Sunday, August 10, 2014

Nicolle Wallace as a Host of The View

I am not a regular viewer of The View, but I have watched the show, now and then.  A lot of my viewing of it has been through You-Tube: I want to see if a controversial guest (i.e., Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, maybe Jesse Ventura) holds his or her own, or I want to watch Rosie O’Donnell’s historic clash with Elisabeth Hasselbeck over the Iraq War, or Whoopie Goldberg’s lecture to Elisabeth about race.  I watch the YouTube video, You-Tube recommends to me other excerpts from The View to watch, and I then watch those.

I have occasionally watched the show in the morning.  This has usually been when I have known that certain guests would be on it.  I think of Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, Bill Clinton, or Rachel Held Evans.

Rosie O’Donnell will soon be a host on the view again, after a long time of absence.  And I have also learned that Nicolle Wallace will be one of the hosts.

Nicolle Wallace worked on the McCain campaign in 2008.  You may have seen the movie, Game Change, which was about John McCain’s running mate, Sarah Palin.  Well, the character of Nicolle Wallace in that movie was the lady with the blond hair who was trying to advise Sarah Palin on what to say in interviews.  In the movie, and in real life, Nicolle ultimately decided not to vote for John McCain due to her doubts about Sarah Palin’s qualifications.

I’m wondering what The View will be like with Nicolle Wallace as a host.  I was rooting for her to be on it, but there is a part of me that thinks that she may be too smart, too nice, and too careful about what she says to be a host for the show.  She is a conservative, but I question whether conservatives will root for her as they did for Elisabeth, on account of Nicolle Wallace’s criticisms of Sarah Palin.  (Also, see this article, which questions whether she is even conservative.)  And I have difficulty envisioning a knock-down, drag-out clash between Rosie O’Donnell and Nicolle Wallace, or Whoopie Goldberg seeing any need to lecture Nicolle Wallace on race.  Nicolle Wallace will probably present her point-of-view in an intelligent, polite, yet strong manner, as she has in the past.

Maybe that’s a good thing.  Maybe Nicolle Wallace will bring the debates on The View to a higher level.   Unfortunately, that may be at the expense of the raw honesty that drew viewers to the show.  But the show would focus on substance and issues.

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