Tom SHALES (via Gawker) "AMANPOUR: Too Brunette, Persian for TV?"

[UTUSN]

They should have used THIS pic of Mika Mouse:

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http://gawker.com/5501221/christiane-amanpour-too-brunette-persian-for-tv?skyline=true&s=i

Christiane Amanpour: Too Brunette, Persian For TV?

There is some controversy over Christiane Amanpour taking over ABC's This Week. Longtime Washington Post critic Tom Shales, for example, is upset that she hates Israel and has bad hair.

Now, normally, there's nothing wrong with Tom Shales. He's become a kind of boring TV critic, and being merely "kind of boring" instead of "actively terrible" at the Washington Post is actually doing pretty well for yourself. His SNL book was great and I am looking forward to his ESPN book.

But it is increasingly apparent that he brokers no dissent in television figures when it comes to the subject of Israel, and he also has a really nasty tendency to suspect non-Jews with family ties to the Middle East of bias. Like, did you know that Helen Thomas is criticizes Israel because her parents were Syrian immigrants (like three hundred years ago)? And Amanpour—certainly sounds French, but she's actually half-Persian. ....

And Glenn Greenwald makes the obvious point that no one serious (like, newspaper critic-level, not nutty blogger-level) ever really talks about the Jewishness of Wolf Blitzer or David Gregory and wonders whether or not that affects their objectivity. (Nor does anyone mention that former AIPAC employee Blitzer is also a complete moron. Seriously, there are not thoughts in his head. He just emits sounds. He is a professional sound-maker.)

I, for one, think Amanpour-to-This Week might be a dumb idea and a shame because we're taking one of our very few television celebrities who does anything to educate television-watching Americans about foreign affairs and sentencing her to a career of eliciting canned responses from the same idiot elected officials. Seems like a waste of her experience and expertise. But she's earned a rest from real journalism and CNN is an identity-less third-place joke, so ABC might be good for her.

Still: a prominent 52-year-old half-Persian woman is being subject to attacks based on her sex and ethnicity! Color us shocked! Time to watch Megyn Kelly explain some poll she read that told her 99% of voters spontaneously weep when they even think of Obamacare.


Send an email to Alex Pareene, the author of this post, at [e-mail].

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[Tierra_y_Libertad]

1. Not to mention that she doesn't sound like a cross between Shirley Temple and a duck. K&R

[JuniperLea]

2. She has brains...

I'm pretty sure that's the real "problem."

[SPedigrees]

3. I remember back before the total GOP takeover of MSM

when Christiane Amanpour was CNN's respected foreign correspondent. Always talking into a mike from some god-forsaken wasteland, wrapped in a fur coat to combat the intensity of a frigid climate with explosions and gunfire resounding in the not far distance. Brave girl and one highly informed, articulate reporter. Those were the days.

[UTUSN]

4. And Roger AILES called her, "that war bitch"!1 or it might have been MURDOCH, "that war slut" n/t

[bullwinkle428]

5. I love Mika's "Grey Goose seemed like a MUCH better idea

last night!" look!

[madrchsod]

6. wow that`s quite the line up of bubble headed bleach blondes

i`ll take chrisiane over any of these blondes...after all conversation lasts longer than sex.....i know i`m bad.

[Berry Cool]

7. Amazing, isn't it, that women can watch a male anchor without having to think he's hot.

OK, Keith Olbermann. But I watched Bill Moyers too, and I didn't have to pant over him. Nothing wrong with Cronkite back in the day either. But there seems to be this persistent attitude that men simply won't listen to a female talking head on TV unless she looks like they'd want to screw her. As for women, who cares who we will watch?

[lefty2000]

8. I guess we will get to see her teeth at last. n/t

[UTUSN]

10. Sumpin wrong with her teeth?1

[BurtWorm]

9. Shales is a transparent bigot.

Wow! I didn't know this about him, but after reading Glenn Greenwald and Eric Boehlert about him today, it's disgustingly apparent. He doesn't like Amanpour because she's too non-Jewish Middle Eastern. What a jackass!