katie couric and sarah palin
On Sunday, NBC’s “Today” show announced that Palin would co-host the morning program this Tuesday. “She’ll reveal a different side of her than you’ve seen before,” the “Today” website says of the Fox News contributor.Last week, hosts on ABC’s “Good Morning America” told audiences that Couric would fill in for a vacationing Robin Roberts this week.
“I see this as a good opportunity to bring an independent, common-sense conservative perspective to NBC. We’re ‘going rogue’ and infiltrating some turf for a day,” Palin told Breitbart’s Big Journalism website. “Game on,” Palin said when asked for a comment about going head-to-head with Couric.
Couric’s questions during the lead-up to the 2008 election, including one about what newspapers Palin reads, provided political fodder for Democrats as well as sniping from Palin and conservatives about the so-called liberal media.
But when Palin phoned in to the Today Show from Minnesota Monday morning in route from Alaska for some pre-game discussion, host Matt Lauer couldn’t resist bringing up the gaffe.
“What are you doing to prepare? Are you reading some newspapers?” Lauer asked, to the laughs, groans and howls of the Today Show on-stage crew.
“That’s a fine ‘How do you do,’” Palin said. “That’s a great start. Here we go.”
Palin said she plans to highlight energy prices and national security issues Tuesday morning. “I really look forward to this and I appreciate NBC’s boldness in having me on… Doesn’t it kinda reflect that diversity of opinion that I hear you all espouse.”
The Monday issue of the New York Daily News ran with a front-page headline “Kat Fight,” depicting Couric landing a punch on Palin inside a boxing ring.
NBC’s “Today” is trying to beat back growing competition from GMA, which recently narrowed the gap in morning viewership to a six-year low, according to Media Bistro, and threatens to take over the top spot.
Couric bombed at CBS. Her ratings plunged lower than her neckline. Last year, CBS had enough and fired her. Of course, Katie claims that she left to ′pursue other opportunities′, celebrity-code talk for ′my career is in the gutter!′ The perky one rambled about here and there, but it was obvious that her only ′talent′ was to do fluff pieces on a morning TV show.
So on Tuesday, we will have a one-day battle royale as Sarah Palin co-hosts The Today Show while Katie Couric continues her first week on Good Morning America. Both shows have been losing audience shares as the cable TV programs like Fox & Friends and the Don Imus Show dominate morning TV news shows. Palin′s one-day stint may be just a prelude for bigger things down the road. A year or two rebuilding her popularity could help launch a presidential run in 2016. For Katie Couric, she is on the last leg career-wise before doing dinner theater at The Villages in Florida. She may want to consider another favorite Klingon proverb of mine, ″meQtaHbogh qachDaq Suv qoH neH!″ Only a fool fights in a burning house!
The Palin pick was part of the discussion on MSNBC's "Melissa Harris-Perry" this morning, with Harris-Perry asking her panel of guests if the rumor (which by then was fact) was, "Real or fake?"
"I hope its fake," said one, while another chimed in about what we all know: "NBC is doing that as counterprogramming to Katie Couric guest hosting "Good Morning America."
Palin and Couric's nearly contiguous morning show appearances will bring them tantalizingly close to being back on screen together, staring awkwardly across the gulf of worldviews that separates the two women. They're too close, in fact, not to wonder how morbidly intriguing it would be to see them co-hosting a show, like, together. I mean, now that Palin has a bit of totally legitimate experience as a political expert on the highly-esteemed beacon of objective journalism Fox News, Couric must be dying to work with her. In the effort to bring the two whip-smart women together, I've generated a little list of, let's call them suggestions, for what the Couric/Palin television dynamo could do:
Cooking with Katie & Sarah could feature all sorts of homespun recipes, like different pies whose crusts are made from a pulpy mixture of every newspaper and magazine on stands that very same day. After baking each pie, Couric could spoon feed it to Palin, but Palin would close her mouth and shake her head because that would be their little shtick, Couric trying to spoon feed Palin and Palin mistaking the spoon for a threat.
Katie & Sarah's Book Corner wouldn't be the most erudite show on television, but who's reading anyway when there's so much TV on? Certainly not Sarah Palin, who, halfway through each show, would admit to not finishing the book. That would be Katie Couric's cue to put her hands on her hips, turn to the audience, who would all know to say, "Aww, Sarah!" together.
On Kickball with Sarah Palin, only Sarah Palin would be on screen. Katie Couric would be behind the camera, teeing up kickball after kickball and trying to break Palin's concentration by hitting her in the head
Where in the World Is Katie Couric? would be an educational program that would scare children into being more assiduous geography students as they'd watch in horror Sarah Palin haplessly navigating what she thinks is the globe, but what is actually Epcot. Meanwhile, Katie Couric sips espresso in Rome and watches the coverage of Palin's futile search with a mix of shame and delight.
Networks, take heed — there's an untapped oil reserve in television and it's a quirky mix of Sarah Palin and Katie Couric. Sarah Palin, at least, would want to drill for it.