Stork Sneaks Up on Hasselbeck

Barbara Walters will greet first sitting president to join ABC chatfest

(NEWSER) - President Obama will appear on The View on Thursday, and his visit will be only the second-most-anticipated of the day: Co-host Barbara Walters will return to work for the first appearance on the ABC chatfest by a sitting president, reports Broadcasting & Cable . Walters had surgery in May to replace a heart valve and had planned to return in September. "We are so pleased and honored that President Obama will be a guest on The View," she said in a statement. For more on Michelle Obama's June 2008 co-hosting gig, click here . More»

Goodbye, celebrity gossip, recipes—hello, health care, gay marriage

(NEWSER) - The View is bringing politics to the daytime talk show, once the realm of cooking tips and fashion advice. Discussion of topics like health care is "one of the reasons I watch it," an audience member tells the Los Angeles Times . "When they do the fashion stuff, I tune out." Washington has also taken notice: "The View is definitely a show that makes it on to the agenda of staff meetings when you're doing strategic planning," says a strategist. More»

(NEWSER) - As if one argument-laced show isn't enough, Kate Gosselin is about to up her on-air time with a guest spot on the View, People reports. The weary reality TV mom will fill in for Elisabeth Hasselbeck, who's out on maternity leave, on Sept. 14 and 15. She joins other guest hosts Meghan McCain, LaToya Jackson, and ED Hill. More»

(NEWSER) - Meghan McCain will sit in for new mom Elisabeth Hasselbeck on the View in September, the New York Post reports. The daughter of John McCain and one-woman youth movement in the GOP has proven popular on the chatfest, and will tape 3 episodes. Also filling in for Hasselbeck later in the year will be ED Hill, the Fox News anchor canned for suggesting that Barack and Michelle Obama shared a “terrorist fist jab” during the campaign, the Huffington Post notes. More»

Tune into Ellen and The View for TV's most penetrating look at politics

(NEWSER) - The days when politicians could take refuge on daytime TV, hiding behind softball interviews and happy talk about favorite recipes, are over, Rebecca Traister writes for Salon. Tracing the trend from soaps through Phil Donohue to Oprah and Ellen to the unrivaled supremacy of The View, she observes, "It has recently become more common to see politicians, especially John McCain, made uncomfortable by the directness of the conversation on daytime television." More»