CNN 'Parts Ways' With In-House Headhunter

It wasn't long ago that CNN prexy Jon Klein, swimming in $1.1 billion in revenue, was cutting against the gloomy, layoffs-are-coming media landscape by crowing to Felix Gillette, "When you know that you have the resources, it liberates the creative side...We've been smart about deploying the vast resources that we have at our disposal. But knowing that we have the profits to plow back into the coverage gives us an immense advantage. We can afford more people on our air and off our air. So, goddamn it, we're going to have more people." And so Klein ploughed back those profits, fashioning the CNN Grill as a monument to the understated dignity of journalism, and on election night, Anderson Cooper was on the air, cold-chillin' with holograms.

Of course, since then, many people on the "creative side" of CNN have found themselves permanently liberated from their employment - the sci/tech unit, Veronica De La Cruz and Jennifer Eccleston come immediately to mind. Last week, Jeff Bercovici stopped Klein's throat with his own words over the matter. This week, a brief item in Page Six indicates that Klein's dream of having MORE PEOPLE GODDAMN IT may be essentially over.

WITH the TV industry doing more firing than hiring, the networks' in-house talent hunters have had nothing to do. So CNN recently parted ways with Henry Mauldin, head of on-air hiring.

Yeah! Feel that creative liberation!