I saw both of them. Celebrity Jeopardy! is NOT that difficult. I mean, journalists and liberals tell me on an almost daily basis that I - a conservative, Catholic woman - am far less intelligent than they, merely because of my political/religious ideologies. Never mind the fact I have a BA and will soon have two Masters.

Oh, and the fact that I like to keep a running score when I watch Jeopardy on my scientific calculator, including wagers on daily doubles and final Jeopardy!. On most normal episodes, where the questions for average Joes are much more difficult, I make a respectable showing, even if I don't win. With celebrity Jeopardy, I win hands-down every time.

I guess that SNL parody wasn't too far from the mark.

So what they're sayin' is their anchors are too stupid to push buttons?

In the immortal words of Miss Piggy when Link Hogthrob panicked on a episode of Pigs in Space, "You pushed the wrong button, BACON BRAIN!".

...the buzzer is complicated. It's not activated until Alex [Trebek] finishes the last syllable of the question.

See, there is the problem, it's not the button.
CNN news anchors don't know trivia like, "What is a syllable, Alex?"

How does being button-challenged explain a negative score Mr Blizter?

Yeah, but a professional athlete, comedian, rocker and actress don't seem to have these same problems with pushing of buttons. But as we all know people in those particular professions and pretty bright lights...[sarcasm off]

No wonder cnn is in the tank re ratings. They are trying to learn how to push buttons, instead of paying attention to what is going on in the world.

I had the sound turned off when Dana Delaney was on anyway....who won again..?

maybe they need leg tingling sensors for celebrity jeopardy when jurnos participate

I think they were trying to say Wolf knew all the answers before the question was finished being read, and buzzed in too soon, therefore did not have a chance to answer. However, to end up negative you have to answer incorrectly. He could well have been more in the hole than he was.

And the buzzer is complicated

Everyone else figured it out.

The problem is there's no teleprompter or producer talking in your earpiece.

The kids who play on Jeopardy figure out the button. And I assume there's at least some for of pre-game orientation and practice.

Still, with a negative score, it means you were first to hit the button and got the wrong answers.

People like Blitzer aren't smart. They're dressed up and written to look and sound smart. Take away everything he owns for a couple of months and he'd be indistinguishable from any bun on Polk Street in San Francisco.

Forget Jeopardy and it's "buttons".
I want to see Wolf Blitzer and Soledad O'Brien on the next series of Survivor!

Let's see them try to start a cooking fire without immolating themselves.
Good times, good times, yeah!

Listen to Blitzer for two minutes and you can tell there's not much going on inside that head of his.

His face is emotionless and bland. Empty-headed.

Wolf Blitzer joins Dan Rather, Katie Couric, Chris Mathews and other August Progressive Personages as a winner of the Forest Gump Broadcast "Journalist" Intellectual Excellence Award. Instead of an Oscar-looking figurine, winners receive a Curly of The Three Stooges figurine, with "Nyuk, Nyuk, Nyuk!" engraved on the bottom.

Dave in PA, that's not fair to Forest Gump. He was bright enough to know he wasn't a smart man.

I dislike Jeopardy but my wife likes it so I watch.

As far as I can tell the most important bit of strategy is not answering any questions wrong. If you don't know, don't press the button and you will always have a good chance to win. Honestly I despise watching the show because people( not my wife) find it necessary to blurt answers out whether they’re guessing or not. The pride swells when one or two are correct but they seem to forget all of the missteps along the way.

wrt excuses, Jeopardy isn't a "real" game show anyways so it doesn't matter, no prizes, not hot chicks ect…. It's not CNN's fault that people are interested in non-game shows, that's why they're not doing well, it has nothing to do with CNN. In fact, I suspect that Wolf was actually correct in his wrong responses, but instead, a vast right-wing conspiracy to mislead the public is pulling the strings. I expect the Whitehouse to blackball the show to preserve CNN's integrity and to balance the playing field.

Perhaps a game of Press Your Luck would be a better bar to measure MSM pundits by.

No Whammy, No Whammy, No Whammy!

OK, since I've actually been on Jeopardy!, let me tell you what the scoop is:

1 - Yes, you cannot answer the question until Alex finishes speaking. You can't see them on TV, but there are "countdown" lights that turn off, and if you push your button while a light is still lit, you are locked out for one quarter of second, which is an eternity in Jeopardy! time.

2 - Yes, you get to practice, but it's early in the morning, and you only get a few minutes. My game didn't occur until the afternoon, so the few minutes didn't really help. It was embarrassing - during the breaks, the makeup lady kept giving me hints, as it was obvious I didn't have the button's rhythm.

3 - It's folly to think that the other contestants don't know the answers. I was up against a five time champ (who eventually won that year's Tournament of Champions, so I don't feel too bad about losing to him), and a university professor on the other side. The screening process is pretty rigid, and as one of the producers told me, they don't want stupid people on the show - it's humiliating for them, and bad TV for the viewers.

4 - Watching at home and placing your Daily Double bets presupposes that you would have gotten them in the game. I was really frustrated, as I knew all three Daily Double answers on my show, but I didn't hit any of them. (And the other guys got them all wrong - doubly annoying!)

