Terror Trial Verdict, AC360's Palin Obsession Worsens, Another Victim of James O'Keefe's Smears, And Anderson Cooper Meets Some Bonobos

Hi guys. A lot packed into the broadcast tonight. A little something for everyone--even furries! To the bullet points we go:

• We finally have the verdict of the first Guantanamo detainee to be tried by a civilian court: guilty of only one of 285 counts. Admittedly I haven't been following this case very closely (haven't even done by Glenn Greenwald reading yet), but I don't think this should put the kibosh on trying these people in civilian courts. It's not like guy is going to walk free.
  

• Ah yes, a statement from Peter King. Color me shocked.

• Dear Bush administration, thank you so much for breaking the law and tainting our country's moral standing by torturing people. Now we get to deal with the consequences of your actions even as we try to revert back to the rule of law. Awesome. Well done.
  

• The discussion with Kirk Lippold, Jeffrey Toobin, and Peter Bergen wasn't bad. As I said, I haven't really seen what other info is out there on this subject, so it's hard to judge the segment, but nothing stood out to me as being ridiculous. Video below.
  

• Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, this show is OBSESSED with Sarah Palin. Oh, oh, she might run for president in two years. Everyone stop everything! Yeesh. Talk about wasted airtime.
  

• Anderson Cooper referring to Palin: " I mean, I'm fascinated by her." No, really? I hadn't noticed!

• Our anchor: "Have you ever seen a candidate or a potential candidate who makes their critics' heads explode in the way that Sarah Palin does?" He then continues to show me he is completely clueless on this subject. Yeah, Anderson, watching a serial liar who traffics in falsehoods become the object of the media's obsession makes my head a little explode-y. As a journalist, one would think that you would understand this feeling. Perhaps not.

• Erick Erickson--yes, sigh, he's there--brings up Bristol and "Dancing With the Stars," which leads Anderson to say: "Just in our defense, we have not discussed that on this show, though, tomorrow..." Um, yeah, you have no leg to stand on here.

• Moving on to the Bulletin, oh look, someone literally shot their TV over Bristol Palin's performance. Yeah...

• Also, the "shot"--again weirdly in the middle of the broadcast--made me die inside a little. Bristol Palin and The Situation in a badly acted PSA about teen pregnancy? No world. No.
  

• My regular readers (and Twitter followers) probably know I was particularly interested in the teachers union story. Actually, when Anderson teased it I got all nervous and had myself a little "don't f*ck this up, 360" prayer.
  

• James O'Keefe, the disgusting serial smear merchant, is at it again. This time one of his minions infiltrated a New Jersey Education Association conference, buddied up to a teacher, and got her to talk about the union, all the while taping what she said. The teacher, Alissa Ploshnick, was suspended and denied a raise. Oh, did I mention that she once saved her students' lives by literally throwing herself in front of a van? Yeah. I first read the story here and then took a day or so to look into it before tweeting out my feelings.
  

• After watching the segment twice, and after talking with the author of that blog post, I think the 360 kids did a fair job. Obviously I wish they would have been more like, "O'Keefe is teh evil!" but, uh, that was probably never going to happen. Anyway. This video by O'Keefe is being promoted by 360 guest Dana Loesch. I cannot believe they continue to have her on the show. This isn't about differing viewpoints. This is about lending credibility to someone who traffics in smears, falsehoods, and severely questionable ethics. For a show that has been deservedly earning praise lately, her bookings are completely beneath them, and quite frankly, embarrassing.
  

• The bunny suit is back! Anderson's piece about the bonobos at the Great Ape Trust in Iowa was just...wow. I mean, it's fascinating and the baby was adorable, but...I can not get past that suit! He hopped, people. He hopped. Bwah! This was way more humiliating than I even imagined.

• The carrots from Kevin (at least I hope I'm remembering his name right) was a nice touch. And please guys, never stopped the mocking.
  

• On tonight's RidicuList, Alvin Greene thinks he's going to be president because he's "the man." Oh, Alvin Greene, you're adorable. No, wait, I believe 'crazy' is the word I was looking for. Says Anderson: "We don't contest that Greene may, in fact, be the man. But president?" Ha! All in the delivery, people. All in the delivery.
  

