by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
Larry King was a hallmark of CNN for decades. And then he just vanished. It was kind of weird. And, even stranger, CNN has completely ignored that for a lot of long-term viewers like me, having a breezy, value free chat show on during CNN’s weekday primetime was a rather comfortable thing to see.
Chris Cuomo just doesn’t do it for me. He’s strangely off putting for some reason, nowhere near as affable as Larry King was in his prime. I struggle to think of who CNN could replace him with, however.
The first person who comes to mind is Joe Rogan. I think Rogan can be a real idiot at times, but he is affable and given his alt-Right lite credentials, I could see his presence on the network doing a lot to bridge the gap between CNN and the rabid, bonkers MAGA shitheads who hate it so much. (Yet, who am I kidding — MAGA hates CNN because it’s objective and they crave to be fed the party line. But, luz.)
I suppose someone like Jon Stewart might be able to do the type of show I’m looking for, but that just doesn’t seem very practical. Neither Stewart nor Rogan seem really all that interested in being on CNN for various reasons.
Now that I think about it, given how King was not a traditional journalist and, as such, you could even draw from an unexpected place: SNL. There are a number of SNL-connected people who would be great as a potential Larry King-like interviewer. Kenan Thompson or Tina Fey would be just the right mix of regular person and interviewer-with-an-interesting-personality to bring back the same vibe as Larry King.
But, who am I kidding. No one listens to me.