5 - You don't have to ring in first to get an answer wrong; you can ring in after someone else gets it wrong, and then get it wrong yourself. This happened to Wolf a couple of times.

When I went for my tryout in New York City, the first thing the screener told us was "It's all about the buzzer". She was so right! Apparently, there is now an electronic version of Jeopardy! with real buzzers - I wish I'd known about it before my game, because that might have saved me.

scientific calculator , that would be of course-
RPN, excellant for running tallies.

And these clowns want their chosen ONE in charge of the REAL button????
THAT is the problem here,not some stupid game show!!!!!

Heh, "those buzzers are complicated."

I figure if one is too stupid to figure out how and when to push a button, one really ought not be opining about complex political affairs.

Of course, that's just my humble opinion.

Colin:

Since you clearly ignored my earlier comment, let me rephrase it for you. It's not a question of stupidity, it's a question of reflexes. I knew practically every answer that my opponents did, but they were both a lot younger and faster on the button then I was. It is a competition after all, and afterwards, one of the producers told me that in a very competitive match, as I was in, the person who answered was able to ring in within 10 milliseconds of Alex finishing the question. There's not much margin for error there, especially if you are not 100% sure of your answer.

"It's not a question of stupidity"
Yes it is. Blitzer scored minus 4600. He didn't get that score by not answering questions. He got that score by answering questions incorrectly. He couldn't even name the town where Jesus was born. He is not only stupid but pathetically stupid.

A button is too complex for these brain-trusts to handle? Hhhmmmm.... Maybe Saturday Night Live was right.

And KevinB misses the point entirely.

John Moore liberal party fart catcher from CFRB radio in Toronto also failed on Jeopordy?

KevinB, you needn't rephrase your previous comment, since my post had nothing to do with what you said.

Justthinkin' is correct. You missed my point entirely -- and, I'd wager, the point of this entire thread -- which is to justifiably mock the excuse provided by the "CNN insider", that the buzzer mechanics were "complicated."

Never bring a TV news person to a battle of wits.

If you watched regular Jeopardy and compared the level of dificulty in the celebrity version you'd find the level of dificulty much lower for the celebs. Even the junior tournament has tougher stuff.

The reason the news speakers can't answer questions is that they are idiots.

KevinB, there is an old saying that only a lousy tradesman blames his tools. I have no doubt it is tricky to push the button at just the right time but it is equally hard for all the contestants. The fact remains that Wolf did ring in, his problem was, He didn't know the answers. At the same time I believe he would have a natural advantage because he works in front of the TV cameras all the time he wouldn't suffer from stage fright.

The Beatles?

Soledad O’Brien is such a phony. In April 2008, Reverend Jeremiah Wright gave a speech in Detroit to the NAACP.  One of the things that  he said in this speech was that black and white children learn with different parts of their brain, and then gave an "unflattering imitation of the way white pastors speak."  Peoples comments were that he gave a racial speech. Soledad  O'Brien, on CNN, was quoted as saying, in a gushing manner, that the speech was a "home run" and "really funny." When questioned about the things he said in the speech, she would say things like, what he really meant was .....or what he wanted to say was... Once again she's covering the truth and being racist.  Just as with the Henry Gates incident.  In an appearance on Anderson Cooper, the night or so before CNN's "The Moment of Truth" she appeared enraged that it was a racial profile against Gates. She said that she got calls from her FRIENDS saying it was all about Gates being black.  She went on that show with the purpose, at all costs, to destroy the credibility of the white police officer and throw him under the bus.  When Cooper was talking she wanted to make the point that Gates said "Thank You" to the police officers.  By mentioning that, she was purposely misrepresenting the truth by playing down Gates' belligerence and racial remarks, which she didn't even mention.  Even Gates' attorney and friend, said to the media that he used very strong language. Colon Powell and President Obama both said he should take blame in the incident.  I have seen this in many occasions with her, where she doesn't speak the truth and hides the true facts.  Another time on Anderson Cooper, Cooper said to O'Brien that Senator John McCain hasn't brought race into the campaign, like he said he wouldn't.  You would think her response would have been something like, that's great because he shouldn't.  Instead she strongly insinuated that he would, even in the last week of the campaign. Also, her questioning style, in interviews  is completely different with a white person than it is with a black person.  Like in her interview with Henry Gates in "The Moment of Truth"  She just went along with his lies. I have seen several comments on various websites about her racism.  There are many other examples I could give of her racial bias, dishonesty and hypocrisy. She seems to consider herself to be black. She mentioned in an interview that her parents made it clear to her “you’re black” and that’s all there is to it.
She’s all about being #1, she wants the world to revolve around her. She comes first, before her family. She wants to be a celebrity figure and a star. In interviews she says she works 6 days a week, mostly out of town, and on some holidays. She goes to gala events, concerts, lots of entertainment events, as a single woman, leaving her husband and kids behind.
I think Soledad O’Brien is a very poor journalist. What ever happened to the days of CNN with Bernard Shaw and Judy Woodruff? T hey were honorable journalists. You could believe what they said. John Las Vegas