Greetings. Early last August, in The Decline of CNN: CNN Attempts to Censor Anti-Lou Dobbs Ad, I noted my feelings about CNN "personality" Lou Dobbs and his continuing decline into a morass of seemingly racist concepts and incredibly biased nightly viewer polls. As I said then, this is particularly painful since Lou was once a reporter worthy of considerable respect, going back for decades.

I expressed the view that Lou was reflecting badly on CNN, and while I understand the ratings realities that have made Lou valuable, I felt that CNN was being seriously tarnished by Lou's behaviors.

Around an hour ago, at the start of his regular CNN program, Lou announced that he is leaving CNN [video] -- effective immediately -- through mutual agreement with CNN brass (despite his contract reportedly running through 2011).

Word has been circulating for weeks at least that Lou was looking for an exit from CNN -- but this sudden departure announced and executed on the same day is still surprising. There clearly is much more to this story than is immediately obvious, and likely we'll learn most of it soon.

In the meantime, Lou is already sounding like he wants to run for office. Another third party Ross Perot in the making? Or maybe Huey Long? If I were a betting man, I'd be looking for him to pop up on some News Corp. (or similar) network for a while perhaps, and then a lowest-common-denominator, "populist," anti-intellectual, anti-immigration run for ...

Well, that's just speculation of course.

For now anyway, goodbye Lou. I'll miss the belly laughs I've gotten from your crooked polls. And CNN -- you've at least started on the path to regaining my respect.

--Lauren--