From tanning with Snooki to bravely tasting spinach, we’ve already seen that Anderson Cooper’s daytime persona is a letdown from the journalist we all fell in love with. But that’s nothing compared to the behind-the-scenes disaster that’s unfolding: Gawker alleges that a teenager is in a coma after one of the show’s producers encouraged the kid to record his own reckless behavior.

Details are sketchy, but we hear the show booked a teenager to appear on a show about how the adolescent mind works. In advance of his appearance, a source says, a producer “encouraged [the] kid to go out and ‘film the crazy stuff you do.’” In the course of following those instructions, the teen filmed himself skateboarding adventurously and fell, sustaining a severe head injury. We are told he is comatose, and that Cooper is “distraught.” The show never aired.

Teenagers do stupid things that could give them serious head injuries every day, and it’s not Cooper’s fault that someone who works on his show said something that could maybe be tied to an accident. Let’s not assign blame, and instead focus on the tragedy. The tragedy of not getting to watch that gnarly skateboarding crash.

Anderson Cooper may be a sexy intrepid reporter poised to become the gay white Oprah, but he’s not without quirks: he doesn’t drink hot beverages or eat green vegetables. In the video below, the Silver Fox tries both coffee and spinach for the first time and makes the expected “Yucky!” faces. And his audience actually claps for him, like he’s being so brave to eat spinach. “Good job, Andy! You’re so brave to eat a vegetable!” What a crock.

To balance out the utter pussitude of the video, I’ve also included a clip from last night’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” in which Mark Wahlberg’s friend Nacho Libre eats two big balls of wasabi and chases them with three large cups of Tabasco sauce. It’s terrifying, yet undeniably badass. If “Entourage” had had a character like Nacho, the show would have sucked considerably less.

Read the rest of this entry »

Anderson Cooper is a well-respected journalist who has reported from dangerous places like Iraq, Afghanistan, New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, and Haiti in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake. But in this clip from his new talk show “Anderson” (watch below), Cooper ventures farther behind enemy lines than ever before: he goes spray-tanning with Snooki. I smell Pulitzer! Wait, no. That’s just hairspray.

Anyway, I think it’s great that Coop has a cushy new job that doesn’t involve going to third-world countries, because getting shot at gets old and we all gotta make that scrilla. I just wish there were a better way to collect the flotsam of the Oprah-viewing demographic than taking off your shirt and hanging out with Snooki.

Read the rest of this entry »

Wow. It kinda got serious for a little there, what with back-to-back posts about terrorists and suicide. So please accept this video of Anderson Cooper giggling uncontrollably while making poop and pee jokes about Gerard Depardieu pissing in the aisle of an airplane as a palate cleanser. I love Anderson Cooper so much, you guys. Tread lightly in the comments, or I will come down on you like the Hammer of Thor. The thunder of my vengeance will echo through these corridors like the gusts of A THOUSAND WINDS!

Also on CNN last night, Christine O’Donnell walked out of an interview with Piers Morgan, but neither of them bothered to make a joke about doodoo in the process, so I don’t really see how that’s newsworthy in the least.

via Deadline

The revolution currently going on in Egypt may end up being one of the most important cultural and sociopolitical events of our lifetime, but you aren’t going to get the “normal Joe SixPack Americans” to care until Egyptians start beating up our celebrities.

That took a big leap forward today when Silver Fox and Channel One-alum Anderson Cooper was repeatedly punched in the head by protesters. “The attackers pushed and shoved the CNN crew and punched them in the head, he said, but no one was seriously hurt,” according to a report on CNN.com.  A colleague, CNN’s Steve Brusk, tweeted that Cooper was “punched 10 times in the head” by a “pro-Mubarak mob.” No word on whether or not the crowd counted along with the punches, like when Hulk Hogan does it.

I like to think Cooper got punched in the head not because of Mubarak, but because he went to Egypt to cover world events and tried to film them on his Flip™. Also, I’m going to keep being ignorant enough to believe “Mubarak” is a Jack Kirby monster who has somehow taken over Egypt. For more on the turmoil, allow me to retweet from @mattufford:

“Did I just hear the phrase ‘police on camels’ on CNN? Maybe the Egyptian revolution can overthrow some stereotypes.”