ululate!

I wasn't sure whether I should even do a "Ululate!" piece for Larry King, who just died at the age of 87 from complications possibly related to COVID-19.  King was never central to my viewing habits over the years, but he was a constant presence somewhere in the background.  A bit like Donald Trump, King liked slapping his own name up on most of his projects:  Larry King Live, The Larry King Show, Larry King Now, and Politicking with Larry King.  He was a calm, affable interviewer, perhaps a little harder-hitting than Charlie Rose, but only a little.

I will, however, remember King most for a monumental moment in broadcasting:  the tense debate that King hosted between Ross Perot and Al Gore in 1993.  That debate was uncomfortable for me to sit through, and it showcased Al Gore's skills as a nimble debater:  Gore absolutely wiped the floor with Perot, who proved temperamental under fire.  This was a terrible PR moment for Perot, and it may have swung a lot of fence-sitters toward Gore, who displayed an almost Vulcan level of calm as he casually dismantled Perot's arguments, one after another.  All of this happened while King stared beadily.

Well, the show is over, and the King is now dead.  I salute his long, stellar career in broadcasting, even if he was just one leg of the satanic centipede that is CNN.  The man survived a heart attack, quintuple-bypass surgery, and even lung cancer.  He somehow survived eight marriages as well.  Despite his frail, skeletal appearance, King kept chugging along, and there's something to respect in that.

RIP, Mr. King.