-By Warner Todd Huston
As CNN continues to search for new talent to spark its revival, new President Jeff Zucker is looking to Canadian talk show host George Stroumboulopoulos to come down from the Great White North on a mission to make it big in the states. Yes, CNN is importing a liberal from Canada because importing that liberal from Britain worked out so well.
Stroumboulopoulos, who mercifully goes by the nickname “Strombo,” hosts a TV show on Canada’s CBC where he cozies up to rock stars, talks art and movies, and ruminates about pop culture.
In its announcement of the move, CNN pledges that Strombo will bring to America his “fresh, thought-provoking style fuses big ideas, with art, pop culture, politics, news, sports, and celebrity.”
“We’re really pleased to bring this special series to CNN,” said Amy Entelis, senior VP for talent and content development for CNN Worldwide. “It is a good example of the expansion of the CNN strategy to bring new kinds of relevant and engaging programming to a broad audience.”
Last September Strombo was criticized by Canadians upset that he hosted a star-studded party paid for with tax dollars dedicated to the Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC).
Even as CBC programmers were complaining about proposed cuts in its budget, Strombo was hosting a lavish party because, as he then told the media, “I like partying with people.”
The Toronto Sun slammed the $72,000 in tax dollars spent on the party saying the cost was “more than one-and-a-half times the average income of a working Canadian” for a “one-night, celebrity-filled party.”
To reveal a bit of his “thought-provoking style,” Strombo also appeared on video to discuss his taxpayer hosted party. In the video Strombo helpfully laid on his fellow Canadians some of his “thought -provoking” philosophy of life.
Ummm…I’ve always wanted to be in a band, not a solo artist. And I want to be in a community. I’ve always thought that community is interesting. An individual is a tree. A group of individuals is a forest. And forests are strong and they’re beautiful and they work together and they feed other things and other things feed them. That’s sincerely what it is. I like partying with people, you know, so, tonight I come and I get to see my friends, you know. And that’s fun.
All these cool people that showed up, they didn’t need to come out here tonight. But they did. It’s nice of them, right. And you’re here. You’re here. And you’re here. You’re here. That’s truly what it is, right. My, like… this life is a fluke for me. I just want to be around cool people who do cool things. And that’s what this is tonight.
So very fun! Maybe even a bit too needy. Even fluke-like.
Now that fluke is coming to CNN.
As to his politics, while he claims to be interested in American politics, he has said on his show that he is “unbiased.” Some, though, have complained that he is just as biased to the left as any other CBC presenter.
For one, religious Canadians have said that Strombo is a constant advocate for gay marriage while still others have complained about his shows that paint Israel as a totalitarian regime.
Stroumboulopoulos will host an hour-long show with a ten-episode order that will air on CNN this summer.
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“The only end of writing is to enable the reader better to enjoy life, or better to endure it.”
–Samuel Johnson
Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, RightPundits.com, CanadaFreePress.com, StoptheACLU.com, AmericanDaily.com, among many, many others. Mr. Huston is also endlessly amused that one of his articles formed the basis of an article in Germany’s Der Spiegel Magazine in 2008.
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