Wonkette: Tsunami Coverage, Worthy of Gentle Mocking, Right? Yeah? A Wonkette operative with too much time on his hands wrote in to share his favorite
December 29, 2004

Wonkette: Tsunami Coverage, Worthy of Gentle Mocking, Right? Yeah?
A Wonkette operative with too much time on his hands wrote in to share his favorite moment from CNN's tsunami coverage, noting Tucker Carlson's awkward interview with an eyewitness. According the operative, the exchange went something like this:

Tucker: Imagine having a wonderful dream and waking up to see a wall of water just about to crash down on you. Well, that's what happened to John Austin. We've got him on the line right now. Mr. Austin? What did you do when you woke up to see the tsunami?
Austin: Hello?
Tucker: Mr. Austin?
Austin: Hello?
Tucker: Hi, Mr. Austin.
Austin: Hello? This is John Austin. (You could almost hear him follow up with "To whom am I speaking with")
Tucker: Hi, Mr. Austin. What did you do when you woke up to see the tsunami?
Austin: Are you looking for John Austin?
Tucker: Hi, Mr. Austin. Are you there?
Austin: This is John Austin. This line isn't very good.

Tucker: What did you do when you woke up to see the tsunami? Austin: Hello? Tucker: What did you do when you woke up to see the tsunami? Austin: Oh, hi. Well, I'd been drinking the night before so I was a little bit groggy from it and I turned on the Discovery Channel and started watching a thing about Hitler and how there were twenty seven assassination attempts about him when I...

It's moments like that are why we treasure live television. But sometimes find things can be "too good to be true." Imagine our surprise when, according to the CNN transcript, our operative looked to be on track! Except for one crucial detail:

Austin: And I had woken up with several hours sleep and (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and so forth and turned on Discovery and was watching some program with Adolf Hitler and how he survived 27 assassination attempts.

Yes, we try that (unintelligible) trick to cover up drinking, too.

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