• The show wasn't bad. If we get an intervention going for the Palin problem, it might soon even be great!
  

David Doss Out As AC360 Senior Executive Producer, Also Anderson Cooper Dons Bunny Suit At Request Of Apes

Hello readers! An odds and ends post for you! Given all the breaking news of the Chilean miners the last week, I really haven't had much to say. It was great to finally have a story to celebrate. Special shout out to Gary Tuchman and his producer Ismael Estrada for all their hard work. Check out Ismael's 'producer's notebook' here.

Last week also brought us some meta news in the land of 360: Senior Executive Producer David Doss is moving elsewhere at the network. He's been with the show since I started watching regularly, so this is no small tidbit. What it means exactly is anybody's guess, but I hope it results in a better quality newscast.

I know many regular viewers are pretty excited about this announcement. Personally, I always put more of the blame for the show's problems on Klein than I did Doss, but hey, what do I know? I just think some of those viewers might be longing for the so-called "Red 360," which I suspect was never as good as they remember it being. In any regard, that show is long dead.

Doss suddenly being out definitely makes one wonder about those rumors that he and Anderson Cooper were butting heads. Honestly, I can't imagine Anderson butting heads with anyone, but again, hey, what do I know? It just seems weird that it took five years for it to happen.

Anyway. The best part out of all of this? Charlie Moore is taking over! Will we soon be seeing more of AC360's Waldo? One can only hope! What? No specific reason! It can't always be about the Silver Fox, people. Ahem.

In seriousness, he seems to get along well with Anderson, which I would assume means they have the same sort of vision, which I hope means good things for we the viewers. See Mr. Moore, we're not scary, really! We just want quality news. You will get on Twitter now, yes?

Okay, people. Something else happened last week, and it was, shall we say, strange. The normally Twitter-averse Silver Fox shot out the following tweet:

From ac: in IA for story on ape communication. The apes asked me to dress as a rabbit. Weird, huh? http://twitpic.com/2xd7lq

And that twitpic was the following, so yes, weird!

Honest to God, my first thought was photoshop. Because seriously, the man who refuses to merely dance in front of cameras is going to put on a bunny suit and then send the picture to hundreds of thousands of people? Anderson Cooper, I do not understand you!

Where to even begin? What does one mock first? Perhaps the casual vagueness of the initial tweet. He's just there chilling in a bunny suit because apes told him, y'all! You know, just like every Wednesday! Did the Silver Fox really think he was going to send that picture out into the world with less than 140 characters of explanation and the Internets were not going to have a collective WTF seizure? Needless to say, the next day our anchor decided to give us a little more info:

From ac: lots of questions re yesterdays bunny costume. Doing story on bonobo chimps. the researchers sometimes dress up as a rabbit....

...when chimp indicates that is what he wants on a complex lexigram chart. I thought it was a joke, but the chimp wasn't laughing

Oh, he was laughing. On the inside, Anderson. On the inside.

But I think my absolutely favorite part of all of this was his last tweet:

From ac: who knew bunny suits had so many fans online? Going to post more pics. Find out whats up with the bunny tonite on 360

Up until this point, I had been trying very hard not to think about that dark corner of the interwebs that surely became quite excited by this whole situation. "Who knew bunny suits had so many fans online?" Bwah! That is either some mad subtle snark or one of the most naive things he's ever written. But I'm going to go with snark. I have my reasons.

So! That should be an interesting piece. Below is Thursday's "shot," which contains more explanation and more pictures of hilarity.



To put the 'end' on this post of odds and ends, finally, I give you this little morsel that I happened to come upon a week or so ago. Apparently, our friends at AC360 enjoy doing the news and science experiments! You see, if what I've linked to can be believed, there has been a piece of chocolate crumb cake sitting just outside our anchor's office since 2003. And it has disturbingly not changed in all these many years!

I hope Charlie Moore's new duties don't force him to give up the very important task of cake-keeper. That would be tragic. Specifically amusing to me, with any other show I'd be WTFing all over this post. But as I read, my initial reaction was, "yeah, that pretty much sounds exactly like something the 360 kids would do." Yes people, our news-givers are kinda weirdos...and it's part of why I love them. Suddenly the bunny suit doesn't seem that out of the ordinary, huh?