CNN viewers this week might have noticed that the network's 10:00 p.m. hour was hosting yet another primetime experiment. Instead of repeating the 8:00 p.m. airing of "AC360," Anderson Cooper returned to the air this week to host a different version of his show with a panel format.
The network has been running this experiment throughout the past week. The programming decision follows previous experimentations with the 10:00 p.m. hour. Last month, the network tried out a show featuring a panel including Donny Deutsch titled, "(Get To) The Point." The ratings were dismal and the show was quickly mocked.
The network then decided to re-air Jake Tapper, who CNN president Jeff Zucker called the face of the "new CNN," and his new show "The Lead" at 10:00 p.m. That decision was quickly altered after the Boston Marathon, as the network remained in live, breaking news mode to cover the bombings.
Cooper's panel has hosted some pretty big names this week. On Wednesday night, Christiane Amanpour, Jeffrey Toobin, Anthony Bourdain, Rudy Giuliani, Eva Longoria and Amy Holmes appeared around a large table at various points throughout the hour. At one point, the panel clashed over the closing of Guantánamo. After Giuliani argued for Guantánamo to remain open, Amanpour and Toobin jumped in.
"But they haven't been charged, they haven't been tried and they've been cleared for transfer," Amanpour said. Toobin added, "What about that significant group of people whom we describe as 'vicious killers' but we don't have enough evidence to try them. Do we just keep them there forever with no charges?"
Giuliani responded, "You have to accept that during a time of war. If we had a group of Nazis during the second World War, we wouldn't be worried about 'Are we going to try them? How are we going to try them? What kind of evidence do we have?'"
"But we did ultimately try the Nazis," Cooper said.
Watch the exchange in the video above.
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