million Dollar Man" or "The 10 Million Dollar Man."

So readers, is he worth it? It's really hard to judge whether one person is "worth" the amount of money they are given, whether it's Michael Jordan, Julia Roberts, or Anderson Cooper. But Cooper does indeed seem to be the future of CNN, the "face" of the network, if you will, and it looks like they want to lock him in for a long time to come.

Cooper hosts his nightly show at 10pm and also contributes to 60 Minutes over on CBS.

• OK, how about one last wrap up of the Oscars? This one is from Ken Levine, and very funny.
• Wait a sec...the Geico caveman went to The Oscars?
• Mary-Kate Olsen writes for The New York Times.
• Kristin over at E! Online has a video interview with Heroes braineater Syler (Zachary Quinto) and has news about the (possible) future of Studio 60.
• TV Guide's Michelle Heller goes behind the scenes at The Late Show With David Letterman.
• Wolf Blizer likes the Situation Room satire they did on Saturday Night Live this past weekend.
• And, here's video of CBS News veteran Bob Schieffer singing a country and western song.

One of my favorite moments of the hours and hours and hours of Anna Nicole Smith coverage on the cable networks was when CNN's Lou Dobbs told Situation Room host Wolf Blitzer what was coming up on his show at the top of the hour. After he told viewers what was coming up (Iraq news, Wall Street news), he promised that for the entire hour there would not be a single mention of the death of Anna Nicole Smith.

Now it's Jack Cafferty's turn. And he did it on Wolf's show too. Video after the jump!

Some more talk about Wolf Blitzer's recent interview with Dick Cheney, when we were once again reminded that Cheney don't like talkin' about his lesbian daughter. Hmm. His buddies are scolding people for mentioning Mary Cheney and using children as "political props". Every time I see that clip of the "What? Are you going to kill me?" presentation, I laugh for about five or six... hours. It's not good for my health.

Senior Media Critic John Oliver stopped by to elaborate. I liked the list of fourteen things that Cheney's willing to talk about (well, what we heard of it, anyway). Political Activist Chrissy Gephardt (!) also chatted with Jon about the issue. Good sport.