I was tuned in to CNN almost 24/7 from mid-September till the end of last week. So I saw the "top-of-the-hour" segment Jack Cafferty did where he said, regarding Sarah Palin's possible succession to the presidency, "And if that doesn't scare the hell out of you, it should." More below the fold...
When I heard those words I sat up in my chair, raised both my clenched fists high in the air and said "YES!", feeling a huge sense of gratitude to this man I'd only heard of a week before for stating, simply and strongly, what he really felt about something that is of great importance to... well, only something as trivial as the future of the United States. God, what a breath of fresh air.
Then Wolf Blitzer says something to the effect of "Well, she had a lot of cramming to do" and Cafferty lashes back "Don't make excuses for her!" And when Blitzer simply says (paraphrasing) "Well, it wasn't her finest moment" Cafferty doesn't exactly roll his eyes, but only because he's trying not to.
This exchange was on Friday, Sept 26. Up until that date, Cafferty was billed as having comments at the "top" of every hour, which typically meant three commentaries per weekday (don't ask me how they define "top"). But since he "rolled his eyes" at Blitzer? He had two spots on the following Monday, 9/29, and three on Tuesday 9/30 - one of which was the Sarah Palin "She's baaaaack" segment, which again targeted the Alaskan beauty queen's ineptitude, but this time with a guest host instead of Blitzer. And that was the last we heard from Mr. Cafferty. If you go to his page right now, it is dated "October 2, 2008" with the note "Jack will not be in the Situation Room Today." October 2? It's now October 7th! WHERE IS HE?
I don't know what the heck is going on here. I guess it's possible he's on vacation, but I find it highly improbable that a guy as passionate about politics as he obviously is would take a vacation right smack-dab in the middle of the biggest election-year newsweek of his lifetime.
If it's due to Blitzer feeling a lack of respect, I say "Suck it up, Wolfie;" if it's due to CNN worrying about becoming another MSNBC, I say "Good grief, if the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times can both manage to report straight news AND offer commentary, so can you."
Mostly I say BRING CAFFERTY BACK! (And I emailed CNN with that plea and beg everyone here to do the same.)