Rosie and Elizabeth battle on "The View"
Rosie O'Donnell famously faced-off with Tom Selleck several years ago over gun control on her old daytime chatfest. That was just a warm-up. On a recent episode of "The View," the liberal anti-gun Rosie took on resident conservative Elizabeth Hasselbeck. The shooting at an Amish school in Pennsylvania led to a fiery debate over gun control:
Rosie: "I think the horror of imagining six to thirteen-year-old girls handcuffed together and shot execution style, one by one, is perhaps enough to awaken the nation that maybe we need some stricter gun control laws."
Elizabeth "So you can’t- You can't take way the right to, to bear arms...It is a right. It’s in our Constitution. It’s the Second Amendment."
Rosiel: "Well, let’s talk instead of yell."
Elizabeth "I’m not yelling."
Later...
Rosie: "Well, what about this? The firearm death rate among children in America 0 to 14 is 12 times higher then all 25 other industrialized nation combined. Combined."
Elizabeth: "What about the fact that firearms- Well, firearms are used 60 times more to defend people then they are to take a life in this country, too. That’s another statistic. This is why we have the debate."
More back and forth follows with neither woman backing down. Finally Joy Behar breaks the tension with some of her humor:
Behar: "I think people want to hunt, that's a right as you’re describing with their rifles. Why do they need an AK--47? Are these deer in the Israeli army?"
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I think ABC and Barbara W. are going to have to really revisit this. It's all well and good to have opposing political viewpoints ... on "Crossfire."
This is "The View," not "Hardball." They're going to lose their target audience, which I think is women 25-54, by getting so political so often. Now I'm not saying such a show is not worthy, but there's a reason Regis Philbin drags in the viewers at 9 a.m. And it ain't because of his position on gun control. If they start dropping too much from "Live," Disney is going to get mighty antsy about "The View," which looks like a network show but is, in fact, a syndicated program -- and a bigtime moneymaker at that.
The November sweeps are coming up. If there are year-to-year gains in total viewers and the demo, Rosie stays, if not, it's buh-bye. Maybe Katie Couric will be available?