Wolf Blitzer was aomng the targets of a particularly Washington-centric Boston Legal Wednesday night on ABC.
The episode began with what ammounted to the demolition of the fourth wall–that is the one between the fiction of TV and the reality outside the box.
The Boston Legal team spent the first 30 seconds or so of the show referring to the fact that the show had been moved to Wednesday night, complete with various characters expressing their surprise, which provided an opportunity to mention how many days it would be on Wednesday, the news that it would not air next week, and even a question about whether the show was coming back next season.
BL is famous for self-referential asides about it being a TV show, but this was its longest sustained aside, and is certainly the longest I have seen since the famous "credits on the pancake" episode of Green Acres.
But I digress, big time.
Anyway, the show featured an attack on the FDA in the guise of a suit against hormone-stuffed beef, and an attack on the Democratic Party’s nominating process in the guise of a suit against the Democratic Party over its nominating process.
References to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton flew, as did criticisms of the pledged and super delegates, the Iraq war, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, John McCain, and whatever political target was handy. Both Obama and Cilnton were skewered, with Obama’s "Yes We Can" mantra mercilessly lampooned, for example.
But what about Wolf Blitzer? I hear you impatiently importuning.
He appeared in the guise of grey-bearded bespectacled newsman character, Wolfgang Blitzkrieg, who is covering the trials because, he says several times in case anyone missed it, he is "with the best political news team on television," adding: "We really are the best, you know." Later, he expands, saying "we are the best political news team ever assembled…in history."
The riff is of course a reference to the "part of the best political news team on television" line Blitzer offers up with the annoying regularity of a "Head On" commercial. I’ve got a new promotions phrase for CNN: "Political news, apply directly to the forehead. Political news, apply directly to the forehead."
Blitzer aired a clip of the episode on his Situation Room show Thursday
