It's official: NBC's Campbell Brown is moving to CNN. Once considered Katie Couric's heir apparent on Today, Brown has been an NBC utility player for a while now, taking the anchor chair at Weekend Today, filing news reports on NBC Nightly News and anchoring on MSNBC, and doing some critically-acclaimed reporting in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Last month, Page Six predicted the ouster of Paula Zahn, with Brown as the leading candidate to replace; today, TVNewser reports from an "unimpeachable" source that Zahn is indeed on the outs.

Why would Brown leave NBC, and a news department where she was on a steady path on up? Though she's been out of sight for the last little while, Brown is nonetheless a face that has been seen across timeslots and issues, with unimpeachable (there's that word again!) political chops from her years in D.C. and the smart, no-nonsense demeanor to play in the big leagues (some people call it "gravitas"). That has worked against her at times, where she's been seen as clipped and cold; then again, it's also been suggested that she's quite the opposite (from Radar in September: "Campbell Brown Too Sexy For Today?"). Whatever it was, she didn't get the Today slot -- or the wild profusion of high-level offers that were predicted -- and, despite her role in the election coverage, business as usual clearly did not cut it. Ergo, CNN -- and the chance to be a bigger fish in a smaller pond. (Hey, the links show up on YouTube and TVNewser just the same, anyway.)

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