mountainave

I'm perhaps being overly critical, but I found WABC's coverage of the Port Authority bombing this morning to be underwhelming. Shirleen was anchoring solo for the majority. Not ideal for a major breaking news event. Nobody else to bounce off of or to jump in with new information. At one point she read out the bomber's exact home address, which seemed inadvisable at best. I happened to flip on Fox 5's coverage as well and thought Rosanna and Lori did a solid job.

Haven't seen anything about a suspension of Jim Dolan. Was this reported somewhere?

CNN does the same. Or, at least, they did for a while. Not sure if it happens there as often, still. This is a huge pet peeve of mine. The same is true on GMA, too.

Dray Clark is departing for NBC Philadelphia.

Amy Freeze has been part of the ABC News network coverage of Irma for a large part of today.

Noticed that Matt Gutman subbed in for Dan Harris on GMA Weekend earlier in August.

Byron Pitts previously held the title of Chief National Correspondent. Is he still with ABC?

Plausible. But NBC's I-Team has five reporters. EWN has two if you count Nina. If WABC really wanted to double down on investigative reporting, I suspect they would do more than make a name change. We'll see if they actually follow through on the Investigative Reporter job posting and hire someone else.

I agree.

A branding change: "The Investigators" has become "7 on Your Side Investigates" http://abc7ny.com/7onyoursideinvestigates/

If Whoopi leaves and Joy becomes moderator, ABC should bring back Sherri Shepherd. She was such a great fit for the show and is funny, too.

Presumably, either Jim Hoffer is leaving, or they decided to return to having two investigative reporters.

Does anyone recall how WABC covered the September 11 attack? Did they at any point carry the network coverage, or did they stick with local coverage throughout the day?

What would Barbara think...

Amen to the above posts. I, too, grew up on Charlie, Diane, Robin, and Tony.

Tony Yates filled in for Lori a few mornings this past week. I actually thought she was great with Ken. I prefer her to Shirleen.

You're right. That is a little bizarre. By all accounts, if the plan was for her to replace Rob, it would have been announced during or shortly following Rob's departure. Maybe they are still negotiating contract details?

I'll bet on Amy replacing Robin, and either Dan Harris or David Muir replacing George.

David anchored tonight instead of Tom, perhaps given the gravity of the day's news.

Today was a full day of hot topics and the panel was Whoopi, Sara, Joy, Sunny, and Paula. You can just tell that this is a more intellectual panel. The discussion was richer and more thoughtful. It certainly is a different atmosphere than we got with Whoopi, Michelle, Joy, Raven, and Paula. I would love to see Whoopi, Joy, Sunny, Paula, and Jedediah. Sara is great but I think Jedediah is less afraid to jump in with passion. Sunny and Joy are so, so liberal that it would be nice to have Jedediah there (along with Paula, though I think Jedediah is better) to balance out the points of view at the table.

On another note, what leverage did ABC have over Whoopi to be able to cut her salary in half? My guess would be that they had ratings and feedback data that suggested that Joy was well-liked by viewers, and that ratings didn't drop on Fridays when Whoopi was gone. In other words, maybe they told Whoopi to take a pay cut or be replaced by Joy.

I'll add to the choir and agree that Candace seemed to fit in well. Unlike Paula, she was able to be outspoken in her conservative viewpoints, and she did so without being obnoxious. Moreover, Whoopi actually seemed to like her and respect her quite a bit.

When was the last time Michelle Collins was at the table?

That New at 11 box looks like it belongs on Fox 5. Plus, it's huge. Totally covered the collision in the video they played. If people are already tuned in, I wonder what the point is. Maybe they have data suggesting that some people are watching the open and then changing the channel or turning the TV off, so they are looking for a way to keep people lured in.

Ah, okay. I must've been thinking about the studio.