You're (Cross)Fired!

Maybe there is hope. CNN's "Crossfire," one of the trailblazers in the genre of snot-slinging political screamfests, is about to shrink into voodoo-head size. Sometime within the next few months, the cable network has announced, the program will be transformed into a 10-minute segment to air periodically in Judy Woodruff's "Inside Politics."

That also means the bowtied homunculus who goes by the earthly name of Tucker Carlson, is heading off to No. 3-rated MSNBC (actually, we used to be a fan of Tucker back when he was writing for The Weekly Standard, but that was long back before he traded in insight to join the ranks of ex-journalists whoring themselves out for back-alley punditry).

Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Gail Shister notes that CNN's new U.S. boss, Jonathan Klein, agrees with Jon Stewart's assessment that "Crossfire" and other shows of its ilk have helped corrode political discourse. "We need to lower the temperature," says Klein. "It's time for us to do a better job of informing our audience in an engaging way, as opposed to head-butting and screaming."

One down. A trillion more to go.